I have a friend who volunteers at a hospice. He has seen a lot of death. A few months ago, I asked him whether he noticed a pattern with those who had an easy passing as opposed to those who had a difficult one. He said that was an easy question. Those who have an easy time of it have their house in order – not their material house, but the one where their relationships with others reside.

He told me the story of one poor soul who had a very difficult time of it. He had a lot of unfinished business with an estranged son, whom he had not seen or heard from for many years. This tormented him. In the last days of the man’s difficult ordeal, my friend contacted the man’s sister in an effort to get in touch with the son so that perhaps they could say a last goodbye and maybe even reconcile. He was told that the son had died several years earlier.

I heard this story just around the time that I received a tentative diagnosis of T-Cell Lymphoma. T-Cell is a virulent disease that, if untreated can kill within a few months. Treatment does not prolong life a great deal. I set about to do a karmic accounting. Were their people I had wronged for whom apologies were in order? Did I have any unfinished business with anyone? Putting aside material issues, did my life add up as a karmic credit or debit? Was I “in the red?”

The first thing I did was decide to put aside all the issues involved in the “road not taken.” What I could have done or might have been was just too speculative. For all I knew, I could have been Run Over By A Truck (or as we say in my family ROBATTED)on my very first step along the road not taken. All that was out. What I needed to include in my accounting was only the things that I had done.

I was pretty pleased to discover that I was not in the red. I didn’t have any big-time enemies. I have a lot of terrific friends. I have a loving and caring family – a wife who is 110% in my corner. And, by no means least, I’ve had a pretty good life. I never wanted for a meal or a roof over my head. I’ve had lots of good times with lots of great folks. I wasn’t going to complain about dying. I didn’t want it to happen. I wanted more of the good life, sure. But I damn well didn’t have any grounds to complain, given what I had been given. That made me feel real good. That’s not to say that I didn’t have issues that needed addressing. There were. But they were nothing like the predeceased, estranged son. It made the t-Cell diagnosis bearable.

Fortunately, T-Cell Lymphoma was not the right diagnosis. Today, the Stanford doctors will install a central veinous catheter in my chest to handle all the infusions and draws I will soon be undergoing. I go into this process knowing it will be long and difficult but also believing that I have a positive balance in my karmic account. That sure helps.