The Mortality of Heroes

A few weeks ago we received the unwelcome news that a good friend of ours has been diagnosed with brain cancer.  Radiation and chemotherapy can slow down the disease but they can't eradicate it.  Our friend is a world-class theoretician, extremely influential in his field, whose productivity has continued well beyond retirement.  The news was hard for me to grasp.  How could such a formidable intelligence succumb to attack?  Besides, our friend is a decent, kind human being, a thoroughly nice guy, a mensch.   Is it fair that the gods have hurled that thunderbolt at him? But what, after all, has fairness to do with it?

I’ve long admired him and somehow I imagined that an academic superhero like him would manage to live forever. This was stupid, I know, but that’s the way I felt.  His diagnosis was deeply upsetting to me.

Of course one is sad when a good friend is diagnosed with a terminal disease.  One is sad for one’s friend, for the suffering that’s bound to ensue for him and his family, and one is sad for oneself, for the prospect of losing him.  My wife and I attended his wedding reception, he and his wife spent a weekend with us, and we’ve spent weekends with them, memories that I treasure.   But he’s been more than a friend.  He’s been a hero to me and that’s one of the roots of my severe reaction to this news.   The other source is that I've not yet come to terms with the mortality of those I love.  I know I'm mortal but somehow I expect my friends to live forever. 

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