(Following is an article I wrote in 2001)
In memory of Wilson Munroe Lamb and Melvin Lewis Kegley
I can remember the little girl next door. Barely in Elementary School she is suddenly stricken with a disease called Leukemia. After years of fighting the disease, she never approaches her teen years before it takes her life. My first experience with death was at her viewing. The heavy cloud of depression hung in my mind for awhile.
I can remember a little boy being hit by a car on 14th street while riding his bicycle.
I remember a young man in High School losing his life in a fire, saving his little brother.
I remember my Grandpa and Grandma Kegley, with him in his wheelchair, in their mobile home right off of Beltline road in Coppell, TX. Death, after a series of strokes, took possession of his life in 1978. In 1990 his wife, my grandma, lost hers after a heart attack.
Old man Milton, my Cowboy and wrestling watching buddy, lost the same battle.
The graveyards are filled with such memories and our memories are filled with such graveyards. Loved ones.
Moms and dads.
Brothers and sisters.
Friends.
We all experience the pain and
trepidation of death.
Death and It's Shadow
"Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow
of death. " (Psalms 23)
So here we are. The light of existence is now obscured by the ominous presence of death.
It hangs above our heads like Damocles' sword swearing to cut us off from the land of the living if we tread to close.
And we live in it's shadow.
It's shadow covers every aspect of our lives.
Relationships.
Dreams and goals.
What we do, think, see and say is extended out to the end our own finiteness and no further. When the breath of man is stilled then his dreams are stilled with him. He lives and dwells in the corridors of mortality never knowing when the dimly lit flame will be extinguished and the corridor will be darkened.
the curse of finitude
Life.
To experience this dynamic is God's most gracious gift. There are many things about "life" that
each individual could resurrect from memory to encourage the crease of a smile at the corners of
the mouth. We remember smells of summer, spring, fall and winter. We remember moods.
We recall sunrises and sunsets. We reminisce about vacations and anniversaries with pictures,
videos and scrapbooks at the ready. We learn from triumphs and failures. In the midst of our sojourn on Earth, we enjoy her exquisite beauty, while gazing up into her heavenly chambers, wondering.
Our senses are inundated with sights, sounds, and touches of grace akin to the dew softly touching the morning fields.The ambience of this existence is sweet like honey, but, like clouds that bring rain and
then whither from their ferocious intentions, this vapor of life extends it's aroma so far then drifts
into the evening shadows. This life buds, blooms, and fades. And like the rose, when in full glory suffers the irony of the thoms, our lives are tinged with sorrow. We are tender flowers that stretch their stem to breathe in the ebullience of the sun. We strive for growth and then we weep over the
fading of the vibrancy of our frame. Here in this garden of finitude, we of flesh and bone, drink
in the rain until our roots become weak, and the wind desecrates this rose of vitality, and scatters
it to a plateau of uncertainty. This valley of "being" is illustrious with colors and fragrances;
This banquet of hope sets dreams on wings to soar; These mountains flow with lively streams
of sustenance. And it is here, in this existence called life, where we find, hiding amongst the
shadows, our worst fear.
Death.
Whether the sun is shining or the shade of clouds cover the blue, this foreboding is everpresent.
It's shadow is cast deeper than the easy smiling veneer of man. It goes beyond his polite conversations and social gatherings. Here in his inner sanctuary, a quiet corner, the truth of his
future resonates with clarity. It drinks tea with him. It eats breakfast with him. It works with him. And finally man will capitulate to the will of this master. All who are born, are born to die.
But man suppresses it with diversions and extra-curricular activities. Thus is the motive of this temple of clay, to set the mind wandering from the reality of his own finitude.
But whatever trails of life that wechoose to trod down cannot dull the senses enough to shed the innate despondency that grasps us when we wonder, "Is that just a bend
in the road, or is that the road's end?"
In some ways this existence is condescending. It at times seems to be an arbitrary whim of forces unseen and unknown. Our hands are in constant motion in preparation not for the expiration ofthis human event, but rather for the continuation of life. The future calls to man and bids him forward with courage, but she holds promises and despair.
