I woke up scanning the beautiful, haunted images of a friendship lost in a dream. Gray mist and youth. Two girls holding together because they had nothing else to hold on to.
I stumbled upon these photographs, set up on a page memorializing the lost time, the lost relationship the regret of letting someone you love go. It’s was R’s way of saying she was sorry for vast distances created between best friends that may never be recovered.
There were photos of R’s life now – she was a beautifully unique looking woman (It was her, but it wasn’t – they way dreams go). Silvery-blond hair, a sharp nose. She was not old. She was striking. The photographs were tinted blue or had a blue mystic quality to them and showed a good life. One full of love and children and happiness and silver pots and back patios. But not the Americanized image of such things, they were simpler images. Slower images. Images not full of things, but feeling. But they showed a life I’m not entirely sure, in reality, she’s able to live. Only I can’t claim to know another’s idea of happiness – I can only know my own.
Next to the photos of R’s life where photos of her friendship with C. Old photographs. One of C with cropped wavy hair – a Dorris Day kind of cut. She stood in a field of mist, her eyes straight ahead, her face unsmiled. She held her fists tight in a deep turquoise wool-knit sweater. She was 13 or so and beautiful. The caption said “My best friend.”
The next photo was 4 woman sitting behind one side of a table. This was so much distance in this shot – from the photographer to the woman. You could hardly see their faces. Yet the colors were browns and deep wood. The caption listed their names: one was C, one was R, the other two were just names that I didn’t recognize. But C had her small baby held up to her face, this small white ball, and R was next to them.
The last photo, I don’t really remember – one of C again – I remember the bottom of the photos was just legs, but I think what was important was the caption: “My best friend. I’m so sorry.”
I’ve never know R from anything other than stories. But what I feel most about it sometimes is my friend’s sense of loss. I’ve known a loss similar, not with so much life strings and veins attached, but I think many people have lost deep, close friends along the way. I wonder if this dream was for C? I wonder if this dream was for me – to remember that there are some things in this life we can’t ever get back; to hang on to love and friendships despite the difficulties, fear, and hurts they sometimes bring. It’s always the loss of such things that haunt us the most.
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