The brutality of it all.

So I have been on Facebook for ages - some of you know me there under my IRL name. But I am not an enthusiast - it got pretty tired of it pretty quickly. The great thing about Facebook is keeping contact with everybody, and the sometimes great thing is re- connecting with old friends.

I was not popular in High School - was not part of the "in" crowd, I was more part of the artsy crowd. The off - beaters.  Therefore I really do not care about most of the people that I went to High School with - I confirm their friend requests, and it stays on that level. But I had a few great friends - some of whom found me in the last year on FB. My best friend from High School found me two weeks ago and we have already chatted for more than an hour on the phone. It was great. One of the other girls and I have already met for lunch once and are planning to do so again. Anton found me last year and quickly brought me up to speed with some of the friends he had contact with and asked if I would help to organize a small reunion. We haven't got around to it yet. One of the friends was Toeba (a nickname) with whom he was great friends and saw regularly.

I have not been on Facebook since Thursday and very briefly on Sunday, but when I went in yesterday afternoon I was shocked. Toeba was brutally shot in his lounge in the early morning hours of Thursday morning by a gang of robbers. His 12 year old daughter was in the house. As was his girlfriend. He protected them to the bitter end. The ugly crime statistics in South Africa has hit close.

I am sad for his loved ones, I am shocked as in over 23 years after we had left school this is only the second of our class mates that have passed away - I guess we have been very lucky. It is just the way it happened that completely gets to me - the brutality of it all. The utter senselessness.

So we will be having a little reunion on Thursday morning, at his funeral, without Toeba. But in his memory. That is if I go. I have a problem with funerals.