241. Just Kids

I recently learned of the senseless death of a friend from elementary school—someone I hadn’t seen in over forty years.  His name was Joe Kane.

 

The news reached across all that time and unexpectedly unlocked a reservoir of childhood emotions I didn’t even know I was still carrying.

 

Letting those feelings out left me feeling connected to Joe's spirit and to the memory of his kindness, a quality that many have remembered and commented on after hearing this tragic news. And in that connection, I came to a better, if bittersweet, understanding of this period in my own life, of the odd and destabilizing duality of growing up in an alcoholic household and how the magical resilience and essential fragility of childhood continues to co-exist within us, bringing us together and apart and together again, if we're lucky. 

 

A lot of this episode draws from comments on a couple threads on my personal Facebook page which I've made public.

 

This episode is an expanded version of an essay I wrote in my newsletter about Joe's death. You can read it here if you'd like.

 

Here's the article that started all this.

 

And here's the link to the GoFundMe for Joe's funeral expenses and to benefit the Beth-El Center