Worse Still

The friend I wrote about in my previous post is fine, recovering at home, taking better care of himself. Praise God.

I called that situation "The Unthinkable". Well, reality is quite frequently what we don't expect it to be. A young friend of mine, 27, died after eight days in a coma, induced to save his brain from a massive stroke he suffered out of nowhere. But the damage was done.

There are many reasons why I'm having trouble coming to grips with this. Pray for his parents, Larry and Theresa. His funeral is tomorrow, geography prevents me from attending.

Life is never fair, and God does things for His own reasons. A good friend of mine says that God can see the whole tapestry, while we can only see the little frayed tassels that hang down. I trust God and His plan, that'll never change. I just wish young people didn't have to be taken away to remind us all how much we take this life for granted.

The Unthinkable

One of my best friends is very, very sick. He's in a hospital right now, has been for eight days, and has almost died twice. I can't go visit because the doctors want him to rest. This is horrible.

Rick has been the very best I could ever want in a friend, and I consider myself very good at being loyal and true to my friends. He stuck by me and defended me when I went through some really hard times, and at the time we'd known each other less than a year. We worked together at a rancid cesspool office of disguised evil, so we share an understanding of what's been killing him for the last twenty-six years. He loves my music and believes in me as a songwriter and a performer and encourages me to stick with it. I can confide in him and he confides in me. He's fun and funny and loves the Gators and Bruce Springsteen and can't tell you about a song without singing it and playing air guitar. My dad and I went with Rick and his wife to see Bob Dylan. He doesn't even begin to realize what a good person he is, empathetic and generous, hard-working, just a gem of a human being.

I'm literally beside myself. If anyone out there reads this, please pray for my friend Rick. When he gets released he'll have to make major lifestyle changes, so he'll need prayers for that, too. We all have our cross to bear, and right now his is heavy.