“It’s an amazing thing how
you watch your garden grow…
Yes it is a wonder…it’s
your mind.”
– The Seed Song
The email came last Sunday late in the day.
It wasn’t unexpected - he had been ill for sometime. Indeed the watch was on…but that’s the thing
about losing someone for whom you have a great affection, isn’t it? Preparing for the event and being confronted
with it are not the same things.
Perhaps its because something inside us says death should
not come to living legends…icons ought not leave our presence. Brilliance, true brilliance does not come
that often. Of little doubt it came…and
of little doubt the light will continue to shine. That’s the big light, but there was the less apparent…intimate
light that personally touched so many.
In the end his family was with him to support the
transition. It is a sacred, in many ways
a holy moment. Not in a religious sense,
but a commentary as to the nature of the ‘entrances and departures’ into and from
the transient theatre of humanity…the magic of life – the mystery of death.
In the air…
The aircraft is a ‘long haul’ 747…it is appropriately named
and it is full. It takes 14 hours from
Los Angeles to Sydney, crossing the international dateline, and a second flight
3.5 hours to Wellington. On a flight of
this length one has a lot of time to think.
There is a choice – consider the time as an irritant…a necessary, but
unpleasant delay to the purpose of the trip…or as a gift, a period of solitude
in which God smiles and allows some quiet space. I prefer the latter.
Back at home –
wherever…
When the news came arrangements began to be made by many
people in many places. Getting to New
Zealand on short notice is not the easiest thing to pull off. Yet, in the minds of those who were
close…those who had known the intimacy and had engaged the gift, there was no question…schedules
were adjusted and they came.
They, like me are in transit. They will drift in from Europe and Canada and
Scandinavia and Asia and Australia. If
they encounter one another en-route, they will quietly greet…making small talk
about his passing and other things in their lives. This is what people do.
Once they arrive, they will continue in small groups telling
stories and whimsically smiling, as each – in the richness of his or her own
mind – remembers a personal experience…an event…a touch. With it will come those curious human feelings
of comfort and loss. Comfort for their common
path, and moments of intimacy they experienced…loss knowing the ‘path…the
intimacy,’ will forever be for them a memory – a yesterday.
Who was this man?
Robin Anthony McKenzie was a physiotherapist from New
Zealand, and became in his lifetime, possibly the most influential person ever in
the evaluation and treatment of people with low back pain. His full bore curiosity and determination
brought a method of helping those suffering from this universally common,
personal and societal affliction. He
treated thousands of patients, but understood that for his knowledge to have an
impact, he would need to duplicate himself.
He did so by establishing an institute with more than 27 teaching
branches worldwide. He would say he
never set out to change the world of back care...he simply wanted to
understand. In the end, he did both.
Between now and Tuesday morning I will spend a little time
with those other souls who found their way to this tiny country, to say goodbye
to this man so full of questions..so full of life. A man who understood the universal axiom,
that the more one gives, the more they receive – a lesson worth remembering yet
once again.
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