We all do it. We all think there will be another day, another trip, another visit. We just can't quite make a get-together work this time, but we will on the next one, definitely.

But then next time doesn't happen.

In college I had this professor who was everything I wanted to be: a former reporter who ascended to managing editor, then executive editor of the South Bend Tribune. In retirement, he returned to Notre Dame, his beloved alma mater, to teach aspiring young journalists like myself how it was done in his day -- which, in oh so many ways, is how it's still done today. I wanted to be able to do that -- work my way up to the top of the journalism world, then take on a couple of classes at a university somewhere to share my wisdom and experience.

On Friday, before I had a chance to get in touch with him one last time, Jack Powers died at 75.

I consider my junior year high school English teacher to be the educator who inspired me to write. When I went to Notre Dame to pursue journalism, there were several professors and peers who helped me along that path, and Jack was a big part of that. He taught two courses that required his permission to take, and he almost always shooed in the editors of the campus daily newspaper, The Observer, and the bi-weekly magazine, Scholastic. He barely knew my name (he always made sure he knew who was running the campus publications, but I wasn't yet on the masthead when I enrolled in his class) but I soon established the relationship that he had with many of his favorite students. Usually all but a few in each class were among his favorites. At the end of each semester, he would invite the class to his house on a Sunday afternoon for a luncheon prepared by his wife, and it was a warm afternoon in the cold South Bend winter -- or spring. I still have the group photo somewhere.

Jack was my Tuesdays With Morrie, though we never reached that point. When I read the book, I could picture the two of us in those roles, but I also knew that there were dozens of other students who could be plugged into it as well. Or one of his 10 children.

Jack and I stayed in touch my first year or two out of school, when I returned home and got a job with my local newspaper. We exchanged a couple of Christmas cards and I sent him a clipping or two. During one football weekend the fall immediately after I'd graduated, we met in the student center and chatted about our summers, my cross-country trip, and my fledgling job search. Of course, he offered to help.

But then our relationship slipped into one where I often thought I should sit down and write to him, but I never did. Even in class, he would talk about certain former students with whom he still talked, so I knew he wasn't sitting around everyday wondering what happened to me. But I'm sure it crossed his mind every now and then. I'd meant to tell him about my move from the paper to a national magazine, one he could pick up at the Meijer on Grape Road or the Martin's on 23 and find my name on the masthead in the back. I never did.

I went to the South Bend Tribune's website and read the columns and editorials that popped up following a search of his name. While written from the point of view of people who were hired by Jack and worked alongside him, many noted his classes at Notre Dame and all mentioned characteristics I recalled with a smile.

To this day, when I need a moment to remember the difference between "less" and "fewer," I try to remember how he explained it. That column reminded me of a Notre Dame women's basketball game against Rutgers, which featured a player from my high school with whom I'd taken an art class. I spoke with her before the game; afterwards, Jack found me and wanted to know what I thought of the Scarlet Knights' calling a timeout to run one last inbounds play with about 3 seconds left in a game they were losing by about 15 points. "I don't know," I said. "Maybe they wanted the practice in a game situation before the postseason." He hadn't thought of it that way, and decided it was a good enough reason.

In class, as in the newsroom, he did have a booming voice. He hated students dozing off in his classes, when he'd clear his throat mid-sentence, anyone on the brink of unconsciousness would snap back to an upright position, hoping Jack hadn't seen the increasing slouch. I know from experience -- only one time though. Really. I swear.

But I think what I found most intriguing about him as a professor -- one I was more in awe of and impressed with than the high-ranking editor of the Chicago Tribune who taught a two-and-a-half-hour class on Mondays because he'd commute from Chicago -- was that he was old-school. He was your stereotypical newspaperman, a gruff "get me the facts" kind of guy. Perry White, without the sensationalism. But the part of Jack I didn't get to see in the classroom was the kind of writer he was, and judging from all the articles I've read tonight, that might have been what he did best.

Despite being old-school, Jack wasn't stubborn. He was open to new ways of thinking and I remember how he finally answered a question to which I had not been able to get a straight answer for years: Do you put a comma before the "and" in a series? Is it "Larry, Moe, and Curly" or "Larry, Moe and Curly"?

"When I was coming up, yes, you put the comma there," Jack told us one day. "But even an old guy like me can change, and you no longer need to put the comma before 'and' in a series."

Since then, I've never added that last comma and I've never written "over" when I should've written "more than." Sammy Sosa did not hit over 50 home runs for four straight seasons, he hit more than 50 home runs for four straight seasons.

Jack won't be missed by over a hundred people; he'll be missed by more than several hundred.