We started off this year on a rough note. Putting down our doggie… that was brutal; the one year anniversary of that sad day is coming up in a few weeks. During the year, I would hear about more deaths, and unfortunately, not just the famous ones. I don’t recall them all, but down the stretch, my cousin’s husband, and my mom’s cousin, two family members that I knew my entire life, passed away. That wasn’t fun. Hearing about my friend that was found dead on Christmas Eve morning… kind of brought the year full circle. I get it… as we get older, we will go to more and more funerals, but one of my friends? We’re in our 40s!!! This is too young; at least another 20-30 years for something like this. That’s not how it works though. Nobody expected this. It took a while for this one to sink in.
I was waiting for the arrangements to be announced, knowing that we had planned to be out of town for the end of the year. When I finally was told about them, I found out that it was to be Friday night, right in the middle of our New Year’s trip. I had hoped it wouldn’t be then, but it doesn’t work like that. I couldn’t exactly ask that this be scheduled according to my calendar. I couldn’t exactly call his wife and let her know that I wouldn’t be there because of this either, that maybe we should plan something at a later time for us to get together… to send my condolences and some flowers wouldn’t be nearly enough. No, being there for this was the only way; there was no way I could miss it. I didn’t.
As I made the drive back, I had a lot of time to think. The days since I had found the shocking news were made up of many moments like this. All I wanted was one more night… one more night with my friend, with the 4 of us, sitting around the table playing cards. Something I had been thinking about was our seating formation. Yeah, we’re kind of creatures of habit; when the 4 of us would gather, we’d always sit in the same positions. This was the first question I asked my friend when I arrived; I knew he would know. He did. The last thing we would do on this evening, before I left, was to gather around the casket in that same position; it wasn’t nearly the same.
I shed many tears on that drive back, and a few more before I left the funeral home. Life goes on… it always does. Yet, each time we lose somebody, the path we take going forward is impacted. Each person that leaves this earth will be missed, by someone; this absence will be felt more by some than others. As I try to come to grips with this whole death thing, with what my faith tells me, it’s still not easy to understand. Dying young, leaving this earth, leaving your loved ones behind, your kids… As I talked with my friend, I told him what I wished for… the one thing, that when you peel everything else back, that I want: to go before my son. You should never have to bury your kid. Well, my friend that passed did accomplish that, passing before his 2 young daughters; his mother wasn’t so lucky. Neither are we… neither am I. I’ll miss you brother. As this whole coming to grips with death thing forms in my head, I smile when I think about reuniting with family one day, about being able to see my friend again one day. I look forward to that day because of this, when my friend will be sitting on my right, dealing the game of his choice. When each of us would ante up that $40 to start the long evening of card playing; we may be able to play for days, weeks at a time next time around. That makes me happy. Driving back on Friday night, knowing that I will never see my friend again in THIS lifetime. That makes me sad. RIP bro…
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