Usually, I don’t spend much time thinking about my mortality, but last week was an exception. Over the past month I’ve had several experiences that have placed me on an emotional rollercoaster of sorts.
Several weeks ago, one of my oldest friends, Pete, reached out to let me know that his older brother had passed away after a long illness. Having lost my own sister several years ago, it brought back many memories of going through that journey with my own sibling. A few weeks later, Pete was in town celebrating his 50th college reunion. He and I got to spend a wonderful day on the golf course while our wives went shopping and enjoyed lunch together.
Unfortunately, I wasn’t able to stay after golf for the traditional libation as I had just learned that another friend, who I’d known since the seventh grade, Tom, had just passed away after many months of battling pancreatic cancer. Since the calling hours for Tom began at 2:00 PM, I excused myself immediately following golf and headed directly to the funeral home to pay my respects.
To my pleasant surprise more than a dozen of my friends from high school also attended Tom’s visitation. So, while grieving the loss of our mutual friend we also had the opportunity to share in what became an impromptu class reunion.
While several family and friends eulogized Tom, one of the most poignant reminiscences came from our friend Dave. While I knew that Tom and Dave were old friends, I didn’t know that they had known one another since the age of one. In about ten minutes Dave summarized their relationship and many of their shared activities and escapades that included baseball, learning to play guitar, dating, travel and participating in family events all through adulthood.
While overwhelmed by a sea of emotions in the past several weeks, the one theme that keeps resonating in my mind has been the question of, “Where has the time gone?”
Looking back, it seems as though it can’t have be more than fifty-three years since my high school graduation, or more than forty years since my children were born. I can’t believe that my career in the financial services industry lasted forty-five years and now, even that’s behind me or that ten years ago I didn’t have any grandchildren and now I have six!
There are lots of expressions that depict the season in one’s life when our journey starts to come to a close. Many of them use sports analogies, i.e., “the fourth quarter, the red zone, the back nine, the final innings.” I came across one such expression the other day, “The gun lap.” The final lap in a foot race, that the best runners save their strength for so that they can finish well.
This week’s book recommendation is entitled “The Gun Lap”. Wherever you find yourself in your life’s journey, I think you’ll find it thought provoking.
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