Hey Dan

I was listening to NPR this weekend while running around. Garrison Keillor’s A Prairie Home Companion was on. He was talking about reaching the time in his life that the tall trees of his life were starting to fall. That this was the time he realized that he had been living in their shade and it was time for him to provide shade to others. I not sure that is what he said but that is what I heard.

This has been a strange time in my life. For a while now, my parents generation have been passing away or falling in to illness. This has taken some getting used to. You see, I am from a family that lives forever. Most of my grandparents saw well into the other side of 80. Therefore, until I almost 30 no one other then a great-grand parent died. When you lose a great-grand parent it said but kind of expected. Now, uncles and aunts are starting to show signs of age.

These are the tall trees of my life. They have shaded my life. They have watched me grow up from a baby with big hands to the man I am today. I remember being a young man wanting to prove myself and find my own patch of light. Today, I have my own patch of light. After years of fighting for it, I now do not want to lose those tall tress that shaded me so I could get here.