So, a few of you “tune in” every Monday and Friday to see what news I have to post. I must disappoint you at the moment, for I have no news. Or, actually, I have a little news but no time to write. I’ll hopefully get back here before the end of the day and add what the news is.

Saturday, August 20, 2016, writing about Friday

The morning suggested we would get rain. Radar showed it close at hand. But, when I looked outside the windows at noon, the sky seemed lighter than it had an hour ago. I went outside, walked to the north side of the building, where the break room is, and got my bag lunch out of the fridge. Our building is being remodeled, and right now the middle of the building is closed to us. So we have to go outside to go between the north and south parts of the building.

Lunch eaten, I decided to risk the rain and take a walk. One circuit up and down the commercial subdivision road is a half-mile. On days when it’s not too hot I like to do a mile. In these hot days of summer, I walk less, and stay on a shorter route that has more shade than direct sunshine. But on Friday I decided to take the full route. Naturally, as soon as I get a ways away from the building the sun breaks through the clouds. I should have taken the shade route.

I enjoyed the walk, Normally I sing as I walk at noon. The sight distance is good. I can see if anyone is up ahead, and can quit when I need to. Some days I sing oldies; some worship songs; some hymns. I tend to sing songs I’ve written lyrics to. To clarify, I don’t write songs. But from time to time I’ll take the lyrics of a song and either add a verse or improve on them. I like to take secular songs I like and write Christian lyrics to them. Every now and then an idea comes to me on how to improve them, or even for something new. I guess I’ve changed or completely rewritten the lyrics on between 5 and 10 songs.

But on Friday I didn’t feel like singing. I walked in silence, my mind full of the many things I have to do in life, how some were going well, some not so well, none seemingly ever finished. A scheduling problem that needs to be worked out over the next three weeks was up front, dominating my thoughts. I was hoping another person was going to step up and take care of this, but it seems like that’s not going to happen. So the things that will need to be done presented themselves like a to do list in my mind.

I didn’t take time to sing, or to watch the birds go by, or to observe the condition of the vegetation all around me. I suppose work was going on at the large construction site right next to our office complex, but I wasn’t aware of what was going on, so all consuming was the problem I was working through.

But the sun came out more fully, about the time I was on the part of the loop farthest from any trees. I decided I’d just do a half mile. The temperature wasn’t too hot—in the upper 80s, but I still didn’t feel like doing the whole mile.

I got back into the building and immediately had a large cup of cold water, to re-hydrate. The scheduling problem wasn’t fixed. I still had a full afternoon of work at the office, with more work to do when I got home in the evening. But I felt better for walking. I’d burned a few calories, worked my brain.

So what was the point of this blog post? I haven’t added to the collective wisdom of the world. I guess I worked my brain, on a day when I was working my body with menial, occasional tasks. So that’s good.

I should be posting something today, and had intended to post about what writing I’m doing. But honestly, I’m rather brain weary right now, so instead I’m going to post something I posted on Facebook, something I wrote that I find funny, about the 2016 presidential election. You may not find it funny, but I do.

Way back in 1992 or so, I was his supervisor. I’ll call him “Joe”. Joe came to us from California, and I’m not quite sure how he got to northwest Arkansas. He was an engineer on my staff, designing subdivisions and managing projects. I remember one subdivision he was project manager on. I didn’t have enough staff to go around, in a boom time, so, even though I was his supervisor and department head of 19 people, I assigned myself to design the sewer system for the subdivision. It went well, me being his boss and at the same time an engineer on his crew. He was transferred by us to Los Angeles, to open an office there.

After that I lost track of him, except for a few months when we would be on a certain weekly conference call. I don’t know if he left us of his own volition or was laid off. I never did understand exactly what the work load was in that office, and whether Joe had anyone but himself when it was closed.

