Trailing off

What has been called a curse — “may you live in interesting times” — has been a blessing.

Hot dang, what a ride, this life. Travel, adventure, romance, exclamation points.

Filled with joy, sorrow, glee, despair, sin, remorse and utter catastrophe and triumph, all while balancing on the smoldering edge of the great abyss, I’ve been blessed to have danced on embers to the sound of an unknown orchestra playing ad lib. (How’s that for convoluted? Pretty much like living.)

This western society has so many euphuisms for death, the great unmentionable. Perhaps that word is frightening or offensive. Tough. We have pass away, “The Big Sleep,” “The Long Goodbye” the end, transience and a plethora of other code words and phrases. All so we don’t have to face it. Personally, this ego is partial to the word transformation as an apt description.

I’ve been blessed to have made a living doing what I love, so it was never work. Family, friends, loved ones and enemies especially were the greatest teachers. Hospice volunteering has brought the deepest benediction and the greatest sadness. Although musicians Seals and Croft wrote “We may never pass this way again,” I have a feeling I’ll be returning time after time until I get it right.

As you read this I’m on the greatest adventure.

In the immortal words of Daffy Duck, “That’s all, folks.”

Editors note: Kelly wrote this column just before he left the Cibola Citizen to move to Arizona to be close to his family in his end days. Kelly asked for this column to be published after he passed. The Citizen respected those wishes. See his obituary on page B6.