Terry Lipman

I’m old enough now not to be surprised when informed that a friend died. It’s going to happen to all of us someday. It doesn’t make it any less sad however.

We’re always shocked when someone passes that we knew, or worked with or admired, but as we age the realization or better yet the expectation is always there in the closed compartments of our minds. We all pass when we finished what we came here to do in the density of form.

I was ten when my first friend died. Her name was Libby McCloud. I prayed for her well into my adult years and even to this day I think of her childhood smile and playful teasing.

Through the years when other friends and colleagues passed I attended their services, grieved with others and shared the memories of good times and laughter. We all do that when we attend to the living by respecting the dead.

Yesterday I received the news that a long time friend died of a heart attack. Terry Lipman was a fine man with a great spirit that guided his noble pursuits and earthly accomplishments. He knew about the spirit and feared no ending. He knew that life is eternal. He knew our forms end, but not the spiritual energy that inhabits and guides the body. He knew the individuation of the indivisible continues forever by the grace of love from the All That Is.

A poetic epithet is my gift to his life.

You gave in life your love and light
With grace of self beyond life’s fright.
So now you are forever here
Deep in our hearts your spirit’s near.

Goodbye Terry. The eternal light is now brighter.