Just got a note in from Keith Young, yet another student in the classes once taught by William Worley, author of the classic San Francisco mystery My Dead Wife.
Here’s Keith, verbatim:
“A recollection from his class at Lowell. One day he told us, that, whatever happens to us, in our lives, when we had highs, and lows, and everything in between, to remember: Ubi Sunt. I believe that was Latin for ‘this too shall pass’. For probably the reasons that you have noted on your site, that Mr. Worley was a true original, I have seared into my memory, Him. I distinctly remember his, standing in front of the class, wrinkled face, and clothes, but with a beautiful energy that he was Sharing with the class. I am now 73 yet have never forgotten the man. May he rest in Peace, and be one with the Universe that he described.”
Not trying to get into a dustup over Latin (not my battlefield), I was curious enough to hit the net and found this definition: “Ubi sunt is a phrase taken from the Latin Ubi sunt qui ante nos fuerunt?, meaning ‘Where are those who were before us?’. . . Sometimes interpreted to indicate nostalgia, the ubi sunt motif is actually a meditation on mortality and life’s transience.”
I think we now have for our contemplation a Worleyism.
