RIP
2020 just needs fuck right off.
Now.
Seriously.
Traditional wisdom says that you should be able to sense when a loved one has died.
I’m here to say that’s a lie.
I found out this evening that my dear friend Floyd passed last October. And before you ask, no, it wasn’t COVID. It was his heart, and he went in his sleep.
Floyd left behind his husband Ron, with whom he’d shared his life for the last 40 years and many grieving friends, myself among them.
Floyd and I met January 28, 1983. Despite it being a Friday night I wasn’t planning on going out. As I recall it had been an exhausting week and I wanted nothing more than to simply stay home and unwind.
But I stepped outside that evening, saw the most incredible full moon rising above the Rincon Mountains east of Tucson, and something told me in no uncertain terms to go out. There was, as they say, magic afoot.
My destination was The Fineline, a relatively new dance club on Drachman Street. I’d been there with my partner Dennis, numerous times, but since we’d split up a two months earlier and he took off for Austin, this was one of the first times I’d gone there by myself.
And hell, I was young and in a state of perpetual hormonal arousal, so why not?
I’d been working out (believe it or not) since Dennis left and I was feeling good about my body and the way I looked. I radiated a certain amount of confidence and it didn’t take long for Floyd and I to gravitate to one another. He was there with his partner, Ron, putting a damper on any thoughts of immediately scampering off to get nasty. But Floyd assured me they had an open relationship and while nothing would be happening between us that night, he was definitely interested in getting together. We exchanged phone numbers.
Later that same night I met Lee, a friend whom I’ve written about before, thus cementing the magic of that night in my life.
Floyd called me the next morning. We had phone sex. Floyd was a dirty, dirty boy and I loved it. We hung out a lot in the weeks that followed. As we discovered our shared taste in music and culture, a genuine friendship and affection bloomed between us. That’s not to say the physical attraction waned; if anything it remained constant, and over the years we became infrequent fuck buddies, all—somewhat surprisingly—with Ron’s blessing. Even during my San Francisco years we remained in touch, with Floyd traveling to The City numerous times on business.
After I returned to Phoenix and made it through the cancer ordeal, I started driving to Tucson to visit the guys on a semi-regular basis. I had a new car and if for no other reason I needed to reconnect with the friends who knew me best while putting my life back together.
Floyd and I called each other Dolly (from our shared love of Personal Services.) I’d call him up and say, “Dolly, I need to get out of town for a while. Are you and Ron free?” and depending on the answer, I’d hop in Anderson and make the 90 minute drive south. I remember one insane Saturday when I drove down to help with some computer issues, brought his PC back home to repair, and then returned it later that day.
Floyd did the same sort of spontaneous trips north, and one of my favorite memories were the two separate times he (and a few weeks later with Ron) came up to Phoenix and we shot photos at Arizona Falls.
Shortly before Ben and I left for Denver, Floyd and Ron fell on some very hard times. They both lost their longtime jobs, were unable to find work, lost everything they’d built together, and were forced to move in with Ron’s sister. Through it all we stayed in touch, they stayed together, and when they’d gotten back on their feet and Ben and I moved back from Denver, talked of a weekend visit but it seemed life was continually getting in the way and one thing or another always prevented it.
When it finally seemed we were going to be able to coordinate a visit, COVID hit, killing our plans again. I last spoke with Floyd in September, when he called to tell me that Abe, a mutual friend from our University of Arizona days, had passed.
Floyd, Ron, Abe and I used to joke that when we got old and retired we’d buy a big house together and disgracefully spend our twilight years like the Golden Girls.
The best laid plans of mice, men, and queens…
Though we went through periods when we didn’t see each other, or even talk much other than an occasional text or email, Floyd was one of those people in my life I just knew would always be there…and now he’s not. I think that’s why this has hit me so hard. His impish grin, that devilish twinkle in his eye, and his extensive…vocabulary…will be so sorely missed. More than with any other death that’s hit my life (and yes, sadly that includes my parents and my first partner, Dennis), I feel like a part of me has been ripped out and there’s nothing but an empty hole remaining.
