A Shitty Friend

Wow! So, life throws us a curve ball once in a while. Mine caught the outside corner of the plate the other evening as I was sitting in my Friday night AA meeting. A friend sent me a brief text message informing me that a mutual buddy had apparently committed suicide a couple of days ago. So of course, moments later was the first time in a month I've been called on to share. What do you say at a moment like that? I don't really remember what I said - shared my loss and shock and befuddlement and settled back in a daze to contemplate the ceiling tiles as the meeting wound its course. Accepted a few kind words from friends and virtual strangers (nobody in the program is truly a stranger - those who know, know.)

It was a couple of hours later, after I'd had dinner, shared the news with my family (they'd met him with me at our local watering hole and he'd helped us move almost a year ago), and settled in front of the computer to visit and get a sense of what had happened, that it began to sink in. I went to his Facebook page, read some comments, shared a few, looked at the pics of his smiling mischievous face - drinking a beer (which we did a fair amount of together), hanging with friends, scuba diving, biking. I really lost it. What a waste and what a loss - one of the most intense livers (not the organ) of life I've ever known. He was what everyone dreams of in a friend - open, curious, vivacious and full of life, funny in the extreme, always ready with a tale to top whatever tales were being shared, bright, and exceptionally caring. As I mentioned elsewhere, I don't think he knew how to say no to anyone in want or need. He will be sorely missed, and I don't begrudge him for a nanosecond the decision he made on how he chose to go. To each his own. He was not the shitty friend. I was...

I am still very early in my sobriety, but am well enough dried out through AA and through counseling to finally confront the demons that drove me to drink in the first place. I've long known that I have few real friends, close friends. You know, the ones with whom you'll share your deepest secrets and fears and desires. I'm probably not very unique in that respect, relative to other men anyway. We tend to share on a pretty superficial level. Women, I think, are much better at that, and probably healthier for it.

AA helps some of us stop our drinking, but its up to those of us who choose to, to to do the deeper work of understanding and dealing with what's driving us to drink. Much of the discoveries can be painful, but richly rewarding as well. At the premature death of my friend, I find myself exploring again the pathologies of relationships and friendships, trying to divine the wheres and hows and whys of our connections with others. In my case, my shrink has helped me conclude that I was emotionally abandoned at multiple times from early childhood through early adulthood, to the point that my defense was to close myself off from all but the most superficial of relationships. I was emotionally abandoned by a mother who had four children in five years, followed five years later by another, apparently leaving her with insufficient time or inclination to give any of us what we needed in terms of emotional nurturing. My best friend moved away when I was twelve, which devastated me more than I realized or shared at the time, although I remember sitting alone and sobbing for hours on end that summer. I never spoke of it to another soul. A few years later, my young girlfriend, who I had no reason to expect to wait for me while I froze my ass off in Korea, wisely chose not to, and that was when I moved from the ranks of high-level amateur drunk to a polished world-class professional. Fresh pliant clay is easily formed, but, once hardened, infuriatingly difficult to reshape...

From that point forward, with lady friends or guy friends, my modus operandi was, I think, eerily similar. I wasn't reluctant to put myself out there enough to get attention, hopefully affection, and affirmation. Once that objective had been accomplished, I shut off the valve. I had what I was after and wasn't going to risk the tiniest amount more. I wasn't about to invest enough that I couldn't handle the loss, and as a result, invested so little I never could enjoy the full potential benefit of any relationship. Low risk, low reward. No gain, but no pain. Pretty pitiful. And pretty shitty if you are on the other side of the equation. None of this was conscious, mind you, nor intentional. Doesn't change what it is, though...

The sad, funny, ironic thing is that many people consider me a good friend, think more highly of me than I likely deserve. While it is true that I will almost always respond to a request from help from someone who asks and genuinely needs it, I don't have a pro-active bone in my body when it comes to seeking out opportunities to serve anything less than humanity as a whole. I've long characterized myself as a "forest person" rather than a "tree person." You know, macro versus micro, when it comes to other human beings. It's only recently that I've started to realize that this is a defensive behavior, designed subconsciously to avoid the personal investment in another individual's life that can, and generally will, lead to pain somewhere along the way. Alcoholics are driven by two things - resentment and fear. I resent, I now realize, my real and imagined losses and abandonments, and I fear repeating them. It's an ugly pathology that has led to a lot of heartache for those who've risked loving me. And it is a perfect factory for manufacturing shitty friends. I'm living proof...

