About My 'Dash', Jack's Death & Other Topics Relating to Year's End
January 2, 2011
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How Will We Be Remembered? Does it Matter?
Funerals, weddings, graduations, hospital visits and near-death experiences always seem to wedge their way into my mind's darkest places and then get me thinking.
Haven't had a near-death experience in awhile but I did attend a funeral service for my friend Jack McDaniel (Mar-Can Computer) last week.
Jack and I were the same age and we had a number of things in common besides an interest in computer technology. Jack and I are (were) in the same business -- customer service.
Jack took care of customers with broken hard drives, loose cables, flickering screens and so on.
Jack always went the extra mile for me whenever I had technology problems . . . he built a few new computers for me and also fixed techno-glitches for my office any time they needed fixing. And he did it right. And if it wasn't right, he did it over.
And that's why I was at Trinity Episcopal Church last week for Jack's funeral service. I liked him.
I came away with two powerful things from McDaniels' service.
One -- I learned about the "dash." The "dash" is that little thing between the year you were born and the year you die. Jack was born in 1943 and died in 2010. (1943-2010) <<<------ Notice the "dash."
The pastor at Trinity Episcopal pointed out that the "dash" was in fact the live we lead between the year we're born and the year we die. The "dash" isn't very big but it does separate the date of birth and death and serves as a placeholder for all those things we seem to worry about during the time of our living on this Earth.
But the "dash" isn't really all that big, said the Trinity Episcopal pastor . . . and maybe it just shouldn't be taken all that seriously.
The Second Thing I took away from the service was something that McDaniels' daughter said about her dad. Something relating to how he would want to be remembered or how she and her sister would remember Jack.
Either way . . . The words from her mouth whacked me square in the mind.
Jack was sixty-seven when he died.
Jack & I were both born in 1943. I'm sixty-seven.
Should I be worrying how I'm going to be remembered by by wife, my son, my daughter, family, friends, business associates, clients, personal enemies, politicians, guides on the Pere Marquette River, chamber members, hall of fame inductees, HOF Board Members, Mike Seward, bartenders, waitresses, paddleball players, Steelhead that I have released, Notre Dame coaches & QBs (past and present), 1961 St. James Classmates, Facebook Friends (all 23 of them), Twitter followers (both of them), Randy Wackerle, Joe Siniff, Mark VanWagner, DeGreif, Todd, Wittbrodt, Wisniewski, Podleski, Art Dore, The Cuban, Tim Roller, George Lynch, Josh, Shawn, JuJu McCool, Kent, Adamowski, McGill, Hollister, Johnson, my dog River . . . OMG!
Holy Crap! This is a one gi-normous problem.
This is not good (from any perspective) and unquestionably out-of-control.
Am I worried? Damn Right I'm worried.
And as I'm writing here . . . just a I did when I heard Jack's daughter's words . . . I'm welling up behind the eyes.
And I'm pretty sure I know why . . .
I'm worried about my damn "dash."
It's not very big you know . . . just one keystroke on the key to left of the "plus sign."
Maybe thinking about the "dash" is the perfect way to spend time at the end of the calendar year.
And . . . That's what I'll be doing this New Year's Eve.
Have a safe and sane New Year's celebration . . . And . . . If you can . . . Think nice thoughts about me.
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O. J. Cunningham |
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