Lest we forget

Sometimes I get to thinking.

I wonder about life and its twists and turns, and watch the stars move in their courses. One thing you start thinking about is how fast time passes by.

You wake up one morning and realize 10 or 20 years have gone by. Friends you shared many happy hours with no longer darken the door. Loved ones are gone. Memories, like photographs, fade.

Never have gotten used to that. Don't guess I ever will.

Some nights I'll hear a song or pass a particular place and it jogs something. My mind drifts back to long ago laughs and forgotten smiles, embarrassed looks across the room and warm feelings that are gone, too. They drifted away one morning with the wind.

Songs I've sung, words I've written, books I've read and things I've felt -- all gone away to wherever such things go, sometimes for the better, sometimes not.

I'm thinking tonight of those with whom I wish I could talk. Those who, for whatever reason, have faded away. Those who have literally or figuratively passed on to another life. Those I just don't see anymore.

I think that everybody you encounter in this life leaves a little part of them with you. Whether good or bad, large or small, it doesn't matter. I've never figured out a way to completely turn those feelings off, nor do I think you should. Life's too short.

Here, let the Oak Ridge Boys say it better than I can:

Oh, you're always in my heart
And you're often on my mind
I will never let it die
Just as long as I'm alive
Sometimes it makes me sad
That we never said good-bye
Well, I guess it never hurts to hurt sometimes.

Sober thoughts on a Monday night in Halls. Lest we forget.