Way Too Close For Functionality

By Alicia Delvaux

August 21, 2007

3 comments

Art/Past 

I saw this piece of art on Postsecret this weekend. It says, "I invited to church the person who molested me." I love Postsecret for its brash and resolute reality, its commitment to publicizing help for those considering suicide, and its gentle unspoken reminder of what the submissions to the site say: we are all artists, we all have things we hide, but none of us are alone (in that).

The postcard proclaiming its sender reached out to his or her abuser made me pause. Partly because I thought there might have been a time in my life when I would have been so overwhelmed with altruism that I would do something like that, and partly because it confirmed something in me that I've been tossing around for the past few months. Forgiveness often requires distance. Before I delve into relationship territory (which is what this is about) I am just going to cut it short and say that sometimes no amount of time, no number of apologies and heartfelt (or heart-wrenching) conversations can save something not meant to be revived. The separation is sweeter than the idea that we can all be friends.

Music

I saw The Clarks on Sunday in the drizzling precipitation that began the night before and persisted all day. Upon arrival at Mill Creek Park with my best friend J. and my buddy Patrick, I was hoping that the rain would create a mud pit and then a euphoric, Woodstock-esque situation in which the attendees stomped, danced, and rocked out in a mass of music-induced mob mentality, but I hoped in vain. We huddled up on a tarp and listened to the Pittsburgh musicians entertain in a much more subdued manner than I imagined in my head, but it was delightful nonetheless.

In spite of (or maybe because of) the grey skies and the ever-falling drops, the grass at Mill Creek Park was lush and green and a few hundred people were there enjoying the songs. I decided that location doesn't really matter, it's what fills a place that makes it alive. The pavilion was brimming with sound and families and a sense of something peaceful despite the weather. The highlight for me was the cover of Bruce Springsteen's The River, which was my favorite song during childhood.

Togetherness

Yeah, childhood. I was nine years old idolizing a man who sang of the working class like he was the Poet Laureate of Middle America. I knew nothing of The Boss other than that he had showed me a true love story and that if I could only be as lucky as him and Mary someday, to fall into adulthood while still an adolescent, to age before my time, to be wise in the dreary and depressing solidarity that is true knowledge: life sucks and then you die.

I kid. If my father knew the cassette tapes he played in the garage while working on cars and carpentry were shaping my view of the ideal man, he might have sent me off to boarding school. Or bought me a Debbie Gibson album or something. Instead, I grew up with Bon Jovi, The Eagles, Jimi Hendrix, and Southside Johnny and decided I'd marry a mill worker, like my daddy, and we'd be so down and out that we'd know the only thing worth fighting for is what no one can afford: true love (or a college education.) Or maybe that was my romanticized image of life after high school.

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