{"id":155,"date":"2015-11-05T19:11:51","date_gmt":"2015-11-05T19:11:51","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.brennenhoos.com\/?p=155"},"modified":"2015-11-05T19:11:51","modified_gmt":"2015-11-05T19:11:51","slug":"the-ghosts-that-we-knew","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.brennenhoos.com\/?p=155","title":{"rendered":"The Ghosts That We Knew"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Marble<\/a><\/p>\n

Funny how one\u2019s brain questions, squints, guesses
\nHow it
\nholds on
\nto ideas
\nconceptions
\nonly entertaining niggling sensations with grudging skepticism
\nCurdling those things the gut knows with complete
\nconviction
\ncertitude
\npeace<\/p>\n

After 23 years, my viscera knew him.
\nImmediately.<\/p>\n

He looked so very different and my brain just could not reconcile this man in his 40s with the no-longer-reality it held of the man in his\u00a020s.
\nAnd also\u2026 I thought he was dead.<\/p>\n

But my insides\u00a0knew intuitively this was him.<\/p>\n

You see, I loved him.<\/p>\n

It was 1992. I was only 19. He was.. I don\u2019t know. 20? 21? 22? He was quiet and shy. And brilliant. He was shy about his teeth so he didn\u2019t smile very often. He had dark brown eyes and scraggly blond hair. He was super skinny. Skeletal.<\/p>\n

Beautiful.
\nHe was so beautiful.
\nSo.
\nBeautiful.<\/p>\n

He loved biology, especially the work of Charles Darwin. When he talked about biology (a subject that was of no interest to me),
\nhe lit up like the hill across the river illumined\u00a0by\u00a0the early morning sun.
\nAwful teeth forgotten
\nMelancholy evaporating
\nAnimation enveloped him<\/p>\n

He was fascinating. I loved hearing him talk about something he loved. I would have done biology all day forever with this boy.<\/p>\n

He also used heroin.
\nWas he an active user then?
\nI don\u2019t know or remember clearly.
\nOh he was beautiful.<\/p>\n

And he really, really liked me. He was one of the first boys that I knew liked me, that I liked back. I remember how he kissed. Tentative. Soft. So tender.<\/p>\n

He gave me a marble chess set that I kept for years,
\nthrough marriage,
\nmoves,
\nchildren,
\nmissing pieces.
\nIt was grey and brown.
\nI think he might have been the first boy to ever give me an actual gift.
\nA pawn or a rook emerged occasionally as life passed and there he\u2019d be, smiling.
\nSweet. Shy.
\nSo beautiful.<\/p>\n

He was unbelievably sweet and kind.<\/p>\n

I cannot remember exactly why we never really dated.
\nWe did that first flush of new love slowly.
\nAnd it was so achingly wonderful.
\nHe put the stop to it.
\nMaybe he was afraid of me dating him because he was prone to melancholy and was using some pretty heavy drugs. It is one of those niggling memories.<\/p>\n

I was also a Christian.
\nCreationist.
\nJesus believing church goer.
\nHe, a die-hard evolutionist.
\nNever compatible.<\/p>\n

But\u2026he really, really liked me. And respected me.
\nI think he didn\u2019t keep on with me because he tried to protect me from himself.<\/p>\n

And I thought he had died in the intervening years.<\/p>\n

We attended college together for only one year. And then, he moved with a large exodus of students. And that was that. Never heard from him again. No word. Nothing.<\/p>\n

And then\u2026 last night, this friend request on Facebook.
\nAnd my belly broke\u00a0open with warmth and joy!
\nIt\u2019s you!\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n

It was like seeing a ghost.
\nAnd it was like being given the most amazing gift \u2013 someone who was dead was now alive.
\nSomeone loved and lost
\nwas restored.<\/p>\n

As I sat there through all these feelings, trying to figure out if it was really him\u2026 this deep relief and joy at the thought of loving him again (you see\u2026 I have loved him all these years). Finally, this splash of true hope that here was someone who knew me when I was me and would be able to know me now that I\u2019m me again. Someone who thought I was lovely and not too much. Someone who tried to protect me.<\/p>\n

I cried and cried with relief.
\nHe was alive.<\/em>
\nAnd stared at his profile picture, disbelieving
\n\u2026and still hoping.<\/p>\n

And then,
\ngoing through his photos and timeline\u2026
\nsaw that he was recently married.<\/p>\n

I cried. And cried. And cried.<\/p>\n

Relief and grief.<\/p>\n

How can there be this emptiness again? This grief?
\nHow can it be so vast and overwhelming when the window of hope and excitement was so short?<\/p>\n

Even now, writing this, I have to hold back those awful tears.
\nThat ugly cry that wails and wrenches the very edges of your deep foundations.<\/p>\n

He is still beautiful.
\nHe got to become a biologist.
\nHe is no longer skeletal.
\nHeroin did not kill him.<\/p>\n

He found a woman and married her just 5 days ago. And she loves him. And he her.
\nAnd I am so sad, I do not even know if I can act like a human.<\/p>\n

How does a ghost get to be made flesh only to be taken away?
\nLove is a terrible, terrible thing.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

(This post originally appeared at www.dirtfarmchronicles.com.)<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Funny how one\u2019s brain questions, squints, guesses How it holds on to ideas conceptions only entertaining niggling sensations with grudging skepticism Curdling those things the gut knows with complete conviction certitude peace After 23 years, my viscera knew him. Immediately…. Continue Reading →<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-155","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.brennenhoos.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/155","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.brennenhoos.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.brennenhoos.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.brennenhoos.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.brennenhoos.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=155"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.brennenhoos.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/155\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":158,"href":"https:\/\/www.brennenhoos.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/155\/revisions\/158"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.brennenhoos.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=155"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.brennenhoos.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=155"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.brennenhoos.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=155"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}