The season of gathering is here.

Families and friends make plans

After the time of keeping distance

They finally can keep.

Tables will be set.

Cooks will load the groaning board.

Feasts laid out and chairs set at places

And at many tables after the time of plague

There will be chairs left seeming empty

Invisibly occupied by the ones taken

So untimely and serving generously

From the platter of memory

Photo by krakenimages on Unsplash

Bob Wertzler is retired from almost twenty years in the mental health field in California and Arizona. There are times the title, “Recovering Therapist”, seems to fit. In 2006 he retired to move to Western North Carolina to help and become primary care giver for his father who had developed Dementia. Before all that, there was work at various times as a soldier (US Army 1967-70), community organizer, cab driver, welfare case worker, wooden toy maker, carpenter, warehouse worker, and other things. He relates to a line in a Grateful Dead song, “What a long, strange trip its been.”