Bob Saget’s death was a jolting reminder that time is not guaranteed.

I grew up watching Full House and the news of Saget’s death was a reminder that any of us could go at any time.

When Betty White and Sidney Poitier passed away, I was sad, but it was easier to accept because they were both in their 90s. They’d both had a long life, but somehow, the news of Bob Saget’s death hit harder than both of the other two combined.

Perhaps it was because I had grown up watching Full House along with tens of millions of other Americans. Perhaps it was also because Bob wasn’t that much older than me. He was younger than my dad.

I’m a night owl, so I was up and scrolling Facebook when the news hit social media. At first, I thought it had to be some sort of joke. How could Bob Saget be dead? He literally just posted the night before about how awesome his show was in Florida. No way.

But as the minutes ticked by, more and more news outlets started to trickle in. TMZ, CNN, NBC, Huffington Post… It was true. This man I’d grown up watching every week as a teenager, this larger-than-life character I’d watched recently in the Full House revival, Fuller House, on Netflix really had just suddenly died. No warning, no news of any health problems, just gone.

Over the last few days, I tried to make sense of why it hit me so hard, and honestly, it’s the fact that he was seemingly healthy and I’d grown up watching him and I’d expected to keep seeing him appear on my screen for more years to come.

Maybe it’s because I’m also now in my middle life that his death was a sharp reminder to take care, to live now, and to fix the things that were broken in my life because if Death could come so suddenly for Bob Saget, it could also come for me. I was reminded again of the shortness of time and of the fact that we’re never guaranteed more.

He probably had a list of things he still wanted to accomplish, conversations he still needed to have. One more “I love you” to send to his kids and his wife. I think about my own goals and dreams and about the time I’d wasted by just not doing.

For the next few days as I moved through my daily routine, Bob’s death lingered like a shadow at the back of my mind, jolting something awake in me. A sense of urgency, perhaps. For the first time in a long time, I could hear my heart beat loud and clear like the movements of a second hand in a clock. Tick tick tick.

As the days rolled by, so many generous and wonderful stories would come from people who knew Bob Saget. Everyone was saying how kind, loving, and wonderful a person he was; and in many ways, that is proof of a life well-lived, to leave such an impression on those you left behind. It made me think of my own mortality. Perhaps I am at that age now where these things matter more than ever. I’m at the halfway mark, and his death is a quick reminder of how quickly it could all end.