Parting Gift

Friends come into our lives, throughout our lives. Sometimes friends stay with us for a while, and sometimes they leave us. Sometimes they leave us permanently, through death, (although some may argue that death is just a different state of being.) Sometimes they leave us "for good", as in divorce. Sometimes friends move away and sometimes they just drift away. Sometimes they change, or we change and perhaps we both wonder why we were ever friends in the first place. We marry and have children and our friends become the parents of our children's friends. We divorce and lose half of our couple friends in the process. We lend our friends money, and never see the money or the friend ever again. And sometimes, years later, we find each other on Facebook, and become "friends" all over again. Well, at least in cyberspace.

I lost my good friend Tim Shannon about a month ago, rather permanenly, to the bony curled index finger of the Grim Reaper, beckoning Tim to follow. But in the wake of his dying, Tim left me something to remember him by. He left me his many wonderful friends, who have rallied around each other in his absence, trying to fill the giant hole he left in all of our lives, some of whom will become friends of my own. Of course, I would much prefer that Tim have his own life back, a breathing, heart-beating Tim, with a twinkle in his eye and a grin on his face, back here on our spinning, little blue planet Earth.

If he did have to leave us all behind, I cannot think of a better parting gift.