As I get older, it’s becoming more and more apparent to me that you need to tell the people you love that you love them every damn day, because they can be taken from you at any moment.
This Guy Reminds Me…
…of my old friend Steve so much.
Road Trip!
Last week was Ben’s fall break, so on Monday he and his friend Barry drove up to the Grand Canyon. I had never really considered that as a day trip, but they proved me wrong. To be honest, I was more than a little jealous simply being able to get away from all. the. shit. going on, so Ben suggested we make the same trip on Saturday since his park pass was good for a week.
It has been forever since we’d gone on a proper road trip (the Arcosanti* visit in August really doesn’t count as it was so close to home), so we got up early and hit the road yesterday.
To be honest, I am filled with angst at the thought of any road trip in the “new” car. This is for a variety of readily-admitted ridiculous reasons. First off, Rabbit is the first car I’ve bought used. Granted he’s not that old and has low mileage, but not being the original owner I don’t know his complete history, and while his CarFax was clean and he received all his scheduled maintenance, I’m still…apprehensive.
I never worried about hopping in Anderson for an impromptu trip. Hell, one of the first things I did was take a scenic, multi-day trip through New Mexico right after I’d gotten him. And then there were the trips to Yellowstone, White Sands, Green Bay, and of course, more than one round-trip to Denver. I think it’s because the car was new—or relatively so—at the time and I knew its complete history. In addition, the car had never done anything to have me question its reliability.
Of course the reliability thing came into question over the last two years, which I think spooked me enough—even though this is a completely different car—to have trust issues, even with a few months remaining on the original factory warranty as well as having an extended warranty in place for another 50,000 miles after that.
Something else I was thinking about as we left Phoenix on our adventure was how all those times I hopped in the car by myself to go on these thousands-mile trips; the first time without even having a cell phone!
I don’t know; maybe it’s the additional ten years I’ve aged since my last major solo trip, but I just don’t feel (and frankly I’m hesitant to use the word) as confident as I once was being out and about on my own. I don’t expect anything to happen, but as you get older it’s something you at least need to have at the back of your head.
Anyway, the combination of getting spooked by Anderson’s troubles last year and my advancing age has definitely put a dent in my desire to throw caution to the wind and just hit the road for a day or a weekend. And then there’s the question of the dogs…
But I digress.
Our little trip north was enjoyable. Being on the road kept me disconnected from the endless online assault of the horrors of the world and allowed me to decompress emotionally, something that was much needed. And the Canyon was thirty degrees cooler than Phoenix, always a welcome respite.
Rabbit behaved beautifully, and while Anderson got a little better MPG, I certainly can’t complain. I think a few more trips are in order to dispel my motoring angst with this new ride, and if nothing else to simply keep reminding myself that at 30K, Rabbit is still a young’un, and even Anderson didn’t have his first major issue (a clutch replacement, covered under warranty) until 60, so relax and as MINI tells us, “Keep Motoring!”
*I posted photographs to Instagram but never blogged about it – probably because it wasn’t near as impressive as the hype had lead me to believe all these years. In fact, after seeing it, I now refer to it as “The place where old hippies go to die.”
I Broke Down Last Night
I thought I’d been handling this self-quarantine, lockdown, whatever-you-wanna-call-it thing pretty well. I’m a homebody at heart, so I figured going into this not leaving the house lifestyle would be a walk in the park.
Well, that was proven wrong last night. It started with a mild headache yesterday afternoon and progressed to an upset stomach. Ben started making dinner and the smells that were coming into the den sent my headache into overdrive. I wanted to wretch. I told him I wasn’t at all interested in eating at the time and closed the door.
After Ben had eaten I ventured into the kitchen, where he joined me. I turned to him and started crying. He came in for a hug and I just let loose. I didn’t cry when my mom died. I didn’t cry when my dad passed. And yet now—for seeming no reason at all, I lost it.
