Oh Wow. Oh Wow. Oh Wow.

So there you have it, Steve Jobs’ last words.

Since Steve Jobs’ death several weeks ago, there has been a plethora of blogs, articles, what have you, about his life and death. There is a biography already published, that chronicles his entire life and all too untimely death, so I’m not going to pile on and do the same thing here. Well, maybe a little.

What intrigues me today, is after reading his sisters eulogy of Steve, his final words. I don’t know how anybody couldn’t be. We all live our lives with the specter of death hanging over our heads. Most of us deal with this by not thinking about it too much. When you’re younger, it’s something that is a total abstraction. It’s a reality for sure, but so far away that there is so much to do that it’s not worth thinking about too much.

As you get older though, you know it’s out there, and it’s getting closer. You start to  lose family, friends, you might even deal with  an illness and  come face to face with your own mortality. For me, it’s always been a question of how I will handle the news of my own, and how brave I will be as I march, or in my case lurch towards the inevitable.

My mom died from Cancer four years ago. I witnessed the stages of her passing. From the initial denial to the overwhelming sadness that there was nothing more that medical science could do for her. Gradually came acceptance and a readiness. In the grand scheme her illness took her quickly, but the reality is, the last month of her life was very painful, and for us, her family, her passing couldn’t come quick enough. All along though, she was brave. My mom was a woman of faith and knew she would go to Heaven, but still, there’s that great unknown of what’s ‘really’ going to happen.

Unless you die suddenly, this is what we all must face. Call it what you will, but as Jim Morrison so aptly put it, ‘no one here, get’s out alive.’ I guess I get some solace from the fact that we all are in the same boat. Time marches on, and our time here is but a blink of the eye in terms of time. Long after we’re gone, newer generations will fill the void, and on and on it will go.

So, ‘Oh Wow. Oh Wow, Oh Wow,’ what the hell? Jobs was in and out of consciousness when he uttered those soon to be famous last words. Did he see a new product in those last moments? Something he’d forgotten to do? Or did he see where he was about to go, and comment in amazement at what was waiting for him?

Steve’s sister said in her eulogy that ‘What he was, was how he died.’ I think that is true for all of us. I think that is what scares me so much. I question everything, I have to know, I need an answer. I’ve read books on what Heaven will be like. I’ve read bible passages looking for clues. I believe, but I fear the unknown. Hard as I try, I can’t get over that.

I’ve been ill several times. At certain moments you feel so bad that you don’t worry, or fear death, you just want the sickness to end. The thought of missing a birthday, or Christmas no longer matters. You just want it over with. I respect the circle of life. I can’t see wanting to live after all of your friends are gone, your spouse, your family. I don’t want to die first, but I also don’t want to be the last, but still, there’s the fear.

Jesus says in the Bible that he’s preparing a place for us and that he’ll be waiting for our arrival. I have to trust this to be true. I have to trust that my mom will be waiting there for me. As well as others I’ve loved that have passed. It’s that, and the hope that who I am and what I’ve accomplished won’t just vanish when I’ve left this earth. That Jesus really does have a place for me, and is waiting.

I hope that when it is my time, that I get a glimpse of that before I go. That when I get to see what awaits, that I have time to tell others what’s there, how beautiful it is, and that I’ll be waiting as well. Maybe then, we can all say ‘Oh Wow. Oh Wow. Oh Wow!’

I heard the news today oh boy.......

I received the phone call today, the kind of call you dread getting in the middle of the night. When I looked at the caller ID, I saw that the call was from an old friend of mine, Tony Kozar. We hadn't talked in awhile so I thought he'd finally called to catch up, not exactly.

I answered the call with my usual greeting when he calls "Hey man, what's going on?" After a short pause he cleared his throat and just said "We lost Pat Galvin yesterday." As my hearing isn't what it used to be and I didn't want to hear what I thought I just heard, I asked 'Excuse me, what did you say?" "We lost Pat Galvin."

