A tribute to a friend

By Robert Meyer

This past October 16th, I took time to remember and honor my deceased friend George Honkomp who passed away five years ago the same day. Rather than become melancholy as I mourn his loss, each year I attempt to do something positive to commemorate his life, and how meaningful his friendship was to me.

George spent the last few months of his life in a coma, after an operation to correct a severe medical problem resulted in complications that caused profound brain damage. During that period of time, I had many opportunities to visit with him, but his condition didn't allow for any communications more sophisticated than a gripping of the hand.

I remember the fateful day in which he died. A gray fall day it was. His mother left a message for me at work, saying I should come urgently because his time was short. By the time I arrived at his house nobody was there. All I saw when I looked through the front door window was the hospital bed where he had resided for months, stripped of the linen. My memories with him flashed in front of me.

My thoughts would always go back to the last time we had the chance to have a meaningful conversation in late January of 2001. On that occasion I was able to tell George things that I wanted to say for years. I told him that he had been like an older brother to me. I confessed to him that I had certain failings as a friend that had harmed his own spiritual sojourn through life. It turned into the most meaningful and emotional conversation we ever had.

George never expected me to say the things I did that day, but by some act of providence I had the opportunity — the last one ever presented — to make it count. If George's passing was bitter-sweet, that recollection was the sweet. The bitter was the knowledge that the circumstances of life might never allow for building a friendship like that again, even if such a person were to emerge in my life once more.

In the last year of his conscious life, I made frequent visits to his living room where I would see a Bible on the end table and hear the music or talking of a Christian radio station. George found a renewal in the faith that had energized his purpose in life during his youth.

I remember so often the nights when George stayed with me until 3 A.M., talking about the things we believed in at a 24 hour coffee shop. Often it happened on the night before my military leave was ending, and I had to return back to duty. I don't know how he got up for work the next day, but those exhortations carried me until the next time I came home.

It is still hard not to miss times like those, and I still mourn for their loss.

George was a mentor in my youth — one who taught me the meaning of friendship. How do you adequately honor someone who brought you from eating candy bars to using concordances?

During his illness and after he died, I asked myself why the better man was taken, while I was left behind in this world and temporal life. Everything happens for a reason, though we now see through the glass dimly.

I remember when Jesus was asked why the Tower of Siloam fell, suddenly killing several unsuspecting people. Were they worse sinners than others his followers wondered? Jesus told them that those unfortunate souls were no greater sinners than anyone else, but unless they repented they would also perish.

There was the answer to my question, hidden in principle. If it pleased God that I remain for a season, then I ought to do something with the gift of life I have been given. George would say so himself if he could talk to me now.

The test of a great mentor is how those he influenced carry on in his absence.

When I was just 17 years old, George gave me a copy of this poem, "Two kinds of people," also known as "Lifters and leaners," by Ella Wheeler Wilcox. I know George himself was a lifter, and I believe he was exhorting me to be one also.

There are two kinds of people on earth today,
Two kinds of people no more I say.

Not the good or the bad, for it's well understood,
The good are half bad, the bad are half good.

Not the happy or sad, for in the swift-flying years,
Bring each man his laughter, each man his tears.

Not the rich or the poor, for to count a man's wealth,
You must know the state of his conscience and health.

Not the humble and proud, for in life's busy span,
Who puts on vain airs is not counted a man.

No! the two kinds of people on earth I mean,
Are the people who lift, the people who lean.

Wherever you go you'll find the world's masses
Are ever divided into these two classes.

And, strangely enough, you will find, too, I mean,
There is only one lifter to twenty who lean.

In which class are you? Are you easing the load
Of the overtaxed lifters who toiled down the road?

Or are you a leaner who lets others bear,
Your portion of worry and labor and care?

I'll never forget him.

© Robert Meyer