Ephemeral

By Allan Yap & Nigel A. Skelchy

When you attend a funeral, especially of someone you don't expect to die, you realise how ephemeral life can be.

Ron was as close to an elder brother I'd ever have. In many ways he was what you might call the perfect elder sibling. He was never there to spoil the fun like many elder siblings I know, he was quiet, kind, never judgemental, but caring, generous of spirit and loving, in his own way.

His way of loving someone wasn't my overt demonstrative hugging/backslapping/telling style but it was him. And I didn't realise that I'd miss him this much.

I was very close to him but yet there was a wall that was difficult to breach. I always felt that time will allow us to get closer but that assumption is always a dangerous one as demonstrated by events.

During the whole of last week, I basically had something to do to take my mind off him. I kept an eye on Carol CC and the girls. I knew they'd need my support as his Mum had Y and Mum had Dad.

But now that we're back home and back to "real life" again, it's just weird how at the oddest moments I'm drawn back to memories of him and how it'll be impossible to create more new ones. And that saddens me. He had become such a fixture in such an unobtrusive way that it's hard to imagine odd weekends without him showing up at the house.

Ron had a tremendous instinctiveness to how he lived his life. He knew in his own quiet way the choices to make in treating people, in being his own person, and how to be a friend to others. Most of us rely on self help books but he was the living epitome of one.

I'll miss him.

See you Kor Kor.