I'm not old. Some would say I'm not even middle-aged. But that's the thing... how do you technically know when it really is YOUR middle-age? It may have been 10 years ago. It could be 5 years from now. The fact of the matter it, you don't know when your time will be up, so you don't know when your 'middle-age' is (technically speaking). Obviously, I'm not talking about your mental state of mind about your life... I speaking very specifically to your life span.
Late last night, I found out one of my friends from high school passed away after a very tragic accident last week. He was one of those guys that always had a smile on his face, and knew how to put one on your face, too. I'm ashamed to say I really lost touch with him, as I have nearly all my friends from high school. I've even let my college friends slip away more than I'd like to admit. But Nick was one of those guys I really wish I kept in touch with - he was one of those friends that you could call to just talk to if you needed it. Everyone needs friends like that. More importantly, everyone should hang on to friends like that, and not lose touch.
This is not the first friend from high school that I've lost. Which really sucks to say at my age. Unfortunately, I lost one friend early on in junior high, even, and learned quickly how someone can be taken from your life in an instant. And even though they told you it was coming, it slipped right by you and you wonder if you just did one thing differently...
Some of the losses made sense, at least, though not any more acceptable (like military action). But the worst ones are the ones you learn about years after the fact, and they make you feel like absolute crap because you had no idea. You can't even call yourself a friend after that point.
But this time... Nick's passing hit me differently, even though I found out as everyone else was finding out. This was the first one I learned about on Facebook. You don't think about stuff like this in social media. I'm glad I at least learned about his passing, but to see everyone pouring out condolences - not on any one page, but as their status and through old pictures - it became a social memorial, for lack of a better term. You could really see how many lives he touched.
Seeing everyone pouring out their hearts made me think of my own mortality and look at my own life and connections. Are there people out there that I want to reach out to, people who I felt I was good friends with and let slip away? Facebook does help with that, but at the end of the day, it still just a digital time stamp of your life and the people you know. The connections don't get re-established until you do more then friend them and read their status - there has to be some personal effort. Then there's the people who aren't on Facebook - how do you find them?
And when will my 'middle-age' actually be? Has it passed? Is there another friend from high school I'll have to say good-bye to soon? That would suck. That's when being 1000 miles away really kills me. Yes, many others moved away as I did. But we all seem to have that connection to the core of people who are still in the area or moved back after college. It's where our 'adult' life began - where we made our first true friends. Sure, we make other connections... but there's something about that first one.
Life is precious. And while friends may be there for a reason, a season, or a lifetime, each one is important. No matter what point in your life they are there, to lose one is to lose a small part of who you are. All you can do is hang on to that spirit they had and the memories you made together to preserve them within you. After all, that's what the heart's there for.
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