Carrol Vertrees: Memories brighten the day when losses bring storm clouds

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Carrol Vertrees

Updated: March 6, 2012 8:08AM

Another piece of my teen years left us recently. It probably is normal for people as old as I to get a bit nervous when this begins to happen with regularity.

The eternal timekeeper is out there, in no hurry, knowing that he will get us all eventually.

I was saddened when I read that my Elnora school friend Clint had passed on, but I had to smile, remembering those simple, good days as kids — remembrance helps to ease the sorrow when another piece of childhood disappears.

We played in the school orchestra. He did the trumpet and I played the baritone, aka the euphonium, a word I had not heard of as a kid. Sometimes, for fun, we switched instruments, and I believe now that we were thinking “Go ahead, we can blow our own horns when we enter the real world.”

That one sticks in my mind like an indelible piece of music.

He blew his horn well, working his way through law school and becoming a judge in Indianapolis, a leader in that big city.

His passing reminded me that as we age, we often lose friends and people we love. That’s the way it is. It is stormy in real life. Remembering friendships helps, but storms still come.

As a kid, the storms, the thunder, the winds scared me, and when they hit, we often ran to the cellar. My mom directed traffic. I can hear her now, holding a candle in the darkness: “Hurry, son, a storm is coming.” There is a hymn called “Blessed Assurance,” and it fit those stormy nights. I felt safe, hearing her voice. I can still hear it.

Dark nights, down there with only candles, among the canned pickles and some spiders that probably wondered why they were being bothered. In the bleakness of winter, storms like that don’t hit us, but they are waiting. Always waiting, no matter what the season. Real storms that shake and depress us.

I am no philosopher, just a worrier. I know, though, that when the thunder of life’s storms shakes and scares us, we need havens. When a friend, or someone we love passes on, we can either hide in the cellar indefinitely or come out, remembering the fun we had — the rainbows of our past.

There are psychological cellars, comforting places to go, our own private rooms in the recesses of our minds. Every time we read an obituary of a friend, as I did twice in the space of a few days recently, we may be tempted to stay in our cellars, away from reality.

We have to come out, though. And those of us who have no real cellars must count on finding the quiet places in our minds. Scared or not, there is no choice.

That timekeeper is just doing his ordained duty, part of a drama that has more acts than anyone can count. Sometimes we are the audience, and eventually we are the players.

Sure, I am saddened every time a friend leaves us, but I am able to smile when I remember the time we had together.

Still, there is a small puzzle for me. I wonder if Gabriel, the master trumpeter, could blow on the euphonium.