I guess John expressed it best in saying,
“The events I remember,
But their sequence and magnitude is less clear.”
Of course, we were much younger then,
Young principals in West Coast Schools,
Engaged in a profession, we all held dear!
Three old men soaking up the sun,
Reminiscing at Bothwell, the home of Rod
Whose birthday we’d come to celebrate.
Time to bridge the intervening years,
The forty summers since we left the Coast,
When teaching was fun and kids were great!
We’d been retired fifteen years and more
And questions were asked to clarify,
Links to people and times long past.
John, in the middle, was seventy-five.
Rod, the oldest, turning eighty-two,
And I, younger by ten, was last.
We said farewell with a shake of hands –
Glad of the time “To remember when . . .,”
To reconnect – across passing years.
Each reflected on the times we’d shared,
In the past and here today, –
The time for parting quickly nears.
. . .
I turned away to mask my fears.
Bill Edmunds 