If you live long enough you outlive a few friends and numerous pets. Grief becomes a necessary tool of life. And I think replenishing your circle of relationships, both animals and human, becomes essential. But loss is an unavoidable pain for all of us. Some of us have gotten more practice than others as we age.

Boomers are just beginning to enter those years when the kids are gone – which is a loss that hurts. A few friends have begun to die early and unexpectedly. Their parents are beginning to reach their twilight years. And the world just doesn’t seem all that hospitable after all.

This brings us to an interesting phase in Boomer growth. Eighty-four million people are entering some of the most painful years they will face. And when you add to that the loss of physical viability, it can be a bewildering time. It’s always been the case but never has one-third of the population faced this same phase of life at once.

Over my five decades of time I have lost a lot of stuff. And I have grieved over them sometimes for years. It doesn’t seem to get any easier but it does make more sense somehow. I cry hard every time I have to end a visit with my kids who live only ten hours away. But it’s like a million miles to me. I think of them as little tikes, crawling around the house with dirty bobs in their miles, all the little baseball games and times when we were both growing up together trying to figure out what in the heck was going on.

I have a pick-up truck that has 173k miles on it. My dad gave it to me when it was new. I will never part with it. A chunk of my dad lives in my heart in that truck. The thought of not having a place to park it brings grief to my heart. Things even have a grief factor when they are lost. I went through a rough time when I couldn’t afford my house and had to sell it. I still have pictures of it. The loss was crushing. But I have a new house now. And still I miss things about the old one.

This week I faced the loss of another part of my life. Our dog Rocky hadn’t been feeling well. He’s a ten-year-old red heeler. I would have to say he’s the best dog I have ever known. I have lost several dogs but this one hurts. I did have a Springer spaniel named Freckles when I was 17. I loved that dog. She followed me everywhere I went. She’d wait outside stores for me to return. We drove a roofless jeep together like pals. I couldn’t own a dog for years after I lost Freckles.

We found Rocky has a very enlarged heart. I took him to the vet to find out why he wasn’t doing well. She found Rocky had an arrhythmia in his heart. The specialist found he had torn some valves. He had a mild case of congestive heart failure. I asked the usual question, what the prognosis was. The doctor said, “one year.” It hit me hard and I started crying which was embarrassing for everyone. I am a pretty tough guy. But thought of knowing my pal would be gone within a year hit me like a baseball bat hurled into my gut.

Rocky has always had a bad habit of begging at the table. The night I brought him home I fed him from my plate. What the heck! He loved it. He also has a bad habit of barking when there is any movement in the house. Man, that bark sounds like music now. It’s amazing how many thing become endearing when you’ve lost what you love.

I am not sure how things will go for Rocky. The vet said we would need to plan to put him down within the year. My wife, Lori, has relied on Rocky in my absences and rough times we all face. She is going to take the time hard. But at least we know its coming. And we can spoil the old boy.

This year I also lost a friend. Actually we had become mildly estranged. I regret I didn’t make an attempt to see him when I move from Seattle to Boise. He just fell over dead the day after Christmas. He was three years younger than me. And easily the best songwriter I have known. We traveled speaking and singing together several times. He had the bad habit of giving my musical gear away to those who needed it. He would just look at me and say, “you’re not any good anyway and they need it.” I was usually speechless, but laughed. Now I wish he’d given away everything I had so I could cherish more stunned moments.

It is amazing how many things that bothered you when someone was alive seem so healing when you face loss. This will be a good year for Rocky. We have some meds for him that will help him have a more normal year for himself. But he will be gone. I have decided we should get another dog. I will likely outlive the new one, too. But I will never forget Rocky. We are going to have some portraits taken of us with Rocky. He looks a little weaker than he did in his prime but we will have a little shrine and laugh about his barking and how much fun it was to feed him from the table.