Reverse Proportionality

So far, this site has been unlike any other blog I have ever seen.

There is no mention of my job. There is no mention of politics. There is no mention of current events. And, as of yet, I haven't named names.

Not even my own.

There is a time for all those things. This isn't it. Rather, this is an outlet for things that need to be said.

I guess you could say that I am a writer. And the written word is how I communicate. And, apparently, how I heal.

The other day, I reached a professional milestone. I climbed a mountain which precious few in my profession ever get to climb. It was exhilarating.

My wife has been wonderfully supportive throughout it. My bosses and co-workers have been great. It is truly the best of times for me professionally.

And, even as I enjoy this time, I wish that my buddy could have seen it. Or my mother-in-law, whom we lost a little over a year ago. Or my grandmother. Or my wife's grandfather -- who shared the same as of yet unnamed profession as me.

They would have loved it.

This fuckin' disease has taken a lot of people I care about. Indiscriminately.

Actually, not indiscriminately.

As my buddy used to say, "Your friends and relatives die in reverse proportion to how nice they were in life. The nice ones go rather quickly; the mean assholes linger on forever, making your life a living hell."

I have seen no statistics, but his hypothesis holds up -- at least in my limited anecdotal experience.

That is his legacy.

But then again, he used to like to watch "Wheel of Fortune" and root for the "Bankrupt" space.

Hey, I never said he was perfect.

In fact, he was pretty damn twisted. Which, I guess, was part of his charm.

Maybe his theory was full of shit after all.

A Faint Light Across Dark Waters

The other day, I got a call that one of my oldest friends was coming to San Diego on business. Being two of just a handful of college-bound nerds in a small town high school filled with FFA kids, we had virtually every class together. However, we really didn't click until we took two sisters to a High School prom (a wicked crash-and-burn cautionary tale for another blog).

We both grew up in good families, but without a lot of extras. We both had to scratch really hard to make it through undergrad. And although our lives took extraordinarily different paths, we had always been the greatest fans of each other -- of how we had both overcome obstacles on the way to successful lives, marriages, and careers.

It was a somber night of self-medicating. As we downed pint after pint of Harp, he talked about losing his father and I talked about my recent loss. And, as has happened countless other times with other listeners, his face lost color as relayed the story about how I was there when he had slipped away -- for he too had experienced something similar. Apparently, he had been sitting on the foot of his father's death bed playing cribbage when his father had let go.

He indicated that he still felt the pain of losing his father some years before. However, the painful episodes -- while still present -- had lessened both in severity and frequency.

It WOULD come, he assured me.

It was nice to hear such assurances from such an old-vine friend.

* * *

It's all about time, I guess. And we all just have to keep moving toward our own light. My best man was forced to leave his physical body behind to journey toward a celestial light; and I remain here, earthbound, desperately searching for the proverbial "end of the tunnel" varietal.

And even though I cannot yet quite see the light at the end of my own personal tunnel, I remain confident that it IS there and it WILL come.


You see, because, like Gatsby, I believe both in the light and the orgastic future that year by year recedes before us.

And so tomorrow, I will run faster, stretch out my arms farther. . . . And one fine morning --

Better Times

Tattoos

A couple months before my 40th birthday, I found myself wanting to get a tattoo, which came as quite a shock to most people. I am a pretty traditional guy with traditional tastes. I work in a conservative industry.

"You'll regret it," they said.

And yet I still wanted one. Even if I would regret it after the fact. I mean, isn't that half the fun? Having a story to tell about the time you stupidly went in and got a tattoo?

In order to minimize the buyer's remorse, I took a long time trying to figure out what I wanted, however. I made a couple trips out to tattoo place to look at designs.

The place I chose was in a college area filled with 19-year-old guys getting tribal tattoos and 19-year-old girls getting designs right above their ass cracks. Not a lot of bikers in this joint. In fact, it kinda reminded me of a 50s diner with a bunch of those old poster racks that used to be in record stores when I was a kid. Not intimidating at all.


I decided on a Phoenix -- the mythical bird the rises out of the ashes -- which was particularly appropriate for me.

By way of back-story, I was involved in a horrific accident in 1986 in which I suffered third-degree burns over a good chunk of my body. When my 19-year-old girlfriend (who later became my wife) showed up at the ER, I looked down at myself and told the doctors I didn't want her to see me like this.

