No, I'm not scared.

Nancy called to tell me Bud Pedersen died. Alone in his house. Was not discovered for several days. Died at his front door. Was he going out? No answers to that question or the many others, like why did he die? What killed him? He had just turned 70. Yes, younger than I, another person who lives alone and does not want to die alone. Does not want to die . . . period.

Bud was a colleague at BSU. Taught in the English department for 25 years after his 20 years in the military. I liked him fine, but we weren't close friends. For many years he used an essay I wrote on how to achieve "voice" in writing. Nancy, too. Both used it as a model for students in their E101 classes. That is a fact and it pleases me, but it's not the fact I started out to write about.

It's Bud's death I'm writing about. No autopsy. Nancy thought it was the law here, as it is in her home state of Texas, that when someone dies alone an autopsy must be performed. Apparently not.

Nancy said she spoke to Bud the week before, tried to get him to go for a walk with her, and he said yes, then, the morning of the walk, said he had decided just to stay in bed and watch TV. She said he had put on weight since his retirement from teaching.

I never saw Bud other than slim. 

Right. The issue is not his weight either. It's dying alone. No one knowing it. I don't like the thought of it. 

I say again, someone in my family ought to call me every day. Just to see how I'm doing. Just because.