Why thinking about dying is a gift.

Really.

Randall and Sharon and Mt. Rainier. They are both such funny and wise teachers.

I have been thinking a lot about dying recently.

Not because I am facing my own death any time soon, though who really knows, right?

It’s because I’ve been watching friends and acquaintances and people I don’t even know come to terms with what we’ll all eventually face, many in particularly graceful ways.

As you might remember, I recently spent a week at a choir camp because my best friend from childhood, Wendy, invited me to come.

What you probably don’t know is that, two years ago, Wendy’s beloved husband Kevin died suddenly in the very same small Indiana city where the choir camp was held. Evansville was where Wendy and Kevin, both Presbyterian ministers, had been hired many years ago by the very same church that was the sponsor of the choir camp. They had raised their triplet daughters there and been connected in every way to community life.

When Kevin died, Wendy was no longer working at the church, and for a while it seemed like her life might stay grounded there. But eventually she decided to move to another state, to be closer to one of her daughters and her mother. Sorting through everything that had accumulated in the big house where Kevin and Wendy had nurtured their family was grueling, but I sensed that the journey of holding on to Kevin’s memory — and letting it go — was healing for Wendy.

She has found a job she loves at a church near her new town and has begun a new life. It’s pretty amazing, really.

When we were both back in Evansville, I was hit hard by the fact that Kevin wasn’t there. It was particularly poignant to sing in the church sanctuary where I often saw him preach — he was a terrific preacher — without him.

Of course it was difficult for Wendy, too, though as she often says, “I live with the fact that Kevin is gone every day.” It’s a gift to me that I never feel like we can’t talk about him and discuss how things are different — harder, surprising, frustrating — without him. It’s not a situation I ever imagined we’d be in, and I ache for her. But I am so grateful to my friend for sharing her grief and her journey with me. It feels like a tremendous privilege.

My friend Randall is another story altogether. I never knew Randall before he had the devastating cancer that took his voice; I’ve never known him when death wasn’t stalking him. But when I met Randall and his wife Sharon, they were both so full of joy and curiosity and love that cancer wasn’t ever really part of our conversations.

They moved several years ago to be closer to family and friends on the West Coast and since then, Randall has gone into hospice care. He occasionally writes wonderful notes on his CaringBridge site. Yet whenever I see an email notification about one, I think, Uh-oh.

I wish I didn’t have that first reaction; I know that’s not what Randall would want. His notes are always warm, insightful and, well, life-affirming.

The most recent one reports that “dying is going well,” a funny reaction to a note Randall and Sharon received from a goddaughter whose opening line was, “I hope dying is going well.”

As Randall says, “She is learning to accept that death is a part of life!”

Oh, right. It’s so difficult to remember that, even when you have seen death up close.

I was particularly struck in this note by Randall’s humility and willingness to acknowledge the ambiguous middle places: “One doctor estimated that I would not live past December 2023, but I am still here. I don’t feel proud that I proved her wrong, because no one really knows.”

Randall is grateful for all the attention and help he receives: from Sharon, from the hospice nurse, and from the many prayer and meditation groups they belong to, both online and in-person. “With a lot of support,” he says, “I am dying in a style that is mine, which primarily means I am not doing it alone.”

Think about that for a minute. Isn’t not being alone really the whole point of living, not to mention dying?

So as I think about my friends who have shared these intimate journeys with me, I’ll try to focus on what they’ve taught me.

Stay present. Connect as much as possible. Embrace hope and joy.

As the spiritual leader, teacher and author Ram Dass said, “We are all just walking each other home.”