dustin hoffman: speaking truths and making me cry.

the good stuff.

i'm not meeting you now, are you crazy? i can't just come running every time you call. because we're twenty-seven now and not sixteen. because it's 3:30 in the morning and i have to be at work in five hours. because i'm a responsible adult with a job and a promotion around the corner and realistic dreams and an apartment that I pay actual money for and i don't live my life all willy-nilly like you do.

i have NOT forgotten how to be fun. just because i cashed in on my impeccable spelling and to ability grocery shop on a budget and am making a decent salary doesn't mean i'm a sellout.  

i'm still that girl.  and i haven't forgotten the good stuff. 

i remember when we used to slip out of the house late at night to meet in the middle, around 59th street. i remember how you would walk twenty blocks further than the middle of our parents' apartments because i was too scared to take the subway but i didn't want any of my neighbors to see me. i remember sneaking the doorman shitty weed and homemade cookies so he wouldn't tell on us-- i'm pretty sure my mom thought the constant baked good assembly line in our kitchen meant i was trying to fuck said doorman and muttered death threats under her breath every time he winked at me on our way out. 

i sat through those awful dinners wit your awful parents and ate every bite of dry, soy and tofu-ridden low-fat health food, maintaining pleasant small talk and consistent eye contact with both of them while rubbing your crotch underneath the table. i made you mix tapes. i spent hours redialing the radio station to request our songs and waiting all hunched over with my tape recorder pressed up against the speaker until they finally came on.

i learned how to dance just so i could teach you. i went bowling and ate fried chicken and tried to sneak into the boats in central park. 

i wore dresses without underwear and walked over subway grates. i drank shitty vodka and bodega cranberry juice out of plastic water bottles while riding the A train back and forth for an entire afternoon.

i did it because i was young and i did it because i was foolish and i did it because i loved you.

and-- you know what? i'm getting my shoes.  

i'll be there soon. 

jamie soukup reid.

we can, and we should, write about the sun. we can write about how sweet and hot it is in august when the pavement is boiling, when we're freckled and drunk on summertime and the grass is still green. we can write about picnics and first kisses and new puppies and young love. we can take photos of homemade lunches and drink mimosas and hold each other tightly and whisper about how happy we are.  

and we should.  

because these are the things we'll remember when the impossible happens. when the day that was just a wednesday becomes a day we count up from and down to, a date, an anniversary. 

there are few forces as compelling, as persuasive as this. sorrow is all-encompassing: it does not ask permission, does not exchange pleasantries, does not wait for the door to be answered. it coils itself around bodies and breathes down necks. it stretches and tears and pulls. sorrow insists. there is no misunderstanding or negotiating, there is no plan b, and as i sit here trying to write about jamie, a young woman i hadn't spoken to in years, i wish i could write about the sun. i wish i could write about wednesday and how it was warm and wonderful. i wish i could write about how jamie and her brand new husband got into their car and drove to their home in philadelphia and made dinner together. how their lives continued to run parallel to mine with no intersection, no cause for a sudden left turn.

we can, and we should, write about the sun. and we should write about jamie, too. so that we won't forget. so that we'll always remember.