Friend’s Death Provides Catalyst to Appreciate the Gift of Life

I can’t think of a time when I learned of the passing of a friend while reading the morning newspaper, but a recent Monday changed that.

I knew it was possible, of course, as we all have a meter running on our lives. Some are more aware of it than others, especially if the killer is identified in the form of a disease, but generally I get up and go about my day as if there will be endless tomorrows.

It’s not like I haven’t experienced loss before. I have. But somehow, as I looked out my window, through the leaves of the pear tree wet with morning rain, across Westlake Lake to the Santa Monica Mountains covered in low-lying layers of cloud and fog, I thought, “He’ll never have another day to witness this magnificent beauty that is life.” It was a penetrating realization, and one that motivated me.

Motivated and inspired. Motivated me to be more conscious of each day, of each fulfilling breath, and inspired me as I remember the last time I saw him. He sat behind me with his new wife at a function we attended last fall. He had physically shrunk from the effects of the cancer and treatment. I turned around and asked how he was.

“Not so good,” he said through a brilliant smile. Such grace in the face of death is a humbling thing to observe.

That Monday I went outside on my porch to feel the cool misty wind on my face. I felt weighted with the realization of a person to be missed, but my heart was lifted by the extraordinary sensation of appreciation for life itself--the recognition that it is a gift, given to me and to you. While we do, while we feel, while we talk, while we sleep--the same power that lands the goldfinch on my branch and moves the clouds across the valley moves me too.

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How do I then make the most of this day? How do I then live, as if today and tomorrow were each a precious boon? What path to conscious recognition do I follow? Is that path out there somewhere, in the lifestyle I live and the things that I do? Or is it within me, as I take notice of each breath, finding comfort there as I realize that it’s not there because I now notice it, but that I am here because of it.

Death adds texture to life. Not that I should live in fear of death but neither do I welcome it. More importantly, I aspire to live in gratitude for life--and not just so I can write my book, or watch another sunset, or further the relationships that matter, but so I can enjoy the contentment that comes from knowing that life is indeed a gift.

The passing of a colleague makes for sober moments as the realization of the permanence of this loss sets in.

But coupled with that, I have found the hint of truth. The life that came mysteriously into a being just as mysteriously leaves--its fleeting presence a reminder of its power to those of us left behind.