Play like there is no tomorrow

Written by Mendy Smith
Published: April 25, 2014 at 3:55 AM [UTC]

I just discovered that a dear friend of mine passed away today. He was only a year or two older than I am.

Skip was the artistic director of the HGP band, local music teacher and all-round amazing guy. I had the privilege of playing with him on several occasions on stage and in the pit.

The way he lived his life reminds me that life is way too short. If you are going to make something of it, now is the time to do it. You have to play like there is no tomorrow because it can be cut short at any time.

Rest in peace my friend.

From Krista Moyer
Posted on April 25, 2014 at 12:14 PM

Oh no, Mendy! My condolences on the loss of your friend.

From Yixi Zhang
Posted on April 25, 2014 at 7:07 PM

Mendy, sorry for your loss!

Death has influenced the way of looking and living my life for as early as when I was in my early 20s. I was a young nurse in Shanghai worked with some of the dying people were at my age due to cancers and kidney failures.

Death is probably the only thing that is all around us and a complete certainty, but we refuse to think about until it is right on our shoulders on in front of our eyes. Part of the reason I guess, apart from the discomfort of thinking about this subject, there isn’t a lot we can talk about – it’s not anything we have any clue.

Right now, a very dear friend of mine is dying of lung cancer. I am devastated and I wrote this poem to express how I feel about it at this moment.

The Gardener
~ after Edna St. Vincent Millay’s “Spring”

To what purpose, Spring, do you return again?
You can no longer excite me
with your plump seedlings forcing through the earth,
blushing rose buds and their bumble matchmakers.
I know what I know.

The wind chills my spine as I see
daffodil yellow and poppy red.
The smell of the earth shouts
Flourishing! But
what does that mean? Behind the ribcage, my lungs are
eaten by non-small-cell carcinoma,
a beauty in the eyes of a pathologist.
Above my head cherry blossoms
Explode.

Life in itself is meaningless
without its opposite, which makes life a flight of
slippery steep stairs, down this hill to
the unknowable.

Yixi

From Randy Walton
Posted on April 25, 2014 at 9:27 PM

I'm sorry for your loss Mendy.
Here's a poem I wrote when I was 17, titled "Death".

Death is not predictable,

Nor is it particular.

It is a relentless weight

Resting, till someone falters.

This entry has been archived and is no longer accepting comments.