Last Monday a good friend of Chuck’s passed away. She was only 62, and in today’s world that seems crazy young. She had a sudden heart attack, sitting in a chair reading. We’re getting accustomed to a world when 50 is the new 30, and 70 is the new 50. Bobbie lived in the Baltimore area and had been friends with Chuck for more than twenty years. She was his boss for several years, and introduced him to the world of computer training. Bobbie knew Chuck’s second wife, and was one of the people who spent long nights drinking and commiserating with him after she left him – the sort of person, in short, who was always there when you needed her. He hadn’t seen her in a year or two. We had actually talked of seeing her last month when we were back east, but life intruded and we thought, “Next time.” And now there will be no next time. Life is like that sometimes. Chuck struggled with that fact this past week, and also with the fact that Bobbie was only a couple of years older than him. So it was also a week in which he struggled with issues of mortality and the jarring reminder that none of us lives forever. Chuck and I toasted Bobbie on Monday night by making her favorite Sangria recipe: cheap red wine and diet orange soda. It was surprisingly good!

We decided on Wednesday to go to the funeral that was to be held on Saturday in Timonium, a suburb of Maryland. We spent a madcap couple of days making last minute arrangements for a flight, a car, and a hotel that culminated in an early morning flight on Southwest to BWI. We got in about 5pm, then had to drive to Timonium, change clothes then head to the funeral home for the viewing. Viewings are always strange; there’s your friend or family member in their coffin, and there are all of you gathered around chatting and casting occasional uncomfortable glances at the departed, feeling a little like you’re talking about them behind their back. The other thing that a viewing does is really truly drive home the point that the person is dead. Not mostly dead like The Princess Bride; not resting; we’re talking definitely and completely dead, as in “she’s shuffled off her mortal coil, run down the curtain and joined the bleedin’ choir invisibile,” to paraphrase the immortal words of Monty Python.

After the viewing we went to dinner with a few of Chuck’s old friends, staying out late talking. The next morning we got up, checked in for our return flight, went for a run around Loch Raven Reservoir (did I mention the really sucky heat and humidity and all of the damn BUGS that infest Maryland in the summer?). We hustled back to the hotel, showered and changed and headed off for the funeral service. That turned out to be the real highlight of our trip. It was held at the funeral home in the same room where the viewing had been held the night before, but this was not a sad, tearful gathering: it was a real celebration of a life. Her partner delivered a eulogy that was wonderfully evocative of Bobbie (who I only met once but immediately liked and felt like I had known her forever) and that had everyone alternately laughing and crying. The funniest line was one I had never heard before but will never forget. She was speaking of Bobbie’s tendency to be careful with money, referring to her as someone who could “squeeze a nickel until the buffalo farted.” Now THAT’s what I call a description!

After the funeral service, many of us headed over to Bobbie and Ellen’s for what can only be described as a pool party. Bobbie loved entertaining, and she loved her pool, so that seemed a fitting final tribute; a whole bunch of us drinking beer, remembering her while floating around her pool. It was a long, hot wonderful afternoon that stretched into evening before we all reluctantly parted ways. Saying goodbye to everyone was like a final goodbye to Bobbie. A lot of tears were shed, but as much laughter was also shared. It was a great way to send a really good person off on her final journey.

On Sunday morning we were back at BWI, dropping off the rental car and catching our flight home. We were back by the early afternoon, LA time. By six o’clock that evening it was as if we never left home. As if nothing in particular happened.

Yet in some subtle way nothing will ever be quite the same because now it will be a world without Bobbie.