outside of the fairway market on broadway & 74th are you a bear?
huh? oh...
i've come to accept that strangers will and do talk to me, but i still get caught off-guard when one of these conversations begins.
i realize i'm wearing the cal sweatshirt my brother got me as a gift after i submitted by SIR six years ago. are you a bear?
yes, i am. er, i was. i graduated already.
we walk a few feet down the crowded upper west side sidewalk in between overflowing bins of produce and people rushing by. he puts a hand on my shoulder nearest to him and says,
if you're a bear, you'll make it anywhere. if you're a bear, you'll make it anywhere.
the seasons here change subtly, and you really have to pay particular attention to notice when it happens. i feel like absence most characterizes the changes.
with the departure of summer, i can no longer smell the sweet scent of jasmine, there are no more roses in bloom and the warmth of the sun leaves us earlier everyday. ------------------------ certain turnings of the seasons are so vivid to me that i can remember exactly what i was doing or what song was playing...
one year ago, i was contentedly plugging away at an excel sheet at work with my headphones on.
they say people in your life are seasons and anything that happen is for a reason
my mind happened to be lingering on this lyric when the phone rang. mom was calling and she had that tone that she only uses for the gravest of matters.
i hung up and didn't believe it because it was only hearsay, but more so because i didn't want to believe it. i didn't believe it until the next day and after a series of tearful phone calls with childhood friends.
finally, i dialed one of the few phone numbers i still have memorized. the goal: condolences and strength for a dear teacher, neighbor and friend. she didn't pick up and instead i got the answering machine. the recorded greeting was mr. b's cheeful voice.
and it broke my heart from that moment on. that he would never again interrupt our mini reunions in the brucia living room camera in hand, prompting us to say "whiskey!" instead of "cheese" at the snap of the shutter that he got to see me graduate from college, but would not see his grandkids do so. that i assumed he would attend my wedding someday. that someone so full of life and love was gone.
the grief lingered longer than i expected as a heavy weight in my chest in the exasperated sobs that put me to sleep on many of last october's nights.
the overt sadness eventually faded and deceivingly manifested itself as a false sense of urgency under the guise of a carpe diem attitude.
and when that facade was stripped down, i relearned how to take my time and finally came to recognize the blessings among the blunders, love within the loss.
r.i.p. mr. b, thank you for sharing your love with the world
these are troubling times, but while loss changes, it's only love that truly transforms.
