An Unwelcome Memoir
I guess it is simply a function of getting older, right? No matter their age, these people I once knew are dying too young. I am 60, but I am only 60. I am not 85 or 90. People I met when we were young should not be dying, yet here we are.
{If any hillbillies want to criticize me for writing this post, I recommend that they keep their thoughts to themselves. I put the last ignorant hillbilly on a subtle form of literary blast. I only developed a little sympathy for this person when one of my friends made a suggestion. He said it was within the realm of possibility (or probability) that certain forms of branded hillbillies do not know what a metaphor is. If such a person has read this far, I want you to stop. Please just go away. Seriously, go now.}
I am back at the library today. My usual table was taken by a homeless man in Cleveland Browns’ gear. He didn’t stay long, my table is now empty, but I don’t want to move. I am unpacked and working. I don’t feel the need to move ten feet just so I can keep doing the same thing over there that I am doing here.
I am pausing, hesitating, and procrastinating to write about this most recent death because I do not know what to say. The story isn’t necessarily long or complicated; it is simply terrible. I am debating whether to tell it.
The year is 1986. Yes, present tense; see if you can take yourself back to that time if you were among the living. I was in Hillbilly Land, not far from where I am seated now. I bet I met Dawn no more than 100 feet from this spot. Sure, the high school is gone, but the ground remains. I do not like thinking back to that time; it is marked by a bunch of Hillbilly nonsense piled on top of more Hillbilly shenanigans. Adjacent to that? More Hillbilly stuff. It was a cavalcade of Hillbillies.
I finished a summer at Harvard University and was back in Hillbilly Land. I was preparing to go back to Cambridge for good. I was teaching at a local university during the nights and substitute teaching at any school that needed me during the day. You need a kindergarten gym teacher? Sure, sign me up. High school music teacher for a day? No problem. You get it.
I came in contact with many hillbillies (both upper and lower case), people with no ambition, direction, or hope for the future. The individuals who didn’t have those inherent hillbilly qualities stood out. A high school student named Dawn was one of those. She attended my old alma mater, a school that I ended up subbing at a lot.
We know it is not uncommon for students to develop crushes on their teachers; it happens all the time. Even though I was only a substitute teacher (not one to generally merit admiration or respect), it became clear that Dawn had a crush on me. That one of her friends came up to me and told me multiple times only reinforced what I already knew.
I thought she was an extraordinary young lady. If the universe had different plans for us, she would have been a college student what we met. As it was, there was no way we could have any kind of relationship. That was a simple fact. There was nothing to be negotiated.
After the school year ended, I left for graduate work in Cambridge and never saw or heard from Dawn again. Even so, I never forgot her.
The other day I was going through the obituaries in the local paper when I came across her. Early 50s and widowed. The obit said something about a rare liver disease. I sat in stunned silence, numb from what I saw on my computer screen.
At the very bottom, her obituary mentioned the memoir she had just published a few months ago. Reading that such a manuscript existed made me happy. The fact that she had written a memoir implied that she had lived a life worth writing about, a life others would want to read about. As I said, the fact that she wasn’t a hillbilly had jumped out at me all those years ago.
Author’s Note: I believe the workers at the library are viewing me with suspicion. In high school, I was voted best dressed in my class. Do you know how bad your fashion sense must be to be awarded such an honor? They didn’t give me the title because I was a snappy dresser; it was an ironic award. I have never, ever cared about clothes. Today I am wearing a favorite pair of sweatpants. They are over 20 years old, and they are falling apart. The material is very thin, especially near the knees. I know these will have to be thrown out soon, but I am wearing them because I love these sweatpants. I feel a bizarre sense of loyalty to them.
I just finished Dawn’s memoir. I couldn’t sleep again last night (why has that been happening so much lately?), so I knocked off the last couple of chapters. Even though it was well written, it was hard to read. She experienced lots of tragedy and didn’t spare the details. It appears that those in charge of making people suffer for no apparent reason took a particular interest in her. An indifferent universe remains unreasonably undefeated.
An observant reader might wonder why I need to include the part about the teenage Dawn and her feelings for a substitute teacher she never saw again. Why did I mention that she had a crush on me? Is that really necessary? Well, yes, it is. I am honored that such an extraordinary person thought I was worthy of her attention. I suspected her life would turn out as bright and interesting as it did. I just didn’t know it would be so damn short.
Author’s Note: Some months ago, one of the homeless guys at the library thought I was another homeless person. The details do not matter; it was apparent that he felt that only a person down on their luck would wear such sweatpants. I was also wearing a 30-year-old Harvard sweatshirt that, like me, had seen better days. That morning, I also carried the backpack I used back at Harvard decades ago. I often utilize the old stuff because those items remind me of better days, my good old days. The days when I woke up in a magical setting, surrounded by the most extraordinary people I have ever met. The days when a remarkable woman might smile at me instead of looking through me. The days that are long gone.
I am in my writing room. It is raining much too hard for me to venture out. The library can wait for another day or two. I am sure I will not be missed. As I look out the window, I see a few people walking along the sidewalk. They are getting drenched. No cars are moving out of the way of the large puddles. The amount of water being thrown by the tires is significant. Neither the drivers nor the pedestrians know that this neck of the universe is slightly less interesting today. They are oblivious that an iridescent and significant light went out halfway around the world. Unlike me, they have bigger worries. After all, they are cold and wet, and I am warm and dry.
Postscript
Love, Loss and Lifelines: My Year of Grief on the Run is the memoir that Dawn Picken published shortly before she passed away. Yeah, I think you should read it.
I have been thinking a lot about Dawn and the life she wrote about. One of my friends said that Dawn was lucky to have met the love of her life even though he died so young. “Lots of people don’t even get to do that. They never meet the love of their life.” She looked at me sheepishly as she realized what she had just said to a 60-year-old dude who had never been married and would surely be dead for days before anyone might think something was wrong. I don’t know what to think about my friend’s comment. Maybe Dawn was lucky, maybe not. Read the memoir, and you can decide for yourself.
