When things are going swimmingly in my family, I know something’s up. I know that it will be short-lived. Not to be ‘doom and gloom’ or pessimistic, it’s just how things pattern themselves in my life. We said goodbye to our friend on Sunday as he was preparing to deploy to Iraq. Our small group had been getting together weekly for about two years: dinner, catch up on life and then into Bible study. We love being together. All of us, minus the guy heading out to Iraq and his wife, got together that Wednesday for our regular weekly meeting. We talked about some pretty philosophical stuff. We talked about free will versus predestination. We went over prayer requests and struggles along with victories. We didn’t foresee how much our lives would be changed in less than a week.

Monday morning I get a phone call. Not from the home of the deploying husband but from the house of one of the gals who’s with us all the time. It was her best friend. “Eric was in a really bad car accident—and he was killed.”

…

What? No. This is Eric. Big, tough guy, Eric. Everyone’s best friend, would do anything to help anyone out, just saw him, Eric. This has been one of the worst weeks in my family’s life. This was my husband’s best friend. Our boys went to preschool together. His wife is a great friend of mine and when Bill was deployed, Eric is the one that would wrap his big arms around me and encourage me. He sang on the praise band with Bill. We had plans for the summer. His wife would look at us military wives and shake her head and say, “I don’t know how you guys do it—I go crazy when Eric’s gone for a week and here you are with your husband’s gone for six months or more.” They were married for thirteen years. Three beautiful kids.

The service was today. Standing room only. He touched so many hearts that people from every stage of his life were present. My husband sang in his honor.

We miss you so much, Eric.