Through the miracle of Facebook, we re-connected a couple of years ago. He was still in the LA area, operating his own firm. Quite soon after our reconnection he sold the company. I remembered him being a few years younger than me, so didn’t think he would retire. Sure enough, before long he was in the Dallas area, working for a large architectural/engineering firm. However, soon after that he was in another job, one that required him to travel frequently to the Texas Panhandle—or maybe temporarily relocate there. That job didn’t last long, something about the owner of the company and some funny business, perhaps financial.

We didn’t have a whole lot of interaction on Facebook. I’d like his posts—which were fewer than mine. Once I posted something negative about a presidential candidate, and in comments mentioned how I didn’t like where that candidate stood in their personal life, especially concerning a religious experience. Joe shot back at me, angrily, saying he himself had had a religious conversion since I’d known him. It was a strange post, given that I was talking about a candidate, not the candidate’s supporters. Joe took it personally, as did a couple of others, I might add.

Soon after that Joe was back in northwest Arkansas, working in the engineering department of a local architectural company. He came by the office one day, on the noon hour, to see any of his old acquaintances. I was the only one who was in, or who responded to the receptionists call. Joe and I sat in the lobby and had a nice conversation for a half hour. It was then I learned the facts of his two recent Texas jobs, and how he came to be back in these parts. He said his wife hadn’t moved yet from California, but would be in a few months.

Not too long after that Joe posted on Facebook that his personal computers had been hacked, his webcams hijacked for ransom, his bank account cleaned out, right after he’d had an infusion of cash from somewhere. The bank was going to make good on it, he said, but it was a hassle. It seemed like he was having a string of bad luck.

Before long Joe sent me a Facebook message before working hours one day, saying he wanted to call me. I messaged him my phone number, and before long we were talking. He was no longer at his new job, because, he said, “It’s not an engineering company.” He didn’t come out and say if he’d quit or been fired, and I didn’t ask. He said he had the prospect of getting on with another local, small engineering company, but said he really wanted to come back to us. But, he said, he couldn’t get through to the two people who would be the decision makers. Could I help him.

I told him who the decision maker was in this case, a man he didn’t know, who had come to us after Joe left, which was 21 or so years ago. I said I would talk with my supervisor, who would have a big part in the decision. I said I normally met with him on Friday (we were talking on Monday), and said I rarely saw him at other times during the week unless it was in a meeting with others. I said I’d talk with him and see what the prospects were, but that it would likely be on Friday.

As it turned out, that Friday meeting was cancelled, so it took a week longer to make Joe’s plea for re-employment with us. I didn’t get much encouragement. Having bad news to report, I didn’t immediately pick up the phone. It’s not an easy thing to be the bearer of bad news.

Meanwhile, Joe ended up in a hospital. He posted that his intestines were in a knot. Then, just a few days later, he posted about trouble with his wife, that he had offered to fly her to northwest Arkansas for a visit while she had a week off work. He reported that she replied if they waited till Labor Day they could save some money. In his post Joe said such a reply meant it was over, and that “I love you, Mindy [name changed].” I didn’t know his wife’s name, and assumed that was her.

Two days later a friend of his posted to his timeline, asking if anyone had heard from him in the last couple of days. Another man at our work kept in touch with him, and said Joe wasn’t answering his phone or messages, and that he asked the police to go out and do a wellness check. Later that day he pulled me over and said Joe had committed suicide via gunshot.

Looking back at the chain of events I just described, I can see the downward spiral. The other man at work has told me a few things I didn’t know. It made me feel bad that I hadn’t gotten back to Joe with the bad news. Possibly, knowing that a friend had followed-up on a request, even though that follow-up didn’t result in good news, might have seemed like a bright spot in his difficult life.

Death is coming to all of us, the one certainty of life. We don’t know when it will happen. Many don’t prepare for it, or even if they do, when death comes it comes suddenly. How can we really prepare for it, apart from a solid relationship with our Creator?

Alas, Joe. Sorry if I failed you in some way. I hope you found peace.