When I left home I was both frightened and excited. And not long after that, lonely. It was then I learned that everything in the world ... everything, has a time limit. Nothing lasts forever. Looking back I could see the endings I had already experienced. The few friends who had past away, teachers, family. Even though my family had tried to keep the children shielded from such, we knew.

This thought struck me so deeply that everytime I came home to visit my parents I would leave knowing, that it might be the last time I saw them. Every visit, Everytime. Until, finaly, it came true.

Now my son, for better or worse, is on his own. and now I cherish all the time I have with him, and my grandson, my wife, her family, our friends. They have endings too you see. And even more intimate is the thought that

... I have one too.