Woody
Allen once said, "I want to achieve immortality, I just don't want to
die to do it." Philosophers and theologians for centuries have debated
the nature of immortality. These learned folks have hypothesized that
immortality ranges from a spurious or nonliteral form to the purely
objective form in which the conscious ongoing personal experience of
oneself persists after the death of one's body.
This memoriam is not
the place to further debate the true nature of immortality. It is, however,
an opportunity to memorialize those friends of Dartmouth Class of 1961
who have preceded us in their own experience of transcendence. The late
philosopher Charles Hartshorne wrote, "The real death … which we undergo
every minute … is forgetting." There are many facets of "remembering".
We are remembered by our families. We are remembered by our friends.
And finally, we are remembered by our acts, whether good or evil.
We
all met one another, most for the first time, in the fall of 1957. From
that point forward, each in his own way was a blank slate on which would
be written the story of his life. That very tangible connection, embodied
in the Dartmouth experience, is the one we revere today. Let us not
say that a single man in the Class of 1961 is forgotten. It is our purpose
to remember. Death is a process, not an event.
Each time one of our
classmates passes, it is an opportunity to immortalize that person in
our memories. Some will have achieved greatness, some not so great.
But the Dartmouth connection is the one that transcends the mere physical.
It is the platform on which our lives forever intertwine. Let us celebrate
their lives and our own. And let us vow to remember the connection that
embraces us all.
By
Duane Cox
Taken from Reflections at Forty
Deceased Classmates DOD and Obits
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