The Seperation

I’m not sure how I’m going to write about this subject because the matter, certainly the wrong word, is wholly abstract. That doesn’t make for good writing. I owe QuinnMama thanks on that lesson – specifics. A writer must anchor their work by using specifics. “When I woke up this morning I had rot in my mouth.” Much better than, “I woke up this morning with a bad taste in my mouth.” Snoozefest. Better still, “When I woke up this morning I had rot in my mouth, a woman’s monstrous brown nipple poking my eye and the memory of small bald man with cracked, marbleized teeth saying ‘Do you take this woman. . .’ Far better. Thanks, QuinnMama.

But for this piece of writing, I’m left in the territory of abstraction. How else do you write about a separation from the physical world into another perception. Like the snap of a fresh onion layer, I have broken the bounds in some small way. This break started after the writing of my prior post. All of it triggered by the death of my friend. Clarity, a clear day, blue sky, spring . . . the tether was broken . . . like a balloon I go sailing away, away . . . But I am still here . . .

We are physical beings, tied by forces to the physical world and walking under such gravity certain that we know this place. It almost fits in our minds, almost. We cram all we can – facts, figures, measurements, quantities. And they are real, they just aren’t all real. There is another perception. When we think of the dead, we think of them going somewhere . . . other. I’m hear to argue that we are a short step in perception away from occupying the same space, time . . . something. An added dimension for lack of any other way to describe such a thing. A movie rushing at full force into your brain and occupying everything, inflating, expanding and then rushing away. So it’s temporal, this crack in the fabric. At least for now. And exhausting. I haven’t been the same. There is no living in such a realm while experiencing through the prism of this mind. The screen locks up. It’s just too much.

How can anyone talk with certainty about life when life is the host? This borrowed state of consciousness is not a right, certainly not owned. It is given. An opportunity. For what? I don’t know. I matter little. I am only good as I am a part of the whole. Whatever it is I’m here to learn, I’m learning. Then, I go home. My heart aches.

Our efforts matter because we help move each other onward. An object at rest . . . so move me. I’ll move you. The whole thing will turn over and life will change, again. It is a heartbreaking journey we are all on no matter how we try to pretend otherwise. But it’s not all . . . it’s not . . . it’s just a mild separation to be, hopefully, healed.

A Gift from a Friend

I’ve debated how, or if, to write this post. In the end, I hope it is about what I learned in experiencing the passing of a friend. My intent is to explore my own feelings on the matter and not to make public something that was, for a friend, very private. I will describe a few things about my couple of visits but only those things that relate to my feelings and to what was learned. So, let’s hope I achieve that goal and that this post is not about my friend’s experience in death, but about how, through his difficulty, he gave me a gift.

In November last year, a friend and actor in town, Allen, was diagnosed with stage-four esophageal cancer. As a community of theatre artists, we raised money for him, let him know we loved him and tried to support those who were doing the hard work of caring for Allen in his terrific battle.

This past month I got the call that he was in hospice care. On, Sunday, March 14th, after hearing of his deteriorating state, I went to see my friend. That Sunday, my friend was certainly very sick, but he was there. I held his hand, felt warmth and stroked his arm. There, I had the chance to put my arms around someone who was very dear to Allen. One look in her eyes told me everything I needed to know about the battle she had fought since November. By the time I returned on the 18th, his decline was profound. This time his family was in the room. It was the first chance I’ve had to meet them. It was nice to sit with them and do my best to just help in some very small way. Allen was not responsive. Medication was taking away most of the pain, but it was hard looking at my friend. His body shutting down, cell by cell, organ by organ. We turn off computers so much in our modern day. It was like the brain was doing the same for Allen: terminating processes, eliminating data, disengaging and allowing for the final movement to silence. Allen was five years older than I am. I sat there talking with his mother as she told me how hard it was to watch her boy, her child, suffer. How hard it was when the moment came that two-way communication was no longer possible. It wasn’t as hard to take when she could do things for him. I could not help but think of my own mother in that position. It was a crushing thought.

