October 9, 2021– Long ago, when I was young and feckless, I briefly dated a young woman, two years my junior. It ended due to complications, involving her on-again, off-again ties to another man. We both moved on, and I lost contact with her. D was a free spirit, though, and was fresh air in my rather moribund life, at the time. I learned, a few days ago, that she passed on September 10, leaving her second husband and her child from her first marriage, plus one grandchild.

D’s passing closes the door on a chapter in my life, my twenties, when there was a lot more man-child left in me than was prudent. I began that decade extricating myself from the tar pit that our relationship had become and ended the decade easing into the personal growth marathon that was my marriage.

I thought a lot about D, this morning, in the course of sizing up some of my friendships around Prescott that have assumed a staleness. Thus, as their tide ebbs and their dunes shift, I will give a few friends the distance they seem to want. Others, especially those in my faith community, have shown themselves to not be retreating to a coolness or to offering perfunctory greetings, in place of their former warmth.

I know there are often a thousand reasons why ties get broken and iciness replaces warmth. Other than making a better effort at curbing any of my own negativity towards some third parties, I don’t see that their change in attitude has anything directly to do with me. Besides, when some doors close, others open-and people like my hiking buddy still find my presence useful and welcome.

Tides and sands are made to shift and bring change.