Sunday, September 14, 2003. SWMBO and I had attended church on Saturday night, and were rattling around the house on a calm Sunday. I was drinking coffee, watching NASCAR This Morning, and trolling NASCAR-related internet sites in an effort to squeeze a few more points from my Fantasy team. All of a sudden, an e-mail, the kind you don’t want to receive, from a friend in Texas:
Good Morning, Ken. I couldn’t find your home number. Please call me on my cell: aaa-eee-nnnn.
Messages like that are never good news, and this one kept the streak alive. I called the number to find that a mutual friend of ours in Kansas had passed away suddenly the previous evening. The friend who had died was Rob, my best friend, best man at our wedding, one year my junior. (Rob and I were good friends for a long time, even though we lived 1500 miles or so apart, and really didn’t correspond or call every week or anything like that. I think we both knew that if either of us needed anything, the other’s door was always open.)
I made all the arrangements to go back for the funeral. Airline tickets. Rental car. Hotel in KC. Friends to stay with in Northwest Kansas. All set.
The night before I was supposed to fly back, SWMBO awoke at midnight, clutching her chest, short of breath, and in severe pain. I helped her get dressed, drove her to the ER, and waited as the clock ticked down on my flight which was to depart several hours hence. And with the remnants of hurricane Isabel heading straight for us. It soon became clear that there was no way I was going to be there for the funeral.
SWMBO spent about 36 hours or so in the hospital, all tests were OK. Diagnosis: pericarditis. Frightening, painful, but not life threatening. I brought her home just an hour or two before the storm hit.
So, I wasn’t there to pay my last respects to a lifelong friend. There are priorities, and then there are priorities. I told SWMBO that Rob would come back and haunt me if I’d left her in the hospital unattended.
If Rob knocked at our door right now, the following would happen:
Handshakes and hugs, followed by the opening of the first beer.
Within a minute after that, he’d get a twinkle in his eye, we’d look at each other and smile, and we’d almost simultaneously blurt out “You old sonofabitch.”
After a few more beers, discussion would turn to all the dumbass things we did in our misspent youth.
We’d both point out how we wouldn’t take a million bucks for all those dumbass things, but wouldn’t give a nickel to do ‘em again.
So long, Rob. You’re still missed.
-k-
In Memory of Rob Smiley, 1951- 2003
