05.06.2004 - 2:54 p.m.

Writing another email to a soon-to-be divorced friend, I almost ended it with the words "hope floats" before I remembered that I hadn't seen the movie in years and the phrase may not have meant the same in the movie as I meant it to in my head, and maybe he'd seen it more recently than I had. I think I was looking for a less trite way to say "it'll be okay," because when people tell me that kind of thing, I either want to hug them forever or punch them in the face.

I do not want this friend to want to punch me in the face, but he's not helping very much. When I called him up last night, he wanted to talk about whether I have a job, and if I found an apartment, and how my family is doing. An hour of nothing personal, which I was happy to spend, especially if that's what he needed to deal. It's just that when I got to work this morning, there was also a really long email that was personal.

I hate handling drama in writing.

No, scratch that, I always write about my own drama, so I can think about it and process it and all that. But it is only in the rare fit of insanity that I believe those rambles can communicate anything useful to others. Words are inherently muddy. They need context so I know how to read your writing, which in turn helps me respond in a way that's appropriate to how you will read mine.

And in most forms of writing, it's nice to have that muddy space where a song lyric can be personal to five zillion different people or a white whale can be the symbol for good and evil all at once.

It just gets on my nerves when someone is hurting and I want to say "It'll be okay (read: good warm supportive strength sunrise)" not "It'll be okay (read: patronizing crowded orange puke-taste)."

So yeah, if anyone out there's planning a divorce, do us both a favor and don't even tell me unless I can just come over and hug you.

-stonebridge

previous | next