Saying Goodbye
Another life is over. Another friend is gone. And now the ripples of grief are running through the fabric of the lives he touched. His wife. His children. Their children. His friends. Their children. The overlapping patchwork of other lives. He came into mine through marriage. He was a friend and fraternity brother of the brother of one of my wife’s best friends. A small degree of separation but it loomed large over more than fifty years. Our children knew one another. We partied together. Camped together. We traveled together. We welcomed the New Year. We had season tickets. We thought of one another, in good times and in times of sorrow.
And now he’s gone. Another in the group departed. The third. We’re dwindling. It’s to be expected. We’re at those ages. I have my 60th high school reunion this year. It’s a smaller group by several factors, and now my core group by college and marriage is smaller by one. And I keep hearing from the stargazers that Pluto, the planet of death, is transiting out of my house, but it seems death is sure to stick around regardless of how Pluto lines up with the stars and planets. It’s the one constant we can all count on to be there, waiting.
And now the world turns to those left behind, as it always does. And I imagine, when the time comes, and the grieving reaches out to grasp his friends in the warm embrace of his family that there will be tears, but almost certainly laughter and food and drink because he was a man who could cook and entertain and loved doing it for his friends. And perhaps in the coming days, I’ll dust off some of the recipes he sent after my wife passed, and cook something in his honor, as a way for me as a way to say, I’ve got you right here in my heart.