April Littrell
To Tim
Hey pal, how’s it going out there? Too soon, my friend.
I imagine you uncoupled from your earthly body, a hovering aura free to explore the universe at whichever speed you choose, no-clipping through any and every element, a light among lights traveling lightyears at a time and always finding your way back home.
I imagine you showing up to our work call, hearing us talk about you. First shifting awkwardly, finding words. Then muttering niceties, rolling small tears almost imperceptible on the screen. Then remembering your smile and your bluntness and your sheer glimmering charm and laughing in the spirit of the way you made us all laugh at the absurdities of life. And then you’d realize you were on a work call and realize you were free, forever, from all responsibility and could just exist and you’d fuck off to sit on the surface of the sun and then explore other planets and do somersaults in the clouds back on earth and jettison your spirit to the depths of the sea and out the other side of the planet, first stopping at the core to feel what it’s like to be at the axis of everything you knew and then getting a little dizzy and floating blissfully back to the bay to wrap your light around your children and spook your cat from rest and radiate around your wife with an indescribably palpable warmth that exists in the memory of you but also in the realm where you now exist, somewhere beyond memory, in eternity.
You’re only a week or so into your new form and I know you’re absolutely killin’ it. Having a ball of a time, like you always knew how to here, even with gravity in full effect. Even in the doldrums of endless designs, you relished in the opportunity to design your own days with impunity. Which is the ultimate lesson you left with me—every day matters. Good or bad, and most often both. You knew how to step off the stage of life and poke fun at the play fumbling along with its ever-evolving script, no one privy to the ensuing lines.
Some people in life pass you by, and others, no matter how small a part they played, stick around. The true characters. The faces and voices and names and bodies and personalities of folks that crop up when you think of one or another thing and all of a sudden, there they are in your head. You’ve managed to wedge yourself somewhere in my mind, Tim, and though our interactions were brief, they were all the more impactful. I had a sense though didn’t fully realize at the time… we shared coconuts. You were always the guy I could split a coconut with in our little video chat mirages that would materialize in the lonely desert of our remote worlds. Sure, there were others, but they were trying to trudge ahead in the sand. And I could always stop and sit on a fallen palm with you and feel the cool that might’ve not actually been there but was there in our minds and it needn’t be said and we were both okay with that. And I have a sense you made that mirage a reality for others, too, which is a magical power to have here on earth. You were a magical being, and I’d feel stupid saying that to you when you were here, or maybe I could in jest while really meaning it, but it’s too late now. I don’t need to tell you. You know it. You’re out there flying across time and space.
You have unlimited time now, so I hope you’ll take a few minutes to read this. I didn’t get to say goodbye and wanted some closure, so thought I’d speculate a bit on what it’s like to have your newfound spectral abilities. Miss you, Tim. More than I could have imagined, which is almost insulting to say but it’s true. We didn’t know each other that well. But I knew you enough to know for absolute certain that you have a kind, kind heart. Your light is ever present. Take care, buddy. Enjoy everything to come. See you when I see you.