I was at the gym and saw an elderly fella on one of the machines.

He had two cross necklaces, and then another one with what looked like a chili pepper. My friend has the same necklace, and something told me to ask the man what it signifies.

His face lit up.

My wife’s ashes are in there, he said.

I thought he meant the cross, so I kind of started to say, no, the squiggly one.

But then I thought, what the hell are you doing?

He started: I’m ninety-one years old. We were married for forty years. I wish you half the happiness that I had in my marriage, and you’ll be the happiest man alive. I took her everywhere. I always wanted to be with her. I worked in Hollywood and dated models and actresses, but nobody like her. We went to Dubai and Kuwait. We did everything together. She died in April. Today I woke up and I started sobbing. I’d kill myself if it weren’t a crime in my religion. So I’m here, and I don’t know why.

I just listened.

She’s still with you, I said.

We talked a little more, shook hands, and he said God bless.

I did some other stuff but thought, being in Hollywood, I bet he knew my grandpa, Dicky. So I asked. He did know of him. The man, Al, was wearing an army hat and told me he got married at twenty-one, fresh from the army. He said at my age he was 5’11, 250 pounds, like a bodybuilder.

I played football at the University of Miami, he said. My great-grandchildren are there now. We talked about Miami playing in the college football playoffs the next day.

Keep it up, Al, I told him when leaving, you’re an inspiration. Thank you, God bless, he said, smiling. And then he said, I needed that today.

It made me think about how I’m thirty years old, going through heartbreak and my own challenges. Yet this man is ninety-one, and dealing with the same emotions—the pain of loss. It made me think how there’s so much life yet before me, and I saw it all in this man’s countenance: love and pain, adventure, profound sadness, but also, indomitable light—the distillation of a full life, there at the gym, unafraid to face the world no matter how it hurts. Perhaps I could feel something from his presence I admired. Strength in vulnerability.

Something urged me to talk to him. And so I did, and it opened up the door for him to tell me that he cried this morning.

What am I here for if not for that?

Why are we alive if not to ease the suffering in somebody else, just by asking a simple question, adhering to our curiosity? That’s really all it was.

I saw him a few days later, and I wasn’t the only one saying hello. He was the star of the gym.

I’m still putting on muscle, he said, smiling. It’s incredible. Lifting weights have saved my life again, and again, and again.

Allowing somebody to tell you that they cried today. There’s nothing so beautiful, so human, and so needed in this world.