When We Were Lions

The past few days, I've been thinking a lot about what it means to be young and what it means to be old.  

At age 55, I wonder what it is - beyond the obvious - that's lost on the trip from young to old?

The death of may friend, Steve Bettis, hit me hard, as it did so many of my contemporaries.  I've been in a contemplative mood since I returned from Chattanooga Saturday afternoon, trying to find the meaning of Steve's death, and a life ended prematurely.  What's the lesson in all this or is there one?  

I saw fraternity brothers I hadn't seen in 10 or 20 years, or longer.  It was jarring, frankly, to see - all in one place, all at one time - so many faces from college, from my youth.  Some I recognized, some I didn't.  Many of them, though, looked like old men, or at least older men.  Grayer.  Heavier.  Tired, like life had won a prolonged fight with their youth.  It was almost painful to see.

So many of those guys - especially the ones with whom I'm not particularly close - I remember as young men, boys really, in college.  Youthful.  Clear eyed.  Vigorous.  Carefree.  Innocent.  Life staring at them - and me - like an open road, waiting patiently to be traveled on, destination unknown.  

Now, the end of the road is nearer then ever before, and that's unsettling to me.  Frightening, even. 

How did I get from college to age 55 so quickly?  What have I learned and what have I lost?  Not enough and too much, I fear.  

The college experience is an intense one.  Everyone is on their own for the first time.  No real adult supervision.  Learning to live, every day.  Friendships and relationships form.  Hearts are broken.  All in a four year or, in my case, five year span.  A season of life that passed too quickly but is ingrained in my memory like no other time in my life. 

After a mediation today, I walked around downtown Nashville while I was talking on my cell to Carl P., my close friend from high school, college, and law school.  We reminisced about our early days practicing law, and talked about which attorneys and recently retired and who had died.  

It felt like the first real day of fall - a real chill in the air on a beautiful late afternoon - and I couldn't help but marvel at how much downtown Nashville had changed since I walked the streets there every day in the mid-1990's while I worked at Manier, Herod.  New buildings, new hotels, new bars, new restaurants.  The Arcade a shell of its former self.  

I thought about lawyers - mentors - lost.  Steve Cox, Bobby Jackson, DonYoung, Mark Hartzog.  

I guess, in the end, the memories are what we have and what we hold dear.  Of old friends and of times one our life that are gone, never to return.