When someone passes away, I always stop.
Especially when it is unexpected.
My mind immediately goes back to the last time I saw them. Where were we? What did we talk about? What was the last thing they said to me? What did I say back?
Sometimes I remember completely ordinary things. Where they were standing. What they were wearing. The look on their face.
Things that meant absolutely nothing at the time suddenly feel important.
Because they were there.
And now they aren’t.
That is the part I have the hardest time understanding.
Someone wakes up in the morning with a day ahead of them. There are probably texts to answer, errands to run, something sitting on the kitchen counter they meant to put away. Maybe there is laundry in the dryer. An appointment on the calendar. A half-finished cup of coffee somewhere.
Normal life.
And then somehow all of those things remain.
But the person doesn’t.
I think about how they died. I always hope there was no pain. I hope they weren’t frightened. And if they were alone, I hope somehow, in those final moments, they discovered they weren’t really alone at all.
Then I think about the people left behind.
The spouse. The children. The people who loved them most.
I think about the moment the news arrived and how life must have split itself in two.
Everything before that moment.
And everything after it.
And the rest of us never quite know what to do.
Do you call? Do you text? Do you wait? Do you stop by? Do you give them space?
We become terrified of saying the wrong thing when the truth is there probably isn’t a right thing to say.
Maybe the most important thing is simply not disappearing.
Show up.
Bring the food. Make the call. Cut the grass. Sit quietly. Remember the birthday. Remember the anniversary. Tell the stories.
Because the funeral ends.
The flowers disappear.
Everyone eventually goes back to work.
But the empty chair is still there.
Whenever someone dies, I also find myself doing something a little selfish.
I start counting.
How old were they?
How old am I?
What if that were me?
Death has a way of making us suddenly very good at math.
It reminds us of something we spend most of our lives trying not to think about.
None of us gets to stay here.
We know that, of course.
But knowing something and believing it are very different things.
I write this as someone fortunate enough not to have lost one of the people closest to me. I have lost dogs I loved dearly, and even those losses broke pieces of my heart. So I would never pretend to understand the depth of losing a spouse, a child, a parent, a sibling, or a best friend.
Someday I will.
We all will.
And someday, someone will be remembering the last conversation they had with us.
That thought changes things.
At least it should.
The man I am thinking about today was far too young.
I knew him. I saw him many times. I watched the way he showed up for his family and the way he showed up for young people through sports.
He was a husband.
A father.
A presence.
And presence matters.
There are people today who are going to walk into places where they expect to see him and, for one terrible second, forget.
Then remember.
That may be one of the cruelest parts of grief.
The remembering.
So today I pray for his family.
I pray that they feel surrounded by people willing to carry a little of what is far too heavy for them to carry alone.
I pray that he is now held by God in a way none of us can completely understand from this side of things.
And I pray that the rest of us remember something too.
We are here for such a short time.
Much shorter than we think.
So make the call.
Stay a little longer.
Forgive something.
Tell someone you love them while they can still hear you say it.
Show up.
Because one day all the things on our calendar will still be here.
And we won’t.
What will remain is the love we gave while we were.
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