March 3

March 3: So when I got the call that Dave died, I was in my office on my computer. I don’t remember what I was doing but if was Friday after work and probably writing and listening to tunes— my usual after work activity. Dawn had called. Dave’s dead. Shock. How? I don’t know yet. He was just discovered a half hour before by Pappas who tried to wake him up. He never responded. The authorities were called and upon arrival declared him dead. This is when Dawn called. Shit. Fuck. I texted Rich and Dano. Rich called back and while I was on the phone I started to cry and hung up. I regained my composure.

A little later, I decided to go to Dawn’s and hang out. Rich and Dano would join me. Some of Dawn’s friends were there already. I picked up my dad. Now this is the point. When I picked up dad, Dave’s body was still upstairs in his room. Police were there doing whatever they had to do. Dawn asked if I was going to go in and see him. I said no. Not out of any kind of bitterness or anger. I didn’t want my last memory of him slumped over, a dead carcass, my brother, only 45 and dead. I didn’t want to remember that image. When my mother died in 2007, I saw her on the hospital bed— arms and legs twisted and draped over the bed as if there were some struggle before she died. It was a horrible image and I had to leave the room immediately and hid in the bathroom until I could compose myself. I did not want that type of image burned into my memory of my brother. To this day, that image of my mother still haunts me.

So in a perfect world it would have been nice to see his younger self as the last send off but the reality of the situation was Dave was falling back into fat habits. After a nice two year period of recuperation, he began going downhill. He was eating badly. He wasn’t exercising at all, rarely coming downstairs other than to eat or shit. There was suspicion he was using pills again. I could see it coming but just kind of ignored it, I mean; I couldn’t do anything, or Dawn or dad or his friends. It was all up to him. I think he knew it. He cheated death twice before— once he had a stroke in... like 2008 and then in 2012, his coma; maybe he thought he could survive his lifestyle yet again. Maybe he just gave up. The state stopped sending him social security checks, claiming he was eligible to work (I think that is a yes/no assessment by the state). He had no money. Maybe this created a stress that simmered just beneath the surface. He was in the middle of an appeal.

Anyway, the last time I saw him was that Wednesday. I stopped by the house to give Dave Uncle Bobby’s 400.00 monthly rent, to give to my sister and also to drop off Bobby’s weekly smokes and beer. I remember noticing how large Dave had become, pale, eyes kind of kooky and white hair a bird’s nest. But that was Dave at the end. He really just didn’t care about a better life for himself. There was something that haunted him and I will never know. Or it was just a tragic flaw of character. Anyway, I’d rather have that final image to remember than well, you know. That is all for now. The writing never stops.