Amazingly after that good cry, the headache was gone as well as my upset stomach.
In his wisdom, Ben suggested we both get out of the house for a while, either together or separately. Cabin Fever was setting in. And you know I’m stressed when I reach the point I can’t spend one more second in front of a screen of any kind, which was exactly where I was.
We didn’t make it out last night because it was too late by the time I’d finished dinner, but when we woke today Ben said, “We need to take a drive.”
Since the world is on lockdown, we really couldn’t—nor did we want to—go anywhere that we’d run into masses of humanity, so we settled on one of the public spaces still open: White Tank Mountain Regional Park.
Back in the early 1970s after moving into our new home at 47th Avenue and Bethany Home Road, my family and I had an unobstructed view of the White Tank Mountains to the west. I often said that once I had my own car, my first destination would be driving out west to see them up close.
It took 42-some years to do it, but I finally did when I drove out a few years ago to photograph the White Tank Library. While there I contemplated driving into the park, but for a variety of reasons decided to put it off for another time. It took an additional three and a half years beyond that, but I finally fulfilled my teenage dream of visiting those mountains today.
We both felt much better—much relieved—when we arrived back home this afternoon. Ready to face another week of self-quarantine…
Forgotten Photos
Steve Golden (1957-1990)
Papago Park, Phoenix AZ, May 1983
Prime Time (Part Three)
It goes without saying that Fred offered me a job after only chatting with him for a half hour or so. He was impressed with both my continued architectural history as well as my knowledge of AutoCAD and the systems behind it. “We’re always having to call in our outside consultant when something goes wrong. It would be nice to have someone in house who can troubleshoot this stuff.”
From my Journal of July 9th that year:
I called Fred yesterday morning with every intention of turning down their offer. I knew I was probably throwing away a great opportunity, and the thought of going through this whole temp thing one more time didn’t exactly appeal to me, but the more I thought about what Jim (Fred’s partner) had said during our interview last Wednesday, the more I was convinced this was not some place I wanted to work. However, after voicing my concerns about working hours and overtime with Fred it became abundantly clear that, unlike Jim, he was willing to make whatever reasonable accommodations were necessary to get me in there. When I questioned him about this, Fred said, “Aw hell, you aren’t going to be working with him anyway.” Yeah, right.
Someday I’m going to start listening to my inner voice, because this was most certainly not one of them. Things started to sour almost immediately, as the job I was promised by Fred was most certainly not the job his partner had me performing.
From the resignation letter I left on Fred’s desk the day I walked out:
Despite your assurances that I was not hired as simply a “warm body to fill a chair” that’s exactly the feeling I’ve gotten since I started working here. It became increasingly obvious that my getting any sort of IS responsibility was never going to happen; control of that system is never going to be wrested from the other members of your management team. As just one example, the ongoing problems with Lisa’s computer could be easily solved if anyone had bothered to listen to what I had to say. Unfortunately it was always the mantra of “Call Emron! Call Emron!” whenever something went wrong, even though the man has demonstrated again and again his inability to provide long-term solutions to these problems. I even got to the point where I stopped fixing the easily-repairable glitches with my own setup because I’ve received the definite message from above that I’m not to touch anything. Fred, I’ve built systems as complex as yours from scratch and don’t appreciate being treated as if I don’t know where the on/off switch is by management personnel who have demonstrated time and again they don’t know an icon from a hole in the ground.
So two months later, after receiving (and cashing) my pay check, I left my resignation letter on Fred’s desk and walked out after lunch.
I did find work in the I.T. department of one of the country’s most prestigious law firms in the country shortly thereafter. While stressful, I learned a lot, made friends whom I’m still in contact with these many years later, and decided that yes, this was the career for me.
