September 12 2023

Almost a year and a half ago I found this painting at a second hand store. In that season I was in it — deep in the underground, where it is wet and dark. You can’t dig up out of those times. You can’t force it or will it or save yourself. You can most certainly dig yourself deeper with drink and drug, but thank God I did not dig down any further. I’d hit that bedrock a couple years prior. I could play that tape forward and see the future if I medicated in those ways, and I said no thank you very much. Not today.

A brother, a soul friend, told me, “Maybe you should stay right where you are. Just sit on the path of these emotions. Don’t go forward or backward or carve a new trail. Be in what you’re in.

I told him, “Jeffrey you are my worst best friend. No one likes you. And you’re ugly.”

Of course his counsel proved to be good, which is still infuriating.

When I saw the painting at the thrift shop, Ugly Jeffrey’s words were floating around me. I bought it and have looked at it almost every day since then.

I was in a storm, but I wasn’t sinking. Most days I was the old man at the wheel — beaten down by the sea, scarred and scared. And some days, fewer but still there, I was the young guy with the dumb smile, experiencing a modicum of hope, afraid of nothing. I’d have a sense that it was all ok even though it felt awful. I reminded myself that I’m not in control, that there are plays within plays that I cannot see. If I was to survive the storm, it wouldn’t be because I could control the weather. I can, however, choose my clothing.