Maybe we are waiting to die. I go to a lot more funerals than weddings. Or rather, I’ve gone to more funerals than weddings. It is a fine line of wanting to be well dressed for the person you cared about, and bordering on being the best dressed. I really try to put everything aside at a funeral (the funeral is tomorrow), but a ceremony (which, shouldn’t I have known, was the night to wear black, or a cubs jersey) and just be as human as possible. Hug the mother. Be thankful for life. Grieve. Laugh. And sometimes, it ends with just getting the hell out of there. Tipping your hat to the man, leaving the money, and saying good bye.
And then there is the funeral tomorrow. I recall, gosh, it really must’ve been several years ago now, when I had enough cash on hand to buy a car, that I was writing something like this. I was with two Aries. And tonight I drove with a Leo and a Sagittarius. (And in the past) we listened to Billy Joel in the car, and the memory I shared with the kid who is dead was about listening to Billy Joel. Sounds pretty, um uncoincidental, but these intersections of lives, are many years apart, but are in my little sponge just waiting to be reflected on. Certainly not unique with a musician like that, but all the more meaningful.
I also don’t find it odd, to be hopeful that this kid is lucky to be on the other side, and I really hope that I get to see him when I get there. This is this side. And maybe like life, death is better when you are young.
I feel like a coward. I really think there have been opportune moments to exit which I couldn’t muster up the courage to do so. I don’t know if you call it a regret. You’d certainly call it getting older. And getting older isn’t all good. You see more.
God, and writing. I’m in good shape. I just also make excuses, like people dying. Maybe we are waiting to die.
Ben Bonkoske 