Forty Eighth

Shelley.

One of the first times i met you, certainly the first time i was at your house, you told me that your mother was drunk.  I was very young and had never (knowingly) been around a drunk person before. I was afraid, and acted very stiffly around your mother as she showed us a card trick.  

For you it was a casual statement, an indication of just how different your life was from mine.  

You took me to places in 8th grade that i would not have otherwise been.  I learned to smoke dope that year, because of you.  We snuck out of houses and wandered the streets late at night.  Walking several miles to tape a joint on the door of someone who was important to you at the time.

Talking in your room, covering issues from coloring books to masturbation.

I was at your house the night your oldest brother was having a psychotic episode and was threatening to jump off the loft.

You were there during the time that i decided that having my eyes really wide open would be cool.  All you said was, "it's cool how i can see white all around your eyes,"  rather than, "Oh for god's sake, cut that out."

I was not cool.  You moved on to the cool kids.

You called me, maybe 5 years after we had been close to tell me your dog had died. because you knew i would understand what he meant to you.

I saw you, years later at your brother's funeral.  We hadn't been close in years, but i knew my attendance would please you.  It did.

The last time i spoke to you, you called me late at night, after no communication in 15 years, and told me that i had to read "Captain Corelli's Mandolin."  I haven't read it yet, nor have i forgotten the title.

Shelley, you were wasted.  You were so smart and funny and damaged.  You never had a chance.  I wish i had know how to help, but i couldn't even help myself.

Forty Seventh

Do you suppose that loneliness has something to teach me?

That sounds kind of like a stupid question.  But i found myself asking it today.  

Still reeling from the death of my brother.

Grief stamped a memory inside my body that will never go away, and experiencing this new grief has strengthened the bond between grief and me.  It will never be far from the surface now that i know it.  It's a part of me now.

I am working on the speech i wish i'd been able to give at his memorial, a speech i will never be able to give.  I daren't deny the legend that is Saint Jim.

Forty Sixth

I have just done a very scientific survey on the top 100 books for kindle on Amazon:

On the top 100:

- 6 books featured a male chest, usually naked, perhaps in a shirt.

of the top 100 FREE:

- 15 of the books were displays of male pulchritude.

You are welcome for this intel, gathered at great expense and personal peril.