Why the neglect?

April 2, 2025

It was 19 steps to the top from street level. A set of doors guard the inside of this old brick structure. As I climbed up these steps, step 3 is where I stopped and took a trip down memory lane. As a kid I sat on the corner of that 3rd step as if I were mayor of the street. Once at the top, the parking lot filled up in waves. Inside, some minor spruce ups. Small decor changes to help modernize the interior and give guests home vibes. The deeper I found myself - 5 feet, 10 and then 20. I was mesmerized. Not by what I saw, rather, what I didn't see.

The pews are exactly the same, but angled, down the center isle, away from center stage. Stained glass now serves as an apex to the windows. I attended this church as a kid. And now, I'm back. At the corner of Russ Street and Babcock Street in Hartford, CT. As a kid, mother would make me go. But today, it was my choice to attended. I attended a funeral at the Seventh Day Adventist church, for a women named Rita, and she was almost 90 years old. Six months prior, her husband, Alfredo of almost 60 years, died in or rather because of a car fire.

I visited Rita shortly after her husband would be sent to the burn clinic for treatment. He ultimately did not make it. It was 4 months ago that I mentioned to Rita and her daughter that I would go visit again, this time with my created family. It never happened. Why does this happen? Why do we not make time to sit with the people that at one stage in life we found important? Yet we can't or don't make time for.

These questions are not because I wanted to see Rita again, although I did and intend to. Rather, just being with the people we love or who love us. People that ask about us any chance they get, to some relative of ours or past friend. It's about the time spent with or not spent with them. Time, the limited, unrenewable resource we struggle so much with.

As a kid Rita and Alfredo took me in to live with them. Their now deceased daughter had a hand in caring for me as did the now patriarch of the family, Loudres, Rita and Alfredo's elder daughter. I spent many years with them. Their family extended their arms to us. Rita and Alfredo were from the same pueblo in Puerto Rico as my parents and my mother would eventually start going to church in her late twenties, where she met Rita and Alfredo - so basically, extended family.

Sitting in this church, nothing has changed and yet so much has. Why did I neglect these people that were so kind to me? I last saw them both alive at their youngest daughters funeral some 12-13 years ago. Then 6 months ago at Alfredo's funeral and now again at Rita's. Yes, I thought of my mom, dead now almost 5 years. Yes, as you may have witnessed yourself, funerals have a way of confronting us with our own death or those we care deeply about. Nothing has changed... and yet so much.

Everyone in attendance has changed. I'M older with kids. The church feels smaller. Oh that man has a limp, wow shes in a walker, wow 'he' passed away? This one can't walk, the other can't stand. Yes, death we think of, but time is what is glaring to me.

We are all against time - what came to me after recounting and reflecting this day, journaling and reflecting on it is, we are running out of time. And so what do I have to do differently? Give my body what it needs to age gracefully and to not become a burden to my kids, as my mother would often say. Secure myself in my day to day with my family. Be better than the man I thought I could or would be. Express more gratitude. Be patient with others and strict with myself. Showing up for those you love and who love you. Being a man of true virtue and walk the line and hold it as it applies to me.

The day I reported above was March 28, 2025. Its taken me a few days to collect my thoughts. I'm still working with Rita, Alfredo and my mothers death. But what I face today, right now and going forward is me being up against the clock. What am I going to do with it?

A good life is not measured by our age, but what we do with the time we’re given…