Unfortunately, that all fell apart about eighteen months later, when the management team left en masse, resulting in the promotion of a micro-managing mess (who had no leadership experience and even less people skills) to oversee the department. Within months, all of the desktop techs (including myself) had quit.
I spent one more short period of time working as a temp at St. Mary’s Hospital. I’d been referred by a previous coworker from the law firm, who had left St. Mary’s for a permanent position at another business. The money was good. Too good. (Something else that’s been a red flag for me in years since.)
The department was run by a nurse, who attempted to police us as if we were nursing staff. One morning I arrived ten minutes late and was told my tardiness would go on my permanent record. I bit my lip to prevent laughing to her face and saying, “Bitch, I’m a contractor. I don’t care about your permanent record bullshit.” I quit shortly thereafter. It was no wonder they couldn’t keep people…
My romantic life continued to be a hot mess, although there were no lack of sizzling encounters. My journals for those last years of my 30s are littered with the names of men I hooked up with but whose faces I cannot recall for the life of me. Again, I think unrelenting search for connection stems from the underlying loneliness I wrote of earlier.
My housemate Michael, however, was doing much better on the romantic front, and started dating a man named Raymond. Raymond and I did not get along, and while it hurt me deeply, it came as no surprise when Michael announced that they were moving in together, and I would have to find another place to live.
At this point, with both my professional and romantic lives in shambles, there was precious little holding me in San Francisco. After arranging to stay in my Mom’s spare room until I found work, I packed up and moved back to Arizona again.
Michael and I did not part on good terms, despite our near ten-year friendship. I left without saying goodbye. (Michael and I have long since patched things up and he now one of my closest confidants.)
Long story short, I ended up back in Phoenix in my mom’s spare bedroom. I found a job relatively quickly at Avnet, and ended up celebrating my 40th by myself; all my long-time friends still in SF.
(To be continued.)
To Absent Friends ?
Quote of the Day
A soulmate is someone who is willing to grow with you, who chooses to be with you until the end, and will love you through good and bad. It’s not about sunshine and laughter, it’s about mundane moments filled with unknowns.” ~ T.B. LaBerge
Quote of the Day
Some people bring out the worst in you, others bring out the best, and then there are those remarkably rare, addictive ones who just bring out the most. Of everything. They make you feel so alive that you’d follow them straight into hell.” ~ Karen Marie Moning
Quote of the Day
Our hearts resemble houses constructed by our parents. When we’re young and something breaks they repair the damage. As we get older we learn how to maintain and protect our own houses. First we have to learn how to welcome guests. We may deliberately allow them to enter our intimate lives. Some stay a short time and others stay longer. Some may damage our home or even steal from us. Still, in the end we each need someone to love our home and to become a part of it.” ~ Bammer
Happy Legal Paperwork Day!
I meant to post this last Saturday, but I got distracted and it was left languishing in “drafts.” So here it is now.
Six years ago Ben and I did our part to destroy western civilization, but somehow, despite our best efforts, it still survives. I don’t know what I did to deserve the happiness he’s given me since our paths first crossed, but here’s to another sixty (or some, more realistic multiple of six) years of the same.
To Absent Friends ?
Ten Years Ago
Ten years ago today, after a nearly a month of exchanging emails trying to set up a date to meet, Ben and I—on very short notice—finally connected in person at Starbucks on that warm Sunday afternoon.
And the rest as they say, is history.
And believe me, meeting such a wonderful, caring man at 50 was the absolute last thing I had been expecting. But then, most of my life since somewhere around the year 2000 had not been what I’d been expecting.
It’s been ten years of adventures, both good and—stressful. And as I sit here and look through our Instagrams, I am reminded how wonderful it’s all been.
