The leaves start to turn before they drop.
It’s finally cool enough to sleep with the window open again. I wake up refreshed, a little chilly even, with my blankets wrapped to my face.
Maybe I’ve been single for too long, maybe I’m being romanced by the fall yet again, but there seem to be cute girls everywhere lately.
Though somewhat hectic, everything worked out in the end for Pat and Jen’s wedding.
I missed the wedding rehearsal because I had to close the books for the month at work. I didn’t get to Pat’s place until 9:30 that night, which went late into the morning as loose ends were tied up, and Jason and I stayed up until 3:00 am to finish the slide show.
The girls got even less sleep I’m sure; the last I saw them they were giggling in bed like a high-school sleepover.
Before leaving for Jason’s place to stay the night (leaving the house for the girls), Pat gave me God of War 2 and Ratchet and Clank: Up Your Arsenal as gifts for being in the wedding party.
In the morning we woke up at seven, had some muffins and coffee, decorated the cars, got dressed, and raced to the church.
oh yes there’s many a man or woman
that’s been put in the insane asylum
when this has happened to them
and they’re sitting there today, people think they’re insane
but they saw something that’s real
and they see it when they’re on drugs
the only thing is they see it
not through the light of godbecause when you see the face of god you will die
—Godspeed You! Black Emperor, Hung Over as the Queen In Maida Vale
I saw you through the window, in a coffee shop without a coffee in your hand.
At first I wondered why you were sitting so far away from your bags, as if you had put them down and forgotten where you were.
Then I realized that those bags were the sum of your possessions, along with your pink Dora The Explorer hat, and soiled orange overcoat you wore in the middle of a warm summer night. Everything about you screamed crazy.
You played with your jellybeans, tilting them back and forth in the clear plastic bag, watching them slide back and forth with eyes like stones in their sockets. You were lost to the world.
ENJOY YOUR STAY WITH US
BUT NO LOITERING PLEASE
20 MINUTE TIME-LIMIT
Then you got up and left. You wandered the street, pausing to peer in the windows of jewelery stores where there was no jewelery, like a child without a care in the world.
It made me wonder.
What got you high tonight?
Did you see the face of God tonight?
So I deleted your numbers off my speed dial. I took down your pictures. It was an in-the-moment thing.
I’m calm now, seeing things objectively, yet still undecided.
Part of me wants to believe we can still be friends. That we can still hang out without me depending on you for anything. But I’m not like that, and I don’t stay friends with those on whom I can’t depend.
I cried, not only because you weren’t there when I needed you, not only because you had a responsibility to my friends as well, but because I never allow those who hurt me so much to be a part of my life. Our friendship may be lost, and this is what upsets me the most. Perhaps it hurts so much because you were so important to me. I don’t want to lose that, but I’ll never forget what you did and I’ll never trust you again.
And if I can forgive you, you’ll know that I truly love you.
The best part of the bachelor party wasn’t the fact that it was Pat’s first time being drunk1. Or the fact that he was break dancing next to street musicians downtown (the video of which shall not be shown).
It was the fact that he was completely off his guard, too drunk to remember what happened the next day, but he was the same old Pat: fun, friendly, and considerate2.
He also said two affecting things, lucid in his drunken state.
The first, in slurred speech, he advised us bachelors, “Find the right one. Just make sure you find the right one. She might not be the perfect match, but she is the right one. Just remember that. If you look for your perfect match all your life, you might not find it. Just find the right one.”
The second was when he was going around the room, and he came to me: “Jeff, you too. You’re going to live a happy life. Sometimes it’s rough on the edges, but you know what’s good for you. You know what’s good for you, you know people will take care of you. Don’t worry, man. You’re going to live a happy life.”
“Life is rough on the edges”, he said. Not that my life is particularly bad, I just don’t handle things very well, and this is often when I turn to him. It’s nice to hear from someone — whose opinion which I respect greatly — that things are going to be alright for me, that people will take care of me when things get bad.
Because I knew in my heart that when Pat said “people”, that included himself.