Goodbyes Are Never Easy

After tomorrow afternoon I will have attended two memorial services this summer. One was for a boy at the young age of 17 who died tragically in a car wreck after falling asleep at the wheel. Tomorrow's service will be to remember a coworker I had only had the pleasure of knowing for less than eight months.

Both tragedies.

Caleb Koke was the middle child of my pastors, Rob and Laura Koke of Shoreline Christian Center in Austin, Texas. I became one of the Koke's babysitters when I moved to Austin in 1997. Their kiddos have grown so much as all children do and Caleb was an amazing young man. His death was one of the saddest that I can recall over my lifetime. Watching my dear friends question the loss of their son and also Rob's own father just two weeks prior is hard to wrap my mind around. People who I've admired from a distance and close up were suffering and there was nothing that any of their friends could do for them. It will take time to heal such broken hearts.

David Barney, my coworker at Kershner Trading, was a software developer and as mischevious as they come. He often came into our HR office asking some of the most perplexing of questions and always walked away telling some sort of joke usually about himself. Even the week prior to his death he was helping a coworker and myself as we worked on a prank for another friend at work. You could just tell that he loved the idea of a good practical joke.

And as this week has gone by we've learned more about David, his life beyond our work walls and his life with friends from his work before working with us. You can just tell he was a man of few, but close and dear friends that will truly miss him.

It's hard to know just how to react when you lose a coworker. His desk is no longer occupied. His work no longer touched.

I can only hope that our memorial service we've planned for him tomorrow will honor his memory and will help to remind us how short life can truly be.