I have one less friend today. And I didn’t even get to say…farewell. But then you never do… do you? Something in his brain exploded…like getting shot in the head from the inside. An impossible thought. Bruce was estranged from his family. A good word “estranged”. I know because I am and always have been estranged from mine. It’s not a topic of conversation so I rarely have to explain that it doesn’t feel like anything at all. That there are moments of regret and remorse and life goes on and I’m sure they feel the same way. That I promise myself I’ll drive or fly or somehow get down there to visit…but whether it happens or not is more a matter of chance…and chance doesn’t turn that way very often. I tell myself that it’s a long drive on dangerous highways but it isn’t dangerous, that highway and I’ve done longer drives. It’s wanting to go that is the issue. To be fair they never come to see me, except my niece to Toronto and back in the sixties my sister …turned around pretty quick and never came back. There was no malice really…no big family fight. There was a step-father who poisoned us all and who would have been better in an iron lung or traction for life but he wasn’t. These days history doesn’t go back that far and in spite of the psycho-babble about the need for closure, I don’t feel the urge. I don’t know but I suppose Bruce may have felt some of these things. Selfish maybe…certainly private and scarred…damaged…in need of redemption for sure.Redemption is too long coming for most of us and that head-shot comes instead. Friend, I called him, but he wasn’t really that. I knew him once long ago in passing and his sister is perhaps my dearest pal. Recently he and I shared some e-mail notes…checking the weather and the state of our existence. Sometimes it would be two, three months between notes and I never thought to worry about him…there was no cause. There are people in all of our lives who are not easy…people who are worse than difficult…better to be avoided unless necessity demands. I don’t know if he was one of those…I don’t think that I’m one. I don’t avoid my family because they’re not easy. If they lived around the corner I’d probably see them often but I can’t be sure of that. Some of my best friends live nearby and I don’t see them all that frequently. Someone told me a couple of years ago that she didn’t want any more friends. I understood her instantly. Friends are a burden and at some point the weight gets to be too much. They’re unpredictable, friends. When you meet them they may not look heavy and then a year later they suck all of the air out of the room and their friendship weighs a ton. On the other hand there are friends that love you and lift you and without them I’d certainly not be here at all…and sometimes they’re the same ones. I’ll mourn the passing of Bruce and maybe more for his sister’s sake…and maybe for mine. His death reminded me that I’m seventy…that my back is filled with pain and my life is filled with pills for many ills…that my own trip across the Styx is not so far away. I don’t guess I’ll see Bruce on the other side because I don’t believe that anybody ever does. But just in case, I’ll keep a warm thought for the late Bruce MacArthur, may he rest in peace.
Blues: November 5, 2012
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