Reading obits for high school classmates

Ronnie Horne is dead. The not entirely unexpected news came via an email from a fellow high school classmate. He was my age. These notices have been coming with increasing regularity. My 121-member high school class has been trimmed by about half. Ronnie, with whom I shared classrooms from 1955 to 1967, was just the latest.

The funeral is tomorrow at a church I've never seen and is about a four-hour drive away. Forgive me for missing this one. I've found it difficult to attend the funerals of any of my classmates. While many of them stuck close to the rural communities where we grew up and attended a countywide consolidated high school, I have been gone from those landmarks for some 50 years.

I've felt an obligation to attend some memorials — Punky Morton, my best friend in high school; Barry Dellinger, a very close friend in lower grades; but I mourned the others from a distance — a high school girlfriend; a kind girl with a last name, like mine, beginning with T, which placed us in neighboring desks in many high school classes; the class clown everyone loved for his optimism and friendliness, and all the others; a football teammate who heard our coach tell us we'd never forget our teammates (but we did).

Our 50th reunion was held 14 months ago. The teenagers of 1967 gathered in groups to hug and shake hands, to discuss jobs and retirements, to compare grandparenting experiences, to complain of ailments and limitations, to reminisce, and, mostly, to celebrate having made it this far in life.

We do not fool ourselves into thinking there is anything unique about our experiences. Fiftieth reunions are held every year. Someone's long-lost classmate passes away every day. Millions of people my age read the obituaries every day, silently judging who's my age and who has departed far too young.

The worst aspect of aging is the loss of friends, neighbors, siblings, parents, and others who had shaped our lives and who cannot be replaced. All we can do is remember. Rest in peace.