Blank Stares

 Week Forty: Blank Stares 

Oh how do I get you back

If I could only seal the cracks you’re slipping through

Wish I didn’t feel so helpless when it comes to helping you

Hold on

So I keep holding on

To every little memory made of you and me

Every little glimpse of who you used to be

I know you’re still in there

Deep down somewhere I swear I still see you

Between the blank stares

— Jay Allen, Blank Stares, from the album Blank Stares

I sometimes imagine this life in terms of an endless line of people. When a person is  born, he or she takes a place at the back. I measure the experience on the line by how much closer we are getting toward the front. Those at the very front are excused. When we are pulled from the line before the front is achieved, the result can be devastating for those still waiting.

In its own way, my metaphor for life is ridiculous; I know that. It’s the concept of dying too soon that sticks with me. I call that “getting out of line.” Even those who have been on line for a long time can suddenly get out of line. So it was recently for a relative of two of my friends.

I have convinced myself that sometimes, rarely but it does happen, I know things before I know them. In 2019 I had a t-shirt made that reads “Harris 2024” on the back. I can only hope that one comes true. Years ago in the days when telephones were attached to walls, prior to personal cell phones, I was watching television in the basement. I went upstairs to the kitchen and had one of those weird moments when I realized I didn’t know why I had done so. Before I returned to the basement the phone rang. It was my college roommate calling to catch up. As I like to say, “thoughts fly.” Sure it was a mere coincidence but there have been enough of them over the years to trick me into believing something other than coincidence is happening.

I started my career as an elementary school teacher. One day after the students had gone home, I was walking through the main office when I greeted a kindergarten teacher. Using something between clairvoyance and rudeness I asked her how many weeks she was pregnant. She told me how shocked she was because she had not told anyone that she was expecting. Think that one is not a great example? How about this one? Many years later I worked in the Netherlands with a team of gifted young women (truly an old man’s proof of God’s existence.) After I left and returned to the USA I stayed in electronic contact with some of them (and still do.) I sent an email to one of them claiming I had the very real sensation that she was pregnant. She confirmed that she was, but like the first example, she asked me not to tell anyone because she had not yet told anyone besides her husband.

My contention that “thoughts fly” is most often applied to our daughter. More than once I will call or text her only to have her tell me that she had intended to contact me. On more than one occasion the calls/texts happen simultaneously! Weird huh? Not if you believe thoughts fly, which brings me back to my two friends—the brothers.

Although theirs is not the best example, I grew more and more concerned with very little evidence of a problem. I had completed and sent a portrait of one brother’s dog. Days after it was delivered I had not heard from him. That was my first red flag. The other, older brother is the treasurer of a game we have played for many years. My emails received no responses. Second red flag. I began to invent scenarios that would only pale to the tragedy that actually occurred.

Painting little Archie’s portrait was fun, and I was sure my friend would love receiving it. After I flooded his inbox with inquiries as to his reaction to the painting, he told me that he had been distracted by what had happened to a member of his extended family. He even gave me a link to a website that filled in the sad, sad details. Reading confirmation of what I had imagined I already knew, I sent my condolences to both brothers.

Although their aunt had been on line for 81 years, she got out of line too soon.

JAY ALLEN - BLANK STARES (Official Music Video)