For most of you, you're going "OK, who's Pat Galvin?" Well, Pat Galvin was a good friend of mine. I hadn't seen much of Pat the last 15 years or so, but he was and is a friend. I met him over 30 years ago while attending Portland Community College. Tony Kozar was also attending at that time and him and I got to be pretty tight friends. Through "Kozar" I met a litany of people from Pat, who was lovingly referred to as "Fats," why, I don't quite know, he was never very fat to me, but maybe when they were kids. Kozar gave him this moniker. Most of Kozars friends had nicknames, mostly just their last name, but some guys were called "Goofy" and a myriad of names that I can no longer recall. Me? I was just Jimmy.

Anyway, over the better part of 30 years there were Raider games at Kozars, Rolling Stones concerts in Seattle, and trips to Seattle to see the Yankees play the Mariners. In addition to the Oakland Raiders, the Yankees were one of our favorite professional teams to root for. None of us liked teams from Seattle, so it was great fun to go up there, drink way too much and boo the Mariners. Kozar and the boys went up there yearly. I went a couple of times and it was always a great time.

Fats it always seemed was the only one who could say anything to Kozar that he would listen too. Me? I was too young and never felt like I could say anything that he would listen to, but when Fats spoke, Kozar listened. On one trip, after the game, we were driving around some portion of Seattle when we came across an A-Frame ad outside of some restaurant or something. Well we just had to have it of course, so into the back of 'Dalby's' van it went. Later, Kozar wanted to do something else reasonably stupid and Fats, said "no." Kozar insisted on whatever it was and Pat in a stern voice said something to the effect of "Fuck Kozar we already got a sign, fucking knock it off." Kozar got this hurt puppy look on his face, looked at me and said, "Fats yelled at me." I thought he was going to cry. I about shit myself trying not to laugh.

That's the way it kind of went for a long time. Pool party's at the Dalby's, concerts in town; blues parties at my house, we always all had a great time. But alas, things change, we get older, get married, have kids, drift apart, it happens. I moved to Central Oregon and I didn't see anybody as much. I'd always go to Portland to visit and we'd hook up, and it was always fun to see everyone again. But none of us could believe though how the time had flown. We all had met as 20 something’s and now we were 50 somethings.

Fats and his wife Nancy came to my first wedding and came to Central Oregon for my second, (and last) about four years ago. He had mentioned not feeling great that weekend, but nobody thought much of it. During a trip to Portland some time after that he mentioned some pain in his kidneys but didn't think much of that either. I talked to him last year and he informed me that he'd had Kidney Cancer and had one of them removed. He said it was an early stage and that he didn't follow-up with chemo or radiation, which I thought a bit odd at the time, but it was his cancer and not mine this time. That was the last time I talked too him.

It's brutally ironic I guess, that Al Davis, owner and general managing partner of the Raiders passed away on Saturday. The Raiders dedicated their game yesterday to Al. In a close game that will go down in Raider lore, the Raiders held on to win the game with a last play interception in the end zone, at about the same time that Pat Galvin drew his last, how fitting.

Pat had been feeling poorly the last year and got checked about six months ago. The doctors had found that the cancer had spread and that there was nothing they could do. He spent the last few weeks of his life in hospice and was comfortable at the end. I wish I had been able to talk to him. I wish I had picked up the phone the many times I wanted to, to see how things were going. I don't understand why friends can't put away differences and pick up the phone and let somebody know before somebody dies, that someone you care about is dying, fuck!

So Pat is gone. Gone like the others before him, and like the ones that are to follow. No one on this planet gets out of this predicament called life, without dying, it's just the way it is. That being said, I don't have to like it. I don't have to like that Pat suffered the fate of many other cancer sufferers in that he withered away before leaving us. I don't like that he's gone. I have faith that I will see him again someday, but I don't like the process we go through to see each other again. It's kind of funny that most of us want to go to heaven, but nobody wants to die to get there. Anybody find another way, I'm all ears.

Even though I hadn't seen Pat in a very long time, I will miss him. He was a good man, husband, father, and friend. Pat may be gone, but his impact on my life and the lives of his friends and family will live forever.