\ud83e\udd12<\/p>\n
I got sick for the second time in a month.<\/strong> It started out as a cough on Tuesday and then by noon Wednesday had turned into a 102.6 fever. I\u2019d slept all that morning and could barely move. Eventually I forced myself out of bed, groggily choked down a little lunch, and went back to bed. In the evening my temperature was down to 99.4 but then hit 102.7 in the middle of Wednesday night. After that it dropped a degree each day, and my energy gradually improved, but this fever lasted a disturbingly long time when I was used to a day or two at most. The whole time my sleep felt chaotic\u2014swinging between hot and sweaty and cold and clammy, with a constant flicker of confusing fever dreams. And my congested cough stubbornly remained. My COVID tests were negative, so it was probably something normal like the flu, even though I had my flu shot. But this American Medical Association video<\/a> told me unusual infections have been going around, so who knows?<\/p>\n \ud83d\ude14<\/p>\n I learned that my old college roommate Jason had died in a car accident.<\/strong> It happened Tuesday night on his way home from work. I learned about it the next night when I was contacted by his wife. I\u2019d met her at their wedding only last Thanksgiving. I couldn\u2019t really take in the accident at the time, but over the next day the reality did sink in. And with that and my illness, plus whatever work I could get through, I decided not to push myself that week, and I focused on doing my part in sharing the news.<\/p>\n Jason was his own animal\u2014fun loving and relational, always a hat\u2019s drop away from a deep connection. He was always ready to impart his unique perspective on life, born out of his own struggles, a message of grace, trust, and a dose of contrarian thought. One of his friends pointed out this short video<\/a> as a good example of Jason\u2019s spirit. It was part of his digital marketing phase, one of several attempts to find his place in the world of work. For a few years after college he made his home in the missions organization YWAM, primarily at their base in Hawaii, and from my outside perspective YWAM felt like a defining feature of his life, a very natural fit for Jason\u2019s style. But for reasons I forget, he later made his exit and began his quest for a career he could settle into. Nothing in life ever set quite right with Jason, and I was privy to many interesting critiques of whatever circumstances he found himself in. But eventually I gained the sense he felt most at home when he was taking care of people, and home health care is what he came back to in the end.<\/p>\n The memory of Jason that stands out most is the last time I drove out to visit him over Christmas, back in 2022. It was a welcome change of scenery during a difficult week\u2014a vacation within a vacation, you could say. I toured his section of his brother\u2019s house and met his beautiful little dog and caught up on life over a walk through the woods, and I felt the life-giving effects of being heard on the real parts of my life and trusted with the real parts of his, a regular occurrence with Jason. He had a gift for cutting to the emotional heart of things, simultaneously calming and energizing the conversation. In the words of our friend Mark, \u201dHe really was a remarkable person.\u201d<\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n A post shared by Andy Culbertson (@thinkulum)<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/blockquote>\nPeople<\/h2>\n
\n