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My Friend is Dying

Posted by $ Abaco 4 months, 2 weeks ago to Culture
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When a friend passes it forces me to take stock of life. Happens every time. My next door neighbor is a guy who is smart and has worked hard for many, many years. A chemical engineer (so we talk a lot of shop) who works in vaccine manufacturing. We talk some pretty deep shop. He signed on to all the mRNA products and took them. He has worked into his 70s while his wife and kids live a life of luxury - with condos in sunny climates elsewhere. My friend has almost never been home. He works in a large midwest city and comes here to northern NV for a few days every few months. We get caught up and trade stories when he's back here. He, personally, has been a very frugal guy - often offering me a discount on his gasoline card, having me follow him to the gas station to fill up my truck. Nice guy. He recently told me that he's suffering from heart failure. He is a little frail...typical of many engineers. And, he's worked well past the age people should. Desk jobs destroy your body, really. I've always really liked this guy. He's like a kid in some ways. Good man. Last time I saw him he was heading back to our local airport to get a flight back to work, back east. He was putting on a bike helmet and riding his cheap little bicycle down the hill from our places. He pointed at the bike and said it only cost him about $75, and that he spoke with airport management because he leaves it locked there on the bike rack for months at a time. He informed me via text a couple days ago that he's on life support now and will probably need a heart transplant (talk about multi-tasking...texting me on life support). I realized I may need to go down to our airport soon and get his bike. He's a good man and has worked hard forever. If I see him again I'm giving him the biggest hug...


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  • Posted by chad 4 months, 2 weeks ago
    It is good to have friends you can talk with about what's important to you and sometimes what isn't important but fun. I don't recall the poet who said at the end of your life if you have three good friends you are rich. I have had three close friends with whom I was able to share life's consequences good and bad. Most of all we were close philosophically and could discuss ramifications of political behavior and the morality of free agency. We also lived lives that reflected that moral choice. My three closest friends have passed away and I am quite lonely sometimes. I am 75 and have fragile health, thought I would probably be the one to go first. Fortunately I have a very good family and grandchildren that take up some of my time (had a miserable wife, got rid of her). Enjoy my garden and other hobbies. I have a peaceful life and that is good.
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  • Posted by rhfinle 4 months, 2 weeks ago
    Abaco,
    I feel for you and your friend. You're right about the engineering. Everybody I know either becomes frail or ends up, like me, 150 lb overweight. I've gone through college twice and spent 40 years fixing and designing other people's stuff, and all I got out of it was a triple bypass. I hope they can get his heart problems worked out,
    I read recently that they have a new system where they take an otherwise healthy cadaver heart, bleach out the donor's cells in introduce the patient's on heart muscle cells, which grow onto and take over the cellular scaffolding. That's the ultimate solution, because there's no problem with rejection. You're essentially replacing your heart with a new, lab-grown copy of your own heart. But I don't know where they are in terms of getting this technology in to the patients. It may be a few more years.
    I seem to remember you losing a family member fairly recently, at about the same time I lost mine. That's always hard and it takes a while to adjust.
    My father-in-law, who lived into his '90's said one time that he was grateful to have lived that long, but the downside was, that he had, over the years, buried most of his friends.
    Hang in there.
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  • Posted by $ allosaur 4 months, 2 weeks ago
    Sorry for your loss.
    I'm 77 and sometimes I feel like a survivor due to all the departed to the other side people I used to know. Some were friends and relatives.
    I fully retired due to health reasons during 2013.
    I have reasons to believe that is why I'm still alive.
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  • Posted by CaptainKirk 4 months, 2 weeks ago
    Well, I think some introspection is warranted.
    We can compare and contrast for a reason.

    His decisions doesn't make him wrong. In fact, I know more and more people who took the Jab that I did not expect... They all had their reasons. NONE of them will take it again. That's a start.

    But I feel ya. It's hard watching the world shrink around you.
    Even harder when it's the good that are gone. I have 1 BFF left from my early years. And a recent "little brother" from Russia.

    In the end, I am reminded of how lucky I have been.
    (of course, there MIGHT have been some hard work along the way, LOL)
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  • Posted by $ Thoritsu 4 months, 2 weeks ago
    Sorry about your friend. I guess it doesn't matter, but hope the MRNA didn't precipitate his heart failure.

    Good argument for retiring on time.
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  • Posted by $ 25n56il4 4 months, 2 weeks ago
    Oh my goodness. My condolences to you. I have two darling friends I see only occasionally because one lives in San Antonio and the other in far away west Texas in a town named Marfa. They both took the vaccines and haven't recovered. On has something called 'Long Covid'. I begged them not to take the vax but they did anyway. I didn't. I got the disease and I have antibodies in my blood tests. I didn't tell the hospital whether I took the vax or had the disease. Not any of their damn business. I lost my daughters in law...both of them...one to Stage 4 cancer and one to an accident with a train. I know how you feel. God Bless You. nb
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  • Posted by katrinam41 4 months, 2 weeks ago
    I feel with you, Abaco. I lost my best friend from cancer too soon, 10 years ago. It was hard, because she didn't want anyone to see her bald in a hospital bed, going down rapidly. I managed to talk her into letting me visit (after a 50+ year friendship, I wasn't settling for No). We had a great visit, so many memories to share, some tears, so many laughs. I love that lady, just as horse crazy as I am, game for a challenge. I miss her. My health sucks, but she was always healthy. You never know. Now my dearest friend of 64 years, who is in REALLY precarious health, seems to be slipping after a lifetime of beating the odds. She is strong in spirit, in love, in honor. She has been my hero for as long as we have been friends. )Of course, we met over the back of a horse :). I hope she goes on for a very long time.
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  • Posted by AmericanWoman 4 months, 2 weeks ago
    So sorry to hear of your friends loss of health. Have known men as your friend family living in warm climate swimming pool in the back yard traveling around on HIS dollar and when he dropped in our office after telling me his cancer was under control. I have learned sorry cancer hides somewhere in your body but what happened to my dear friend it went to his heart. We were very close at work said he deserved to be treated like this because during the Battle of the Bulge he drank...oh horrors began sitting on the phones for Billy Graham.....I could go on and on about my friend....his parents had just passed within 2 years of his passing....only child so his wife ha...who never came north to see them got it all after...everything from his parents...my friends insurance that we provided in the days of real benefits at work....she didn't even have the decent heart to come as he lay in a bed...but I did...we did...us at work...she got it all...I hug my friend all the time actually...and even though its been over 37 years...tears spring to my eyes he is forever in my heart.
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  • Posted by $ puzzlelady 4 months, 2 weeks ago
    My sympathy to all you good folks bravely prevailing while losing friends and family as the years pass. Just consider: in the billions of years that our known Universe is thought to have existed, only one, only once, has any individual had life, and among the billions of humans who have ever existed, there has been you, and the few special individuals who have been part of your brief presence. Each unique, as unique as are you yourself. Rejoice and celebrate! While you have consciousness, in whatever shape the body's machinery persists, you are a functioning part of eternity and infinity. Ponder what you are adding to that timeless stream. As dear as friendships are, work to end all enmities, all wars and mutual destruction, which are the cancer of our shared existences. Cherish before you perish.
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