Upon the occasion of the death of my friend, Jim Costa.

I do not want to say the long goodbye.

To have it short and sweet is my wish when I die.

I say no to COVID but yes to all of you

No to lymphoma, glioblastoma.

But yes to your eyes and heart and your goodbyes.

We will not get what we want,

our desires wishes thwarted inopportunely.

To meet our end with peace can be a most difficult thing

but love and morphine can ease the path.

I'll take a modicum of gracefulness and ease

surrounded I hope by love,

support, cradling arms . . . .

as we bid the other the long goodbye.

and ease, ever so gently . . .

into that long good and graceful night.

 

https://www.theatlantic.com/culture/archive/2021/09/eagles-hotel-california-tour-review/619973/?utm_source=facebook&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=share

 

Hotel California

This music, this song is inevitably tied to my friend Jim Walsh who died in an overloaded light plane crash in Sacramento around 1982. One of the last and best memories of being with Jim was a warm Sacramento summer night out for a drive to who knows where (and that was the very point). The drive took us into the foothills up near Sierra College. Back then, 'in the olden days' it was not as built up as it is now - of course of course.

We were in our young 20's, our very young 20's and the night, like our lives, was ours with nothing between us and a bright long future. We drove his silver shining Honda into that night with all the windows and sunroof open to the stars and moon. We talked of nothing but everything that lay between us and the universe racing by. Hotel California played on the radio and we sang with it a bit, lifting our voices in sync but little knowing of life's travails then or what was to come. Not many of us do I guess . . . but even at a young age I had seen some amazing things and Jim . . . he had some stories to tell too, some much darker, some much brighter.

It is good, this memory. I hold and cherish, nurture it close to my heart. I shared it over the years with Jim's brother, Mo Walsh. He is one of the finest men I know on this planet. We carry this mutual sorrow, he for the brother lost and I for one of my best friends. In his dying, Jim gave us the gift of our friendship. From death comes many gifts even if I could not see that in the making. This song is many things to all of us who heard it back in the day. But to me I will always remember that night speeding along in the darkness of a full moon with a best friend, in a silver Honda, on a warm summer night, long long ago.

My day thus far . . . .

I am outside COVID testing people in a line of cars.  Older patient drives up.  Says she is worried that something that happened today may affect her ability to take the test.  I can see the emotion building in her face.  I tell her that we have time, no one is behind her, is she ok?  Does she want to talk?

Then the tears begin to flow at last and she can unburden her sadness and grief for these all too brief moments  Her 5 month old granddaughter just died who had been born with a terminal medical condition.  This woman had just picked up the death certificate that is lying in the front right seat.

What can one do?  Except to hold her hand, hold it with silence and acceptance, with empathy and love.  Sometimes our greatest gift is to help in the relief of great suffering.  Thank god I had the time, that I was able to make the time.

Our own suffering comes back to us in these moments.  I was able to use that to understand her suffering.  Although the two are so different the human experience remains.  The shared suffering so to speak.

There are no heroes in this story - except perhaps for this person in front of me and the parents of a dead baby.  Just people, all these people surrounding me, holding me up making it possible for me not only to do my job . . . . but to hold the hand of a grieving woman.  I am grateful and humbled.

 I had wine and conversation with a good friend last night.  He is older, served in Vietnam as a combat photographer.  

The taliban, a world and decades away from Vietnam over ran Kabul two days ago.  So our conversation may have have been prompted by this because the parallels are all too familiar.

Our conversation did not devolve into drunken reminiscing of war stories, his war stories (for I have none to share nor wish to).  But it did touch upon the endless repetition of wars this country has seen, initiated and those brought upon it.

To this day the memories of combat are crystal clear.  Sometimes, when you are a good friend, you learn to just shut the fuck up and listen.  That is what I did.  Took me long enough I guess. 

I have memories like this.  Crystal clear.  From fire fighting days, medical calls in the field. Horrific scenes etched into times frozen memory that clutches and claws at you at the most inopportune times! How inconvenient suffering can be at times.  

Yet again and again, I also have these moments but of my lovers touch and kiss,  Haleys comet in the Fijian South Pacific skies in 1986 as I lay on the deck of a boat crossing the midnight sea.  I watched Haley's Comet all night . . . and I wondered who will be watching it when it circles back to us again in 2061?  I may be alive against the odds.  If I am alive I will gaze toward the heavens in wonderment, awe but most of all gratefulness.

Grateful for being alive every day, to have had the love of my life with Victoria Wright and the peace and deep intense satisfaction she brings to living, for the friendship of my friend and his wine and all the friends I have scattered around this lovely warming planet.