I've gone through a lot of looks. Mohawks, Dapper Dan, hair down to my butt, but I've never had a shaved head. In honor of my friend Kia, who passed away recently of cancer (you can read my last letter to her below), I'm going to shave my head (and my face) to help raise money for the St. Baldrick's Foundation's efforts to combat childhood cancer. Donate a lot. Donate what you can. Hell, donate a dollar. Every little cent counts and if all my friends donate what they can, it will add up to quite a bit. Either way, you'll still get to rub my head for good luck. Click "Make a donation" to give online, or donate by phone or mail. Thanks.
Kia,
You know me, love. I needed about three Jacks to even begin to write this. It's weird, ya know? I'm always thought of as the consummate pessimist. The curmudgeonly critic with nothing nice to say, but you know that's not who I am. You saw something in me that I never saw and you had such a subtle way of bringing it out. You've seen the real me and now, even now, there's this part of me that believes that you're going to be fine. It's weird... Even now I'm an optimist when it comes to you. I can only think that things are this way, that I am this way, that I am this optimistic, because of who you are and what you've meant to me. In the brief time you were here in San Diego, and in the even briefer time that we got to know each other, you left an indefinite and ineffable mark on me. It's still so hard to pinpoint. Perhaps it was that hippie spirit you carried so well. Most people of that persuasion and outlook would send me running, but even without the use of logic or argumentative skill (although you certainly had those in spades), you were able to bring out this tender and altruistic side of me that had been covered in the dirt and dust of bitterness and betrayal for years. Hell, maybe it was just those big, beautiful eyes of yours. Looking through me. Seeing the innocent, unscarred little boy that was still capable of dreaming about things like love. Love not only for another person, but for humanity as a whole. Someone once said, "Beware of those who try to convince you that the world is not wicked." And here you were. Convincing me with nothing but a look. Even through this haze of tears and my chin hurting from the unfamiliarity of crying, I can still see that look. I can still see those eyes.
Kinsee and I were texting back and forth today and she reminded me of the time when I had that comped suite at the Keating Hotel. Ya'll came over and got naked and took a bath in that tub that has been so randomly placed in the outside den area. I laughed so hard in recalling this moment, as I had not thought about it in quite some time. But it also brought back a memory of a picture that someone took that night. You in front of the window overlooking the madness of downtown below in nothing but a hotel bathrobe and my dog on your lap. You looked so contemplative. So beautiful in your nonjudgment. God, I wish I could see that picture now. God, I wish I could just be there with you right now to tell you about this in person.
I was telling someone about you a few months ago. How I still thought of you constantly even with all the years and miles apart. And, as if it would honestly make me feel better about the whole situation, I launched into this whole diatribe about how you being sick was proof enough for me that there was no God. I mean, especially being from Georgia, how could any God allow some asshat like Newt Gingrich to spout his drivel while one of the most beautiful people I ever knew was undeservingly suffering? I even got so high and mighty as to even offer up myself as an example. I haven't exactly lived a holy life. Why should you be sick when here I am, cigarette and whiskey in hand, all but in perfect health?
And then, rather unexpectedly, she came back with something very simple. Very real. She proposed the thought that just having known you was all the proof I needed. That even if I didn't believe in God in the same way that so many people conceptualize him or her, that God can be found in an idea, a thought, an impulse, a moment. And that if I am to believe the true prophets, who to me are people like Marvin Gaye and Leonard Knight, then I don't need to blame a God that doesn't exist. I need only to blame myself for not believing that God truly is love. For not worshipping the moments that I share with people like you. That the idea of devotion, spiritual or otherwise, is not found in a pew, but in things more tangible. In the crevices between body parts. In words spoken that we would have otherwise kept to ourselves.
I still don't believe in God, Kia. But I do believe in you. I believe in my love for you. For people like you. That within the moments of time that we shared, there was enough good in the world that I could keep believing there was something better not only for myself, but for humanity in general. People like you make the world better. You make people want to run away, to start new lives, to fall in love and to get married. You make people like me believe. And that's all the proof I need.
I love you. I always will. -S.