Dear Alex,

When we last spoke on the phone two days ago, we agreed to "stay
in touch", an endeavor which is perhaps more complex than appears
on the surface. For me, staying in touch entails the uncensored
accounting of my experiences. That is an unconventional enterprise,
prone to precipitate misunderstanding, perhaps even anger. 
Accordingly my threshold request must be forbearance on your
part, tolerance not only of the content but also of the style
of what I need to say.

Since Margaret died, my nights have been restless. My sleep is
fitful and shallow because my thoughts keep searching, searching
for her without finding her either in the present or in what is
proving to be a past increasingly impenetrable to memory.
From time to time through the years, Margaret would remind
me of the life from which she rescued me. When we began to
court, I was considering my summers to be spent as a lonely 
watchman on a Forest Service fire tower, scanning the horizons 
for plumes of smoke. In those days there were no satellites to 
search the landscape for signs of forest fires. But life with 
her was better, much better than sitting in a fire tower. The 
marriage was a dream, an idyll that lasted for 63 years, and now 
that her last warning to me, about a month ago: "Be careful that 
what you love won't go away." has come to pass, I find the end 
a mirror image of the beginning in that the third floor of our 
addition has become the tower from which I scan - this time the 
inward landscape for signs of life.

Death of course has been much on my mind from several perspectives
most prominent the poetry of Rilke which I shall quote in the
original an translate for you.

Der Tod ist groß.
Wir sind die Seinen
lachenden Munds.
Wenn wir uns
mitten im Leben meinen,
wagt er zu weinen
mitten in uns.

Death is enormous
and we are his,
with laughing lips.
When we deem ourselves
in the midst of life
death dares to weep
deeply within.