I left my friend, eyes closed, with little weight left on his frame, breathing in odd strains. I knew when I left that day that he would pass when the moment was ready for his family in their process of grief. Then he would go. There is more to life that what we see. I feel that other space and time, or timelessness, just a short, quick, idle step away from what we call life. I know that. So, I did not worry for my friend in death. I cried for him in his suffering. The lesson, “We are quiet visitors in this life – nothing more.” No need to pretend otherwise.

The following morning, March 19th, my friend passed away. When someone leaves this world through illness, for the longest time it is about the person. But over that it span, the person with the illness begins to give back to us and the subject becomes those around him or her. Then we are taught and comforted. We fear death when it is rightfully a full passage out of this world and into the hearts of many. The self is given, dies, and dissipates. Then there are only the ones remaining - “we” “us” “together” - that share a common love and a common grief.

On, Tuesday, March 23rd, I went to a memorial service. A service in a beautiful place, on what turned out to be a beautiful day, with a lot of people who would have loved nothing more than to hug Allen. His body did not exist anymore. That sole point drove the heartache home like no other aspect of his death. This person who I came to care for, love, and who had an impact on my life was now physically no longer a part of this world. I really struggled to fully embrace the idea. That day, his ashes were buried in a beautiful garden on the grounds of the church. He was certainly alive in spirit, and I know I’ve felt his spirit on a few occasions since his passing. Whatever void is crossed, he made it to the other side. I feel that strongly but, obviously, it is not a point that can be proved. It is something I take on faith and in my feelings and perceptions about life.

I have identified with Allen’ passing in a way I have never done before. I’m usually pretty good at maintaining a certain distance when it comes to illness and death. Not that I pretend I was there helping him through the brutal days - I wasn’t. I did a few things to help along the way, let him know I loved him and in the end went to see him a couple of times before his passing. But he had great, loving people doing so much for him. But I could have done more for him, I know that. But for me, in my own cautious way, I reached out and let him know that he was my friend and that I loved him.

His death has had a profound impact on my thinking. It has stirred me and has me asking questions and seeking answers. And not the question of why bad things happen to good people or the issue of fairness or any other issue that is of this world. It gets back to that moment when I learned that Allen was no longer available to me in physical form. It brings me back to the central issue of my faith – Christ’s death and resurrection. To be honest, I’ve learned to accept it as a metaphor for my faith. A journey we undertake in seeking God. But, now, I wonder. I still can’t imagine any physical body just up and disappearing. There is not any evidence in life to even suggest such a thing is possible. So, on that sole issue, I have not changed. But in terms of the physical body of someone being available one day and then gone; only to be felt as spirit – that experience seems entirely real. Maybe I just need to feel that way. Maybe I talk myself into feeling my friend’s spirit to ease the grief. Maybe. But there are little things that happen, small reminders that speak . . . they say “I’m here. Maybe out of reach. But I’m here.”

I’ve been acting in a play through this process, and I’ve enjoyed talking to Allen and asking for his input on the challenges in playing the role. It’s been a fun and instructive conversation to have while I prepare to step on stage. I have a great imagination so it is an easy conversation to have with my friend. And in my prayers before I take to the stage, I welcome him to play out under the lights. Crazy, to be sure. Fun, absolutely.

In the days since his passing I’ve begun to wonder about my attachment to Allen’s death. The way it impacted on me in relation to how well I really knew Allen does not seem to be in proportion. Allen had a family and many loving friends. It was not necessary for me to do or feel anymore than any friend might feel at such a time. So, that tells me there was more at work. In addition to my true concern and love for Allen and those around him, I know I was grappling with my own issues about death and in some way dealing with feelings about the absence of my brother in my life. It is a choice my brother and his wife made and only time and circumstance will heal that rift. And I’m okay with that. My life is a lot simpler without having my brother in my life. I pray from him and love him from where I sit in life. One day, that will change again. But, I think, in Allen, I have been able to work through some of my grief on the subject. Of course, I was not aware of this aspect in feeling all that emotion regarding Allen, but I think there may be something to the idea. Somehow, in Allen’s suffering, he was giving me a gift. And amazing idea if you stop to think about it. God’s grace and mercy knows no limits. Even in pain and suffering, something deep and rich can be at work. I don’t claim to understand any of it. But I want to thank my dear friend Allen for his gift. He was my friend. We laughed a lot together, battled though some tough moments on creative projects and shared some terrific times together. I am a lucky and blessed man. Despite the day job I work, the crappy apartment I live in, being alone, living paycheck to paycheck, and living with a feeling of being broken and flawed in so many ways, I can’t help but feel blessed. I’m still here, my dreams still alive and granted the chance to have a terrific friend like Allen and others in my life. The opportunity is mine. A gift given. Thanks, Allen. Thanks, my friend. Big love.

