A Grave In Salem
This January, with some online digging, I found out that my friend David had died that September before. He had been my closest friend, and was still my oldest friend, living in Iowa City thirty years after I'd left. At first, we kept up with phone calls and by sending bits of art back and forth, then our calls became less frequent, and I just wrote long letters, which I knew he'd never answer. He hated writing letters, but he always sent me a card at Christmas.
Year before last, I had a feeling, a constriction of the heart, you might say. Sometimes I'd wake up in the dead of night, cramped with anxiety. Sometimes, too, I'd think, David could die! and then, with horror, brush the thought away like an insect. Finally, not knowing why, I wrote him, asking him never, never to drop me from his Christmas card list. He immediately wrote me back, one of two or three letters he'd ever sent me. Then I wrote him. It was a nice exchange.
This year, he didn't send a card.
It wasn't until this January that I searched the Iowa Press Citizen obituaries, and discovered he'd died. Later, I'd find out that he died in his sleep, of heart failure. By reading a Facebook discussion page, I learned how widely he'd been loved and admired as a friend and a teacher. His great kindness and brilliance were cited. Everyone mentioned how important he'd been in their lives. Some quoted funny little scraps of conversation. I nodded to myself. He sounded exactly like the David I remembered. Then I looked at some photographs that were posted, and smiled, seeing him. He didn't look much like David, my David, but why would he?
After I left, he took a teaching job at Coe, was made professor of an endowed chair, and taught art history and studio. He never left, never taught anywhere else. Since he didn't seek out the world, the world came to him, probably much the way I had: over cups of coffee, just walking down the street, eating one of his spaghetti dinners, drinking at The Mill. And there were conversations, no doubt, about books, about art, about ideas. These were conversations that could go until dawn, interspersed with David's stories, which were hilarious, bittersweet, or both, depending.
As he aged, he enlarged himself to fit the world. He became more David-ish, more kind, more learned, more brilliant, more joyful, more sharp-eyed about beauty, whether he spotted it during the Iowa spring, or spied it in chunk of raku. I visualize him in my mind now, filling up like a helium balloon, growing lighter and lighter, until he sails away, into the wide Iowa sky.
Recently, another Iowa friend wrote me. She's an artist and a teacher, and was on Sabbatical when she first heard he'd died. By the time his memorial was held, she was already in NYC, unable to get back in time. I'm still in denial, she wrote. And then she wrote, thinking of the three of us, her, David, and me, hanging out together in Iowa City. It seems like only a few years ago, she wrote, but it all seems clearer now, than it did then. I knew what she meant. Memory is another country.
That's where I keep David, and where I've kept him for a while, in that pocket of the heart where the sky is blue and empty, the day is bright, our laughter is louder, our voices are hard and sure, and we are always young.
Year before last, I had a feeling, a constriction of the heart, you might say. Sometimes I'd wake up in the dead of night, cramped with anxiety. Sometimes, too, I'd think, David could die! and then, with horror, brush the thought away like an insect. Finally, not knowing why, I wrote him, asking him never, never to drop me from his Christmas card list. He immediately wrote me back, one of two or three letters he'd ever sent me. Then I wrote him. It was a nice exchange.
This year, he didn't send a card.
It wasn't until this January that I searched the Iowa Press Citizen obituaries, and discovered he'd died. Later, I'd find out that he died in his sleep, of heart failure. By reading a Facebook discussion page, I learned how widely he'd been loved and admired as a friend and a teacher. His great kindness and brilliance were cited. Everyone mentioned how important he'd been in their lives. Some quoted funny little scraps of conversation. I nodded to myself. He sounded exactly like the David I remembered. Then I looked at some photographs that were posted, and smiled, seeing him. He didn't look much like David, my David, but why would he?
After I left, he took a teaching job at Coe, was made professor of an endowed chair, and taught art history and studio. He never left, never taught anywhere else. Since he didn't seek out the world, the world came to him, probably much the way I had: over cups of coffee, just walking down the street, eating one of his spaghetti dinners, drinking at The Mill. And there were conversations, no doubt, about books, about art, about ideas. These were conversations that could go until dawn, interspersed with David's stories, which were hilarious, bittersweet, or both, depending.
As he aged, he enlarged himself to fit the world. He became more David-ish, more kind, more learned, more brilliant, more joyful, more sharp-eyed about beauty, whether he spotted it during the Iowa spring, or spied it in chunk of raku. I visualize him in my mind now, filling up like a helium balloon, growing lighter and lighter, until he sails away, into the wide Iowa sky.
Recently, another Iowa friend wrote me. She's an artist and a teacher, and was on Sabbatical when she first heard he'd died. By the time his memorial was held, she was already in NYC, unable to get back in time. I'm still in denial, she wrote. And then she wrote, thinking of the three of us, her, David, and me, hanging out together in Iowa City. It seems like only a few years ago, she wrote, but it all seems clearer now, than it did then. I knew what she meant. Memory is another country.
That's where I keep David, and where I've kept him for a while, in that pocket of the heart where the sky is blue and empty, the day is bright, our laughter is louder, our voices are hard and sure, and we are always young.
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