Most of my friends and I are at that stage of life where we give thanks for making it through another day and know that we shouldn't buy anything on time or plan much beyond making a three minute egg.
Still, when one of us dies, it is a shock and the pain of loss is no less great.
One of my best friends died recently and I am struggling to come to terms with never seeing him again.
Although Allen "Skip" Massman was known to a wide circle of friends and acquaintances, flags at municipal buildings did not fly at half staff and no national day of mourning was declared and that is too bad because Skip was one of the last of a breed of Americans that we will not see again, the truly self-made man.
Skip was born in the blistering cauldron of the basin and range country of the American West. I have always believed that hostile desert environments produce a tough brand of people who are forged by the sun's fire and tempered by the unforgiving landscape.
Such a landscape in the American West produced the Apache, the Yaqui and Skip. His environment produced a big, strong man capable of withstanding any adversity and his life's path crafted him into the kind, hardworking, independent and learned person that I came to know.
That early path included rites of passage that few young men of today have a chance to experience. Barely a teen, he left home to make his own way in the world and when old enough, he enlisted in the army and went to war.
Grievously wounded in the Korean conflict, Skip convalesced at Fitzsimons Army Hospital and upon release chose to stay in Denver.
His open, friendly manner made him a good salesman and his work ethic made him a success. His marriage to his wife Sheila was truly a partnership both in business and in a love of life and gave him a companion who matched him stride for stride as they traveled through life together.
Skip and I were an odd couple to become friends. He was country, me, city. He was conservative, I'm liberal. He could build or fix anything. I need detailed instructions just to open a door. He was an opera buff. I'm musically illiterate. He was a gourmet cook and I, as he liked to tell the story, would make hamburger helper and forget to add the hamburger. But we both shared a set of values that included honesty, integrity and an absolute love for this country.
Most people no longer bring to the world the broad experience or the seasoned reasoning that was so much a part of Skip's being and that is a shame for we have always needed people like him and, in these uncertain times, we need them more so.
To say he will be missed is inadequate and I am too poor a writer to create a proper tribute, so I will take what Edwin Markham wrote about the passing of another great American, Abraham Lincoln, and hope it will suffice.
Markham wrote, "When he fell, in whirlwind he went, as when a lordly cedar, green with boughs, goes with a great shout upon the hills and leaves a lonesome place against the sky".
Vaya con Dios, my friend.