Onion Life

Or life as an onion. Either way, it describes me. A seedless bulb, wrapped in layers, resting in the dirt, considering the sky. It doesn’t have to be precise, just to get the point across. It also describes the heaviness I carry in my head. Most would call it depression. I just call it having an onion head. And the weight varies from day to day, week to week, situation to situation. Get me to a point where I’m feeling overwhelmed and fearing that the wheels are about to come off, and the weight gets heavy and over I fall. And once down, I stay awhile. Or some days, I wake up and it’s as if a thin, fine onion skin has covered my head, and I spend the morning wandering in a daze until I realize the skin can be easily peeled away. And, often, on those days, I’m okay with not seeing clearly, at having an altered point of view. I like the warm buzz, the feeling of swimming underwater in a gentle pool. Although awake, I am hidden. Don’t let anyone ever tell you depression doesn’t have an upside. It certainly does. It’s where I stumble on some really strong creative images and thoughts. I think it’s also some sort of self-protective mechanism. Growing up amidst chaos, a very logical option was shutting down, retreating. And after awhile, it gets real comfortable and safe. It still is. Give me a weekend where I can shut down, retreat, I’m in heaven.

Of course there is the downside, when my head is left underground for too long, it goes bad. I forget there is a sun, the sky. I focus only on the grinding dirt and become preoccupied with rot. I’ve suffered a rotten head a number of times in my life. The first that I really can identify was in my early twenties. That one hung around for years until I finally found help through therapy and by beginning to take acting classes. The therapy has been off and on through the years. The acting classes led to an unknown passion and the discovery of a form of writing that made sense – plays.

In 2001, as a long-term relationship came to an end and then my job did the same, I went down the old road again. And only a few years after, I lost my balance again and went down really hard. The onion in my head had simply grown too fat and round. There is no doubt that age and body chemistry play their part, but, it also had to do with being disobedient to God’s will, a true purpose, a path. I wanted! I had made Chicago home. I would not leave! So, God covered me with soil until I figured out the problem was me. So, I moved back to Atlanta. Through a lot of good work with a great counselor, some medication, help of family and a miraculous new network of friends, I have healed and even grown strong.

But I still have an onion head. I’m learning to see it as a blessing. In an immediate world, I walk a step behind, moving slowly. The light is different, the sounds not the same – I hear trains, my breath, the muffled murmur of eternity. I am God’s. Only he knows what to do with an onion head. My job is to keep upright, to maintain balance and to do my part in helping to create this onion life.

. . . the subject of trains

Trains drove their sound into my subconscious at sixteen. After spending all of my life in the suburbs of Atlanta, my family found itself in a ranch style home that rested on a concrete slab like all the other homes in the small neighbor that was once, apparently by the number of fruit trees, a grove. It was an odd spot for a neighborhood in that it was really only one road circling a flat piece of ground between one of Orlando’s many lakes and Hwy 17/92 - a main thoroughfare, leading north out of Orlando deeper into the sprawl.

In the morning darkness, I would drag myself from bed, prepare and walk out of the grove of homes and go and wait on the side of the highway for the bus to take me to Winter Park High School. That’s when I remember really hearing that train, in those early hours, as I slumbered my way down the empty neighborhood road, feeling the bath of warm air of middle Florida and noticing a seeming gloom hovering in the trees, moss, around the streetlights. I would hear that train. Even came to expect it in the morning. Then I would hear it again at night, lying on my back in bed.

