[Vol. 70] Alive. Alive. Alive.
This one's for John
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Happy Tuesday, everyone :)
How are we? Are we all ready for Halloween? I am not. Not at all. Not a thought in my head as to what I’ll wear. Not a thought.
Actually right as I was writing this, a pair of NYU girls passed my little yellow table here at the café and brainstormed their costume ideas aloud.
They’re gonna go as slutty nuns. Solid.
If I don’t get my shit together costume-wise soon, I think I’ll join them. I’ll be slutty Jesus. Or maybe slutty god. Or possibly even slutty “concept of the universe”. Or slutty “eternal and empty void after life”. I’ll give it some thought.
I joke, but truth be told it’s not far off. I think I’ll be revamping a slutty devil this year. Stay tuned.
As you can probably already tell, I’m in a little bit of a silly mood at the moment – which is in direct juxtaposition to the fact that there’s a man delivering a eulogy of his brother like … 100 feet from where I’m sitting. I guess those are the dice ya roll when you work at a café next to a church.
His name was John.
Sounded like a fun guy – racked up more than enough funny stories for his brother to share at his funeral, that’s for sure.
Maybe I’ll go as slutty John then.
See, playing around with dark humour is difficult here because I can’t really see how that joke landed – are we laughing? Are we shocked? Are we picturing what a slutty John costume would even begin to look like?
Relying on the only reference I have at my disposal (the fashion of the funeral party), I’d say we’d start with a lot of black. Maybe a black collared shirt (cropped, naturally) with a black tie (loose, naturally) and black jorts (tight, naturally). And to complete the look you just need a brother that’ll stay passive-aggressively competitive with you even as he’s speaking at your very own funeral.
I’m sensing a partner costume coming on ;)
At this point, you might be wondering why I’m going on and on about this damn funeral that I have absolutely nothing to do with.
The answer is I’m not sure. All I know is I’m not the only stranger who’s infatuated with the body that was formerly John.
I look up and see that most people seem to slow down when they pass the gathering of people in black, sometimes even lingering around the gates for a second or two. I look around me and see that my café buddies are only half typing on their keyboards, or half reading their books, or half drinking their coffees – all the while rubbernecking along with me at the morbid people slowing down by the gates and straining their equally morbid ears to to make out what John’s daughter has to say.
She’s speaking now, by the way. She’s making fun of her dad in the way only someone’s own child could – sharp and sarcastic and loving all at once. She sounds funny. Maybe John was funny too.
I guess we’re all a little bit obsessed with death; all a little bit drawn in by it – so much so that even a 5-foot metal gate doesn’t deter us from trying to sneak a peak. It’s like, we clearly don’t have an invite, and yet we feel strangely invited to listen in.
Maybe it’s like a bell that goes off in our biological brains.
*chime* someone’s died *chime* pay attention *chime*
Of course I think what really draws us in, at the end of the day, isn’t the fact that someone named John has died, but rather that someone named John could’ve been you;
can be you;
will, one day, be you.
Forever the main characters in our own small corners of the universe, someone named John died to remind you that you too will die some day.
Hold on. I’m just hearing that John was a writer – just like me.
That’s another thing we do when someone dies: We find similarities.
‘I’m a writer too. I have a brother too. I will die, too…’
I was re-watching a TV show very close to my heart today, called Sex Education. It’s hugely popular on Netflix and just released a Season 3 – give it a watch. Anyways, in today’s lunchtime Sex Ed binge, I heard a quote I can’t get out of my head, and one that I’m becoming increasingly convinced John would’ve loved too.
"You have to let the people you love know that you love them … even if it causes you a great deal of pain.” Maureen tells her son, Adam.
“Why?” Adam asks. “Sounds awful.”
“Because you’re alive,” she smiles.
Between that quote and John’s family and friends speaking over their not-so-alive loved one, I’m reminded today how important it is that we really live the lives we’re given. Maureen, along with a lot more real characters in my life, continue to teach me that one of the best ways to be “alive” is to love.
Love your friends. Love your family. Love the person or people you love in that extra special way ;) Love all the people that’ll make fun of you at your own funeral someday.
Most of all, love yourself;
most of all, love yourself for the parts of yourself you once could not – the parts of yourself you might still find hard to love, at times.
You’ll forget to do that every now and then, but don’t sweat it. I forget too.
But someday soon – on any old unremarkable day like today – you’ll hear that someone named John has died.
You’ll be reminded then too, that you only have so much time to love. You’ll be reminded then too, that unlike poor old John, you are very much alive.
Alive. Alive. Alive.
See you Friday, friends.
–– Till
P.S. I dedicate this volume to John. No I didn’t know him, let alone his last name, but we crossed paths today. Sounds like you had a lot of love in your life. Rest in peace, stranger friend.
Find me on Instagram: @till_kaeslin
Check out the newsletter’s home on Instagram to see this post there, and more like it: @thatsgaynewsletter
See you in Volume 71, folks!
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