"A lone walker is both present and detached, more than an audience but less than a participant. Walking assuages or legitimizes this alienation."
~ Rebecca Solnit, Wanderlust: A History Of Walking
Is it really only Thursday? It's been a very long week so far, oh it was the usual number of days, but it has had a god-awful... I don't know... darkness to it. There is nothing more depressing than a beautiful summer day that carries the weight of grief as a companion. Yes, I took Robin William's death hard, I am, in truth, devastated. I have some very personal reasons for that, and as such I will probably never share why, but believe me the grief I feel right now is deep, but I will be okay because I know, this to shall pass! Cold? Perhaps! True nonetheless. The loss itself, however, will haunt everyone who loved him forever. That's what suicide does.
Forgive me, I had no intention of getting this into things. I guess I am just sharing about how dark I feel at the moment. It's the same darkness I felt a few months back when our friend "J" took his own life, in the middle of a cool, dark, mid-spring night. No sign was shown by him that day, it was business as usual, and yet within a few short hours he was gone. Just gone. And the rest of us were left with little information about why he made that decision. I have come to the conclusion that truth is... it was none of our business! So, when that fact finally sinks in, it both simultaneously heals you, and drives a stake through your heart.
Nice!
Thanks friend!
What choice do I have now? The same I had a few months ago. None. So yesterday, I decided to take Alan's advice, and grab a cold drink at Starbucks, and head out with the camera! Alan reminded me that when I grieve, I tend to see things I photograph differently. My perspective is, or seems to be, finer tuned. He reminded me that I took some of my best photographs after the death of my friend Pam, and again after the death of my Elvis. I don't know if I took any photos yesterday that would qualify as "some of my best" but I made the effort. And what did I find through the tainted eyes of grief? Autumn is beginning to kick summer out on it's treacherous ass!
"But then fall comes, kicking summer out on it's treacherous ass as it does one day sometime after the midpoint of September, it stays awhile like an old friend that you have missed. It settles in the way an old friend will settle into your favorite chair and take out his pipe and light it and fill the afternoon with stories of places he has been and things he had done since last he saw you."
~Stephen King
I am glad I made the effort. At first it didn't sound like a good idea. I was tired, and really just wanted to nap, but moving forward has to start somewhere, right? Starting at the end of summer seems fitting somehow. The old wound for my friend, and the new one for Robin Williams are two separate spaces that need time, space, and in the end, letting go of.
"The scariest moment is always just before you start."
~Stephen King
Mood: Quiet But Okay
~Me
