Re: Bad Week

A big load to carry.  I hope we can help shoulder it.

-----Original Message-----
From: [email protected] [mailto:[email protected]] On Behalf
Of pcg
Sent: Wednesday, November 10, 2010 1:50 PM
To: DADL (off topic)
Subject: [DADL-OT] Bad Week

I've had a bizarre week. This is part confessional, part therapy, and
part explanation (not excuse) for my sharper-than-usual tongue these
last few days.

Six or seven years ago, I started working at a print shop, and RC was
the first friend I made there. He introduced himself by asking if I
wanted to go a sneak-peek of the new Tim Burton film (must have been
"Big Fish"), and we hit it off immediately. He was the sort of friend
you don't need time to warm up to, the kind with whom you have a
common language that revolves around beloved movies, music, books, and
so on. I introduced him to "The Office" and The Swirling Eddies, and
he introduced me to Geoge Romero and The Decemberists.

We worked together for a couple years, and became very close. My son
and his daughter were born two weeks apart, and we had a joint baby
shower. After I was laid off from another job and lost my apartment,
at a very, very low point in my life, he let me -- no, he insisted --
that I come live with him and his girlfriend. They'd just bought a
house together, had some extra room, and most importantly, we'd get to
hang out every day. We spent many a long, rowdy night there on the
porch, smoking cigarettes, drinking white russians, arguing about
movies and music and politics and God, and making each other laugh
hysterically. He always called me "brother," and liked to say I was
the brother he needed when he was a kid.

He drank too much, and so did I. Sometimes when he drank he'd get
belligerent -- usually about benign things, but he was otherwise such
a kind and generous guy that I never let it bother me. But one stupid
night we got into a heated argument that ended up with me packing my
meager belongings into my car and driving away, as he stood in street
shouting at me from behind.

Over the next week or so, he called a few times, leaving voice
messages apologizing for his behavior, swearing it was all water under
the bridge, it would never happen again. But I was pissed, and I
wasn't ready to let it go. The last voice mail I got from him was when
his girlfriend left him. He left a message saying, "She left me, she
took Lilly, and I need you to come over, man. I don't care about any
of the other stuff. I just need my friend, man."  I didn't get the
message until the next day, but I knew that if I called him back, it
would mean going over there to console him, and I just wasn't ready
for that.

He eventually stopped calling. I've thought about him a lot over the
last two years, wanting to clear the air, get together for a drink,
and go back to the way things were before that stupid goddamn fight.
So the other night I tried to call, but his number wasn't working.
He'd never been on Facebook or MySpace, but I thought I might be able
to find him somewhere online, so I Googled his name. Instead of
finding a phone number, I found his obituary.

Apparently he passed away, in a hospitable, in Davenport, IA a few
months ago. The obit didn't mention how he died, and I was left
stunned and confused. It had to be some kind of weird prank site,
or...something. My first impulse was to contact his ex-girlfriend, as
they had a daughter together, and she must know what happened. It took
some sleuthing, but I was determined to solve this, and I finally
found her online -- doing hardcore porn. You know, selling ten-minute
clips of herself in various situations for ten bucks a pop. The
pictures revealed that she was filming this stuff in the same house
where we all lived together, which meant she must have kept the place.
I was so weirded out by this development that I couldn't bring myself
to contact her.

Finally, I tracked down another friend of RC's, and got a little
closure. Deprived of his daughter, and anguished over what his ex was
getting up to, he drank himself into a coma, where he lingered for a
while before his organs started shutting down, and he slipped away at
the ripe old age of 33.

I've been kinda drifting around in an emotional fog for the last few
days. I didn't break down emotionally until last night, when it all
finally became real. It's such a stupid, pointless waste. I've never
lost a friend who was that close.

I've been having nightmares about him. Last night we were in an empty
cafe in the middle of nowhere, and I was surprised to find him there.
He wanted to hang out, and I told him I couldn't, but said he should
come over sometime. He started crying and telling me he couldn't
leave, because there was nothing outside, and when I looked out the
windows, there was nothing but pitch black emptiness, and then I
looked back, and he was dead. I woke up creeped out, and couldn't
shake it.  It's been a strange week.

Anyway, the guilt and dissonance will pass, I know. But the world is a
poorer place now, and I'm a poorer man. I have to believe that God was
watching me back then, using various people and circumstances to guide
my steps, and to keep me from going down the same path RC walked. I
miss him now. It seems stupid, since we hadn't talked for a couple
years, but he never felt that far away, and I always knew we'd patch
things up.

http://tinyurl.com/2vccdcr

*sigh*

--
-pcg
 [email protected]

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