It is late 2021. I listen in stunned silence as my urologist goes over my prostate biopsy results. After years of monitoring my PSA levels had begun climbing, and now I know why: “Grade Group 3 = Gleason 4+3=7” is as cryptic as it gets, but its interpretation—“Intermediate Unfavorable”—is not.

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This is a story of how friends can show up for one another—and, in particular, how friends showed up for me at this moment. It begins fifteen years earlier, and the community from which it arises goes back yet further. These memories are filtered through my own lens of experience. I have shared what follows with each friend and I have incorporated their memories—filtered through their own lenses—to land closer to the truth. The story is ultimately mine, but each friend agreed to include their story for any benefit it might bring to others.

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It is 2006. Rosalie, a physician in my Quaker meeting, is bringing a prepared message to our worship, wearing a brightly colored scarf wrapped around her head. She thanks our community for the support she’s received since her breast cancer diagnosis and subsequent mastectomy and chemotherapy.

Then Rosalie unwraps the scarf, revealing her gleaming bald head. Many in worship gasp, and she continues. “I’m the same Rosalie I ever was, but I have now joined an elite group that includes Mitch [a bald member of our meeting] and Yul Brynner.” She continues in a light-hearted tone, and we all breathe more easily, knowing she is back.

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One of the first things I noted when I began participating in Quaker community 30+ years ago was the openness with which others shared the truly hard parts of their lives—and requested and received support from the community. What struck me as Rosalie spoke that day was her transparency, as if to say, “I share this with you because you are my friends, and I want you to know me as I am today, with no mystery and no embarrassment.” I decided then that this was someone I wanted to know better.

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It is 2009. Caryl, the first friend I made among Quakers, asks me, Rosalie, and a couple of others to support her during a difficult period at work. We do so, expecting to gather for only a year or two, but Caryl’s work remains volatile. Meanwhile, life goes on and we journey through it together. In 2011 Caryl, widowed twenty years earlier, marries Jeff, a more recent widower, and we celebrate a joy that neither anticipated ever experiencing again.

Two years later Caryl shares the hard news that she’s been diagnosed with Parkinson’s disease, about which it is often said “the only thing predictable is unpredictability.” Over the years, as Caryl’s Parkinson’s advances, Jeff begins participating actively. Today, several friends continue to share intimate gatherings in support of Caryl—and Jeff.

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“Anchor committee” is one of several flavors of spiritual care committees, a practice common among (but not limited to) Quakers. The goal of a spiritual care committee “is to provide sustained support, guidance, and accountability throughout the duration of the need.”¹—exactly what Caryl requested.

I love the image of an anchor committee—friends gathered to offer a friend stability and centeredness during a stormy period in life. The document in the footnote provides helpful guidance for how to support effectively as a group, but such groups need not be grounded in religious faith or communities.

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It is 2011. Fred, a long-term member of our Quaker meeting, has been diagnosed with frontal lobe dementia and ALS, which are closely related. Many of us don Fred’s favorite striped shirts for a Walk for ALS along the Portland waterfront, joined by students from Fred’s teaching years. We all watch as, week by week, these diseases break Fred’s body, challenge his spirit, and tear a hole in the heart of his wife, our beloved Peg, a spiritual director. It becomes clear that an upcoming birthday will be his last, and Fred asks for a community birthday party so he can celebrate it with us.

Our friend Mike helps organize the gathering, and asks Fred what he would like. Everyone dressed in striped shirts, and lots of music, especially Beatles. Mike presses Fred for specific songs, and Fred—by now struggling to breathe—sucks in all the wind he can summon and answers, “Why Don’t We Do It In The Road.” And so it comes to pass that a hundred of us gather in striped shirts for an evening of musical celebration of Fred, including a raucous rendition of Fred’s requested song.

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Fred’s birthday party is one of my defining images of what it means to be a caring community of friends. It is tremendously sad to watch a beloved friend become wasted by disease, and many find it difficult to spend time with such a person on the cusp of death, saying a real and final good-bye. But death comes to all of us and it is far worse, I believe, to walk through this alone. When it’s my time, I hope to go like Fred, surrounded by friends like these with whom I have truly shared life’s journey.

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I share my cancer diagnosis with my family and with my Quaker community. I get a call from Rosalie. “Greg, it seems you might want a care committee. I’m happy to convene one for you. Who would you like me to invite?” I agree, and my answer includes Caryl, Jeff, and Peg. All agree to serve. My wife Diane is offered the option of joining and she accepts. It’s her journey, too, of course.

I am more accustomed to offering care, and it is humbling to share as vulnerably as these friends have shared with me–but my trust in them is complete. In our first meeting Rosalie, no stranger to cancer, asks “Have you given your tumor a name yet?” I pause and reply, “The Beast.” She counters, “That seems like a name you’d share publicly. How do you address it directly?” I wince at being called out—remember that word “accountability”?—but I center and let my emotions rise. “YOU MOTHERFUCKER!!” I bellow. Rosalie smiles and continues, “Now that sounds more authentic. Do others have questions?” We are off and running.

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To live in this world you must be able to do three things
to love what is mortal
to hold it against your bones knowing your own life depends on it
and, when the time comes to let it go, to let it go.

Mary Oliver, from “In Blackwater Woods”

As friends in an intentional community, we have made the commitment to love each other despite our mortality, and to hold each other close, especially when our lives depend on it. While our Quaker meeting is a religious community, religion is not essential—my wife’s long-running cooking club has moved increasingly in this direction as its members confront the ravages of aging. What matters most is a group commitment to show up for and love each other, come what may.

It’s never too early to ask, “Who are these people for me?”

1. A Care Committee: A Ministry of Prayer and Learning Devoted to the School of the Spirit is under the care of the committee on Worship and Care of Philadelphia Yearly Meeting of the Religious Society of Friends. ↩︎