During the holiday break of some elementary school year, my brother T.C., Matt and Eric (friends), and I were walking through the woods as we usually did. I don’t recall now why T.C.’s scarf was left in the woods, but that is not the point. T.C. bet Eric that he could do some card trick and if successful, Eric had to walk back out into the woods and get the scarf. Being the friend to us that he was, he went out in the storm, through the snow, and brought the scarf to our house. Eric was a good person and a great friend. He always called to say happy new year on the Chinese new year, even years after we parted ways via social circles. I guess what I want to get across in this is that old friends are worth calling even if only to say "I still think of you, and thanks for having been my friend."
I strive to be like Eric was, or at least the way I remember him being.
3 comments:
I wish that I had met Eric.
I like that last line - our ideas of who someone was are not always how that person was. I don't think it's true in Eric's case, but it's true in general.
I like the fact that we all see different facets of the people around us. One of my professors one time said that that was the difference between poets and everyone else. Poets said what they meant to anyone at anytime.
I doubt it's true, but he was a lecherous old pervert anyway.
My point is, that even people who have changed or have gone are still the same to us in our minds. Our memories of them hold who they were once forever. No one person is ever seen completely by anyone else.
I think it's an interesting thought.
I wrote a poem about that day. I hold that memory in me. It keeps me straight as an arrow when making promises and agreements with others. It is why I paid you for rent even after I moved out - because I told you I would give you three months notice.
It's strange, how we parted ways with him, and yet he still lived next door for years. It goes to prove that it's never about the distance, but the direction.
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