My friend A is terminally ill with a disease that is working on her with a quiet determination. Having been acquainted with near-death for so long she has no fear of it anymore, instead she lives in the present with a passion I have rarely seen. When she first found out about her condition, A had a professional photographer shoot a portfolio for her.
She could have made it to a Vogue cover with those pictures. It was her way to arrest the atrophy of her body. In her mind she sees herself perfectly beautiful like those airbrushed pictures. "I see the most perfect physical form that I could ever have. It makes me want to strive for other forms of perfection that are still attainable" A explained to me once.
Recently another friend who is a professional photographer told me about an interesting assignment. A couple wanted faces of a celebrity couple on the cover of a popular magazine replaced with theirs. This was their tenth wedding anniversary gift to each other. We were talking about the rather unusual idea and wondered what may have sparked it.
For very different reasons maybe, but like A they were seeking perfection in life, acting out the culmination of all other dream and desire. Connecting a joyous celebration of life and togetherness with impending death left an upleasant after taste in the mind.
I never fail to remind J that there is a time and place for everything. It is possibly the line she will remember me by when I am dead and gone given how frequently she hears it. Instead of having her breakfast she will break into a song and dance number from High School Musical well past eight on Monday morning. She will insist that I watch and applaud the performance instead of screaming at her to finish her milk and cereal. Her sense of occasion is seriously lacking but then so is mine. Consider for example, a person walks into the grocery store with the express purpose of buying detergent because they are fresh out of it and laundry is only half way done. However instead of heading straight for detergent, they wander over to the natural foods aisle and go berserk upon finding goat milk on sale for a dollar a gallon. They at once proceed to stock pile so they can turn it to huge quantities home-made feta cheese. That person would be me. It would not concern me in the least that I ha...
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but there are very few people who can take death and disease in the right perspective and make the best of the remaining time.. good luck to your friend..
btw, I want to get some good airbrushed pics taken.. I know this place where they take these amazing ones.. I saw a whole album of beautiful looking women taken by the photographer.. really professional.. a little zany.. just as I was signing up for a photoshoot session I was told that all the women in the pics were in fact men.. I walked out of the transvestite studio and never looked back..