I awoke this morning from a vivid dream. I was attending a reunion (my college 25th reunion starts tomorrow) and I was led by an old high school friend and somewhat egotistical jerk John (I bet you thought this post was about you) Papandria to another old high school friend John Pasman. I felt shocked and happily surprised. Shocked because I knew that John Papandria and John Pasman didn't really get along so it was odd that Papandria would lead me to Pasman. This thought was easily overwhelmed by the happy surprise of seeing a friend I believed to be dead for nearly ten years. Exit John Papandria.
"How is this possible?," I asked John Pasman. "You're dead."
"No. Obviously not." And you laughed.
"How can this be? I attended your funeral. If it wasn't you then whose was it?"
"It was my brother."
"That's so strange." I could remember seeing his brother at the funeral and they looked enough alike that for a brief guilty moment I did imagine they were switched. But it wasn't so.
And then we were suddenly apart. And that feeling of not-quite-right-ness that always comes before the death of a dream and bad CGI was there and it was over.
John, you were a dear friend taken so quickly that you quite literally were gone before I even knew you were ill. Our friendship was episodic at best, but you mattered a great deal to me. Apparently after nearly a decade I still can't accept that you are gone. Thank you for your friendship.
If the dead search Google for their names, I hope you find this.