I still cry easily, always have, and have always somehow recognized it as a healthy behavior. But the tears come much more infrequently these days, as I've donned this psychic armor against loss. Care not, hurt not. I'm a smart one to be sure...

Bert, God bless him, had apparently penetrated my protection without my really knowing. He was child-like in many ways, bi-polar and ADD I found out later and recently, which explained the quirkiness that attracted me to him the first time we met at our local brewery. He was getting treatment and some medication, but this is tricky stuff I know from family experiences. I am suspecting that this regiment likely played a role in his final act - will likely never know...

Like me, he never met a stranger. Unlike me, however, he was all in from the first encounter. He was curious and energetic - would be hurt by those who wouldn't hear him out, which were many, as his condition didn't allow for him the patience to hear someone fully out before diving in with his own take on whatever topic was in play. This was never off-putting to me, as I am a serial interrupter as well...

I know some women who played a large role in his life, and am looking forward to visiting with them at his memorial. I'm a big funeral goer, which fascinates those who know me. I always knew that these events weren't for the departed, but for those of us left behind, and had learned as well that I somehow have the capacity to provide some comfort to the bereaved in most cases. For me, I suppose it is a chance to make a little contribution to the loved ones of friends, without any risky commitment. The moral being, even if I'm a shitty friend while you're alive, I'm a real pal when you're dead. So if you're morbidly inclined...

Bert loved women, and they loved him. He was attractive, fit, energetic. If he saw a pretty girl he was likely to make a play, even if she was on the arm of a gorilla. Impulse control issues, you know? He was unable to sustain relationships, though. His mind was off on tangents too quickly for him to make and follow through on longer-term commitments required for successful healthy relationships. And I know now that those who spent sustained periods with him knew of his dark down periods, while I only knew him in his elevated states, during which he craved action and interaction. He was a dedicated cyclist and athlete, rode long distances on his bike, which I'm sure was uplifting to him, with the wind in his ears and the world flashing by and no need to focus on anything but the pumping of his well-muscled legs, deep steady breathing and the stories dancing through his mind. He'd torn an ACL in a skiing accident last spring, and had set back his own recovery a bit by pushing too hard too fast. I know this tormented him. He was also a diver, and I'm sure drew similar comfort in working underwater, alone in the nurturing embrace of the tropical seas he so loved. But a ruptured ear drum had brought an end to this enriching vocation. Life deals us all some hard punches. Bert may have been tagged one too many times...

Ruminating over our too-short friendship and too-few encounters, I find myself wondering if I might suffer from similar psychological or neurological short circuits - will be visiting with my shrink about this and getting her views. (No dark thoughts, friends - don't worry. I'm not wired that way, for sure...) Whatever the case, he reached out to me in his own way a few times toward the end, as he did to others in the final months and weeks and days. Not in a way that foreshadowed what was coming, I don't think, particularly if you're tone deaf to the suffering of other individuals, as I apparently am. Shitty...

We'd only actually visited a few times in the months since I achieved sobriety, as our normal meeting spot was the brewery that my sponsor wisely counseled me to avoid due to its potentially destructive temptations. I know he didn't like to think of me as an alcoholic, as that was me voluntarily stepping down from the mini-pedestal he'd constructed for me in his feverish mind. I think he was coming around to understanding that I wasn't that much changed, just healthier, and that what changes there were I gratefully embraced. He seemed to want me to declare him an alcoholic, which he certainly wasn't, so that he could share my experience. I feel no guilt in not taking on this responsibility. Not my role. I understand now, though, that he was hurting deeply inside, and was in his own way seeking any explanation and solution that would bring him some peace. I didn't realize this, however, until it was too late...

Our last exchange was a series of texts, that I deeply wish now I'd saved:

Bert: "I miss our visits."
Me: "Me too. Hopefully we can go riding when it warms up."
Bert:

Damn it, here come the tears again...