Man spends the Sunday afternoons of his youth hoping for tomorrow, and the Sunday evenings of old age wishing for yesterday.
But the human predicament thrives on this slippery slope. This violent thread of life extends into an abyss of which we are not experientially cognizant of such an experience. We neither know, exhaustively, when the epilogue will be written, nor the nouns, verbs, adverbs, and adjectives used to describe it.
Our breath is bated and borrowed, for a thing that can be easily consumed, cannot said to be ours. And on some island within the heart we know this to be true. We live in the middle between two
extremes. The painful whelp of birth and the hopeless whimper of death. Never knowing when the pendulum will swing to knock us from the balancing beam into the waiting arms of Hades.
We place our hearts on wings that fly only for a little while, if they fly at all. But for
most these wings are broken. But such is our ironic fate. We wish for the extension of this life even though it is ripe with melancholy and pain, for it lasts but just a second in time. It is here, and then it is gone. We are here, and then we are gone.
Wilson and Steel-Toed Shoes
He was a gentleman from the old ways, as most elderly folks are. He was a testament of integrity and respect. His manner was the one of a quiet confident man. Although he was Irish and his temper could flair at times, he was consistent in his temperament towards others ..
He was well respected and liked by everyone who knew him.
He was my grandfather from my mother's side.
Wilson Lamb.
In the days of my childhood when the world was still a strange place and misunderstood by me, his springs and summers were spent in the field behind our house, tilling, planting, and keeping the garden that he and my father would cultivate. Plenty of times were spent putting coffee cans over the tomatoes to protect them from the frost.
My grandfather never missed church. If the doors were open then he was there with my grandmother. I can recall the many times I would walk into that little church on Skyline road, and he would already be seated about 4 pews in front of my seat in the back (for that's
where the sinners and backsliders sat). He would turn around, give a little wave and place a fake
scowl on his face.
Also, If you were a guest in his house he would make sure that you had a chair even if it meant he had to stand up. And if you liked diet Coke, boy were you in luck.
But of all the things I remember about him, the one little quirk I'll remember most is his running gag about steel-toed shoes. What he would do was lift up one of his feet, as if to stomp you on your big toe, and ask,
"Are those steel-toed shoes you're wearing?"
I'll recall that gag fondly the rest of my life.
He was 82 yrs old when cancer was found in his pancreas.
The ensuing battle that he went through was like watching the wind and sun drain an oasis. His strength and his life slowly ebbed from his body. This elegant, austere man was being spoiled by an enemy he could not fight.
As the cancer begin to win, his face became hollow and helpless. When he was in the hospital, for the
last time, the pain caused by this insidious parasite was evident to the family that was present.
He at one time leaned up in his bed and cried to my mother, who stood near by with tears in her eyes.
"Help me," he said weekly.
But she could not help him, nor could the many hands that clutched for his.
Now upon reflection, they're times like these when our communal reality slaps us out of our sleep. Each one of us that shared his bedside, from his wife to his grandchildren, sought some solace where solace was a stranger, for death was no longer considered in the abstract but now was settling down upon the heaving breast of a loved one. There, what we saw, was not the hyperbole from a preacher or stories weaved from imaginations that are made of little consequence. There, on that morning, death made sure everybody was paying attention. On that little hospital bed, in the body of a frail old
man, death was putting qn an exhibition. His labors seemed to wear the cloak of futility when the thread he was laboring upon was finally shredded.
But death treats us all the same. It gazes at our deeds with sarcasm, while the vanity of this endeavor haunts the memory of those of us who have yet to trod down it's dark road.
Death is a communal experience. We all experience the despair because we'll all experience the reality.
So with clenched fist with whitened knuckles, and the pounding within the breast we wait. And wait.
On February 15th, 1994 my
grandfather took off his "steel-toed shoes," as
his heart was stilled, forever.
