Insubstantial time
5 January 2007 22:42![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
maystoneWe always think that we have more of it than we do, that we can control it with wishful thinking, tack it in place with good intentions.
I found out today that two people who were as close to me as family had died in the past few years, and I didn't know. I didn't know because I didn't keep in touch with them as I kept meaning to do. Today, though, today I decided that I was going to get down to it and send off that long overdue letter; I went to google their names just for the hell of it, and I came across their obituaries.
Eleanor and Al were my parents' best friends. Al was a distant relative of my dad's, but it was pure coincidence that they moved in next to us in the housing project where we lived when I was a child. Eleanor was 10 years younger than my mom, but they hit it off instantly and became close friends. Since both of my parents worked, El looked after us until my mom got home. She was like a second mother to us, and as I grew toward adulthood, she also became my friend.
Al was the only child of German immigrants, but El was from a large Irish family, who also happened to live in the project a couple streets away from us. Her siblings, because they covered such a large age range, were our playmates and our babysitters. I remember that it was her sister Ilene who taught me how to tie my shoe laces. Every Christmas Day we'd end our holiday visits at El & Al's where all of her family had gathered in a loud, raucous, loving mass. It was great.
My mom and El were inseparable for years. Then when I was in my 20s my parents divorced and my mother remarried. The wedding was at Al & El's, and El was my mom's maid-of-honor. About a year later my mother and her husband made the decision to move away from CT out to AZ to live closer to her sister. It broke El's heart, and a small rift developed. When my mom moved back to CT several years later, they picked up where they'd left off, but something had changed. Instead of talking it out, they let it grow and split them apart.
The last time I saw Eleanor was at my mother's funeral. They hadn't talked to each other for about 10 years; El found out about my mom's death through the obituary in the local paper. She was completely devastated, distraught to the point where I was worried about her. She couldn't even remember what had separated them, it was so inconsequential. She'd always thought that they'd make up. Some day.
This is the part where I'm supposed to say that we should always be sure to stay in touch, always be sure to reach out. But I won't, because we all know that anyway. We're human beings, and as complex and wonderful as our self-aware brains make us in the grand taxonomic order, we're still all subject to the defensive anaesthesia that tells us that time is our plaything when in fact the reverse is true. We can't help ourselves; we can only regret and remember.
I found out today that two people who were as close to me as family had died in the past few years, and I didn't know. I didn't know because I didn't keep in touch with them as I kept meaning to do. Today, though, today I decided that I was going to get down to it and send off that long overdue letter; I went to google their names just for the hell of it, and I came across their obituaries.
Eleanor and Al were my parents' best friends. Al was a distant relative of my dad's, but it was pure coincidence that they moved in next to us in the housing project where we lived when I was a child. Eleanor was 10 years younger than my mom, but they hit it off instantly and became close friends. Since both of my parents worked, El looked after us until my mom got home. She was like a second mother to us, and as I grew toward adulthood, she also became my friend.
Al was the only child of German immigrants, but El was from a large Irish family, who also happened to live in the project a couple streets away from us. Her siblings, because they covered such a large age range, were our playmates and our babysitters. I remember that it was her sister Ilene who taught me how to tie my shoe laces. Every Christmas Day we'd end our holiday visits at El & Al's where all of her family had gathered in a loud, raucous, loving mass. It was great.
My mom and El were inseparable for years. Then when I was in my 20s my parents divorced and my mother remarried. The wedding was at Al & El's, and El was my mom's maid-of-honor. About a year later my mother and her husband made the decision to move away from CT out to AZ to live closer to her sister. It broke El's heart, and a small rift developed. When my mom moved back to CT several years later, they picked up where they'd left off, but something had changed. Instead of talking it out, they let it grow and split them apart.
The last time I saw Eleanor was at my mother's funeral. They hadn't talked to each other for about 10 years; El found out about my mom's death through the obituary in the local paper. She was completely devastated, distraught to the point where I was worried about her. She couldn't even remember what had separated them, it was so inconsequential. She'd always thought that they'd make up. Some day.
This is the part where I'm supposed to say that we should always be sure to stay in touch, always be sure to reach out. But I won't, because we all know that anyway. We're human beings, and as complex and wonderful as our self-aware brains make us in the grand taxonomic order, we're still all subject to the defensive anaesthesia that tells us that time is our plaything when in fact the reverse is true. We can't help ourselves; we can only regret and remember.