This year was one of those “landmark” years and we had such plans for celebrating (I seem to remember a trip out of the country being discussed at one point) . I was turning 60. Ben was turning 35. We’ve known each other ten years, and in a few short days from now we’ll be celebrating 5 years married. But life has intervened—as it is increasingly wont to do these days. So instead of jetting off somewhere, tonight Ben fixed a delicious steak dinner for us and afterward returned to the scene of the crime…
Quote Of The Day
Marriage/relationships are not what everyone thinks it is. It’s not waking up early every morning to make breakfast and eat together. It’s not cuddling in bed together until both of you peacefully fall asleep. It’s not a clean home and a homemade meal every day. It’s someone who steals the covers and elbows you in the face. It’s a few harsh words, fights and the silent treatment, it’s wondering if you’ve made the right decision. It is, despite all of those things, the one thing you look forward to every day. It’s coming home to the same person everyday that you know loves and cares about you. It’s laughing about the one time you accidentally did something stupid. It’s about eating the cheapest and easiest meal you can make and sitting down together at 10pm to eat because you both had a crazy day. It’s when you have an emotional breakdown and they hold you and tell you everything is going to be okay, and you believe them. It’s about still loving someone even though they make you absolutely insane. It’s not perfect and it’s hard, but it’s amazing and comforting and the best thing you’ll ever experience.” ~ Troy via Just-Korey
And as Ben and I prepare to simultaneously celebrate ten years together and our five-year wedding anniversary in 2018, I wouldn’t have it any other way.
In Honor of Valentine’s Day
Who is older? Me
Difference in age? 25 years
Who was interested first? He emailed me first.
Same high school? Nope.
Born in Same state? Yes.
Worst temper? Me.
Better sense of humor? Him.
More organized? Me.
More social? Him!
Most stubborn? Very Equal.
Wakes first? Me.
Bigger Family? Him.
Cleans the most? Me.
Cries the most? Neither of us.
Who Said I love you first? Me.
Who’s the better driver? Him… no, me… no, him… no…
Better cook? 1000% Him.
How many kids together? 2 furry pee factories.
Married? YES!
How long have you known each other? 10 years in September 2018
Married for: 5 years in September 2018.
Better Late Than Never
About a month before our wedding anniversary this year, I ordered a gift for Ben. When I saw it, I knew it would be perfect since both of us are such geeks. I thought I’d allowed plenty of time for it to arrive—but I hadn’t anticipated it sitting at customs in Los Angeles for nearly three weeks. As it turned out, it did arrive on the day of the anniversary, but it was still no good. It needed to be properly framed and there was no way Ben was going to see it until it had been.
I finally got it back from the framer’s last night. And as I’d expected, Ben loved it!
But I’m not so thrilled. This star map is backwards from what you’d expect. It’s not what you’d see looking up, but rather what you’d see if you looked down onto the earth from a vantage point on the outside of some celestial sphere (or like on a globe) upon which the stars had been fixed. It’s very disappointing.
Four Years Ago Today
We did our part to destroy heterosexual marriage. Happy 4th to my beloved!
Happy 9 Years to My Bubba!
Quote of the Day
For my Bubba…
I like you to be exactly the way that you are, because in all my experience, I have never known anyone like you.” ~ Tennessee Williams
Submitted Without Comment
#truth
World AIDS Day
As is my tradition every December 1st, I remember…
Kent Kelly
Ken Cohen
Steve Golden
Dennis Shelpman
Jim Hagen
Chuck Krahe
Marty Kamner
Michael Nelson
Jim Nye
Kevin Ohm
Rick King
Ron Aiazzi
Grant Neilsen
Ric Hathaway
David Koston
Kim Holstein
Russ Alvarez
Ben Walzer
Ken Borg
Harold Gates
Jim Girard
Keith Roseberry
Tom Farrel
Peter Whitman
Chuck Mayer
Richard Gulliver
Scott Woods
Bobby Farina
Brian Lea
Fred Sibinic
Steve McCollom
John Trapp
Philip Ruckdeschel
Quote Of The Day
The loss of a friend is like that of a limb; time may heal the anguish of the wound, but the loss cannot be repaired.” ~ Robert Southey
Eight Years Ago Today
…I met this guy, and words cannot begin to describe how wonderful those years have been. Here’s to many, many, many more, my love!
