Another Chapter to this Story

Putting distance between you and your hurt. Does the impregnation of time help in any which way to assuage one’s pain? No, I am not lamenting on the loss of Candy for I am far too wise and too old to let my life stop for the loss of something that I loved, something that had lived so long and given to us so much. I am talking about those hurts in life that accrue with time and obstruct our ability to process the present; tarnishing our capacity to process the future.

I don’t want another dog. I looked at the face of a beautiful miniature collie while in Tel Aviv this afternoon after work. He/she was at a crosswalk with his/her owner/companion. I looked at how damn innocent this dog was looking at the person taking him/her for a walk and it was the innocence that hurt me. There was a loved muddled with a dependency that carries a weight heavier than I think I can handle again. I don’t think that I am strong enough to have something so kind and innocent love me to that degree. I suppose, that it is more than the burden of being this needed or wanted, it is my fear that I don’t think I really deserve this.

This is an imperfect world and it’s supposed to be that way. Even our spin on a tilted axis has a bubble built into it. Plates are shifting all the time with horrific results like that in Sichuan. News of too many friends of late who have to deal with deep conflict in their lives is getting more difficult to process. I am getting Emails telling me of heart attacks of those I have known (Ronnie you were a good man) and others with ailments that are life threatening. Yet when I write about these things, some who have read this blog call my wife to tell her that Jamie’s writing is so negative. I apologize for this, but if you’ve read this many year’s work in its entirety, there’s a lot of “good” stuff I hope to balance this out. However, the fact remains, that this is an imperfect world.

Yet, and I’ll work this in here though it might not seem logical at this point - it’s all about the story. You see, our lives are filled with these stories and if we live, if we exist, if we take risks and do the global nomad dance in our travels and in our friendships, then we’re going to have a lot of stories, a lot of laughs and a lot of pain. I sometimes think the people who don’t want to read about the lows in life, are truly the ones who never experience the real highs. They just plow along at half-speed working at their 9-5’s and gravitating to the norm. Sorry, no way no how on this end. I am going to fly down mountains and hold my dog tight until the end telling her about the fun she’ll have in heaven playing with my late nephew and sitting on my father’s lap. And then I’ll write about it. I’m going to make my wife nuts with my music and my antics and then think about her when she’s fast asleep at night knowing that I truly have a best friend and that whatever happens is just going to happen and fuck the logic of it all it just is. I am going to love my friends and have a slew of “brothers and sisters” scattered around the globe who really are not related to me. And I’ll do Native American whoops of joy when things go well for them and scream loudly at the stars when sadness enters their lives. It’s all a chapter in this story.