This morning I woke up to a text on my phone informing me that a mutual colleague had died suddenly. I hadn’t spoken to this person since we’d both moved on to different duty stations, but he had recently left a comment on my blog and we’d attended a military retirement course together a few years back. We were both Americans living our best lives abroad, taking advantage of every moment. I remember in the retirement course that we both had big dreams and expansive ideas about what is possible in the military afterlife. He wound up retiring before me. Our roads diverged. I imagined that he was clicking away, living in his tiny house, doing all of the things that he’d spoken about at his farewell. 

“He was definitely going through a time of change in his life.” That’s all I had been told in that early morning message. As a human being who has been living for a while on this planet, I know full well that this statement can mean any number of things. But amongst the inference, I also knew that I neither wanted nor needed any additional details. It was just sad. It is still sad.  

I’m sitting here in my office waiting for a meeting to start and I look up at a framed photo that I received from that shared duty station. As is custom, the border is filled with goodbye notes from everyone I served with at the time. In the lower left there is a homemade sticker showing a woman in a red suit and hat tipped down covering her face. Around her are the words, “Where in the world is Commander Hallinan”. The logo is taken from the old computer game (and PBS show) Where in the world is Carmen Sandiego? I had found that sticker one day taped up on our out of office white board— sitting next to my name. Sure, everybody knew that I was frequently traveling, but as soon as I saw the sticker, I knew whose desk I should top. Someone who was bright, sharp, and not afraid to share his infectious sense of humor. 

Not long after that sticker showed up, I was serving as a coordinator for our boss’s retirement ceremony from the Navy. One day I sent an email out soliciting ideas for a cake. Immediately, I got a response from this guy: it was just a JPEG showing a supermarket-bought white sheet cake with a scowling stick figure pointing. Below him, “GTFO” was written in red. It was perfect ….even if we ultimately went with something a bit more traditional for our beloved boss and his wife. But that was him. Always ready to lend a genuine hand but also there to ensure that we all had fun with the task. 

He also volunteered to serve as a trip coordinator for a staff ride to Normandy. I had never been there before and thanks to him, I was able to bring my Dad and brother along. I remain so grateful for having taken that trip— and the organization happened because someone like him was willing to step up and take on the extra work to make the rest of us more professionally knowledgeable and yes more empathetic. And if I told him that this is how I’d describe the end result of that staff ride, he’d just shrug his shoulders and say, “I just thought it would be cool.” And that too was true. It was. He was a cool Navy Chief. 

I know that we’re all getting older— and, by doing so, we should count ourselves as incredibly lucky to still be ambulating through our days. I also know that over the years, we’re wading through all kinds of stuff. The good and the bad come at us. Hopefully we’re getting through with a little extra effort and hopefully while remembering to ask for assistance when it gets extra sticky.  Again, I don’t know the details of this particular situation, but after walking a similar path in terms of career and movement, I can presume that life was happening to him. Health, stress, change— all of these life essentials do things to our very easily punctured external layer. 

No matter how I might feel about a person, I absolutely want everyone to have a good life. One that someday they can look back upon and feel proud about. But I also am a realist and accept that nobody can control this outcome with absolute authority. In my view, in the end it’s all a numbers game and nobody knows how things are going to go. Nothing is promised. Sickness. Health. We all meet it as it comes. 

So while I hadn’t seen him in a few years, I am feeling pretty sad today. Waking up every day is a gift, but it can be easy to lose sight of that. I know this because it happens to me all the time. And I can only hope that I don’t need to be reminded of how important it is to remember to ask for help. As for this shipmate we’ve just lost, I will only remember how I knew him in life. A great human being. Yes, a Navy Chief. A person who was always willing to help. Always a positive presence. Always aware of the people around him and standing by to make folks smile. The world no longer has his humor, but the world has a whole bunch of people who feel damn lucky to have known him.