(next week Part II)
In memory of Wilson Munroe Lamb and Melvin Lewis Kegley
I can remember the little girl next door. Barely in Elementary School she is suddenly stricken with a disease called Leukemia. After years of fighting the disease, she never approaches her teen years before it takes her life. My first experience with death was at her viewing. The heavy cloud of depression hung in my mind for awhile.
I can remember a little boy being hit by a car on 14th street while riding his bicycle.
I remember a young man in High School losing his life in a fire, saving his little brother.
I remember my Grandpa and Grandma Kegley, with him in his wheelchair, in their mobile home right off of Beltline road in Coppell, TX. Death, after a series of strokes, took possession of his life in 1978. In 1990 his wife, my grandma, lost hers after a heart attack.
Old man Milton, my Cowboy and wrestling watching buddy, lost the same battle.
The graveyards are filled with such memories and our memories are filled with such graveyards. Loved ones.
Moms and dads.
Brothers and sisters.
Friends.
We all experience the pain and
trepidation of death.
Death and It's Shadow
"Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow
of death. " (Psalms 23)
So here we are. The light of existence is now obscured by the ominous presence of death.
It hangs above our heads like Damocles' sword swearing to cut us off from the land of the living if we tread to close.
And we live in it's shadow.
It's shadow covers every aspect of our lives.
Relationships.
Dreams and goals.
What we do, think, see and say is extended out to the end our own finiteness and no further. When the breath of man is stilled then his dreams are stilled with him. He lives and dwells in the corridors of mortality never knowing when the dimly lit flame will be extinguished and the corridor will be darkened.
the curse of finitude
Life.
To experience this dynamic is God's most gracious gift. There are many things about "life" that
each individual could resurrect from memory to encourage the crease of a smile at the corners of
the mouth. We remember smells of summer, spring, fall and winter. We remember moods.
We recall sunrises and sunsets. We reminisce about vacations and anniversaries with pictures,
videos and scrapbooks at the ready. We learn from triumphs and failures. In the midst of our sojourn on Earth, we enjoy her exquisite beauty, while gazing up into her heavenly chambers, wondering.
Our senses are inundated with sights, sounds, and touches of grace akin to the dew softly touching the morning fields.The ambience of this existence is sweet like honey, but, like clouds that bring rain and
then whither from their ferocious intentions, this vapor of life extends it's aroma so far then drifts
into the evening shadows. This life buds, blooms, and fades. And like the rose, when in full glory suffers the irony of the thoms, our lives are tinged with sorrow. We are tender flowers that stretch their stem to breathe in the ebullience of the sun. We strive for growth and then we weep over the
fading of the vibrancy of our frame. Here in this garden of finitude, we of flesh and bone, drink
in the rain until our roots become weak, and the wind desecrates this rose of vitality, and scatters
it to a plateau of uncertainty. This valley of "being" is illustrious with colors and fragrances;
This banquet of hope sets dreams on wings to soar; These mountains flow with lively streams
of sustenance. And it is here, in this existence called life, where we find, hiding amongst the
shadows, our worst fear.
Death.
Whether the sun is shining or the shade of clouds cover the blue, this foreboding is everpresent.
It's shadow is cast deeper than the easy smiling veneer of man. It goes beyond his polite conversations and social gatherings. Here in his inner sanctuary, a quiet corner, the truth of his
future resonates with clarity. It drinks tea with him. It eats breakfast with him. It works with him. And finally man will capitulate to the will of this master. All who are born, are born to die.
But man suppresses it with diversions and extra-curricular activities. Thus is the motive of this temple of clay, to set the mind wandering from the reality of his own finitude.
But whatever trails of life that wechoose to trod down cannot dull the senses enough to shed the innate despondency that grasps us when we wonder, "Is that just a bend
in the road, or is that the road's end?"
In some ways this existence is condescending. It at times seems to be an arbitrary whim of forces unseen and unknown. Our hands are in constant motion in preparation not for the expiration ofthis human event, but rather for the continuation of life. The future calls to man and bids him forward with courage, but she holds promises and despair.
