Heard yesterday that an old classmate had passed away.
Someone I never heard much about after 8th grade.
Someone who had been the target of bullying during those years.
I never took part in the bullying, but I never stepped up in his defense either.
A choice that I have long regretted.
I've thought about him occasionally over the years, wondering if he had friends, wondering how his life turned out.
Wishing I could tell him that I was sorry.
Hoping that he found happiness.
I hope in his passing he was content with his life and felt no fear before and in the moment.
Wishing that maybe he had experienced a last laugh of sorts over all of us by becoming a billionaire and living a richly rewarding life full of great companionship, excitement, enjoyment and comfort.
But unlike almost every other classmate, there was never any slightest word about him.
And all I learned yesterday was his birth date, .... which kind of rang a bell like I actually knew it at one time .... and the date of passing.
My fortune cookie tonight seems directly related: "Courage is not the absence of fear; it is the conquest of it.'
Courage to do the right thing when needed instead of walking away.
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