The doctor told me, "You better see her now. You're probably not going to make it."

"OK. Send her in."

And before you think what a horrible doctor this was for telling me this, I guess you should know that he was right. I damn near didn't make it. It was extremely touch and go for a long time.

But eventually, slowly, I came out of it. And rose from the ashes. Like the Phoenix.

After I created the design -- an amalgam of other designs I saw and my own thoughts -- the tattoo artist suggested a couple changes. "If we do it your way, it will be hard to add on to it later."

I assured him that this was a one-time deal.

He laughed and said, "Everyone says that. But you'll be back. People always come back after their first one."

He was right. Within a couple weeks, I was considering getting another. But my wife -- who loved the first one -- resisted. "One is sexy. Two is trashy."

She had a point.

However, despite this, a year later I was back in the chair.

Again, if I was going to do it, I wanted it to be meaningful.

It was.


My buddy's initials -- with the words "No Retreat" in a small arc above them and "No Surrender" in a small arc below them -- down on my right ankle.

"No Retreat, No Surrender" comes from a Springsteen tune. One of our favorites from the Boss. Probably because of the line, "We learned more from a three minute record than we ever learned in school."

So when my buddy's brother-in-law asked for a song to play during his memorial slide slow, I suggested this one. It was perfect. Probably the first time that The Boss has ever been played inside a church in Palos Verdes.

I look at the ink as a diary of sorts -- a roadmap of places you have been, things you have experienced, people who were important to you.

And like I felt after I got the first one, I have no regrets.

It's Been a Month

It's been a month since he died. My best friend. The closest thing I have ever had to a brother.

And I am still not exactly sure how to put my thoughts and feelings into words. (Hence, this exercise.)

First of all, I know that he is better off. Hell, anyone who would have seen him during the last 2 months of his life would know that. He stayed alive only through sheer stubborness and determination. More than once the doctors had counted him out. And more than once he had surprised them.

But by the end, he was just a shell of his former self. Unable to talk because he was intubated. Too sick to be able to point to letters on a letter board that my wife and I made for him.

And, when he found out that we would never be disconnected from machinery -- something he had repeatedly said he didn't want -- he stopped trying.

He got so that we didn't want to look at you when you came to visit. He fought the hospital staff. He refused to look at pictures of his kids. He made gestures about pulling tubes out. They had to restrain him.

It was fucking awful.

So, I know he is better off. But that doesn't make it any easier.

Probably the worst day occurred when a co-worker forwarded something to me via e-mail.

Unlike most of the insipid crap that gets forwarded -- "Forward this to 10 people and you will have 10 days of good luck" -- this was pretty interesting. It was a game where someone had taken scenes from a number of movies and removed the characters faces. All that was left was the clothing and the scene and you had to guess which movie they came from.

My buddy loved the movies. We had even written a couple of screen plays together. We ate them up and disected the plots. And we would argue with anyone who said that "Chinatown" wasn't one of the best movies ever.

As soon as I opened the e-mail and saw the game, I picked up the phone to call him.

That's right. I picked up the phone to call a guy who had been dead for 2 weeks.

The whole experience really screwed me up for a couple days. I found it hard to concentrate at work. I couldn't sleep. I felt like I was walking around with a big whole inside me.

My wife suggested I contact his wife and we could talk through things together. What a good idea.

We spoke for about an hour -- which was probably about 55 minutes longer than I had ever spoken to her on the phone before.

She indicated that she was also having a hard time dealing with it. In fact, one of her most recent past times was to call his cell phone and listen to his voice on the voicemail. She suggested I do it too.

Talk about a bad idea.

Another couple days of sleeplessness followed.

And then, just as things were getting better, along came the Superbowl. We had usually gotten together with our families and had a BBQ and watched the game. But not this year. Not ever again.

I don't know what I expected. I didn't think that I would be completely healed by this point. But I sure as hell didn't think that I would be blindsided with a wave of emotion by a stupid e-mail or a football game between two teams I didn't give two shits about.

Give it time, they say.

After all. It's only been a month.

The Eulogy

Since my best friend died on January 6th, there have been both good days and bad days. And believe it or not, the day of his funeral was one of the better ones.

