Like A Bridge Over Troubled Water

     It's been almost 6 months since my friend John died. I think about him all the time, honestly, more often by far than I did when he was alive.  Does that make me a selfish person? Maybe, but I prefer to think that I just counted on his existence as a given. The way we think of our parents or siblings or children as part of our lives that will always be there. I always made sure when I spoke with John that he knew how deeply I valued him, I have no regrets in that, but I , like most people, just always thought there would be another day. Paul was right when he said, "now, I need a place to hide away, oh I believe in yesterday ."

        John was an amazing man, full of life and smiles and love and such a gift to the people whose lives he touched.  Which is not to say he was always happy or without sadness. He was a real person, and more than that he was a man who grew up in a rural midwestern blue collar family that was deeply Catholic and was a closeted gay man, by no means a recipe for a happy healthy teen or young man. He suffered and I was (fortunately I feel) right there to try and be a sympathetic ear and a staunch ally. I wasn't always the best support I could have been we fought a few times and though those fights happened more than 25 years ago and we had long since moved on and made on I still remember every harsh word or unkind thing I said and still regret.

No, what I mean, is that John took people under his wing and made them feel loved and protected and supported and quite literally would give someone the shirt off his back if they appeared to need it. He looked for acceptance that he struggled so long to achieve with his birth parents in surrogates. He adopted these parents and loved them fiercely. None of which is to say he didn't get love from his biological family, they did love him, I just think they struggled with values that were deeply ingrained in them and could not reconcile easily with his identity as a gay man.  But from Edna, his dance partner when he was 21 to Nick his, "Opa" he found people and took them into his heart and there they stayed, his entire life.

        I am a better woman a better friend and a better ally for the LGBQT community because of JohnAaron. Because of who he was and who he helped me to become. Now I miss him like people miss a limb. I feel that phantom itch like it's still there. Every time I hear George Michael or really any of a lot of music I miss him more. 

    Also, I am pissed at the universe. He was too fucking young to die. He worked so hard through most of his life and he didn't get enough time to enjoy everything.  Yes he travelled to amazing places and saw wonderful things and indulged in the things he loved, too much maybe, but fuck that he deserved it!! When my nephew died at 4 months and I sat alone in a funeral home parking lot at dusk wondering how I would be able to be there for my mother and sister when I was hurting so much he was there. I didn't have to ask him to be there, he just was. 

        I feel like Pooh bear, waiting on the hill for Christopher Robin to come back to do nothing with me. I guess I will always be waiting.