Yesterday our friend Bruce “slipped the surly bonds”¹ of his ALS-ravaged body and departed this earth for whatever lies beyond.  This has been long anticipated, and it is in many ways a release and a relief for him and for those who love him.  But that doesn’t make it easy for those of us he left behind, especially his wife Lynette.  I myself am just at the front end of coming to terms with his death.

Bruce made several appearances and contributions to Elder Chaplain, so much so that many of you have told me you feel you know him, even though you have never met.  So I feel the need to share his passing with you, along with a few brief remembrances.

When I launched this blog in 2022, Bruce offered me the photo at top, which he took of Comet Neowise in 2020, to use as my home page photo.  We loved the notion of a bright light burning itself out gradually while heading toward an even greater light over the horizon.  I find comfort in imagining Bruce now basking in that even greater light.

As Bruce’s ALS progressed, he and I embarked on a series of conversations we called “Hard Earned Wisdom,” which culminated in the post Choosing Life, One Day at a Time.  This post only begins to capture the wisdom I feel I have received from this remarkable man.

Over the past year Bruce and Lynette inspired a group of us to undertake a challenging climb on behalf of ALS Northwest, which supported them in living the fullest life possible despite ALS.  The posts Practicing Hope—For ALS and The Abode of the Gods attempted to capture this uplifting experience.  We are all deeply appreciative of the contributions made to ALS Northwest by readers of Elder Chaplain.

A year ago Bruce asked me to serve as “emcee” for his celebration of life, and the conversations Bruce, Lynette, and I have shared over the past two months have been among the most intimate I’ve ever experienced.  As Lynette said at one point, it’s surreal, even weird, for loved ones to sit around a circle discussing the memorial for one of the participants, yet it is also lovely and wonderful—something we might all wish for.  We reviewed the final draft of the program—what felt to me like Bruce’s last piece of unfinished business—two days ago, and we agreed his work was complete.

Now comes the hard part—living without Bruce.  Hard for all of us who love him, but especially for Lynette, and their children and grandchildren.  As a community of family and friends, we will gather in a few weeks to celebrate Bruce just the way he wanted.  All too often we attend gatherings like this, share deeply heartfelt condolences, then return to our day-to-day lives, leaving family members to navigate the long road of grief on their own.  My sense—and commitment—is that this will be different, that those of us in Bruce and Lynette’s circle have been so transformed by their journey that we will stay on that long road with Lynette and family—just the way Bruce wanted.

1. From “High Flight” by John Gillespie Magee, Jr. Bruce’s father was career Air Force, and a passionate amateur aviator. Bruce loved telling stories of his father’s love of flight. ↩︎

The seeds for my “Spirit Quest 2026” were planted many years ago.  They came to fruition this past July, when four fellow climbers and I, along with two guides, spent five days in pursuit of the summit of Mt. Olympus, in the heart of Olympic National Park.  Several of us, including our friends Bruce and Lynette, began discussing a climb of Mt. Olympus more than a decade ago, but when Bruce was diagnosed with ALS in 2021, these plans fell by the wayside.

Few diseases offer less hope than ALS, yet since his diagnosis Bruce has been practicing hope and inspiring others to do the same.  Last fall I proposed reviving the idea of climbing Mt. Olympus, but this time as a fundraiser for ALS Northwest, which has provided Bruce and Lynette with invaluable support.  Our crew of five came together quickly, and the way forward opened:  we found a guide service we all liked, ALS Northwest jumped in enthusiastically, and soon we had permits for our preferred dates.

Fundraising is an activity most people dislike—including us—but this was simply a matter of inviting people to participate in something larger than themselves:  to express support for Bruce and Lynette, even if not known by most who were solicited, and to practice hope for a future without ALS.  We practiced hope ourselves by setting a fundraising goal of $15,000 with no idea where it would come from, but in the end we raised $27,000 from 127 donors.

Mt. Olympus is named after the home of the gods of the ancient Greeks, and aptly so.  The trail begins in the heart of the Hoh River rainforest, which receives 140+ inches of rain annually, producing trees of extraordinary size presiding over a lush canopy and groundcover.  The scale of this landscape was the first of many reminders that we were but brief visitors to a world created and governed by forces more powerful than ourselves, and that we should tread respectfully, humbly, even reverently.

After traversing 12 miles of level valley floor the trail begins climbing, at first gradually, then with steadily increasing steepness, and each of us began encountering another form of humility: the limitations of our bodies.  For one of us, it was the lingering effects of a sinus infection; for another, foot blisters.  For myself, it was simply exhaustion from the exertion of ascending with a 50-pound pack.  After dinner on our second evening we gathered to assess our capacity for a summit push the next day; we each took inventory of what we felt capable of, and we developed a plan that fit each person’s desires and abilities.  Three (plus a guide) would rise early and ascend the Blue Glacier until an agreed-upon turnaround time; another climber and I (with the other guide) chose to rest our bodies for the return trip, then ascend to the Blue Glacier overlook to enjoy the view and await our companions’ return.

