Okay...

So, I have been avoiding the movie "The Fault In Our Stars" for quite some time. I guess I was scared it would hit too close to home or it would ruin my life and I would never be the same and wish I hadn't watched it. One of those things is true. It hit so close to home, it may as well have blown my home into a million little pieces. In this movie, from the first minute to the last minute, there are nothing but profound and truthful moments and words. John Green, unfortunately, understands cancer all too well. The one that got me the moment it was said and that I couldn't stop thinking about even after the movie was long over... "The Last Good Day".

“There’s no way of knowing that your last good day is Your Last Good Day. At the time, it is just another good day.”

It's hard to remember because looking back, it's all just a blur, but I believe Robin's last good day was a Monday. December 1, 2014. Just five days before she left us. Our favorite cousin, (sorry other cousins), Emily came over for a movie night and a sleepover. Those days, Robin was not excited much. She didn't want to eat dinner. She didn't want to make a joke or hear a joke or laugh with us anymore. Emily always put a smile on her face, though. The way Robin is my sister is the same way that Emily is her sister, too. We always had kind of a tough time actually deciding on a movie, but it was a no brainer that it would be a Christmas movie. We settled on Jack Frost. I had maybe watched it once or twice as a kid with her but it always stuck in my mind as a movie that made me think of her. I think we had homemade burgers for dinner. Robin never wanted to eat but Emily made a plate and Robin shockingly shared with her. They held hands and we quietly watched Jack Frost. I did not leave my post, right next to her. I never did unless I HAD to. I remember my mom talking about The Last Good Day in the next day or two after that. I remember asking her... "When do you think it will be?" "I think that was it." And that was the moment I knew. That was her Last Good Day.

You will never know that it's the last good day. As Hazel Grace says, "at the time, it's just another good day." But as the next few days passed and she couldn't leave her bed, and then she couldn't speak, and then she could hardly look at us for more than a second, it became blatantly clear... That was the Last Good Day. Had we known, we would have done more. We would have said more. We would have loved more (if that were even possible). But we didn't, and you can't know. So take every good day for what it is, because you never know if it's the last one.

How Can We Not Talk About Family When Family's All That We Got

Midnight panic attacks are never fun. They don't come often and they probably can't properly be described as a panic attack but for a moment I'm taken aback and I lose my breath and tears stream down my face. Just for a moment though, when I realize you're not coming back. They come when I get excited to come home and see you or when I'm at our old familiar places or when I get lost on your Facebook and I can hear your voice in your status updates and forget that it's not 2013 and you're not going to respond to my comment. I get as far back as three or four years and I see something funny so instinct still tells me to text you and make fun of you. They come when I realize I haven't seen your face in almost six months... When I realize I haven't seen you happy and well in almost a year, and when I realize that six months is a number that's going to keep growing for six years and sixteen years and sixty years and forever. No one tells you about the midnight panic attacks. They tell you that life will be harder to live and they tell you how unfair it is and they tell you how you'll never stop missing them but no one tells you what's real. And what's real is that life day to day is easy. We live and we smile and laugh and dance and work and we play but then midnight rolls around and you have something funny to say or you need to talk to the one person who just gets you and you almost say it until you realize... Oh yeah, she's gone.