I was tapped to do his eulogy. On my birthday. That's right. One year from the date of my 40th birthday party -- where 250 people drank and ate and drank some more at a crazy Mardis Gras themed party (before Katrina made such themed parties inappropriate). What a difference a year made.

It was a tremendously uplifting service. His mother spoke. A strong woman who had already buried a husband and, as a young girl, three brothers who were all stationed on the same Navy ship. When it was sunk, an entire family was destroyed, prompting congress to pass legislation mandating that brothers could not serve on the same vessel even again. She was strong, and told stories of his childhood.

His brother spoke. A sergeant in the special forces. I knew he would be strong. Quite the different picture than the 14 year old kid I had first met 23 years before. He spoke of how he had always thought that he and his brother were so different. But that when he needed bone marrow, they found out exactly how similar they were.

And his wife spoke. She spoke with strength and grace that was completely unbelievable. No tears. Just a big warm smile and stories about the life they had shared.

And then his other best friend spoke. A wonderful impassioned speech, filled with quotations and deep thoughts. Very moving, and not at all morose or depressing.

And then, finally, it was my turn to speak last.

I walked to the front of the church and pulled out my speech. Really, it was nothing more than the brief statement I had written 7 days before. When I was in a deep dark place. A place so dark and depressing that I could not emerge until I had captured my thoughts on paper.

But I couldn't do it.

Not after hearing all those wonderfully uplifting statements.

So, there I stood. In silence. For just a moment. A long moment, actually. Most would call it an "uncomfortably long moment." And then folded it up the speech and put it in my breast pocket.

I just spoke off the top of my head. Stories about what an incredible smart-ass he was. His twisted sense of humor. And his absolute zest for life - hiking, football, hockey, wind-surfing, the Dodgers (ok, no one said he was perfect).

And I spoke how his wife stood by him at the end, unwavering, even when he was in so much pain that he became hateful to those who cared for him the most, making it difficult for them to love him when he needed them the most.

I really can't remember everything I said, nor do I really want to. I have no notes to go back to. But whatever it was -- which did not come from me but rather through me -- apparently worked. People came up and approached me afterwards, and said how incredibly moving it was and how I had really captured him.

Or maybe not. Hell, I don't know, maybe that's just what you say to someone who just gave a eulogy. For the best friend. On their birthday.

It's probably what I'll say to the next poor bastard I see who has to give one.

Yesterday

Date: Sat, 07 Jan 2006 13:05:06

Yesterday my best friend died in my arms.

We met in 1983. Two scared but excited 18-year-olds from small towns, all alone and far from home in the freshmen dorms. Over the next 23 years, he became the closest thing I have ever had to a brother.

He stood beside my at my wedding in 1989 and I stood beside him at his a few months later. We were godparents to each other's children and spent 17 straight New Year's Eves together - even during those times when we lived several hundred miles apart. And he was with me during some of my darkest days when I was seriously injured, expected to die, and in an ICU ward for 35 days.

We shared a love of fast cars -- especially rag tops -- and spicy food. We both loved expensive Scotch and cheap Mexican beer (him, Dos Equis; me, Carta Blanca). We lived for the Raiders and hated John Elway with a white-hot passion. We could both quote every lyric ever written by the Boss and had been known to drive 30 miles for a Tommy's burger. And then there was hockey -- no one camped out in the crease when we were on the same line.

In typical fashion, he was with me 15 minutes after midnight on New Years Day 2005, when I got belligerent with one of Irvine's finest and was nearly arrested. After it was all over, we had a great laugh and joked about how 2005 was going to be "our year."

But, by the time of my big 40th birthday chingadera twelve-days later, he was starting to get sick again and he had to leave before he could give a tribute speech. And by the time the next New Year's Eve rolled around, he would have spent 8 of the next 12 months in a hospital room.

When it was time, ten of us assembled in his room. The minion all held hands as the machines which had kept him alive for the last 2 months -- and from which he would never be freed -- were turned off. His wife held his right hand, my wife and I his left, and the others made an unbroken chain around the foot of the bed.

As he struggled to breathe for the next few minutes, I leaned over his emaciated frame, rubbed his hairless head with my free hand, and told him that it was OK, that I would help look after his five-year-old and his two-year-old, and that he should "let go."

Eventually, he did. Surrounded by those who loved him. At 1:40 pm, Friday, January 6th, 2006.

Yesterday.