Man spends the Sunday afternoons of his youth hoping for tomorrow, and the Sunday evenings of old age wishing for yesterday.
But the human predicament thrives on this slippery slope. This violent thread of life extends into an abyss of which we are not experientially cognizant of such an experience. We neither know, exhaustively, when the epilogue will be written, nor the nouns, verbs, adverbs, and adjectives used to describe it.
Our breath is bated and borrowed, for a thing that can be easily consumed, cannot said to be ours. And on some island within the heart we know this to be true. We live in the middle between two
extremes. The painful whelp of birth and the hopeless whimper of death. Never knowing when the pendulum will swing to knock us from the balancing beam into the waiting arms of Hades.
We place our hearts on wings that fly only for a little while, if they fly at all. But for
most these wings are broken. But such is our ironic fate. We wish for the extension of this life even though it is ripe with melancholy and pain, for it lasts but just a second in time. It is here, and then it is gone. We are here, and then we are gone.
Wilson and Steel-Toed Shoes
He was a gentleman from the old ways, as most elderly folks are. He was a testament of integrity and respect. His manner was the one of a quiet confident man. Although he was Irish and his temper could flair at times, he was consistent in his temperament towards others ..
He was well respected and liked by everyone who knew him.
He was my grandfather from my mother's side.
Wilson Lamb.
In the days of my childhood when the world was still a strange place and misunderstood by me, his springs and summers were spent in the field behind our house, tilling, planting, and keeping the garden that he and my father would cultivate. Plenty of times were spent putting coffee cans over the tomatoes to protect them from the frost.
My grandfather never missed church. If the doors were open then he was there with my grandmother. I can recall the many times I would walk into that little church on Skyline road, and he would already be seated about 4 pews in front of my seat in the back (for that's
where the sinners and backsliders sat). He would turn around, give a little wave and place a fake
scowl on his face.
Also, If you were a guest in his house he would make sure that you had a chair even if it meant he had to stand up. And if you liked diet Coke, boy were you in luck.
But of all the things I remember about him, the one little quirk I'll remember most is his running gag about steel-toed shoes. What he would do was lift up one of his feet, as if to stomp you on your big toe, and ask,
"Are those steel-toed shoes you're wearing?"
I'll recall that gag fondly the rest of my life.
He was 82 yrs old when cancer was found in his pancreas.
The ensuing battle that he went through was like watching the wind and sun drain an oasis. His strength and his life slowly ebbed from his body. This elegant, austere man was being spoiled by an enemy he could not fight.
As the cancer begin to win, his face became hollow and helpless. When he was in the hospital, for the
last time, the pain caused by this insidious parasite was evident to the family that was present.
He at one time leaned up in his bed and cried to my mother, who stood near by with tears in her eyes.
"Help me," he said weekly.
But she could not help him, nor could the many hands that clutched for his.
Now upon reflection, they're times like these when our communal reality slaps us out of our sleep. Each one of us that shared his bedside, from his wife to his grandchildren, sought some solace where solace was a stranger, for death was no longer considered in the abstract but now was settling down upon the heaving breast of a loved one. There, what we saw, was not the hyperbole from a preacher or stories weaved from imaginations that are made of little consequence. There, on that morning, death made sure everybody was paying attention. On that little hospital bed, in the body of a frail old
man, death was putting qn an exhibition. His labors seemed to wear the cloak of futility when the thread he was laboring upon was finally shredded.
But death treats us all the same. It gazes at our deeds with sarcasm, while the vanity of this endeavor haunts the memory of those of us who have yet to trod down it's dark road.
Death is a communal experience. We all experience the despair because we'll all experience the reality.
So with clenched fist with whitened knuckles, and the pounding within the breast we wait. And wait.
On February 15th, 1994 my
grandfather took off his "steel-toed shoes," as
his heart was stilled, forever.
(next week Part II)
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