A Lead Balloon at A Pity Party

Posted on April 7, 2003 in Reflections

I had to skip the writer’s group tonight mostly because I got the news that a friend of mine is dying. She asks that I not hold a “pity party” for her, so I am disabling comments for this piece and not identifying her.

Not so long ago, I saw Waking Ned Devine. Wouldn’t it be wonderful, a eulogist asked, if we could attend our own funerals and hear the nice things that people said about us, the things they’d meant to say while we were alive.

I once had an out and out argument with someone who lied about things I said to others. After we cut things off, I went to bed. The next morning, I got this email in my box. Overnight, it seems, there’d been a major earthquake — the 1994 Northridge — and suddenly this person who had wanted me dead the night before was clamoring to see if I was “all right”.

The discussion had been nasty and I was in no mood for listening to this “sudden change of heart.” I just didn’t buy it as being sincere. For right or for wrong, I told her to get lost.

Tonight, part of me is thinking “if such people didn’t come around when I was alive to say those things, fuck them. I don’t want them at my funeral.” Maybe there’s a lesson for living in this, however. Imagine various people dead. How would you feel? If you’d miss them, go tell them right now.

What about the folks who did me wrong? What if they died suddenly? First, I wouldn’t disgrace myself by pretending that I liked them. This also happened to me. A chatter on an IRC politics channel mocked me for my refusal to run with the herd after 9/11. (When everyone else was saying “Bomb everything in sight”, I said ‘Don’t be signing any blank checks here.’ He was one of many who called me “a terrorist lover”. I set him on /ignore.) A few days later he died of a heart attack. When told of it, I simply nodded and said ‘We weren’t on speaking terms, but I never wished him dead.” Which is the truth.

I will miss my friend and I’ve certainly made it clear that I’d gladly give up the rest of my life to see her complete the big unfinished business of the one that’s been cut short. But I’ve said how much I have valued her before. I will say it again if she lets me. Otherwise, instead of pity, I shall just try to be myself with her. All who go to the grave should know exactly where I stand. I shall make an especial effort to express my appreciation of the living while they live.

As for the phonies, don’t be surprised if I am a lead balloon.