➜ My Father’s Health Is Failing

[DWARREN123]

I am truly sorry for your loss. Prayers for you and the family.

R.I.P Sir.

[pfigment]

Condolences to you and your family sir....

[TXUSMC]

Condolences, brother.

[gwalchmai]

RIP, Bill.

My condolences, Eric.

[Silentpoet]

On 8/6/2020 at 1:54 PM, Eric said:

Bill passed away at 1:25 this afternoon.

Prayers and condolences my friend.

[TBO]

On 8/6/2020 at 1:54 PM, Eric said:

Bill passed away at 1:25 this afternoon.

Sorry for your loss. Prayers for you and your family for strength and healing. 

Sincerely

[DrB]

I am sorry to hear that. My condolences.  I do remember some of his stories.

Dave..

[Zonny]

I'm sorry, Eric.

How special that you will have memories of your father through his memorable writings. 

[Dric902]

May forever feel like home for him

prayers for you and yours, old friend 

[CincyRed]

Sorry to hear this, prayers to you and the family.

[Fnfalman]

Good Journey, Bill. 

[johnbt]

My condolences. I was reading some of his stories to my wife the other day and she went from "Why are you doing this?" to "Read another one."

[SC Tiger]

On 8/4/2020 at 9:24 PM, Eric said:

My father has been in the Hospital. He got out today, but the outlook isn’t good. He is at home with round-the-clock nursing care. I thought I’d put this post here for those that remember him from his Bill Powell Stories threads, both here and on GT. I thought those of you who remember him could share a kind word. I’m sure he would enjoy the comments. Please keep him in your prayers. 

I saw the thread on GT.  So sorry, Eric.

On 8/4/2020 at 9:56 PM, Rabbi said:

Bill has some of the best stories ever! 

 

I loved "Slicky boy" among so many others.  

 

One of the most knoweledgable and gifted car guys on the planet! 

I don't think there's an exotic car out there that he hasn't farted in. 

[minderasr]

My condolences.  I'm sorry for your loss.

[Eric]

Today makes one year since my father passed. I can’t believe it has been a year already. I think about him all the time.

[Batesmotel]

I hope you can keep him in a lifetime of great memories. Last March was 40 years for losing my dad. We did not gave a great relationship but it still hurts. 

[Walt Longmire]

I enjoyed his stories over there on GT. Perhaps sometime in the future, you could post some of them up again.

[Fog]

Sorry to read of his passing. RIP

[Historian]

16 hours ago, Eric said:

Today makes one year since my father passed. I can’t believe it has been a year already. I think about him all the time.

Eric every time you look in the mirror you'll see the man your dad created.   

He lives on in you.  

[LostinTexas]

17 hours ago, Eric said:

Today makes one year since my father passed. I can’t believe it has been a year already. I think about him all the time.

Mine died on a Friday. September 18 will be 23 years ago. I still miss him. Still want to have that one last "Life" talk. I was finally at a point in life I could take the time to enjoy him, and we both thought we had plenty of time. A stroke took him at 60. No matter, I learned to go on.

That side of my family is all but nonexistent. I have one cousin out of 3 that I occasionally have loose contact with. Not that we don't like each other, just distance and being brought up in totally different environments takes a toll. We literally have nothing in common, other than name.

Life ain't always what we think it should be. Not a lot of comfort for you Eric. You learn to cope better, so there is that.

Cheers

[ChuteTheMall]

Sorry to hear about losing him, and praying for the best possible outcome for your family.

I liked his stories, and they should be reprinted here on TBS. He certainly was gifted.

[railfancwb]

I don’t think we ever get over such loses. At least I haven’t. Just get used to them and go on as best we can. 

[railfancwb]

I periodically reread this when reflecting on those I’ve lost.

The Sandbar - Travis McGee (John D McDonald)

 

Picture a very swift torrent, a river rushing down between rocky walls. There is a long, shallow bar of sand and gravel that runs right down the middle of the river. It is under water. You are born and you have to sand on that narrow, submerged bar, where everyone
stands. The ones born before you, the ones older than you, are upriver from you. The younger ones stand braced on the bar downriver. And the whole long bar is slowly moving down that river of time, washing away at the upstream end and building up downstream.

Your time, the time of all your contemporaries, schoolmates, your loves and your adversaries, is that part of the shifting bar on which you stand. And it is crowded at first. You can see the way it thins out, upstream from you. The old ones are washed away and their bodies go swiftly by, like logs in the current. Downstream where the younger ones stand thick, you can see them flounder, lose footing, wash away. Always there is more room where you stand, but always the swift water grows deeper, and you feel the shift of the sand and the gravel under your feet as the river wears it away. Someone looking for a safer place can nudge you off balance, and you are gone. Someone who has stood beside you for a long time gives a forlorn cry and you reach to catch their hand, but the fingertips slide away and they are gone.

There are the sounds in the rocky gorge, the roar of the water, the shifting, gritty sound of sand and gravel underfoot, the forlorn cries of despair as the nearby ones, and the ones upstream, are taken by the current. Some old ones who stand on a good place, well braced, understanding currents and balance, last a long time. A Churchill, fat cigar atilt, sourly amused at his own endurance and, in the end, indifferent to rivers and the rage of waters. Far downstream from you are the thin, startled cries of the ones who never got planted, never got set, never quite understood the message of the torrent.
*****

This metaphor for life and death from Pale Gray for Guilt (1968), one of John D. MacDonald’s Travis McGee novels, came to mind the other day. I looked it up, and here it is for easy reference. 

***** 

https://www.miskatonic.org/2014/12/12/the-sandbar/

[minervadoe]

I lost my father in 1984 and my mother in 2015.  Time has allowed me to enjoy their memories more, but at first thinking of them brought only sorrow.  How we process the deaths of loved ones is a highly individual process.  You can't rush it. 

[railfancwb]

3 minutes ago, minervadoe said:

I lost my father in 1984 and my mother in 2015.  Time has allowed me to enjoy their memories more, but at first thinking of them brought only sorrow.  How we process the deaths of loved ones is a highly individual process.  You can't rush it. 

Be fifteen years in October since I lost my wife, and it has only been within the last couple years that I’ve been able to use her name in conversation without flinching.