A Reminder to Appreciate

Yesterday I had a full-day meeting in a cramped little meeting room in London. It was the typical fare-fight the transport system, race along stairways since my trains were inevitably late, fight my way onto tube cars that swell and purge their passengers, and then head for the Dream Job office. Luckily, at the Dream Job office I work at, one of the consultants was nice enough (or scared enough of me) to have a Starbucks venti white Americano ready for me to gulp down in order to join the human race.

The air is humid and sticky, and as we enter the building and walk upstairs to the conference room he's all Yorkshire happiness. Turns out his girlfriend of a few years is pregnant. Pregnant. And he's divorced with two kids, but was not long ago saying that he felt he was nearly too old to have more kids. I smiled for him-I can be happy for others-and asked him all about it, and he told me in giddy delight, punctuating the air with a smile and a constant reiteration of the due date. He said they were actually both thrilled to be having a child. He also said he figures at some point they'll get married, but not yet.

Kinda' like how I often wonder/wish my life could go.

We head into the meeting, a tangle of computer laptop wires like overgrown black vines taking over the plastic fake-wood hardtop table. The shades are drawn to allow the illumination of the projector, a tiny device projecting a white beam that captures the dust in little devil-like whirlpools. The table is strewn with the detritus of the work-force-mobile phones, crumpled and well-loved cardboard coffee cups milked of their nourishment, notebooks dog-eared and jotted with black slashes of ink. I set my bag down and wonder...if 90% of the world's population has never made a phone call, why do I work so hard with the 10% that have?

The meeting commences with the usual suspects, the usual group that I know how to read and react to, that I know the roles we play and the work we need to do. We represent a group of people from different companies, all come together to work on a product that will hopefully revolutionize a market we work with. To my right is the Yorkshire-father-to-be, and to my left is a nice and quiet man that I work with, a man named Sam from a partner company we work with, a man I work with a lot.

The meeting is agony-we have to go line-by-line through a 200 line Microsoft Project plan. And I really mean "line-by-line", debating each and every date to milk more time from the time-scale. Do gerbils really need to be exercised for 15 working days? Can we not work them for 12 and apply further resources? Do we really need super-poly duct tape, or is masking tape acceptable, which therefore adds another 6 days back into the project plan?

And so on.

Halfway through the morning Sam's phone starts to go nuts, so he excuses himself to take the call. He's gone for a while, then he returns at the doorway and summons me. I step out of the meeting, making my way through the room that looks like a storage cupboard has exploded on it, and step outside.

"Yes, Sam?" I ask, relieved to be in the hallway, where the air is moving.
Sam looks confused, a little lost. "I just got a phone call. You know Marlon, my manager?" he asks. And I do-I've had a few meetings with him, a shorter, solid man perhaps in his mid-40s. He has a strong profile, rapt and attentive dark brown eyes, and a quick smile. I nod.
"Sure do, why?" I ask.
"He was found dead Friday night. His girlfriend found him." he said, looking confused.
"Oh God, Sam. I'm so sorry. Do you want to sit down? Do you want to excuse yourself from the meeting? Can I get you anything?" I ask, laying a hand on his arm.
He shakes his head, still looking confused. "I don't understand. I just spoke to him Friday morning. I feel a little shocked."
"Do they know what happened?" I asked, my mind hurtling towards the horrible idea that perhaps he met with foul play, an idea that would cause so much more grief. Then I mentally kick myself for asking such an insensitive fucking question. What does it matter how he went, the point is, he passed away and it's horrible enough.
"No, no idea." he replied. He motions back to the room and I make a few phone calls to senior Dream Job staff that perhaps need to know about this. Then I head back into the room.

I didn't feel terribly broken up about it-death (any death) is tragic, and I was shocked and sad for Sam, Marlon was so kind, but at the same time I didn't feel the sense of bereavement as I really had only met him about 3 times, including once last week. He was very kind, and it is a horrible tragedy, but I didn't know him well enough to be able to say that I was shaken to the core. Honestly, my heart went out to his girlfriend-she must be in one thousand gallons of pain.

At lunchtime I talk with Adam, my counter-part in this work in Dream Job. I tell him about Marlon. He looks up at me.

"How old was he?" This is the first thing he wants to know.
I shrug. "Dunno, perhaps mid-40s."
He runs a hand through his greying hair. "Younger than me." he says grimly.

I hadn't even thought about it-if Marlon had been my age, I wouldn't have given it a thought. It is then that I wonder if maybe men measure death perhaps in comparisons-how healthy were they? How old were they? Am I ahead of the death game? Do I have an edge?

"What did he die of?" Adam asks.
"No idea." I reply.
"Probably a heart attack." he says, nodding to himself. And I think: this must be what you fear, too, then. I fear foul play, and his poor girlfriend having to be exposed to it. You fear a young death, and a heart attack. It must be human nature to want to know how someone died, or why.

He sighs. "It's terrible. Shocking. Suppose I ought to take him off my mailing list." he adds as an afterthought. And I should be shocked, I am shocked, but at the same time, I know this is only business, and this is how business is done, how thought processes work.

The meeting ends and I rush home to be with my Mr. Y. He calls me while I am on the train to tell me that the estate agents are coming by the house on Tuesday to do an evaluation, which puts depression in both of our hearts. Our lease is up the end of November, and if estate agents are doing an evaluation, it can only mean one of two things-either the owner is taking another loan, or he's putting the house up for sale.

Which means at the end of November we may be moving out of the perfect terraced house and looking for a new abode in Whitney Houston.

We mope a bit about it, and then suddenly cheer up simultaneously. While he is sitting on the computer chair, I go up and hug him, standing behind him and practically laying on him.

"It's ok if we have to move. It's a pain in the ass, but there are lots of properties for rent in Whitney Houston." I say, rubbing his sore neck.
"Yeah. And who's to say the next place isn't one thousand times better?" he asks, shrugging, and I feel his shoulders move beneath my rubbing hands.
"It sucks to move, but as long as you're there, I don't care." I add.

We grin. We take a bottle of French champagne I just bought and a Lush bubble bath bar and draw a hot bath together, lighting the candles in the bathroom for mood accompaniment. We touch each other constantly in the fragrant bubbles, and I tell my Mr. Y that I would fall apart if he died, I would simply come unglued. I think...I'm so sorry Marlon. But thank you for reminding me that I must love and take care of what I have. We have a long champagne bubble bath, laughing and talking, and when we get out I make his favorite risotto dinner, and then we curl into the shape of each other and fall asleep in our bed and our bedroom, which we love and if we must move we will miss, but anywhere can be my bedroom as long as he's in the bed with me.

-H.

PS-Luuka has been naughty. Again.

PPS-I have been thinking of renaming Mr. Y. I'm not sure how he got that moniker, but perhaps it's time for a proper name. Mr. Y is thinking about it, and in the meantime, your thoughts?

Posted by Everydaystranger at September 28, 2004 08:10 AM | TrackBack .