One thing I do miss is this certain article that would sporadically appear in this paper. It was an advice column called "Dear Rick," and I'd like to share my favorite one with you now, as it seems obscenely germane.
This particular one is from June 2006, I believe.
Dear Rick,
I’ve been a little reclusive lately. So reclusive that I’ve gotten three emails from three different people asking "Where are you?" "What happened to you?" "Where did you go?" in that order. The truth is that I haven’t gone anywhere. In my reclusion I’ve been thinking a lot. Sometimes about the future, sometimes about next year, sometimes about growing old. Sometimes about friends or sex. Mostly I’ve been thinking about Love. I think about Love a lot, probably because I’m lonely, and when I think about it I sometimes believe and sometimes don’t believe something that I’ve always felt to be true even before I felt it. That something is that Love is not a thing, just a word, and a pretty vague one.
I’ve heard people say about other people’s Love: He/she thinks they are in Love. I say bullshit. What else could you call it? What else could it be? If you think it, you probably are.
Love is something you say after trying it on and walking around the block or after walking around and around the block until the seams are ripping and the soles are worn through. You say to yourself, "This is it. This is Love. I Love you." Love is something that you whisper to someone in the middle of the night because you can’t think of anything else to call it. Every time you say it, it will be different and it will be true. And only you will ever know.
That decision, the naming of the thing, seems like the best definition there is.
I’ve also been thinking about crashing my car and spiders in my shoes.
So, my question is: Do you Love me, Rick?
Sincerely,
Spiders In Shoes Scare If Exist
* * *
Dear SISSIE,
No. No, I do not. You need an editor.
Rick
If you would like to read a couple more "Dear Rick"s, you should mosey on over here. That's my brother's LJ, he's the one who introduced me to Rick in the first place. He doesn't post on the LJ anymore, but if you want to read more "Dear Rick"s, you should find some way to let him know, and he can look for some more for us. His most preferred methods of communication are heliograph and crying in the nighttime.