No one reached the summit, but in the end this journey delighted us all.  The vast expanses of glaciers and peaks were breathtaking reminders of the glory of our created world and our small place within it.  In this alpine heaven, it felt as if the boundary between the terrestrial and the celestial had parted, giving us a glimpse into the world beyond even if we couldn’t enter it.  As seasoned climbers, we seek the summit, but here it felt like more than enough to enter the Olympian abode of the divine, to share our hopes and prayers, and to leave offerings of gratitude:  for our own experiences, for the donors and well-wishers who supported our journey, and for all that Bruce and Lynette have brought to our lives.

Psalm 90:12, a favorite verse I have often reflected upon, says, “Make us know how few are our days, that our minds may learn wisdom.”  Increasingly, I encounter limitations not only of time but also of my body, and my hope is to gain wisdom from these encounters.  After my 70^th birthday in 2025, I realized my days for undertaking this climb were growing fewer, as were the chances to honor Bruce and Lynette while he is still with us.  I am so grateful for the nudge to make this happen, and that Bruce was able to celebrate with us afterwards. 

This climb also helped me embrace the fact that, as I age, the list of things I can no longer do is continually growing, yet there also remains much I can still do.  Bruce has embodied this wisdom throughout his journey with ALS, and one of the best ways I can honor that is to “go and do likewise.”

As a chaplain, and as a friend, I often tell others, “Loss is unavoidable—the best thing we can do is show up and accompany each other through it.”  Today I invite you to accompany me through the loss of my dear friend Rosalie.

Rosalie has already been introduced to readers of Elder Chaplain, as she was a central character in my 2025 post “Here for Each Other.”  I invite you to revisit this post now for additional insights into my remarkable friend.  As mentioned there, the first impression Rosalie made on me was during a Quaker meeting in 2006, when she shared movingly of how she was coping with her metastatic breast cancer.  What I didn’t mention is that, six months prior to that post, Rosalie’s cancer sprang back to life.  It had spread throughout her bones, and this time there would be no respite.  Rosalie died earlier this month, surrounded by family.

Of all the words I might choose to describe Rosalie, “caring” and “integrity” rise to the top.  Rosalie was a physician, and caring is what she did in all dimensions of her life.  Her outward demeanor was reserved, and she could be direct to the point of bluntness, but her heart for life and for healing shone through.  Early in our relationship, she asked if she could speak with me privately as a larger meeting was breaking up.  She said, “You’ll need paper and a pen.”  She then proceeded, “You’re having your hip replaced next month.  Here are the things you’ll need that your surgeon may not be thinking of.”  Her recommendations, from icing machines to constipation remedies, proved invaluable.

Rosalie and I often served together on spiritual care committees for others at our Quaker meeting, and for several years we both participated in a group called Shepherds, focused on the broader needs of our community.  Rosalie frequently identified needs that no one else had noticed, and took actions that made sure those people felt seen and supported.  As mentioned in my earlier post, Rosalie convened a care committee for me when I was diagnosed with prostate cancer.  And she accepted my offer to convene a care committee for her when her cancer returned.

When Rosalie’s oncologist came into their first appointment after imaging showed a return of her cancer, she handed Rosalie a treatment plan involving aggressive chemotherapy.  Rosalie said she’d had Taxol before—and it was awful.  Speaking doctor to doctor, she asked: What is midpoint of the bell curve of survival under the proposed plan? Around five years.  And if she chose not to follow the treatment plan?  Two and a half years.  Rosalie felt she’d rather have two and a half good years than five years of potential misery.  And that was that.

Rosalie’s perspective was one of profound gratitude.  “Of course I’d rather live a longer life, but mostly I’m thankful for the 18 years I was given after my initial diagnosis and treatment.  Then, my daughter was in high school; now, I’m going to see her get married.  I’ve been given so much life over these 18 years, how could I complain I didn’t get more?”  It’s a gift to be in the presence of someone as deeply grounded as Rosalie.

After a roller coaster of treatments intended (and sometimes succeeding) in improving her quality of life, Rosalie entered hospice last November. Soon she felt much less pain.  A few weeks later she sent me an astonishing email, entitled “What Shall I Do While Waiting to Die?”  Her goals:

• Increase my aqua jogging time slowly to 30 minutes (from 20 now)
• Step dance holding on to the refrigerator handles three times a day
• Finish another baby quilt
• Wait for spring to arrive so that I can again walk in the garden
• Smile a lot and try not to watch people’s amazement when I tell them that I am in hospice

I’m so happy she had the chance to accomplish all of these goals during her remaining months.

Which brings me to the topic of quilts …  The photo accompanying this post is of the quilt Rosalie gave me when I was recovering from surgery for my prostate cancer.  She made one for my daughter after she underwent a difficult surgery.  She made a large one for our Quaker community to remember her by, and when she presented it to the community last September, she shared these words.  “I love giving away things that I have made.  It gives me joy to think that someone will warm their knees under a quilt that I have made.”  (As I have, countless times.)  She continued, “Many of my quilts have spoken to me over the years about community, and this one also speaks of community.  That each of us has a unique gift to each other, and together—together—we make something greater, stronger, and more beautiful.”  I have learned so much from Rosalie about how to be in community, and I have sought to emulate her spirit as I nurture my own communities.

