A Tribute to a Friend

Jill

I started following the local newspaper obituaries several years ago, as I seemed to always miss deaths of friends parents.  I soon also noticed how many of my long past friends, or colleagues seemed to end up in the listings as well - depressing.  I've been loosing friends to death as far back as high school.  Some are stunning, others are........not as much.  But when you lose somebody your own age, that you've known.........all of your life, it kind of gets your attention.  But then there are the ones that just don't reconcile in your mind.

Yesterday I had finished a job in Salt Lake and had sat down at my computer in the early afternoon.  Taking a break from other tasks, I did as I so often do and took a quick look in the local online paper.  It wasn't the name, although I know it well, it was the eyes that caught my attention.  I was completely floored when I saw Jill's picture.  It couldn't be, but the name was right there.  It hurt and I mean a lot.

Now you have to understand, this isn't what you may otherwise think it to be.  Jill and I have known each other most all of our lives.  We grew up only a couple blocks from each other.  Our parents new each other.  Some of my brothers/sisters knew brothers/sisters in that family.  Given all those things, we really didn't "run in the same circles".  Although being a year apart in age, we did have a band class together some forty years ago.  Not necessarily polar opposites, we still didn't have much in common.  Still we were friends, of which I could see her in a crowd without even trying.  I think it had to be her blue eyes - I don't know.

In the past four years I've lost several friends that I've known most of my life.  They have all had an effect, but nothing like this.  You see, Jill was one of "the good ones" - and I don't mean that in anything but the most sincere context.  She always stood by her values and they were always her values, not what somebody else may have told her.  She was always a constant in the universe, in that she never wavered in her convictions.  It was kind of like knowing true north.  It never changed.  To that end, she was everyone's friend.  I can honestly say, I had never heard her speak an unkind word of anyone else.

Not long after I graduated from high school, like so many others in my life, we went our separate ways.  Sure, there were occasion that you'd run across each other, but it was generally pretty routine at most, if anything at all.  It seems like when she got married, I would have been in a far different place - in pretty much every respect.  Still, I had fairly regular interactions with her dad and later came to know her older brother quite well.  Both of them are fine men that I to this day have the upmost respect and admiration.  The last time I saw Jill was when her father passed away nearly seven years ago.  Again, pretty straight to the point, not a lot of small talk, just - hey and that sort of thing.  Her obituary said she had been fighting cancer for three years, so I would have never seen that part.  It did also say that she fought cancer with tenacity and grace.  I knew that grace and is what I will always remember of her, as I never saw her in a weakened moment.  The person I knew forty years ago is exactly the person I shall always remember.

Forty years ago we were just kids.  Why that comes to mind, I really don't know.  We had the rest of our lives ahead of us and the thought of what may become of us, any of us, was just a dream.  To me, I thought then and still do to this day believe, Jill knew exactly what her course in life would be.  I just think none of us thought about things like cancer.  Truth is, some of my other friends from forty years ago have died, and although stunning, they didn't leave an overall empty feeling like this.  Forty years ago..............who'd thought.

So what does this have to do with riding?  After having a part of me die yesterday (when reading the obituary), I really needed some time away to process..............stuff.  So this morning, I turned my phone off and went to that corner of heaven known as Woodruff.  I think I needed to suffer a little today and boy did I ever.  The wind was rough all the way back.  When all was said and done, I had the emotion worked out and was able to think.  It still doesn't make sense, but then again its not like we've kept in touch over the years.  I know very little about her life for the past few decades, but what I do know is I feel an emptiness that I wouldn't have imagined.  But then again, I didn't expect to see those blue eyes yesterday in that particular place.  Today I rode to remember.  And what I do remember breaks my heart knowing what others are certainly feeling.

This song was literally in my head all day.  Please click on this link:  Christine McVie - Song Bird

This one can stay for a while...................stupid bike anyway.