The Guilt Free Life

Today Kevin, an aquaintance of mine, was killed in an ATV accident. He was in his mid-20’s, managing a company more efficiently than men decades older; a brilliant shining star with all of his ducks already in a row despite his youth. One of his dreams was to marry a nice Jewish girl and to have kids.

In Neale Donald Walsch’s Home with God, there is a passage that rings true to me regarding this situation: that everyone who is aware of a person’s death is affected by it. However I didn’t spend time with him outside of the work environment in which I knew him–in fact, he had left my company months ago. So how could the death of this young man affect me?

An untimely death always reminds us of the preciousness of life; that theme is prevalent in film, books and art in our society. But there is something more…and I wonder if this “accident” wasn’t one at all.

Just think…if we exist in our physical lives to love others, learn lessons—and to help each other learn theirs—then what happens when those tasks are achieved? Did we all learn to read or tie our shoes at the same time? Don’t some others excel at certain skills while others lag behind? Could it be that his tasks were completed in a timely fashion, and he decided to move on?

This belief is not meant to diminish the need for grief. Grieving is a tribute to the sadness we feel at the loss of a loved one. Yet his death, and his life, affected hundreds of people at different levels; and dealing with loss is one of God’s challenges to those of us left behind.

Yet what does his death mean to me?

His death allows me to believe that he chose it–at exactly this time and in this manner–in order to enable us the deeper journey into life’s nuances within our souls. It gives us a reason for introspection about our purpose here, and to show our support to those more impacted by the loss than we.

So farewell, Kevin, and know that your life touched many—both near and far, and it woke up something inside me like a breeze to an ember.