Lingerdog's World

A friend of mine from childhood died Friday, he was young, well by my standards young anyway. Twenty Eight is too young to go, but it happens everyday, some expected after a long battle with illness, others a tragic accident that leaves those who remember, and those who love, in shock and dismay, that a rock in their world, is gone into eternity.
I believe he went to heaven, we went to church together, but honestly I don't know, I never took the time to talk to him about his faith or salvation, sadly a missed opportunity.
His name was John Dale "Johnny" King Jr. A story about him in the local paper tells of his life after he left York. And a memorial page for him can be found here. There too are stories shared about Johnny.
And sometimes we face our grief and remembrance alone, because in a world so big, sometimes we think that we are the only people that knew a person. But through sites like facebook, sometimes we learn that a person we knew, also knew other people we knew.
You sometimes learn that the world is a lot smaller place than you had thought, and that we are connected by usually invisible strings that tie us to each other. At a time like this though, we get to see some of those strings, as the people who knew this person speak their condolences for the world to hear, so that this persons death does not pass silently, un-noticed, because in some way, this person made an impact in another persons life.
I see people I know, speaking about Johnny, and I wonder, how did you know him, and how did we never learn that we had a mutual friend.
In a day or two for some of us, and maybe in weeks or months for others, we will go back to our lives, and Johnny will be but a memory to be fondly spoken of at gatherings of mutual friends.
But for others, their lives are forever changed, family, wives and children, they will have this heavy on their hearts for some time, and it is they, that most need to hear the words of consolation and remembrance, to hear that their loved one, is remembered, that their passing is not un-noticed, and that they did make a difference in someones life.