“So Long, Partner”

Until we meet again, my friend.

Have you ever looked at a word or phrase long enough only to then think to yourself, “What a strange collection of letters—I can’t believe I never noticed it before.” I sometimes find this happens in the midst of reading, or as I’m writing by hand on a piece of paper. For whatever strange reason or by some trick of the mind, a word or phrase that I’ve encountered thousands of times before suddenly looks foreign, as though I’ve never seen it up until that point. I know what the letters and syllables amount to, I know what the word(s) means—but in that moment, it just seems alien to me, as though it belongs to another language entirely.

Consider, for example, the colloquialism “So long.” On its own, the saying sounds a little ridiculous and altogether meaningless. Even the Merriam-Webster Dictionary struggles to make heads or tails (another colloquialism) of its origins: “So long, an expression of farewell, is a colloquialism that we take for granted as being a logical construction. ‘It’ll only be so long before you meet again,’ right? However, no senses of these two words actually add up to mean ‘good-bye.’ So where did it come from?” 

Perhaps I can add my two cents (another colloquialism) on the matter. Think about how the expression So long is often used in old movies, particularly Westerns—“So long, partner.” The phrase still seems a little awkward and strange, as all old sayings seem after a time, but I can venture a guess as to what these words are trying to convey. I imagine So long as being a shortened version of a longer saying that came about over time, something along the lines of, “Good-bye, my friend, until we meet again—long years and many miles stand between us and our next meeting.”

John Wayne, the quintessential Cowboy during Hollywood’s Golden Era, is quoted to have said, “Talk low, talk slow, and don’t say too much.” In quintessential cowboy fashion, such a drawn-out and painfully protracted phrase as, “Good-bye, my friend, until we meet again—long years and many miles stand between us and our next meeting,” simply would not suffice given the many time constraints of old-timers (another colloquialism) and cowboys like John Wayne—“So long, partner” would do just fine.

Eight years ago on this very day, February the 3rd, my family said So long to the dearest man in all the world. That cold, cold evening, as shadows crept across the world with the setting of another sun, Tata, my father, saddled his horse for the final time and prepared to cross those last remaining miles that stood between him and home—“Long years and many miles stand between us and our next meeting: but I will see you all again. Good-bye, everyone, until we meet again at Jesus’ feet.”

And with that, he was off. Off to see his Savior; off to see his mother; off to shake loose from his aching bones and troubled heart the many cares and sorrows that darken so many of our days here below. Off to rest: rest from cancer, rest from worry, and above all, to rest from sin.

In a world where cancer ‘claims’ millions of lives each and every year, we should be slow in saying that the Lord has no use for it. “Behold, I am making all things new,” says the Lord (Revelation 21:5). He is the Lord of life and the conqueror of death. Through His triumphant resurrection, the sting of death has been removed for all those who believe in Him:

“I am the resurrection and the life. Whoever believes in me, though he die, yet shall he live” (John 11:25).

Cancer can no more thwart Christ’s purposes than death can. And if cancer be the cold hand through which Christ brings many of our loved ones home into the warmth of His eternal embrace, then so be it.

I miss my father terribly, and I think about him often—especially on days like today. But we in Christ do not grieve as those without hope. On the contrary, we of all people have infinite reason to rejoice:

“For I am persuaded that neither death nor life, nor angels nor principalities nor powers, nor things present nor things to come, nor height nor depth, nor any other created thing, shall be able to separate us from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus our Lord” (Romans 8:38-39).

Before my father went home to be with the Lord, the phrase So long was entirely foreign to me. I knew what the letters and syllables amounted to, I knew what the words meant—but it wasn’t until I uttered the words with my own lips that I truly came to understand them. Until I tasted true suffering and loss, the language of Heaven remained a mystery to me. With the Lord’s help over the years, I’ve come to see that the words So long really do mean what they say: “Good-bye for the time being. Long years and many miles stand between us and our next meeting—but I will see you again.”

So long doesn’t mean forever, by no means. The way may be long, the wait longer, and the nights weary, but there is always an end to any given road—and, in the Lord’s kindness, many pleasant inns and fellow travellers along the way for comfort and company, Himself chief among them. The separation may be painful, but the reunion well worth the wait.

When the way is hard and the losses harder still, the Lord means for us to develop an eternal perspective. In doing so, we can cultivate joy and thankfulness in even the darkest of circumstances because we know that He is by our side and that He is actively working all things together for our good and His glory (Romans 8:28).

Such a perspective enables us to humbly take all that comes our way as from the hands of a loving Heavenly Father who seeks only our best. Such a perspective has changed my very prayers from prayers of lament to prayers of faithful confidence. I have gone from saying, “Lord, my heart aches that Tata will never meet my son,” to instead praying, “Though Tata will never meet my child here below, Father, be pleased to number my son among your very own children that, in the age to come, he and Tata might meet under a fairer light—not as grandson and grandfather, but as brother and brother in Christ, never to part again.”

“God be with you till we meet again,

by His counsels guide, uphold you,

with His sheep securely fold you;

God be with you till we meet again.

Till we meet, till we meet,

till we meet at Jesus’ feet;

till we meet, till we meet,

God be with you till we meet again.”

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