The Death Of An Old Friend

The Death Of An old Friend

I was in Las Vegas this week having a great time when I received a text and emails from my back east friends. One of the friends I grew up with had died. It was heart breaking to get the news, however, he had been ill and in pain for a long time. At least now his suffering had stopped. Most of us expected something bad would happen to him because he smoked and didn't do a lot to maintain his health. Even so, his death was a big loss.


When I was growing up, he took me under his wing and treated me like his brother. Since I never had a brother, he filled that role for me. We did everything together and really enjoyed each other's company. As you know, I always say that I value my life by the number of times I laugh. He and I had many years of laughter.


Sadly, after the death of his oldest son and my divorce from my first wife, we stopped talking to each other. The last time we talked was over 30 years ago and now he was dead.


His fantastic wife and I stayed in touch from time to time. Only she came to my 60th birthday party and it felt so good to see and hug her. She was as beautiful as ever. Not just on the outside, but inside also.


I admired her strength. She raised her fabulous children, went from being a housewife to a professional business person (when money became tight), dealt with her personal illness by never complaining and was there for her husband through many hard times.


When I received the news about her husband, I realized I felt bad for him and worse for her. However, after I had some time to think things over, I realized how strong a person she is and truly believe she will go on to make a positive energy and happy life for herself. She has so many friends that love and support her so I know she realizes she will never have to go through life alone.


Through this process, I also feel unhappy with myself because I could have done more. Even though he wasn't talking to me, I could have taken upon myself to make contact with him. We had a great past and I should have tried harder to bring us closer together. I should have spent more time being in contact with his wife so I could make her feel there was another person in her life that cared for her.


We take so much for granted. We feel our day is a long time off. We feel we have time to mend past break-ups. Then we get a shock to our system and realize life is too short. That's when the shouldas and couldas come out. I'm in that stage right now.


I have stayed in touch with some of my past back east friends, but not as much as I could with many other friends. I hate shouldas and couldas so I decided to be more diligent in staying in touch. I have the power to do so, therefore, I shouldn't wait for them to contact me - I need to be the one who contacts them. I'm going to do this not just for them, but for me.


Knowing they're well, knowing what's going on in their life, knowing what's happening with their family is my reward. Life is too short to wait for them to acknowledge me. Friends are hard to come by, sooo, we all should be the source of positive energy. We all should be the ones that become dedicated to mending old fences.

Your life will change for the better if you take the action first.