A Time to Mourn, and a Time to Dance

It was pretty early in our friendship when I had buckled Tim into the front seat of the car. One of our many trips from his artist studio to his home. He was in fairly good spirits and he must have been feeling pretty good because he asked, “How much time do you have?”
“I don’t have anything special to do,” I lied.
“I don’t want to go straight home,” he said. “Let’s take a drive.”
“Where to?” I asked.
“I don’t care … someplace in nature,” he said.

There are these moments in time. They rush back to me on days when I least expect it, and it’s like a slap in the face. Always respectful. Never wanting to be a burden. Completely polite. Tim was one of the people who thought very carefully about the impression he was making on the world around him. When I was with him it was never about him. It was always about me.

Odd, that.

We ended up heading the car out to Sauvie Island. It was still relatively early in the fall, probably mid-September. The date isn’t as important as the time we spent together that afternoon. We were aimlessly wandering the many roads that criss-cross the island, looking at pumpkin patches. Talking about theatre. Discussing projects we had in common, and ones I had lined up, and a few he had just finished.

We were listening to the Beatles on satellite radio, and he told me about the first time he ever heard them on the radio in Kentucky. How he had discussed them with his sister, and how they changed his life. We stopped at a little store and I left the radio running while I went in and bought wine coolers, Flamin’ Hot Cheetos and Hostess Sno-Balls. When I got back to the car, he said, “Why is my ass on fire?” And I told him I had turned on the seat warmer for him.

He didn’t care for it.

We drove. We drank. We stopped. We talked. I fed him handfuls of Cheetos.

On the way back to his home that afternoon we stopped at King Burrito to get dinner. I said, “I’m going to leave the car running. Don’t go anywhere.” It was instinct. He roared with laughter. And he asked me to roll down his window, so he could shout at people.

A year went by.

We started to talk about time. He would remark that his doctor (who he loved) had told him he had a short time to live, and he always followed that up with, “That was three years ago.” Or, “That was four years ago.”

I’d stopped marking time passing and started marking time remaining.

We dropped all pretense about texting. They would pop up randomly. We developed a fondness for movies starring Elvis Presley. I shared with him my Elvis-is-alive-because-he-is-worth-more-dead-than-alive theory.

And we never shied away from telling each other how much we meant to each other.

Almost a year after our trip around Sauvie Island, he sent me a text that read, “Sauvie Island. I love you.”

He went into long-term care. Then the pandemic. Then the separation.

A few months later, I sent him a text that read, “Love you right back! I dreamt of seeing you last night. You were too busy to chat, but I got to hold your hand for a while.” Almost immediately he sent a reply, “Your hand is always in mine.”

And what persists is the joy he brought to us all. On his birthday, we remember him. We honor him. We think of his kindness. And the time we had with him.

And we miss him.