They weren't kidding, life IS short!

Yesterday I went to the funeral of one of my college professors, a man I have known all my life. I grew up around the corner from his family, played with his kids, graduated from high school with his son and learned from in college. He died before the age of 70 from cancer. He never got to enjoy retirement, grandchildren and all the outside interests he pursued voraciously all his life.

When I went to the service I saw a dear old friend I hadn't seen in years. He was another college professor of mine... everybody has this kind of professor, the one who holds your hand when you're being a neurotic 20-year-old and tells you it will be okay, who helps you figure out the answers in his ridiculously hard class and who goes the extra mile to give you that little bit of support you need to be a better student and better person. This guy is something else! He's got a wonderfully quirky sense of humor and takes a dry subject (music theory) and actually manages to infuse it with life and interest, although he does so by using odd stories about wombats and playing the piano with his butt. But I digress! I've kept in touch with him sporadically over the years but hadn't seen him in about five years until yesterday. He has always had health problems but recently was diagnosed ALS, Lou Gehrig's disease. That disease is a total bitch - it robs you of your motor skills bit by bit but keeps your mind completely intact the whole way through.

This man held my hand through a really tough time in my life. I had always thought I would be a musician and that it would come easily and I learned in college that wasn't so. My grandfather died, my stress was enormous and I had a massive meltdown. He was there for me the whole time when other conservatory faculty basically told me to get lost, he never judged or lost his patience and actually seemed to like me when I didn't even like myself much. I owe him. But having contact from anybody in that period of my life has been difficult because it reminds me what an idiot I was, so I haven't exactly been diligent about staying in contact with him. Those two years were a small part of my life but critical to who I have become as an adult, and this man played a big role in helping me get through it.

I resolve to make the effort to see him now. I don't have time to coddle my own ego. And if in some way I can pay him back a little bit now for the debt I owed him years ago, then so much the better. I need to remember the kind of person I am, not the kind of person I was.