The End of the Line

It is the terminal phrase often heard from someone close to an end game. It comes in all sorts of permutations such as the “light at the end of a tunnel” or “the deer about to see the headlights”. While it is as hazy as a mirage in the desert which deserves a serious or a second look, but which we ignore, because at a young age, we think we are indestructible, entitled to live the future. It only becomes a consuming reality to someone in advancing years. After all, mortality becomes an afterthought for those of us old folks, when families are raised, children are sent to and finish school and leave to start a new life and family of their own. Parents become euphemistically empty nesters whose lives become punctuated by occasional caring of grandchildren whose shrieks and shouts often are louder than the admonition of grandparents.

It is also the time when after working more than half of a lifetime, do we have the rest of the remaining years left to our own devices, to enjoy and do whatever we have wanted for much of our previous years. We either remain at where we have stayed and spent much of our lives, or move some place else for a change of environment, find and develop new friendships. Taking a different road whether left or right affords a freedom not experienced when one has to worry about what is in for the following day at work, what clothes to wear, what school or profession is best for the children as if we know with certainty what they would become. And all the mundane things associated with those productive years. It is liberating to know that it is not obligatory to set the alarm clock to start a new day. As one friend say, everyday is a Saturday.

Which is why some of the remaining fellows of SPSA, its membership waning due to attrition, changes in past and present environment, diminishing interest, different professional directions, and yes, death, still go on a yearly ritual called Spring Board Meeting held, generally on a cruise ship. It satisfies a requirement of the Society’s Constitution and allows it to function under the IRS mandate as a charitable organization. But more importantly, it is to take advantage of the free time most of the organization’s participants now have, to continue the camaraderie established, to see much of the world, and at the same time decide on what SPSA agenda need to have to keep it alive. It is another way to spend some time for those who have made it this far.

In a weekly show “Strange Inheritance”, Jamie Colby, the host of the show, always closes with a line, “Remember, you can’t take it with you”. It is an advice to those of us who find ourselves close to the end of the line.

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Editorial, reprinted July 2018 issue of The Philpppine Surgeon
by Edward E. Quiros, M.D., FACS., Editor-in-Chief