“When I first met you, that’s what I remember. I looked up at the sky and thought, I’m going to love this person because even the sky looks different.” ~Margaret Stohl
In Memoriam
He would’ve been 55 today. And it’s doubly sad to realize that he’s now been gone for more years than he’d been alive when we first met.
It was the night of the summer solstice, and typically warm for Tucson. I’d just come out of a disastrous three week affair with stunningly beautiful mortician’s assistant, newly arrived in Arizona from the wilds of upstate Michigan. The man was gorgeous and the sex was great; unfortunately he was completely and utterly unavailable. This was turning into an all-too-common scenario that had played out again and again in the year or so that had passed since I’d begun exploring life and love after having moved out of my parents’ house and into a place of my own.
In fact, I was becoming so disheartened by these turn of events that I started questioning whether this “lifestyle” was all it was cracked up to be. Did straights have it any easier?
Angry and depressed—and against my better judgment—I went out that evening. I was young and horny and figured what better way to get over a broken heart than to try and score a little skin-on-skin action with someone new? (Hey, I was 23. Cut me some slack!)
At the time there were less than a handful of gay bars in Tucson, and of those, there was only one real dance club: The Joshua Tree. JT’s as it was known, had been around in one incarnation or another for years and never failed to draw a nice crowd from the university. Just what the doctor ordered.
Not unexpectedly, the evening had not gone well. It was one of those nights where everyone sensed the thundercloud hanging over my head and steered clear of me completely. After about an hour of being summarily ignored, I decided to give up, drive down to the Bum Steer (a straight pickup bar a few blocks from campus) and see how the other team played. I mean, no harm in a little “experimentation,” right?
As I was getting ready to leave, I remember telling the Universe, “If you want me to keep on being gay (like I had any choice in the matter), you’d better send a sign—and quick—because I’m walking out of this bar—and away from everything it represents—and I may never come back.”
As I was pushing my way through the crowd streaming in through the narrow entrance hallway, I locked eyes with this cute strawberry blond boy coming in. He looked at me and smiled. Even as the crowd behind jostled me out the door, time stood still for the brief instant our eyes met.
Once outside, I thought about what had happened and I immediately turned around and went back in.
A few minutes later I found him sitting out on the back patio sipping a beer. There was only one place to stand where I could get a clear view to safely flirt from a distance (because there was no way I could just go up to him and say hello) and I grabbed it straightaway.
It didn’t take him long to spot me standing there. We kept making eye contact, and I was trying very hard to look cool while swatting away the insects swarming around the neon sign that was unfortunately located right over my head.
After several minutes, with a big smile on his face, he nodded for me to come over.
Conversation was easy, and it took very little time for us to decide to go back to my place and get to know each other better. During all this I remember thinking, “Oh LORD…what am I getting myself into this time?”
Little did I know.
Sex wasn’t great that first time, but there was something that drew us back together the very next night. And the night after that. And the night after that. And it was then that something happened. As we lay there, looking into each other’s eyes we simultaneously blurted out, “Something special is happening here, isn’t it?”
Yes there was. And apparently those simple words were all that were needed to help him come to a decision about something he’d been struggling with; he returned home the next morning and came out to his mom.
It was not well received. I believe her exact words were, “You can either not be gay, or you can get the hell out.”
All of a sudden, and quite unexpectedly I had a housemate boyfriend lover.
It was a first time relationship for both of us, and given the option, I don’t think either one of us would’ve chosen this particular way for it to begin. But as they say, you deal with the hand that fate has given you. Unfortunately, I didn’t exactly do all I could to encourage and nurture it, either. Being fiercely independent, after two weeks I was climbing the walls having this other presence invading my personal sphere. Sensing my discomfort (no doubt because I’d gotten absolutely surly), after long, drawn-out negotiations, he came to a working truce with his mother and moved back in with her.