It’s hard to say how often I heard the pulling train cars because after awhile, I think I actually stopped noticing. My mind began to register it as insignificant. Until sometime in the late night or early morning hours of February, when my father pulled himself from my parent’s bed, quietly removed the small shotgun and shells from underneath the bed (the same gun and shells I had seen under the bed when snooping for no real reason). He walked out to a small fenced area just off the master bath. A solitary place where a person could stand naked if they wanted because no one could see through the overlapping slats of the dark fence. And wearing only his underwear, a sight I had come to see a lot of in his last days, a man seemingly unaware or unconcerned with his personal state, he put the shotgun to his chest and pulled the trigger. It was a small caliber shotgun and my guess is that the shot itself did not kill him right away. There would have been a lot of bleeding, choking on one’s own blood and then consciousness would cease. I heard none of it.

But I did wake early that morning. I lay in bed. What was it I heard? Why are Mom and Dad up? Something is not right. But, I honestly did not want to know. Then my bedroom door opened and the shadows of two people entered. One was Mom. Something was not right. The second shadow was much larger than my father. The dark shape belonged to the minister from the church we had started to attend. They told me and then I listened as they went to tell my brother. I remember sitting on the sofa talking to the police – there were questions to be asked and answered. There was the feeling of the world suddenly upside down, my head on the brown carpet with my feet spinning in the air. Then there was my Mom walking around the house, trying to be functional, but completely lost. She was wearing a nightgown and at some point I noticed my father’s watch hanging loosely around her wrist. Something wasn’t right. I took it from her. There were specks of my father’s blood on the watch. It needed cleaning. He was, apparently, also wearing his watch, the same watch that is wrapped around my wrist as I type this post.

It’s all murky, that morning. With the passage of years it has become even less clear. And, I could not tell you then or now, for sure, if I heard the train that morning, but something in me says I did. I’ve lived many places since that morning. And in quite a few, there have been trains. And every time I hear one, somewhere inside, a signal is sent. There is a wail in the air, a scream, a cry . . . “this is life, this is life.”

So I Walk

So I walk . . .

At soon to be 45, if you can call July soon, I am in the middle period where I seem to sway back and forth along a tightrope trying to decided which way to proceed. Of course, there is no choice, but, at times, I still fool myself, just not for long. So, I have to be honest. At almost 45, given that men die sooner than woman and that I really don’t have a great desire, at the moment, to see 80+, I have maybe 25 to 30 years left in this life, barring some unforeseen incident or health issue. And that pure, concise thought settles it for me. The “it” being the desire to waver or consider for too long a course of action. It is clarifying. And I am thankful for the realization. You know, “thanks God for reminding me that it will end.” So often I, we, work really hard to avoid our eyes on that real truth (i.e. the graveyard scene in “Our Town.”) It won’t last – nothing we build, create or claim will hold. The atoms and molecules will lose energy. And we’ll sleep.

I’m not one of those pretends to know what happens after death. You know, that’s an issue of faith. But so is living. At my best, I have learned to surrender to God everything I hold dear – my writing and creative efforts (yes, I list that first and people who know me will understand. And, yes, that is terribly f’ed up), relationships and family (I will blog on family at some point. Could be it’s not all it’s cracked up to be.) and the wants in life (name your toys and ambitions). At my best, none of it matters, I surrender it all and allow God work his miracles. I allow his will to be made manifest in me (and I never claim to understand divine will) and open up to having fellowship with others, being accepting and often loving (despite what some folks claim.) At my worst, I am just the same as any man or woman living in this time – worried, anxious, obsessed with self and status, need, desire and attempting to frame life in a way so I can create a belief that I have some control. I have none. It’s a fallacy. I am completely vulnerable all the time despite the protest of my ego and various means of self-defense. But the comfort, for me, is found in the grace of God. The mercy that says “I love you anyway.” And, “ no, you don’t deserve it, I give it as a gift. Trust me.”

Yes, I am a Christian. Although probably on the liberal side of the aisle, and I don’t pretend to know the only way to God. Others, I’m sure, find the same grace by different means. But one thing I feel to be true is that grace doesn’t care how you arrive. Grace and mercy are just glad to have you home.

This blog will be a place to help me along in that journey, and, maybe, help others in their walk. And that matters. The togetherness part. That although we are, by the seeming function of the world, forced to take the walk alone, and yet, the richness in life is found together – bouncing along the same taut wire, somehow managing, by grace, to make our way.