Dead or Something. This is Incoherent.

disclaimer: i shouldn't have to feel like i have to defend this post. but i do. what's wrong with that?

I had a phone call from a friend. When we were nothing but kids, he kissed me, and he’s been nothing but a true friend ever since. We talked about drugs and guns and why we wanted to die. If we had the courage to kill ourselves, there would be a remarkable freedom. And here I am, minutes later, with a larger than usual glass of red wine. Listening to John Denver. And wondering what it would be like to die, and would I even wonder if some I loved hadn’t tried his hand at it first. If he hadn’t, I wouldn’t have been able to talk irrationally with someone who needed to throw away the boundaries of everything completely rational for a while. I would still be listening to John Denver.

I’m still sitting here. My Dead Friend died two and a half years ago. It seems probably to you that when he died, so did our friendship. You’d be wrong to think that. The truest form of friendship keeps on giving, even when the person is gone. With time there’s more investment than before, and even though the memories are fading, the feelings aren’t. Conversations are now memorized pieces of scripture. Feelings are cemented into my soul. No matter how many plastic surgery words I’m given, guilt is branded into and it won’t come out. I’ve prayed Mary and Martha’s prayer, and as it turns out, my Dead Friend wasn’t Lazarus.

In this far from perfect world, there are moments when our humanity is exposed. We’re ashamed of our nakedness, those imperfections that, like freckles on skin or wrinkles at the corners of our eyes, don’t fall into what we think are supposed to look like.

But, you know, that’s not the fucked up part. This is, I think:

If it had all been perfect, if my Dead Friend had been Lazarus afterall, I would have been nothing to the Friend On The Phone. I would have been another number he scrolled past. Another person who just wouldn’t understand. And goddammit, I hate that I have to understand. I hate being the one that my friends call when their grandma dies, or their brother dies, or their cousin’s sister’s hamster’s dog dies (which hasn’t happened yet). But I have to be, don’t I? Because when I scrolled through my own phone book, there were startling few people that I actually felt I could call. And if my Friend On The Phone can call me, then isn’t the world a little bit smaller, and a little bit better? That’s cliche, but please, understand that some cliches are what you need to hear. When they’re from someone who has prayed the Mary and Martha prayer.

It’s all completely irrational, isn’t it? There isn’t anything that is rational. The very idea of rationality is completely irrational. Thank God for red wine and John Denver.

Rocky Mountain High
-John Denver

He was born in the summer of his 27th year
Comin' home to a place he'd never been before
He left yesterday behind him, you might say he was born again
You might say he found a key for every door

When he first came to the mountains his life was far away
On the road and hangin' by a song
But the string's already broken and he doesn't really care
It keeps changin' fast and it don't last for long

But the Colorado rocky mountain high
I've seen it rainin' fire in the sky
The shadow from the starlight is softer than a lullabye
Rocky mountain high

He climbed cathedral mountains, he saw silver clouds below
He saw everything as far as you can see
And they say that he got crazy once and he tried to touch the sun
And he lost a friend but kept his memory

Now he walks in quiet solitude the forest and the streams
Seeking grace in every step he takes
His sight has turned inside himself to try and understand
The serenity of a clear blue mountain lake

And the Colorado rocky mountain high
I've seen it rainin' fire in the sky
You can talk to God and listen to the casual reply
Rocky mountain high

Now his life is full of wonder but his heart still knows some fear
Of a simple thing he cannot comprehend
Why they try to tear the mountains down to bring in a couple more
More people, more scars upon the land

And the Colorado rocky mountain high
I've seen it rainin' fire in the sky
I know he'd be a poorer man if he never saw an eagle fly
Rocky mountain high

It's Colorado rocky mountain high
I've seen it rainin' fire in the sky
Friends around the campfire and everybody's high
Rocky mountain high