Rosalie began that presentation by quoting from a card she had received, which she thought captured well how she tried to approach quilting.  I think it applies equally well to how she approached life.

Advice From a Glacier
Carve your own path
Go slow
Channel your strengths
Smooth the way for others
Keep moving forward
Avoid meltdowns
Be cool

On the morning of August 21, 2017, I gather with several family and friends high on a southwest-facing slope under crystal clear skies.  Slowly the sun’s intensity begins to fade, the shadows cast by nearby trees become less distinct, the chatter of the birds in those trees dies down.  We fix our gaze across the valley at a long ridge about 30 miles away.  Having learned that the path of totality moves across the ground at about 8 miles per second, we know that when we see that ridge go dark, it will be our turn in four seconds.  And that is exactly what happens.

Like millions of others along the path of totality that day, we quickly remove our protective glasses and, for just under two minutes, we stare awestruck at the silvery disk of the moon, illuminated by the glow of a full earth, surrounded by the iridescent brilliance of the sun’s corona, all set against the eerily dark sky.  We wish desperately for this moment to linger, that we might savor this surreal display for much longer, but the laws of the universe do not acknowledge our desires.  The moment quickly passes, a moment we all know we are unlikely to ever experience again.

◊

This morning I rose early to catch the last phase of a lunar eclipse, another wondrous celestial event, even if much less rare or spectacular than a solar eclipse.  It brought back memories of that special day in 2017, along with an associated theological reflection I have often pondered. 

Eclipses, it seems, are bound to happen in just about any solar system like ours, where planets orbit suns and moons orbit planets.  Indeed, spacecraft sent out to explore our solar system have observed them on other planets.^[1]  Nothing too unusual, if you think about it for a bit.

We on earth, though, experience an extraordinary circumstance.  The relative size of the sun and the moon, as viewed from earth, are virtually identical, which is what makes solar eclipses so spectacular.  If our moon was smaller (or farther away) we would get only a partial eclipse; if it was larger (or closer) we would not see the sun’s corona surrounding it, just total darkness (as this morning’s eclipse would have appeared if viewed from the moon).  This delicate alignment of size and position creates the conditions that have struck awe into human beings from the beginning of our history.

All of which can lead a person to wonder:  Why did this precise, unusual alignment occur in the solar system and on the planet which we happen to occupy?  And, separately:  Why does the occurrence of a solar eclipse cause humans across space and time to react with such intense emotions, whether of fear, wonderment, or joy?

The traditional response, across history and cultures, is that this must be the work of a power far greater than ourselves, one that not only created the world and universe that we occupy but also created us as beings who seek to make meaning of our existence and our experiences.  One might call this the religious response, and solar eclipses are just one small example of the phenomena that have generated this response throughout the ages.

An alternative response, more common in our modern era, is that there is no such design or intent to creation, that our universe and all life within it arose from an unknowable event and proceeded according to scientific laws, and that we should make meaning of our existence and experiences without resorting to supernatural thinking.  According to this response, which one might call atheistic, it is mere coincidence that the earth, sun, and moon align in a way that creates the solar eclipses we experience.

As I faced this morning toward the partially shadowed moon and contemplated these thoughts, I didn’t find myself drawn to either of these schools of thought, certainly not toward one to the exclusion of the other.  Rather, my overwhelming sentiment was simply, “However this came to be, I am awestruck, and I am grateful.”  As I considered this further, I was struck by the irrelevance of this dichotomy, of such either/or thinking.  What matters most, I reflected, were the sentiments that arose within me.

One of the founding principles of chaplaincy is that we meet people where they are in their time of crisis, and we help them use whatever tools they have—religious, spiritual, emotional, intellectual—to try to navigate their crisis in a way that is, for them, coherent, meaningful, and effective.  To help them move through the crisis and ultimately find peace, irrespective of whether they possess a religious or an atheistic orientation, or something in between.

I have long appreciated a saying of the writer Anne Lamott, which sidesteps the dichotomy of religious vs. atheistic thinking.  One way to think of God, she suggests, is simply as a name for whomever it is we are speaking to when we cry “Help!” “Thanks!” or “Wow!” when there is no one else around,^[2] as most of us do from time to time.  I know that when I gazed at the lunar eclipse this morning I audibly uttered “Wow!” and when I remembered my wonder at the solar eclipse, I smiled and spoke a silent “Thanks!”  God remains beyond my understanding, but these spontaneous utterances are evidence of my belief that that there is a power far greater than myself toward whom I am grateful.

Photo credit to Bruce Alber, my friend profiled in Choosing Life, One Day at a Time. Bruce is a wonderful astronomical photographer whose photo of a comet heading toward the horizon at sunrise graces my home page. I am grateful to share that Bruce is still enjoying life, one day at a time.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solar_eclipses_on_Jupiter

[2] Anne Lamott, Help, Thanks, Wow: The Three Essential Prayers, 2012