“Well, it's certainly true in life that the greatest hell one can know is to be separated from the one you love.”
The Power of Myth
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Friday, June 14, 2019
My Dearest Matthew,
In my younger and more vulnerable years my father gave me some advice that I’ve been turning over in my mind ever since. “If you want people to like you,” he instructed me on countless occasions over the course of years, “be very interested in everything they have to say. Act like you really care about their lives.” He also advised me to pay close attention to the casual words folks utter when first you meet them. “If you pay close attention,” the old man assured me with a twinkle in his blue eye, “people will tell you who they are and what they’re going to do. It’s subtle but they’ll tell ya. Listen.”
What seemed more abstract than obvious when first I heard it grew explicit as time wore on. Turns out, Pops was on to something. Ornery old bastard made everything about him, lacked empathy, emotional depth and parental instincts, yes. But dude was spot on about many important matters. People do reveal themselves in subtle and not-so-subtle ways early on. Often in the guise of projection.
Of course, I didn’t know anything about any of that back then. I was too torn up inside to see past my overwhelming self-consciousness, crippling fear, quick-shifting emotions and all those intrusive, obsessive thoughts. I had nothing to offer anybody except my own confusion. Consequently, I lacked the empathy necessary to conduct myself appropriately in a romantic relationship. For that and the countless times I selfishly betrayed you, I am deeply and eternally sorry. You were the best thing that ever happened to me and I fucked it up.
Regardless of how ugly I may have behaved, please know that you are the love of my life. Nothing compares to you, Matt. Trust and believe I’ve suffered in untold ways since you left. Thanks to karma, shame, and your total obliteration of me from your life. Cleary, I’m dead to you. Carrion flies do seize upon my pale lips in some dark corner of your heart.
Your expulsion of me set in motion the darkest night of my soul. At one time, leading me down a perilous path of perennial intoxication. There aren’t enough adjectives in the English language to adequately convey the depth of pain I’ve endured and vigorously endeavored to blot out during this vast space between us. My sorrow and bitter regret are as intense today as they were twenty years ago. It never goes away. It never will. You just learn to “live” with it.
Your expulsion of me set in motion the darkest night of my soul. At one time, leading me down a perilous path of perennial intoxication. There aren’t enough adjectives in the English language to adequately convey the depth of pain I’ve endured and vigorously endeavored to blot out during this vast space between us. My sorrow and bitter regret are as intense today as they were twenty years ago. It never goes away. It never will. You just learn to “live” with it.
Drugs help.
What I owe you, as much as an earnest apology, is a debt of gratitude for the priceless lessons you taught me. Not to say that you’re my raison d’etre / green light or anything, but you are the greatest teacher I’ve ever known. You taught me that there are consequences of our actions and that when you treat someone who loves you like shit, sooner or later they’re going to walk away and never look back. You taught me how and why to be a better person.
Remember the last movie we saw together? As Good as It Gets. Remember what Jack Nicholson’s character tells Helen Hunt’s? “I’ve got a really great compliment for you and it’s true. You make me want to be a better man.” There was such synchronicity in our last date it’s incredible. I wish I’d have known about all of that back then. Synchronicity, karma and the like. Nobody taught me nuthin’.
Matthew Ian Altenberg, I’ve got a really great compliment for you and it’s so fucking true. Losing you made me a better woman. I wish you could see the better woman I’ve become and could fully comprehend the pain in took to get me here. Losing you was more painful than losing Kay on January 1, 1999. In case you’ve forgotten, my name is Destiny Jane Jones. It’s been many a moon since we lay our blue eyes upon each other. The last time I saw you was at TGI Friday’s in Woodland Hills sitting at a table near the front door with your left arm slung around your pretty new girlfriend. Late ‘99. When I walked in and our eyes met, you leaned in to kiss her on the cheek then gave me some strange salute.
You’re happily married now to that same lovely lady. You have a family, your Ph.D., the suburban-American dream. You must be so proud. I’m proud of you. I too am a teacher now. I teach English at a charter school for at-risk kids in the desert. Although not in the way I’d originally imagined, I get to use my acting skills every day. Children make a captive audience. And along with the perfunctory vocabulary and grammar lessons, I teach the value of being a “good person”—a person of integrity—to my students whenever possible. I explain to them the law of karma, citing everyone from Christ to Buddha to Alan Watts, Carl Jung and of course, Joseph Campbell. Our mentor.
In The Power of Myth you might recall Joseph Campbell saying to Bill Moyers: “Freud tells us to blame our parents for all the shortcomings of our life, and Marx tells us to blame the upper class of our society. But the only one to blame is oneself. That’s the helpful thing about the Indian idea of karma. Your life is the fruit of your own doing. You have no one to blame but yourself.” So when my students confide in me that they secretly wish to do “bad things,” I explain to them that they only want to do those things because they’re ignorant of the consequences of doing them. “If you knew what would happen to you as a result of doing that,” I informed a student recently with a twinkle in my blue eye, “you’d think twice. Trust me.” Today, I’m a noble benefactor of my community because of you. And because of you, dearly beloved, I can dive into my watery grave having tasted true love if only for a moment in time.
Speaking of taste, thank God for coffee! Yes, I’m as obsessed as ever with my favorite libation. Often, it was only the promise of a Venti Cinnamon Dolce Latte that prodded me from my rueful slumber. The courage it took to get out of bed every morning to face the same things over and over was enormous. On many a dark morning, I stared at the ceiling pondering whether or not I should get coffee or a gun to kill myself. Fortunately, the coffee always won. That’s addiction for you. Cunning, baffling, powerful. The old man called it "the phenomenon of craving".
Apparently, my addictive impulses were greater than my suicidal ones. Although, I’ll admit, coffee’s never tasted as good as it did when you were mine. Harley’s. Gloria Jean’s. Espresso 2 a Tea. The Coffee Connection. Jazz & Java. Java the Hut. Lala Java. Those were the best iced mochas and cappuccinos I’d ever have. Everything since has paled in comparison. Not long ago I was a barista at the most popular coffeehouse in Palm Springs knowing full well that even their European iced mochas couldn’t compare. Because you weren’t there. I’ll never forget those Java the Hut quad-shot iced cappuccinos I’d get right before Robert Rosenblum’s art history class at NYU. Pure, unadulterated liquid crack. I’d literally be vibrating through his lectures on the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood. Vibrating, wishing you were there to quiver with me. Thank goodness I still have all the beautiful letters you wrote while I was in New York to keep me going.
These days I’m solely the served instead of the server of espresso, etc. And as I nurse the 16-ounce cup of medium roast before me in between decadent flakey nibbles of a pain au chocolat, I can’t help but wonder what the fuck I was thinking 25 years ago when I did those appalling things to you. Was I deranged? Delusional? Duplicitous? Depressed? Dumb as driftwood? Whatever the perplexing root cause of my aberrant behavior you, nevertheless, are and always will be my great American tragedy.
Love Always,
