Someone That I Used to Know
on the Life-Changing Death of a Troubled Daughter
“Alas! there are some wounds that cannot be wholly cured,” said Gandalf. “I fear it may be so with mine,” said Frodo. “There is no real going back. Though I may come to the Shire, it will not seem the same; for I shall not be the same.”—J. R. R. Tolkien, The Return of the King
I had a friend back in the late 1980s. He was quite a bit older than I. I was in that stage of life where all of my children were very young, and we were consumed with all of the loving and raising and disciplining and feeding and diapering that goes with that phase of life. My friend was early in his senior years—the winter of his life was just beginning to set in.
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Keith Lowery works as a senior fellow at a major semiconductor manufacturer, where he does advanced software research. He worked in technology startups for over 20 years and for a while was a principal engineer at amazon.com. He currently serves as an elder at Lake Ridge Bible Church in a suburb of Dallas, Texas.
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