Exile holds us far away from our longest-lived loves, surrounding us with new friends, sure, but all strangers to our past. Those who were there at the time understand the context from which we come. Much of our deepest understanding needs no stating. Most of our conversation needs little explanation. It’s easy.

Absence and separation does not make any heart grow fonder, but muffles a clear, reassuring rhythm. Reconnection gets the heart growing again, throwing off those terrible cobwebs which could have convinced anyone they were alone. The world does not go on without us, but holds our relationships in suspension, awaiting revitalization. Who’s to say if the reviving’s worth the absence?

III used to have four parts to his name: a first name, a middle one, a surname, then a Roman numeral signifying that he’s the third in the family line to carry those first three names. This convention never sat well with III, and caused confusion when the mail arrived. Eventually, as a young professional, he deleted the redundancy and started introducing himself as III. Nobody except his closest birth family members remember that discarded name now.

It seems the same way with these intermittent relationships. Most know us by our current identity. Only our oldest and deepest friends remember the name we were born with, the person they first met and fell for oh so long ago. When I look into III’s deep eyes I see something of the person I’d quite forgotten I’d forgotten about ever being. No picture could capture the depth and color of that time and bring it forward to now. The presence of an old a dear friend, here, smack dab in the middle of OrdinaryTime, reanimates me.

Today certainly seems like an ExtraordinaryTime to me.

©2013 by David A. Schmaltz - all rights reserved

Tags: Working, Writing, Living