(Note: This is an amended version of the essay published 4/30/11, Manila Standard Today. It's a true story. If I had met this guy during his prime I would have married him in a heartbeat. The title is meant to provoke thought -- this could easily be every man's story. We are born, we live, we die. If we're lucky, we find true love and friendship in our lifetime. I like to think there is another, much happier life after this where we can live out our fantasies and be with our loved ones again.)

Just one man’s story

He used to be a fighter pilot during WWII. In the faded photograph, he wore dark aviator glasses and a battered brown leather bomber jacket with interesting patches. A scarf wound around his neck trailed behind him, lifted by a mild breeze. He was standing by the cockpit door of a Lockheed P-38 Lightning, eyes narrowed against the lowering sun. He was grinning cockily, his arm slung casually around the shoulders of another man.

Of the six pilots in his squadron, Lucas was the only one who made it safely back home. He married his childhood sweetheart but lost her and the baby during childbirth. He never remarried. Instead he went back to school on the GI bill. He later became a professor of botany at an Ivy League school on the East Coast. Glowing articles were written about his war exploits and the botanical books and academic journals he published. Much to his embarrassment, he became quite a local celebrity when all he ever wanted to do during his time away from the classroom was to watch his prized orchids grow.

Lucas was well into his 80s when he came to us. His tall, big-boned frame was shaky, his hair pure white. The capable hands that had expertly flown fighter planes and grew astonishing varieties of exotic orchids were palsied and arthritic. But he was still handsome in the way strong, confident men get to be in their old age.

He checked into our facility wearing scuffed cowboy boots, white shirt tucked into faded jeans, and an aw-shucks killer smile on his craggy face. He was an instant hit with the ladies. It hardly mattered that his mind and formidable intellect had started to fail him. In our community, he was just one of many similarly-afflicted senior citizens.

For a number of years now, I have spent Saturday and Sunday afternoons helping out at a continuing-care retirement community for the elderly and the infirm. What had started out for me as a desperate attempt to cope with my son’s untimely death has become a true labor of love for the residents of this facility. Lucas easily became one of my favorites.

Like most retirement homes of its kind, this campus provides a graduated level of care for its residents. Incoming freshmen (youthful individuals or couples from their mid to late 60s) live in self-sustained cottages. At age 90 or thereabouts, when they no longer have the strength or interest or good health to maintain their own homes and yards and cook their own meals, residents move into one of the condo-style apartments in a multi-storied building where the choices range from studios to single- and 2-room combinations with toilet and bath and a mini kitchen.

Each floor has its own communal kitchen and laundry room and on the ground floor there is a spacious dining room for residents and their guests. There is also a spa, exercise room, hobby room, gift shop, computer /business center, and a library. The waiting area is furnished with comfortable couches, fresh flower arrangements, a grand piano, and a fireplace. The six-story building has the look and feel of a boutique hotel.

Lucas moved into a choice corner room on the fifth floor overlooking the lush gardens and resident flower plots. From his veranda, he had breathtaking views of Puget Sound and Vashon Island. Mount Rainier peeked on the east horizon and on the west, the Olympic Mountain range. It was not a bad place to be for a man who loved open spaces and the wide expanse of the sky.

He was content. He tended to his plants, volunteered at the library, and spent many happy hours recalling earlier times. He would take out the faded photograph from his wallet and regale me with stories about the war. Not the sad, terrible things he experienced but the excitement and wonder of meeting people and making friends with strangers who didn’t even speak his language. He spoke of the joy and thrill of flying and how it almost made up for the horrors of World War II.

I showed him the photographs I kept in my own wallet and told him about the boy who dreamed of being a pilot, but never became one. How death came for him so suddenly, without warning and without mercy. Lucas said if he ever made it to heaven he would teach Dexter how to fly. The thought of my son in the cockpit of a vintage fighter plane doing loop the loops with angels in the sky was immensely entertaining.

Then one day Lucas had a particularly bad fall and when he came out of the hospital he was on a wheel chair. He still wore his cowboy boots but he never walked again. All too soon he had to give up his apartment and move to our assisted-living facility where he received help with daily living: keeping track of his medication and doctor’s appointments, getting dressed, bathing and eating. I think losing his independence finally broke his spirit.

Spending time with Lucas taught me one thing. Nothing ever prepares you for death. Even when you know it’s coming; even when it’s imminent. I knew Lucas was failing rapidly, yet I was unprepared for the sorrow that gripped me when he passed away.

I wonder if there really is life after death? It's comforting to think that Lucas lives again in that wondrous place where angels are rumored to be, and that all my loved ones, my son Dex and my mom, are waiting there for me.