Life and Death

The slow transition in life from young to old manifests itself in many ways. Your energy level slowly starts to taper off. You find that you need reading glasses when once you could see the smallest detail, no problem. You put on a few pounds and you notice a few more aches and pains than you ever had before. All of these aspects are inevitable and fairly easy to deal with.

One of the more hideous aspects of getting toward the second half of a lifespan though is that people close to you start dying. Yes, it’s a part of life but it’s not easy to face, nonetheless.

My Uncle, my Dad’s brother, and I were fairly close. I was named after him as a matter of fact and we shared a lot of the same traits and outlook on life. He lived in Tennessee and I drove up from Florida to visit him as often as I could. Especially after he got cancer. He fought it, which is the kind of guy he was. He went through chemo and radiation and it went into remission. I was really glad he would have a few more years and I planned on moving to Tennessee after my son graduated high school so I was hoping to have a couple of years with him. As it turned out, the cancer returned after about a year and it came back with a vengeance. He only lasted a few months after they found it. So much for my plan to spend a couple good years with him… I was with him when he died at least. He was wracked with pain that even morphine couldn’t touch. Cancer is a horrible thing. I only hope I never experience it. We buried him in February, 2006.

My Father still lived in Michigan, where I am from. He and Mom had gotten divorced a few years back and he lived by himself. We kept in touch by phone and I got back as often as I could swing it to see him and everyone else. He wasn’t much for traveling, especially by air, so he only came to Florida once to visit me. It was a very gradual thing but I started to notice he was slowing down a little when I would talk to him on the phone. He would forget things that we had talked about or other things that I thought he shouldn’t forget. I chalked it up to just getting old. Then I started to notice that his memory was getting worse. Even though my Brother and Mom still live in the area and looked in on him occasionally, I flew up to check on him. After getting up there and taking him to his doctor, the diagnosis turned out to be the early stages of Alzheimer’s.

I discussed everything with Mom, who is doing fairly well health wise, and she said she and my Brother would check on him every couple of days and make sure he was doing ok. He was still functioning well enough to not be a danger to himself but we both knew that it was only a matter of time until the disease got worse and he would need some type of full time care. I’m old school I guess when it comes to responsibility to family and I made the decision that since I was moving anyway, I would just postpone Tennessee a bit and I would move up to Michigan and live with Dad until he got so bad that I wasn’t capable of taking care of him anymore. His retirement income was enough for both of us to live on so I would be able to provide him with full time care. I would also be able to spend as much time with him as I could before he didn’t know who I was anymore… That was the plan anyway…

After some time, Mom called me and told me he had gotten sick with a bad cold or the flu and she was taking him to the doctor. Well, he ended up admitted to the hospital with a touch of pneumonia. The prognosis was good though. They caught it early and were treating him with the expectation that he would be released in a couple of days. Well, my Dad’s smoking habit that he was never able to break caught up with him. He collapsed after returning to bed from the bathroom and they weren’t able to revive him. They said it was either a massive coronary or a blood clot. He died suddenly and at least he didn’t have to go through the agony my Uncle did. We buried him in April of 2007.

Sometimes I regret having moved so far away from home. The distance from Michigan to Florida is far enough to make it a major trip to visit home very often to be with family and friends. When you do get a chance to go back, you tend to visit everyone you can around home before you have to leave again. Those that have moved out of the immediate area, you can’t always get to see before you have to head back to the grind.

That was the way it was with one of my closest friends, Rob. His brother Dave and I go way back to the 9^th grade and we’ve been best friends ever since. Rob hung out with us riding dirt bikes and the three of us basically grew up together. I think I spent more time at their house than I did my own. They are my brothers.

We grew up and went into our separate lives though and I moved to Florida and Rob ended up in northern Michigan. We kept in touch by email and I got back to Michigan a few times but didn’t manage to get up to Manistee to see him. I think it was a year ago last September that it got to bugging me. It had just been too long since I had seen my buddy Rob. I hadn’t seen his boys since they were just little tykes. I was going to make a trip up to Michigan and I got in touch with Dave and told him we HAVE to drive up and see Rob while I’m there. I made the trip and we made the drive and it was like we had never been apart. We sat outside that evening by a campfire in his backyard and swapped stories and laughed like I hadn’t laughed since the last time the three of us were together. It was great.

Since that time, I have been more and more anxious to make the move to Tennessee. Other than the fact that I hate Florida, living in Tennessee will put me a short day’s drive from home and I will get back much more often to see my family and old friends a lot more. I was looking forward to getting together with Dave and Rob and going on some motorcycle rides again. That was the plan anyway…

Then on February 1^st, I got a call from Dave. He told me Rob had been killed in a car crash earlier that day. I felt like I had just been hit by a truck. The emotions wash over you… first the shock, then sadness, helplessness, frustration, anger, depression… It just doesn’t sink in at first. You think it can’t be true. Then slowly reality takes over and you realize that it’s forever. Death is final. You wish you could turn back the hands of time and do it over but it’s too late. Gone forever…

A death like this is just hard to take. You’re not ready. You never dream it could happen that suddenly. It’s so easy to take life for granted but then you realize that it can be over in the blink of an eye and happen when you least expect it.

When my Uncle died, he had just passed his 79^th birthday and had lived a pretty full life. He was being eaten up by cancer and death was a relief from the pain. I hated to lose him but at least he wasn’t hurting anymore. When Dad died, it was sudden and unexpected to a certain extent but he was 78 years old and he was facing Alzheimer’s disease. Being the kind of independent guy he was, it would have been living hell for him to have to go through the indignity of it. Death spared him from going through that.

With Rob’s death though, it’s not the same. He was plucked from life while he was still living it to its fullest. He should have had another half a lifetime to live. His boys should have had their Father for most of their lives. His wife should have been able to grow old with him. There is absolutely no good in his death. There is no justification. Just an empty hole in the ones whose lives he touched.

The odd thing is that it makes me feel like I want to live my life more. I hear the clock ticking. I want to do the things I’ve always wanted to do before I die because now I know how fleeting life really is. It can be taken away at any moment. I guess I should work on my own “bucket list”… I also want to spend as much time as I can with the family and friends that I have left. I want to cherish every moment. I want to go on adventures. I want to hop on a motorcycle and tour the country and go to the places I’ve always wanted to go. Then park the bike and fly to everywhere I couldn’t get to with the bike… Then the next moment I feel a little lost and I don’t really know what I want to do. There’s only one thing I know for sure.

I’ll miss my friend.