I can’t say that Paul and I were ever friends, but I knew him well. We went to high school together and we were both active in the same church youth group. We worked on church projects together and we spent time together on long church trips.
So I knew him well, but we were very different sorts of people — with very different friends and then we went in very different directions. He stayed in the little town where we went to high school and I haven’t been back there for years. So our paths have diverged for decades.
Still, it was disturbing to me to hear Saturday that Paul had just died.
I’m getting information second or third hand, so I can’t say for sure what’s true. I’m told he lived with his widowed mother. He was overweight. He was diabetic and he smoked. Saturday morning, he apparently called out to his mother from upstairs to call 911, but he died of a heart attack before help could reach him.
Why do we stay in prison when there’s no lock holding us there?
Midlife becomes big crisis when our self-deception stops working
What if emotional baggage we carry isn’t really our core issue?
We’re neither friends nor enemies, just strangers who share the past
‘This path leads to somewhere I think I can finally say, I’m home’
When love finally dies, it’s like a fever breaks and the pain is gone
Narcissists teach their victims they aren’t allowed to have needs
What’s the best word for those of us who just want to be left alone?
We often live in the tension between known and unknown