George

August 16, 2019

I started writing this article the first week of August, but couldn’t bring myself to actually putting it before the world. I wasn’t ready. I’m still not, but today we’ve passed the halfway mark of the month, and next week my good friend George will have moved to North Carolina. George is 82, so there is every possibility that once he heads south I will never see him again. Moving is a reminder of our mortality, and there are parts of it I don’t like. Both George and I have done a bit of moving in our lives, he a bit more than me, but we both have arrived at that stage in our lives where being settled has a special allure. We are friends, and we both have friends whom we value, and letting go of what we value is never easy. 

I’ve learned more than I can say from George in the few years we’ve known each other. He is Lenape Indian (Delaware, to the uninitiated). I’ve never actually had the privilege of watching him dance in full Lenape regalia, but I have seen photos of him and his sons decked out in buckskin, feathers, beads, and paint. He has told and written stories handed down through generations, stories that pierce the veil between this physical life we all share, and the realm of the spirit where life’s meaning is found. We’ve talked about God, politics, education (he was at one time a math professor at Stanford), and life. He joined the Marines as a young man, gathering experiences that I never had. Now he writes, with a humor and twisted irony that matches my own, and I listen and learn. 

What is it that connects souls together, turning strangers into friends? For most of our lives, we didn’t know each other, and on the surface, had little in common, but as we have worshipped together and talked about our writing, a bond has developed that will be difficult for us to sever. Younger people would say, “Things won’t change that much; we’ll stay in touch,” but men who’ve traveled as far down the road as we have, know better. It will be different, in ways neither of us are looking forward to. 

We humans are strange creatures. The Bible says “God has put eternity in our hearts (Ecclesiastes 3:11).” We’re able to ponder existence beyond ourselves, in both it’s positive and negative dimensions. Death is that strange, unknown realm that has mystified us since the beginning of time. But we are the only ones who experience it existentially as a separation and are able to articulate that experience. One doesn’t have to physically die to experience death; it’s the separation, the loss of something valuable, that bothers us, against which we rebel, that we long to overcome. 

We think we have all the time in the world, until suddenly, we don’t. I’m living tonight in one of those suddenly moments. I don’t like it, but can do nothing about it. So I write about friendship—no, more than friendship. It’s a brotherhood, the deep soul-connection we shall cherish till our sunrises cease, and even beyond, if our faith means anything at all. So long, my friend. I shall miss you, cherish always the grace of God who brought us together for this season of our lives.