I suppose I could wait until next year. Next year, it'll be 10 years.
10.
That's hard to believe. Doesn't seem possible. But then, writing something up on the 10 year anniversary in some ways just seems too cliche and formulaic, and if there's one thing he wasn't, it was formulaic.
Our best friend... my buddy... my brother... an uncle, if only symbolically, to my kids... a stranger to absolutely no one... Bryce Mansfield, passed away on this date 9 years ago today. He was 42 years old. Far too young. Far too early.
I miss him. Early on after his death, the times he crossed my mind, the times I would see something, or encounter something that would make me think of him was much more frequent that it is now. To some, that might sound somewhat demeaning. "What? You don't think of him everyday?" No, I don't. Just being brutally honest, perhaps, but then, I think if we can all just be honest for a moment, that's most likely the case with all of us.
It makes us feel better to say things like, "I miss him everyday," or even post something of that sort to our social media accounts, even though it might not be true. We do it because it makes us feel better just to think it, even if we don't actually believe it. Bryce, and the countless thousands and millions of other lost loved ones aren't here to console us. We must console ourselves with their memories.
And yet, for most of us, somehow, someway, we seem to survive and move on and the daily reminders of those we've lost become more infrequent, replaced by the everyday goings on of whatever paths our lives take after the loss. Sad, in many ways, and too bad, and yet, there's very little we can do about. Building the shrine and not moving on has rarely, if ever, worked out for anyone.
And still, is it so sad after all? Is it so bad that we are frequented less and less with the memories of our loved ones that remind us of a loss that will only surely depress us? I don't think so.
I don't think Bryce would think so either.
You know what happens? As time and distance do their thing, we heal. More slowly for some than others, but we heal nonetheless. And with that healing comes comfort. Time and distance have a strange, mysterious, glorious way of stripping away the bad memories and unhappy moments, leaving behind only the good memories and happy thoughts. It happens in every aspect of our lives. A breakup, a divorce, a lost job, and the loss of a loved one. Over time, the hurt slowly fades away and we're left to remember only the good things.
In every symbolic and spiritual, if not biological, sense of the word, Bryce and I were brothers. As such, we could get on each others nerves and exasperate each other at times. Bryce made decisions in his life I didn't agree with, and I made decisions he didn't like. But you know, I don't remember much of them now. The times I DO remember that exasperated me at the time make me laugh now.
And what I wouldn't give now for Bryce to exasperate me somehow.
If you knew Bryce -- and many people did -- then I don't have to explain him to you. You are full aware of everything that made Bryce, Bryce. From his massive hands, his superhuman strength, his magnificent autograph, and his infectious laugh, to his stupid sneezes, his beautiful photography, his incredible compassion, and his love for Jesus.
A big man, who truly had the biggest heart of anybody I've ever known. Saw the good in everybody, and fiercely protected those he loved. Though not related, he treated my boys as sons, even though they -- and all their friends -- called him Uncle Bryce. True story: My son played basketball with his buddies on their Christian school Jr. High team, and a game -- underway and in action -- came to a halt once when Bryce walked into the gym after tipoff and the boys on the team stopped mid play, yelled "Uncle Bryce!" and ran over and gave him a hug. I'm not kidding.
Bryce had that kind of effect on people.
Look, I could go on and on. Some people complain my blogs are too long anyway. I could write a book about Bryce, and who knows, maybe some day I will. I could tell story after story.
If you knew, you knew. If you didn't, then I feel bad for you, because you missed out on one cool, special dude.
As for me, I have a picture of Bryce hanging in my living room. I hung it on that wall when I moved into this place six years ago, and it will hang there until somebody takes it down long after I'm gone myself. There's a story behind that picture, but it's a little too long to tell here. If you want to hear it sometime, let me know.
But I guess I get to think of Bryce a little more often than I realize, because I walk past that picture and look at it several times a day. So maybe he's not so far back in my memories after all.
I'll tell ya what though. I'm jealous of the Bryce in that picture. Today, Bryce would be 51 years old. I'm sure his body would be breaking down more than it was back then. That's part of what sucks about getting old. But in that picture, Bryce is 40 years old. I'll die someday, and I'll be at least 53. I might be 100. Who knows? But Bryce will be 40 forever. We were roughly the same age for 40 years, but I will never know Bryce as an old man, even though I'll become much older than him.
I don't know, that makes me feel good for some reason. He'll never age. When I'm old and gray, God willing, he'll still be a young man, and in many ways, he deserves that.
Nine years. Next year will be 10. Then 11, and so on. And I'll keep moving on. Missing him, yes. And, maybe, more daily than I realize. And that's OK. It's the good in Bryce that still inspires me to try to be a good dude myself. And if someone, long after I'm gone, writes that I was a good dude, well then I hope Bryce would approve. I think he would.
My youngest son who is loaded up with tattoos that his mother and I hate, was especially close to Bryce. I was glad for it then, and I'm glad for it now. I mentioned above that Bryce had a magnificent autograph. And he did. Just a glorious signature. Very cool. A representation of that signature was my son's first tattoo. I think he did it because he knew his Mom and I couldn't get mad about it.
Bryce would have liked it. That's all that really matters.
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