Saturday, September 14, 2019
Bob Hallstrom was one of the finest guys I ever met in my life.
His intelligence illuminated things around him like a searchlight but I’m not aware he ever analyzed anything with a hidden agenda or to gather support for some ulterior motive or other. He considered the pros and cons of things dispassionately, honestly and on the strength of their merits, with the result the conclusions he reached were consistently eminently sensible. Intellectual intelligence is one type of smarts but Bob’s smarts consisted of more than textbook knowledge.
As an MD he had an advanced knowledge and understanding of the clay suit we’ve all got on, and our human condition to which it gives rise. Such understanding comes at a potential high price. When you see things clearly it’s easy to become cynical, sarcastic, condescending - and perhaps inescapably bitter.
Bob, however, did not see life as an opportunity for sarcasm, cynicism and condescension, neither was he bitter. He genuinely cared about people. A stanza from a tune by a band he admired might serve as an epitaph:
“Well the first days are the hardest days, don't you worry any more,
Cause when life looks like easy street, there is danger at your door.
Think this through with me, let me know your mind,
Wo, oh, what I want to know, is are you kind?”
On the other hand, when life presented foolishness or a fool he simply would not abide, he didn’t hesitate to get down in the mud of mockery, sarcasm and condescension along with the rest of us to have a good self-righteous belly laugh at the expense of some jackass who richly deserved condemnation and contempt.
To his wife, Lily, his brother, Dave and the rest of his family; my brother, his wife and their children who all grew up with Uncle Bob and Aunt Lily, I mourn the cruel and untimely passing of this good man. Our world is diminished without him. I choose to believe that in our end is our beginning, to paraphrase T.S. Eliot. I choose to believe that Bob hasn’t really gone anywhere. He’s right around here somewhere.