But after only one night alone, neither one of us could bear the solitude, and that “something special” we noted would not be ignored. He started spending nights with me again.
This was in direct violation of the agreement with his mother, and a week later, finally accepting the sweet inevitability of what was happening between us, I opened my heart and home to him fully, and he moved back in.
Six months passed and we moved into a new apartment—one that was ours—but now neither one of us was happy. Once again he made peace with his mom and returned to his childhood home, leaving behind most everything he owned “to pick up later.” (I think he must’ve known it wasn’t going to last this time either.)
He was right. While we didn’t see each other for the next week, we were on the phone every night until finally his mother picked up one of the extensions while we were talking and said, “It’s obvious you boys love each other. Get back together and work things out, will ya?”
We did. And while as lovers we didn’t last more than a couple years beyond that fateful conversation, our friendship deepened and endured for another decade until AIDS snatched him away forever.
Dennis Shelpman
18 March 1961 – 29 January 1991
Quote of the Day
“One day, someone will walk into your life and make you see why it never worked out with anyone else…” ~ Fernando Müggenburg
Amen to that, Fernando. I’m here to witness.
A Curious Phenomenon
From my old blog, courtesy The Wayback Machine:
I have been blogging for close to two years now. What I’ve noticed during that time is while I’ve made new friends through the endeavor, several of my long-time fellow travelers in life’s journey have drifted away. One of whom in particular—a guy I’ve known nearly a quarter century—has all but vanished, and I’m starting to wonder if it’s because of something I’ve written along the way. Blogging’s semi-anonymity has allowed me to voice thoughts that even my closest confidants may not have known I was mulling.
This raises a fundamental question. Isn’t it better to have people love you for who you really are, other than for who they think you are?
While not nearly as political as I am, I know my buddy has no love for George Bush, so I doubt that’s the source of his withdrawl. The only other thing that may have caused this apparent chilling of our friendship are the writings about my increasing agnosticism. He’s not a religious guy, but a very spiritually oriented one; something that initially drew us together and that we’d shared these many years. I still respect his New Age beliefs, but at this point in my life I’m just finding it impossible to ascribe to a philosophy that’s become as rigid and entrenched as any other faith-based doctrine and offers no more proof of its validity than the fairy tales of traditional organized religion.
Before I started blogging, we’d chat or email each other several times a week, and I always felt welcome visiting. But over the last year or so (along with my posts examining my crumbling faith in New Age thought), all my emails seem to vanish into a black hole, never to be answered. (His excuse is that he gets so much spam he doesn’t even bother opening his email, despite my attempts to show him how to filter it out at his ISP before it ever reaches Outlook). So I’ve just given up emailing him altogether. At some point you just reach the point where you think, “Why bother?”
I no longer feel like I can just call and come down for the weekend like I’d been doing for years. It seems he always has houseguests, or previous plans, or the planets aren’t in proper alignment. The last time I was in the neighborhood, the ex and I just dropped in on him (we did call first), and neither of us exactly got the warm fuzzies while we were there. And don’t get me started on him coming here. It’s been over a year and a half since he’s been up to Phoenix. His excuse is that his back bothers him. It’s not like going to San Francisco, for Chrissake.
So I’m kind of at a loss. I have a feeling he’s dealing with some demons of his own, but he hasn’t shared any of it with me, and when I’ve asked if everything was okay he said it was. I’m not losing sleep over it, but it concerns me that a friendship I thought I would take to the grave with me may be coming to an end after having survived and flourished nearly twenty-five years.
Amazingly, nothing has changed with this particular friend since I wrote this eight years ago. During the years Ben and I were in Denver, my friend and I spoke once on the phone—and I was the one who initiated the call.
Still, I’ve kept him up to date via a change of address card regarding our return to Phoenix, and have thought many times about calling him, but as I wrote initially, I’m really starting to wonder, “Why bother?”
Happy Valentines Day!
