During this past week we lost a family member. The following are some of my thoughts on the events surrounding this loss.

The loss of life is always tragic, it’s perhaps a little less so if the person has lived a full life rather than just begun, but it is still a tragedy.
Every life touches other lives somewhere, no man is an island this way. To each of those connected people, that lost life is a profound event and will stay with them forever.

The person I am speaking of in particular, though, is William (Bill) Platt.
Bill was my grandpa, not by blood but by acceptance.
The details of how a marriage changes family ties elude me. Someone is part of my family or they are not, blood has little to do with that.
Bill was part of my family and I was happy to have him in it.
We didn’t visit as often as we should have, a problem many families have, so I didn’t know Bill as well as I should have.
What I do know about Bill is that he was a good man. He was always quite lively, ready to meet just about anyone with his hand outstretched for a handshake and a joke on his lips.

Thursday we went to the hospital to see him. We already knew at that point that he was pretty much beyond recovery.
Waiting at the entrance to ICU, we saw other families waiting for the chance to see their loved ones during the limited visitation window.
Everyone talked quietly amongst themselves with a few stepping outside their own groups to talk with others about their loved ones and pass on well wishes.

Just before the doors opened to let those families in, a nurse pushed out a woman in a wheelchair.
This woman looked like she had gone through hell. She looked tired and had the darkest of circles under her eyes to show for it.
Her face lit up like she had never been more alive when her family rushed to her and huddled around her.
I remember hearing one of them say “I’m so glad to see you without all those tubes in you.”
She was wheeled to a recovery room somewhere with her family in tow.

Oh how I wish that could have been Bill being wheeled out.
I can envision him jokingly saying something like “Thought you got rid of me? Back in Jersey we wouldn’t have called that a …”
From there he’d go on, telling a bit of story and adopting his old New Jersey accent.
But that didn’t happen.
I can truly say I’m happy for the family that had their love one wheeled out, I don’t begrudge them their happiness.

Bill died the next day.
You know, I could remember Bill as I last saw him, near the end of all of that, but I won’t.
That’s what happened to him, not who he was.
I’m going to remember Bill as a vibrant individual with hand extended to shake mine in greeting when I managed to visit.

You will be missed.
Rest in peace, Bill.