Because Why?

for those who don't know, i spend a few hours every wednesday or thursday at a random bar with a former co-worker and current friend named jim. i've written about him here before. but what surprises me is how often i'll tell a friend where i'm off to and they'll respond with, "why are you going to hang out with a 65 year-old?"

my immediate thoughts are scrambled by the semi-inconsiderate question and i never really have much of an answer beyond, "why not?"

i've thought about my reasons behind hanging out with someone forty years older than me and it's a weird thing to think about. is it because i have no dad and i want a father figure? is it because older people have more experience and therefore more to debate? or is it simply because older people still know how to have conversation because they grew up during a time people actually respected sitting down and talking as an activity?

there's no answer to why i hang out with a 65 year-old because it's the wrong question. that question forces me to think about age rather than personality. if the question had been "why do you hang out with jim?" i could answer it easily. because, quite frankly, my reasons have little to do with his age.

photo by theresa fremon

"you don't want to be rich?" jim asked in a jokingly condescending tone.

this is perhaps a tone that none of you can understand without ever meeting jim, but to me it is very jim. the question comes with a sort of 45 degree angle head-tilt, lively eyes, and a childish ear-to-ear grin. vocally, it sounds mildly sarcastic, yet reminiscent of how one might question a puppy about food or a walk or something else equally rhetoric, and often times these sentences end in a neighborly chuckle.

"no," i said, "it's not money--"

"you want to be famous," jim jumped in.

he still had the joke-voice on, but i could tell he was also searching for something-- perhaps to see how sure of the world a 25 year-old could be. it seems to me that the older you get, the less sure of the world you become-- you've witnessed lack of reasoning, bad things happening to good people, and perhaps a few ex-wives-- the lack of security issues a new form of peacefulness. and, of the older crowd, i've run into two fairly major groups: one is trying to save you time by telling what horrors they've learned, and the other is trying to let you learn while learning from you by sitting back and enjoying the confidence of a young mind; a mind still so naive it believes it can figure everything out.

"well," i started, "if i have to choose between rich and famous, yes, i'd want to be famous. i want respect."

"ahhh," he said, leaning back, "respect. you want respect. okay. i like that."

i have to, at this point, apologize for all the books i have not read and all the english classes i spent as a costumed superhero because it is likely for that reason i cannot accurately describe to you the man that is jim.

"i can work and make tons of money," i said, "and i can be successful in that way. a big paycheck that pays me to silence my soul. but it's stupid."

"you keep using this word 'soul'," he said, "and i'm not offended, but i'm not sure i understand."

jim is a smart man and when the average person would say, "oh, i get it" and simply move on, he will pry further to see if you can explain to him what he should be getting in your own words-- in that way, he winds up understanding quite a bit more about what you mean than the average person. and you learn more about what you meant as, at the very least, a side effect.

in some ways, that quality reminds me a lot of my dad-- or my dad's funeral, anyway-- the head death-speaker was my dad's principle and i remember one part of his speech impacting my mind in many ways beyond just what it meant about my dad, but also what funerals were. he said, "richard would ask me questions and debate about things that, often times, made me uncomfortable."

i had never known you could say things like that at a funeral. i thought they were insults.

but the sentence was accepted because it was not only true, but it was said with utter respect. the discomfort my dad might have issued only existed because it was caused by the expansion of a mind-- and that can be something hard to handle.

when you talk with jim, he practically aides you in learning more about what you mean because he's not afraid to ask until it's clear to the both of you. i imagine some people don't enjoy this, but i live for it-- it is possibly the greatest gift another human can give you.

"it's non-religious. it's the thing in me-- it's hard to explain without you just being me," i stumbled, "its... okay: it's why i can be me and you can't be me, and why there are things i would do or notice and other people wouldn't. i don't want a job that asks me to silence that."

i like a mental exercise and jim's always good for that. we can sit down and have a conversation the way conversations were meant to be had. we can disagree, agree, or even just help to evolve each others theories. you cannot walk into a conversation with jim and make up facts-- he'll know, and he won't tell you he knows. he'll just ask the perfect questions to sort of play with you.

"i hear jack kerouac in everything you say," he said for what was not the first time, "this struggle to succeed: how can i make it? i try, i do everything i'm supposed to, and i can't succeed. what do i need to do to just make it? and when he finally became successful, it was overnight. a guy in the new york times published a good review and kerouac was on a plane to morocco that night. he bought his mom minks and his new friends were business men-- not the hookers doing tricks for 10 cents that he used to be friends with. and he had drank himself useless."

"i don't think i'm like that," i said, feeling as though what started as a compliment had turned into something horribly otherwise, "i'd rather be much more of an andy kaufman. success can't be achieved within your lifetime. there is no day i will say, i've finally done it. the more successful i get, the more i will fuck with the audience. proof of all this is my last two jobs-- i need to be me and if i can't change things i can at least make some waves-- money has nothing to do with it."

every time i leave a bar and a conversation with jim, i feel like my theories and philosophies have been strengthened. it's an amazingly refreshing sensation, like walking out of stinky bathroom stall and smelling fresh-- poo-free-- air.

and there is respect. when our meeting is done and our next has been set, i don't think i'm the only one leaving having learned something, or considered something. i really believe jim is learning something from me, too. and that's an amazing transaction.

point is, everyone needs a jim. and every jim needs a me.