Lighting A Fire That Warms Forever
But at certain critical points, the deep reservoir of time we had been counting on dwindles to a puddle, finite and measurable. The once-distant future suddenly swarms us--and quicker than we could have imagined. These "suddenlies" of life have a way of bringing what we have done--or not done--into focus.
Consider the passing of Sam Collins.
When my wife Mary was barely 12, Death suddenly stole away her mother. But before their security evaporated in that cataclysmic day, however, Mary and her two siblings had often found love and compassion in the eyes of Sam and his wife Inez. Until Death claimed him last week, Sam represented an important connection to lives shared more than 40 years ago. How would these three remember the Sam of their youth now that this link to the past was suddenly broken?
Mary notified her brother and sister: "My visit with Sam the day he died was like all the ones in the past few weeks: I massaged his feet... only he never awoke this time. I got his Bible and read lots of things he had marked through the years. I talked to him about his condition, I sang to him and rubbed his fingers, and I talked to him about the past. It was a good and fitting final visit."
Mary's older brother Victor tenderly recalled, "From Sam, I learned love and patience. He was the most long-suffering person I ever met. I never knew why he and Inez treated us like their own, but their nurturing love made us different people than we would have been. My children may have never met Sam, but they have seen him in me. If they have ever seen traits of kindness and gentleness, I learned them from Sam. I may mourn his passing, but I truly celebrate his life. Goodbye, Sam. We all miss you, and we all love you."
And younger sister Betty adds perspective: "Sam was so good to us, beautiful on the inside as he was on outside. Though we were always standing on the outside looking in, they welcomed us into their home. They drew us like a warm fire.
"It eases my heart to know that soon I will see Sam again, and he'll be beautiful again. We'll all be home in a not-too-distant time, and we'll be together forever. I hope to see Mother and Daddy... and Inez... and Mama and Granddaddy. Won't it be wonderful, Mary, if we get there and see every one of them waiting to welcome us home?"
One day the "suddenly" of my death will instantly deplete my reservoir of time and good intentions. And I wonder if any acquaintance might be inclined to say, "I was always on the outside looking in--but he drew me like a warm fire."
Copyright 2001 James McAlister
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