I have been exchanging e-mails with a friend of mine for the last couple of nights. She and I went to high school what seems like a hundred years ago at Valley High School in West Des Moines. Earlier this week, I learned she was engaged to be married but that her fiance died last year in a traffic accident and she is having trouble now controlling her sorrow and moving on.

 She asked me for advice, which was the role I played for her back in the day as well. Brian always had the answers, or so she would say. She said she needed my wisdom again. I told her she is in control of her life; that if she wants joy, she will have joy. If she wants sorrow, she will sorrow. I also reminded her that if her fiance loved her as much as she says he did, he would not want her to mourn forever. I told her that probably for the rest of her life, every sunrise and sunset will remind her of him and that there are songs she will hear on the radio that will instantly bring him to mind. It seemed to put her a little more at ease and give her some promise, temporarily.

 After telling her this in an e-mail, I went to bed and laying there pondered the words I had told her. I have lost my Grandparents I grew up with and there isn't a day that goes by where I don't think about them and wonder if they are watching my life unfold and what they might think about it all. I fear the death of my Mother. I think about my own health, hoping it holds out to see Austin and Cameron grow into the men Mandy and I want them to be and to be able to cuddle grandchildren....and while Mandy insists I will probably have to be pulled off an anchordesk or out of a newsroom to end my career, what she doesn't know is that, God willing, I will work until 66, giving me an even 50 years in the business, before I retire and spend the rest of my days with her. I don't know if any of this will come to pass but I sure hope it does.

 But the "connect the dots" feature for me is that while these are concepts that I think and worry about, these are things she has lived and will live. It is tough. She looked to me for wisdom and I hope at the very least I gave her some peace. But the funny thing about wisdom is what you advise others to do, you must also look at yourself and see if you could follow your own advice. Looking back at it, my heart was in the right place and I hope it did her some good but I wonder if it really did or not.

 Quote Of The Day: "Advice is what we ask for when we already know the answer but wish we didn't." Erica Jong

 This Day In History: Theodore Roosevelt became the first American president to ride in an automobile on this date, August 22nd, 1902.

 Something You Should Check Out: This is something I really wanted to share with you after thinking about the above writing. Following the birth of my son Cameron, this was the first song I heard on the radio when I left the hospital later that night to run an errand. It made me break down with tears of joy, providing the soundtrack for a little life review. The singer is named Chris Rice and the song is "When Did You Fall In Love With Me?". Enjoy it and have a good weekend.

 As always, thank you for taking the time to make "Brian's Blog" part of your day. Feel free to leave a comment below or send me an e-mail by clicking here.