Solace found walking in the woods

Prompt: Walking in the woods.
Word count: 461

I received notification that a former colleague had died the night before from cardiac arrest. The news was a shock and set me to reflect on how I felt when family and friends had passed away. It is apparent when one is sick and the possibility of recovery is slight, you can prepare for the emotional upheaval to come.

Walking through the woods enables me to clear my mind. The trees, wind blowing through the branches, sunlight dancing through the shadows has a calming effect on me. My earliest memory of losing a loved one occurred when I was eighteen. My dad passed away from a heart attack on that hot July afternoon. Mom had just returned with him from his monthly doctor’s visit. Dad had emphysema, high blood pressure, he continued to smoke although he was told to quit. The doctor had given him a shot of something to open his airways more. The drive home in that non-air-conditioned car, the summer humidity, it was too much for his heart. He collapsed getting out of the car. A week later, he was gone. He was 62.

Fifteen years later, my mother was near the end of her health struggles. When it was obvious that she could no longer remain at home, my siblings and I gathered at her house to help get her moved into an assisted living facility. She also suffered from emphysema and it was directly due to her lifetime smoking habit. To her credit, she did stop smoking after dad died. However, the damage to her lungs was irreversible. I’m told it is a peaceful way to die, lungs cannot remove the fluid building up and one drowns in their sleep. Mom was 72.

During the course of my working career, I lost several co-workers due to long illnesses, car accidents, and heart attacks at work. The pain of loss varies, but the suddenness of losing a family member or friend, I believe is the most painful. When I received the e-mail informing me of my friend’s death, shock and heartbreak took over. I could not breathe. Hearing me cry my husband came to my desk. He didn’t understand why I was so upset, my friend hadn’t really been in contact with me in the three years after I retired from my job. We exchanged Christmas cards. Friends and family drift apart with time and distance. It is the core of how you feel about that person, how you interacted with them, how they touched your heart, that makes their memory stay with you.

My friend had a beautiful soul, showed kindness and goodwill to all he encountered. He will be dearly missed. He was only 63.