*Bent but Unbroken

I could go on, but I've already reached my required word count, so why bother?
Joking! That's a little homework humor for ya.
Really though, I could go on, but I assume you get the picture.
I could detail memory after memory, and talk about our relationship and what made it special, and I can come up with one sad point after another, all the while seeming really introspective and deep. The truth is, it's easy to write sad, emotion-warranting material when you're talking about a mother-of-three who died at the age of 32. Like I mentioned when I began this assignment, writing about a dead friend is kinda cheap. I worry about that sometimes, between the tattoos and blogging and poems and so on, I wonder if I'm conducting some sort of parlor trick each time I elicit from others the emotions she still digs outta me. It's not meant to be that way. I always manage to comfort myself by remembering that Sarah knew that I was a rampant narcissist. Even when it's about her, it's about me. That never would've surprised her. And what I said at the start is true: If our roles were reversed, she'd base her assignment on me. Well, she may have taken some sort of feminist angle, but I would have been considered a forerunner, I'm sure.
Before I clue up, I'll just say why it is that I bothered. I mean, if she was never my girlfriend, but I still insist she was 'special', there must be a reason behind that, right? What was so special, you're asking?
In truth, we were actually private eyes! We went around solving crimes while exhibiting placid high school student exteriors!
Wait...that's not it.
Well, it's like I said before. We were both the funny one.
I'd spent my pre-teen years as the class clown and general fuckabout in school. Loved the role. I was a good student, but that didn't mean I wasn't disruptive.
I had to hear over and over again that I was "weird." "That's weird." "Paul, you're so weird." My wife still tells me to this day. It never bothered me, really. I wasn't "bullied" about it (whatever the hell that even means). I wasn't ostracized at all, but I was far from understood.
Sarah was the same sorta weird. Again, we weren't social pariahs or anything. In fact, we were both kinda popular in high school; middle-rung kids who were accepted by most and even invited to the occasional cool kid party. But my take was always separate from everyone else's, and I couldn't help it. She was the same way. So, when we were together, we were the same sorta different.
When you're a funny sort, you constantly try to be as funny as possible. I'm not sure if drab people realize that. If you're funny, that's great, but you're never funny enough. You can always be more. I was more with her, and vice versa. I was never as entertaining alone as I was by her side.
Larry David (my comedy idol) unintentionally summed it up for me once. For those who don't know, he is the co-creator of the hit sitcom Seinfeld, the "other guy" depicted as George Costanza in the show (portrayed by Jason Alexander). In a making of documentary that I once watched, David described why he and Jerry Seinfeld paired up to make the sitcom in the first place, and why their ideas and writing always seemed to gel so easily. He said of Jerry, "He and I, we had the same...bent." He searches to find the word, and even though I don't completely understand it, I felt a wave of understanding rush over me when he said it. That was it! That was what she and I shared; we were both skewed in the same sorta way. I have a lot of meaningful people in my life, but she was the only one who I could share that with.
It was hard after she died, to sit and realize that I didn't really know her the best, as I thought I did. Peter knew her the best; knew things I could and never will know. I feel good about that. It left me wondering, though: If I didn't know her the best, and I wasn't the closest,  what was I?
My bereavement councilor would go on to explain that it's a tough spot to be in among the aftermath (of abscence and loss). I was auxillary while being central to her life as well. Where does that leave one such as me after the fact?
I think about it a lot when I write my content for Rowan's book. I can't tell her as much about Mommy as Daddy can, so why bother, really?
In time I reached the answer: I'm the guy who can tell you what she probably woulda said in reponse, if she were here.
If she were to respond to this, she'd say I was milking it.
I'll share a couple of shared laughs that come to mind, and then we'll call it All Done:



While sitting in the "business section" (two leather chairs) of a coffee shop one time, we watched a lanky, bro-type of 19-year old enter and approach the counter. She didn't realize until I told her afterward, but we both said "He looks like an idiot" simultaneously, in the exact same tone. 

One time, we were eating at Pizza Delight and talking about parallel universes. Y'know, how there are an infinite number of universes out there with an infinite number of yous where an infinite number of possibilities are happening? We talked about how we probably did become romantically involved in some of these universes (odds would be likely). After discussing this, Sarah asked me, "In how many of those universes do you think we kill ourselves?" And I replied, "All of them."


One time, we were hanging out over beers and she made some stupid joke about how I should try to open her beer bottle with my eye socket. We kept going with it and I said that I should open all of her beers this way from now on. Then she said that I'd probably develop bruising around the eye if I opened enough of them. And then I said, "Yeah, and people will ask me: 'Why do you have a black eye?' and I'll answer with, 'Well, Sarah was on the beer last night.'"