I don't recollect my first introduction to death. I was told my grandmother Rose had died of cancer soon after my birth. I wanted to miss her, and in a way did, but having no recollection made it difficult. I only new my grandfather, Earl, with cancer. Hospital trips, discussing chemo and plans if it somehow went into remission. I was the fly on the wall in this world, no one wanted to rush me into the reality of life and death. I loved my grandfather: Missing finger, tinted glasses, cigarettes, a night watchmans uniform, the cough and cribbage. The summer before sixth grade he died. My Grandfathers white blood cells grew too few and the cancer grew too strong. I missed my grandfather and yet was incapable of really understanding the loss my father felt. I had only been around for eleven years, this man had been in my fathers life for much longer. I first saw death here. Later my Mothers father, John, died. He was 84, a putterer, a tinker, a man with a firm hand shake and a faint Missourah accent. Eleven years later his wife, my mothers mother, my grandmother Ruth, would die. A petite powerhouse, a rock, an excellent cook, joyful laugh and a love of teasing and innocently risqu'e humor. I miss them all. The idea of deaths inevitability was cemented into my psyche. Live, grow old, hope to pass in your sleep with your children by your side.

Over the past three years, five friends have died all before the last statement could be achieved. Realizing that death is not simply waiting at the end of the road, but an ever looming possiblity, has been uniquely sobering. After the initial need to console and insure the well being of the immediate family comes time for personal reflection. The most startling are the unique moments of clarity; those times when suddenly while driving, talking with friends, listening to music, or cooking, when you realize that you simply are. You grasp for a single instance that you are alive and not simply watching some ongoing, often times very boring, movie. In that clarity the sky is indeed blue, a summer afternoon truly is the finest time to read a book and drink a beer, running with no direction or purpose is as close to flying as we'll get, and loss really is permanent. The slap in the face that this is only what it is and at anytime it may slip away stings brilliantly.