Tim Kruger died a few months ago. I learned about his death only by chance during a conversation with a mutual friend of ours.

"I'd forgotten you guys were roommates," he said, "or I'd have invited you to the service."

Tim was my roommate for more than a year when I was in my mid-20s, working what I considered my first real job.

He died of a heart attack. Tim could have been no more than 50.

I felt cheated out of something by missing his memorial service, particularly since it had gone on only about 15 miles from my home, and even more when I learned Tim had been living all this time up a nearby mountain pass. All these three years that I've lived here, we could have been friends again. I know both of us would have liked that.

Tim was the quintessential nice guy. Shortly after we met, he asked me to dinner, and I said 'no.' He asked me to move in with him and I said 'yes.' The boundaries were set. We never spoke of them, and neither of us tried to cross them.

My friend Deb, who dubbed him Cute Tim, could not understand this arrangement. "How can you not just sneak down the hall at night and jump in bed with him?"

But it was easy. We were friends.

Tim had a rambling house in a semi-rural area of the town in which I was a reporter. He was divorced with a daughter that he rarely saw. He rented a room to me for $150 a month, a pittance that he swore made a significant difference in his monthly bottom line. Looking back, I think now he wanted some company in that house more than he wanted rent.

The house was in view of the interstate. To this day, I look for it whenever I drive that stretch of highway, hoping to recapture good memories in a glance.

Tim and I used to go together for drinks at the bar in a nearby town. It was a local's pub, in which almost everyone knew everyone. Jeff, the bartender, was a New York native with a correspondingly smart mouth and a wit that, while often cutting, was almost always laughter-inducing. We'd sit together on the bar stools on quiet Tuesday nights, drinking a little, talking a lot. He told me about his divorce, and the pain that drove him to smash some of her most precious items in her driveway. She had cheated on him, left him for another man. Tim was scarred, but still hopeful, and always searching for the right woman.

He listened when I broke up, temporarily, with my now ex, never appearing embarrassed by the tears I sometimes shed.

I remember spending hours in the kitchen with him on weekend mornings, lingering over coffee and talking, talking, talking. As much as we talked, I wish I could remember more of what we said. But all I really remember are the warm feelings of those sunny kitchen mornings. I guess that's more than enough, actually.

This evening, I got out my photo album and searched through it for the one picture I have of him. His eyes are downcast, looking at a blonde woman who's laughing up at him. I believe she was his girlfriend at the time, a member of the local ski club to which we both belonged for a while. Even with eyes downcast, you can see that he's a good-looking man. You can see his brown, wavy hair, well-cut cheekbones and, clearly, a kindness in the set of his face.

This picture is among many taken that night, the evening of my 25th birthday. He opened the doors of his house wide so that I could throw a big party in my own honor. Most of the photos show men and women grinning widely, their arms slung around each other, a couple are of people kissing. The one of Tim and the woman is really a terrible photo. I don't know why I saved it, but poor or not, I'm glad to have it now.

I don't know how Tim died, or how he lived the 16 years of his life between the time I moved away and his death. He visited me in the mountains after I left. I remember feeling somehow awkward when he stopped by my office, unannounced. After all those hours of talking, I couldn't think what to say. He never contacted me again, and I felt guilty, that if I'd been able to relax more then, we'd have stayed friends.

I knew he'd moved to a place up the pass. One night more than 10 years ago, I tried to find his home, and drove into a box canyon at someone's instruction. I saw a small cabin at the dead-end there, a light glowing in one window. I knocked on the door and found no one home. That was my last effort to reach him.

Did he die alone? Was there someone, hopefully that right woman, in his life? Were he and his daughter close after all those years? He must have still felt some connection to the small town bar we both knew so well, because the bar owner arranged the service at the tiny town hall there, and held a celebration of life at the bar afterward.

I only wish Jeff had told me Tim still hung out there. I wish I'd have had a chance to hug him, have a beer with him and exchange a few more chapters of our lives with one another.

I'd like to ask Jeff for the answers to my questions about the end of Tim's life. But perhaps some things are better left unknown. If the answers are sad ones, it will break my heart.

I'm settling instead for a bad photograph, and memories sadly dulled by the years. Time gives us only so many opportunities to reach out and reconnect with the best of those we've left behind. Without warning, your chances are gone. Mine with Tim slipped away from me months ago, without my knowledge.

I encourage anyone reading this to reach back while you can, seek out the people you've always meant to get ahold of again someday, make the phone call, bridge the gap, reconnect. Time will only wait for you so long.