Summer Camp: George (Book 16)

I listened to him with only half my attention. He offered me his deepest condolences on my, our, loss. It sounded strictly pro forma, but I appreciated it nonetheless. I smiled at my wife and sat down heavily in my office chair. I picked up my pen, flipped the page on the notepad, and began writing as he talked.
It was going to be a long couple of days, and I couldn’t imagine how we were going to tell the girls. With an inaudible sigh, I concentrated on the lawyer and blew a kiss to my wife. She smiled sadly and closed the door to my office. A short time later, after I’d hung up the phone, I leaned back in my chair and stared at the ceiling, lost in thought.
When I was in high school, and then college, so much of my life consisted of routine. I suppose it’s the same for everyone. Even today, much of my life is routine. Pedestrian. Mundane. But there are times when the routine is broken, and these are the times by which we measure our lives: a kiss, a love, a graduation, the birth of a child, the death of a lover.
Once again, sitting at my desk in the quiet afternoon hours, I thought back to my past, to one of those times when the routine of my life was broken, and the world seemed to change, all at once. As you might have guessed, it was the summer of 1979. But there’s so much to explain before I get there. In many ways, my life changed more during my sophomore year in high school, but the changes were all gradual. They’re obvious to me now, but at the time, I hardly noticed them.