Nothing in the bottled water
I always thought that bottled water was the biggest rip off of the 20th century, second only to indoor tanning beds. Every person on earth would get it for free and suddenly we were paying for it, a tactic of marketing. For the success of the marketers, I give them credit, but it was hardly an industry that was brand new or created just recently. Of course the eco terrorists are still telling us how much additional plastic waste it creates, and I think that every time I take out the trash. Since ancient times people have transported water from other geographic areas, it seems in the 90s sales all of a sudden quadrupled and we were sporting them everywhere we went, spring and purified tap water remain the best sellers in a billion dollar industry. It remains the world's most precious resource. And I gave it to him the last time I saw him.
It was not a particularly strange day, not much if anything had happened of note. The phone rang, he said he was coming over. I said good for me. It had been going on for about the last three / four months, no one knew about it. There were a variety of reasons why it was kept on the down low, which I won't get into here, but it had been going on. I used to see a few people in passing and nearly burst out laughing. You would just die if you knew the dirty little secret, and you are going about your business and if you only knew. What if we showed up in public together holding hands and watch all the mouths drop open in astonishment. No, I would not give you the satisfaction of that. Not anymore, I learned my lesson a long time ago with that. Especially with some people, but that's another story which doesn't bare repeating. But I digress ...
When he came out of my bathroom, he looked strange. He'd always been rather reserved, didn't say that much, had kind of a silent demeanor about him that came alive only under certain circumstances. But that night, there was something odd about him. He was all sweaty and flushed, he didn't look right. His eyes didn't focus. Is something wrong? You don't look right. He said he didn't know, he didn't feel good. You mean you have the flu or something? No, not like that. He said he felt dizzy. I gave him a bottle of water, he drank about half of it then said he was going to get going, he'll be ok tomorrow he was just going to go home and sleep it off. Ok, if he thought that was best. We said our good-byes and we'd chat soon. The next day, I sent him an IM saying I hope he felt better. No response. The day after I called him, on the voicemail I said it was me, hope you are feeling better. The day after that, as I still had not heard from him, I called again and said I hope you don't think I am being clingy, but since you haven't been online and you didn't respond to my first voicemail, please call me back and tell me I am just being paranoid. Because that's all it is, right? I couldn't sleep on Wednesday, I thought it was just my crazy chemistry of not living on sleep meds and trying to ween myself off of it. That's all, I was being ridiculous. Nothing's wrong.
Unfortunately, the paranoia was real. He died in his sleep. I did not find out until today thanks to Facebook postings, and I don't know how to feel. Why didn't I do something? Why didn't I say something? How could I not have known? I had my phone in my hand and I googled "signs of a heart attack" and found all these generic symptoms, and then I said "You're just being paranoid" and put it away. But alas, I was not. It wasn't your time to go yet, you had so much to look forward to and it was taken away.
Life was hard but it was turning around for you and me both. Dare I say that we would have done it together? Probably not, not in that way, but we will never know. How could this have happened? It was good once. And for those last three or four months, it was ... What it was. I have what you left behind, a lot of photographs. You were a photographer, after all. All the landscapes, gorgeous sunsets and portraits you shared with the world. But did I know you? You were so self contained. When I would be yakking on about something, I would simply ask "Well what should we talk about?" And you smiled and said "Nothing." I said "Yeah, I guess not."
RIP. I have a few empty water bottles, and today I filled them with tears.
It was not a particularly strange day, not much if anything had happened of note. The phone rang, he said he was coming over. I said good for me. It had been going on for about the last three / four months, no one knew about it. There were a variety of reasons why it was kept on the down low, which I won't get into here, but it had been going on. I used to see a few people in passing and nearly burst out laughing. You would just die if you knew the dirty little secret, and you are going about your business and if you only knew. What if we showed up in public together holding hands and watch all the mouths drop open in astonishment. No, I would not give you the satisfaction of that. Not anymore, I learned my lesson a long time ago with that. Especially with some people, but that's another story which doesn't bare repeating. But I digress ...
When he came out of my bathroom, he looked strange. He'd always been rather reserved, didn't say that much, had kind of a silent demeanor about him that came alive only under certain circumstances. But that night, there was something odd about him. He was all sweaty and flushed, he didn't look right. His eyes didn't focus. Is something wrong? You don't look right. He said he didn't know, he didn't feel good. You mean you have the flu or something? No, not like that. He said he felt dizzy. I gave him a bottle of water, he drank about half of it then said he was going to get going, he'll be ok tomorrow he was just going to go home and sleep it off. Ok, if he thought that was best. We said our good-byes and we'd chat soon. The next day, I sent him an IM saying I hope he felt better. No response. The day after I called him, on the voicemail I said it was me, hope you are feeling better. The day after that, as I still had not heard from him, I called again and said I hope you don't think I am being clingy, but since you haven't been online and you didn't respond to my first voicemail, please call me back and tell me I am just being paranoid. Because that's all it is, right? I couldn't sleep on Wednesday, I thought it was just my crazy chemistry of not living on sleep meds and trying to ween myself off of it. That's all, I was being ridiculous. Nothing's wrong.
Unfortunately, the paranoia was real. He died in his sleep. I did not find out until today thanks to Facebook postings, and I don't know how to feel. Why didn't I do something? Why didn't I say something? How could I not have known? I had my phone in my hand and I googled "signs of a heart attack" and found all these generic symptoms, and then I said "You're just being paranoid" and put it away. But alas, I was not. It wasn't your time to go yet, you had so much to look forward to and it was taken away.
Life was hard but it was turning around for you and me both. Dare I say that we would have done it together? Probably not, not in that way, but we will never know. How could this have happened? It was good once. And for those last three or four months, it was ... What it was. I have what you left behind, a lot of photographs. You were a photographer, after all. All the landscapes, gorgeous sunsets and portraits you shared with the world. But did I know you? You were so self contained. When I would be yakking on about something, I would simply ask "Well what should we talk about?" And you smiled and said "Nothing." I said "Yeah, I guess not."
RIP. I have a few empty water bottles, and today I filled them with tears.
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