I was thinking of today’s psalm.

Out of the depths I cry to you, O Lord.
Lord hear my voice
O let your ears be attentive
To the voice of my pleading. (Psalm 129)

Three of my best friends, including my two best friends from university, have already died and of natural causes. I was lying awake and thinking of them. I just knew that they were present, not in a spooky, ghost-like way, but in an intellectual and emotional presence.

They may have died and been cremated but they still exist. I just knew it. They are not gone.