On yet another death.

 On another death.

The paper said, “family and close friends,” so I didn’t go. We were friends, but how close? Besides, I didn’t want to go.
     Still, I wasn’t surprised when Axel called to ask where I was. He meant why I wasn’t. I said I didn’t know. And he didn’t press, I am guessing because he knows I don’t explain “why” very well. Maybe he regretted asking as soon as he had. Or maybe he wasn’t asking at all; he was just calling.
     This is the Axel I have been knowing, as folks say where I used to live, since Alva McAllen died seven years ago. I met him at her wake, but he didn’t do her funeral. Now Anders had died, Anders Avril, the only French Lutheran in the Valley, according to Axel. And he did do his funeral. And where was I?
     But he didn’t push it.

Which was kind of him though I was ready. I was pretty sure he would call. And I was pretty sure he’d ask where I was (meaning, why wasn’t I there?). And I had rehearsed my replies. There was a shorter one: Anders was more Axel’s friend than mine, and I figured if I qualified as “close” someone would tell me. Otherwise, I wouldn’t feel I could “just show up.”
     And there was a longer one.

“It's not going in that's the problem; it's not coming out.”*

Which involved how Aristippos was faulted for not showing up for Socrates’ death: True, Aristippos wasn’t in Athens at the time, but he was in Aegina, not that far away — not that far away at all. But why should he have attended, he asked. He was enjoying Aegina. Why leave a feast for a funeral? He means: Why be sad, or pretend to be, if you can be happy instead. Or, he may mean: Why go to Athens to be sad if you can be sad in Aegina without having to go to the bus depot and inquire about the schedule then catch the bus and likely get there too late anyway?
     I know why one leaves a feast for a funeral, but I am not sure that I agree with the reasons — social convention. But, please note: I said “feast,” not “football game.” And I said that in part for my friend Gaspar Stephens, who has given up football games because at bottom football is a stupid sport. Sport is stupid. Didn’t Aristippos say, too, when someone boasted about being a good diver, “Aren’t you ashamed to brag about what a dolphin can do better?”
     Or if not entirely stupid, surely there are better things to be doing.

09.20.21

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 * Aristippos on brothels (among other things). Aristippos of Cyrene, and his faithful Synopean companion Diogenes, appear in several posts.
     The graphic is from Wise Wisecracks, in preparation for online publication by Rantrage Press. Watch this spot!