When Old Friends Leave
Dec 2nd, 2006 by Don Ray
I went to a Yahoo website this morning that I visit often. It is a site of a past company of mine and is made up of retirees of the company. I worked for that company for 3 months less than 30 years and I have many friends that I have known so long that they are almost like family. When I joined the company it had 2,000 employees and when I retired there was over 120,000.
The website was originally set up for all of us to compare our plans for entering retirement and many discussions lately have been on healthcare issues such as insurance, Medicare, prescription expenses and other various costs that people that are now living on a fixed income have to deal with.
Unfortunately it has also been the source of information of this friend or that friend passing away. There was a time several months ago that I would see a new name on the deceased list every week. For the last few months it has been quiet and the postings have turned to talking about the world’s problems.
Today when I went there I saw the notice that another of my friends had died. He was five years younger than me. It was another notice to me of how precious life is and how we need to enjoy each day that we are here as though it might be our last.
Each time I see one of my friends pass away, it puts me in a melancholy mood. It was on another day like this that I penned “Where Did It GO?” and “Time”.
PAINTER, KENNETH, Beloved husband, father, brother and grandfather, passed away Thursday, November 30, 2006. He was born in Dalhart, TX in 1947 and grew up in Amarillo. He had a 31-year career with EDS. Mr Painter is survived by his wife, Wendy Ward of 14 years; his children, Torey Painter Reichwein (Rick) and Tony Painter (Mandy): grandchildren Jack Reichwein and Nikolas Painter; and his sister Shirley Scholz (Karl). He was preceded in death by his parents, Lelan Painter and Helen Crume, and sister, Nora Lincycomb. Family will receive friends at the Funeral Home on Sunday, December 3rd from 6:00 to 8:00 pm A memorial service will be held on Monday, December 4th at 11:00 am at the funeral home chapel. Memorials may be made to the American Cancer Society, 8900 Carpenter Frwy, Dallas, TX 75247 or 800-227-2345. Dignity Memorial Ted Dickey 2128 18th Plano (972) 424-4511
Farewell Ken. I will miss you.
Ah… your too hard on yourself, I choose to live in the present and future…NOT the past!
I always live in the present, but to do so well you need to learn lessons from the past. I never live for the future.
My condolences, Don Ray. I am sorry to hear of the death of your friend. About all that we can do in a situation like this is to cherish the times we shared with them.
Thanks for leaving a comment. Yes, there is nothing we can do to avoid death. We can only do our best to be prepared and to not have too many loose ends lying around for others to take care of when we are gone.
Ken Painter is my father. He taught me many good lessons. The most important are to love, live in the moment and enjoy life and good friends.
Hi Torey. Sorry about your dad. You had a good teacher.
I got an email today looking for someone who had experience building data centers. I had not talked to Ken Painter in years but he was the first name that popped into my mind so I thought I would look him up and see what he is doing and if there might be an opportunity to get him involved. Your blog was the first one I found when I did a google search for Ken. So, I was really saddened to learn that he is gone. I worked with Ken Painter in Jakarta Indonesia in 1997 and had so much fun being around him. Especially after we found that we went to the same high school (Amarillo High) and there we were running into each other on the other side of the planet. He was adventurous and had a wonderful sense of humor. He hiked into the jungle with some of the drivers and spent the night in a remote village eating village food in something right out of National Geographic. Because I was so impressed with him. I recruited him to work on a project in Malacca Malaysia for a PETRONAS petroleum refinery. He was a terrific person and a true friend. I’m so sad that he is gone and really wish I had done a better job of keeping in contact with him over the years. Thank you for posting the info about his passing away. — Jerry Ferguson (jerry.ferguson@eds.com)
Hi Jerry.
Thanks for stopping in and taking the time to leave a comment. None of us do a good enough job of keeping up with past friends. At this time of our lives, there are more of us leaving everyday.
Thanks for taking the time to share some memories of Ken.