Cut Time
I took a picture a little over ten years ago and I want you to take a look not at the foreground (hi, Steve and John!), but rather at the background. See that maple tree back there? That’s in my parent’s neighbor’s yard. The Nelson family: Ken, Reenie, and Ken Jr. (‘Kenny’ to me and Katy). Kenny and I grew up next-door neighbors, and his parents lived there next to mine since 1991. Almost a quarter of a century, now.
Anyhow, the tree in that background, it is now a big tree. Yet, in my mind, it will always be the size it is in that picture; so, no matter how many times I drive up to my parent’s to drop Ess off, I’m always surprised: who put this giant tree in the Nelson’s yard? When did it have time to grow that big? Where have I been?
And now, I find out that Ken Sr. just passed away from ALS. I can not know what Reenie and Kenny are going through. But I do know that Ken faced death squarely, peacefully, with a centeredness that I know I have not yet found in myself.
We’ve had our last conversation, exchanged our last neighborly wave, and I ask myself the question: when did a life have time to wind to a close? Where have I been?
Essie has a classic Fisher Price Ferris Wheel:
… and when you wind it, a music box plays an old tune called “The Good Old Summertime”:
When your day’s work is over
And you are in clover
And life is one beautiful rhyme
No trouble annoying
Each one is enjoying
The good old summertime
The wheel spins and the music plays, both turning and turning. As the space between the notes lengthens, you can tell the spring is unwinding and the music is slowing, but you never know precisely which note will be the last.