"The sun can play tricks
with your eyes on the highway.
The moon can lay sideways
'till the ocean stands still.
But a person can't tell
his best friend he loves him,
'till time has stopped breathing,
you're alone on the hill."
I don't know if Alan Cohen listened to John Prine, practitioner of hillbilly blues, country rock, and newgrass ballads, but my old friend John Smith did and I have spent much of today listening to Prine sing, on old tapes, shiny CDs, and crackly vinyl and mourning both men, Alan dead today and John dead this summer. Alan and my old friend John were men of the same generation, I suspect. John, son of career military man, was born in 1942, spent the '60s working with the Peace Corp and in various social and political movements – which is where I met him, in the movement still, some 20 years later, in Santa Monica. In Santa Monica, he founded a runaway shelter for youth, coordinated the city's personnel department and was arrested countless times with me and others in demonstrations that drew attention to a range of issues from nuclear testing to homelessness. When he died, this past summer in Arcata, his home of the past decade, he was young—64.
I joked with Alan just yesterday, on the first day of school, that I had actually spent much of Sunday night with his video. I raised my brows somewhat suggestively. Alan smiled, his eyes doing that crinkly, twinkly thing that I liked. Alan, in case you don't know, is a star in the IVC Blackboard Tutorials for faculty. And yes, on Sunday, feeling inspired by the new year, I thought I might begin to tackle Blackboard. I failed in my effort to learn Blackboard, but I did spend time appreciating Alan's success, admiring especially as I told him, his great headshot – dapper, classy and smart. I learned, via the video, that Alan earned his BA in 1964, his doctorate in 1974. I learned, that, unlike me, Alan could master Blackboard well enough to be the college leading man.
Death comes. We gulp. The air is more precious than ever. Our lungs. Our heart. It all comes back to us, what it means, how it works. There is never enough time it seems to say or do what we should and that is the special sharp grief that survivors possess.
Now is the time, a wise friend reminded me early this summer, when my mother-in-law, in round three of ovarian cancer, went into hospice, for my husband to tell his mother what he wanted her to know. We knew she was dying and that knowledge was a difficult gift, but a valuable one. But too often, we don't know that death is coming.
Alan, a biologist, perhaps had a better, deeper understanding of death. I know that my friend John had. When I listen to Prine sing his irreverent life-affirming death song, "Please Don't Bury Me," in which he imagines his own death, I can see my friend John's smiling eyes. They had a similar twinkle-crinkle as Alan's – who knows? Maybe all men of that age have eyes that twinkle-crinkle like that. I hope so. Still, as my friend reminded me this summer – now is the time. It is always the time. We need to tell each other what matters, that indeed, we matter to each other.
— Rebel Girl
(Photo of Alan taken from IVC website.)
