You Didn’t Die, You Have To Live – Howie Godnick

Howie and I met through our heart disease and the love of a bike that goes nowhere. Howie’s heart disease struck him when he was just 35. My birth defect waited until I was 48. Together we were heart warriors.

We grew up in very different worlds. Howie is Jewish and from New York. I’m just a kid from the woods in Alaska. But we both shared a love of our boys, family and friends, we’re both the adventurous type and we both share a never ending passion for life.

We also have our own mantras. Mine is “Live.Every.Day.” Howie’s is “You didn’t die, you have to live.”

But Howie died yesterday. I don’t know where he was, what he was doing or who he was with. I do know he was where he wanted to be, doing whatever he was doing with gusto and accompanied by people he loved deeply. That’s just the kind of guy he was.

I’ve always loved waiting for Howie’s next Facebook post because you never knew what you were going to get. Maybe he was dancing in Wembley Stadium at a concert or caring for a sick rhinoceros while on safari in Africa or jumping out of an airplane or cheering for the love of his life as she ran another marathon. Or he might be giving another TEDx Talk like this one. Whatever it was going to be it would make you smile.

Most recently Howie was posting about how proud he was of his son Max. Max had recently been a contestant on the show Jeopardy but far more importantly Max got married last month. You can see the happiness bursting from Howie in the picture below.

I’m going to take a little bit to grieve and then I’m going to get back at it. I know he wouldn’t want me to waste any of the precious time I have left. He’d tell me to keep negativity out of my life, to see the world, to love deeply and to live with gusto. I will do all of those things.

L’Chaim, my beautiful friend. L’Chaim.