He died today

He died today

After battling his cancer for 19 months, my friend died today. He made gutsy decisions in his treatment, fighting very long and until the very end. He was always determined, never letting us see him emotionally defeated by the ordeal, though it must surely have been overwhelming.

There will be a wake in Bronxville on Monday and Tuesday nights, at the funeral home near the Metro-North station. And on Wednesday morning they will have the funeral at the church there, across the street. If you knew James you should at least go up to the wake. I know his family would appreciate it.

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This long process is over now and I think it has had a transformational effect on many of us who were involved. Even for people on the periphery, like me, who simply went to visit James and be with him over the months of his illness.

The illness transformed him. In the end, the deterioration was incremental and very steady until he was gone. Someone mentioned feeling uncomfortable that there wasn't any abrupt feeling of loss today; it felt a lot like yesterday. But little about today was abrupt. It had felt like a possible if not inevitable outcome for months. The news had been coming in. The guy we spent time with had changed slowly since last summer or the summer before.

It changed us too, as we went along. I have deeply reconsidered my view of my life and what things mean. James confronted what we all must face, and while I'm getting older anyway, I believe James has spurred in me a far more pragmatic view of life's aims and appreciation for what I have. I believe my bonds to people I care about have grown much stronger. On those many trips to visit him and keep him company, I have been immensely grateful for his friends and mine who went along each week or month.

He wrote a brilliant play. Most people never will. To read it is to hear his voice in a dozen characters, and hear a complex perspective on the fundamental human situation of mortality. He was brave and steady in taking on the burden of his illness, and watching it was inspiring. I hope I could be so brave . I often felt embarassed being with him, without anything to say that properly expressed how I felt about what he was doing.

He had a pitiable situation yet some parts of it were enviable. He did things few of us will ever get to do as adults. He spent a year in New York, Paris, Brussells with his family and friends. We all have to die. But he had the chance to be with his family, to take time with his friends and family, and to take time with it himself.

By the end, he had changed so much. From walking to sitting to laying in bed, so many secondary conditions and infections, paralysis. The news earlier this week that the could no longer pursue treatment was very discouraging. I have felt a potent difference since. When we first heard the news I felt shock and grief at the scale of the cancer, anxiety and depression about his bad fortune. Since, I have felt regret and guilt about what more I could do to support him or what more I could have once done to be his friend. But this last week I felt sadness about the finality.

Today we were surprised that the slow downward slide had ended. We had grown used to the bad news that always made things worse, harder yet still not impossible to overcome. This week's news was yet another death sentence in a long parade of them. After all the struggle, James was still so tough and so strong that we were actually surprised to hear that he had died of cancer. We had gotten used to him beating it.