It has taken me some time to clear my head and heart to the point I feel brave enough to admit I am selfish. On my desk is a seven-page letter I meant to send to Lorri but forgot about several times, and now she is passed, and I have no one to which to mail it.
Lorri and I had known each other since kindergarten at Margaret Keating Grade School. Not only that, we graduated from Del Norte High School together.
Her father and mine served in the Air Force during the Korean and Vietnam wars. While my dad stayed in the service until 1972, Mr. Stobert received his discharge in 1965, if my memory serves me, and settled down in Klamath, below the radar base where he had worked. He was the head chef at the Requa Inn, where my brother worked for him, save for the month I took over for my brother after he broke his arm and could not wash dishes.
Lorri was always a shy child and grew into a shy woman, at least the last time we saw one another face-to-face. Though I learned that she hated to tease me, her fear of ridicule outweighed her hate, so when goaded into it, Lorri went along to get along.
In the letter on my desk, I wrote about how I remembered an early evening at the Trees of Mystery when I was sitting on the wood railing outside the shop talking to a tourist girl, and I caught Lorri looking at us. I recalled how our eyes locked and how we smiled at one another like we each held a piece of a secret.
A couple of years after high school graduation, we bumped into one another in front of the Del Norte Triplicate office at the corner of H St. and Third in Crescent City. We stood there for over two hours talking, and we promised each other that we’d get a cola or a coffee one morning before I headed off to the Marine Corps.
Sadly, that never happened.
We lost touch for years afterward, and I only learned she was in SoCal the evening I was attacked by someone who tried to choke me out with a rope, and I drove to the Trees Motel and asked to use the phone to call the sheriff’s office, which Mrs. Stobert obliged me.
When FB came on the scene, I was quick to ‘friend’ Lorri, and where we chatted over the years. She always asked me to visit, and I always said I would, though I never managed to get around to it.
And now, I can’t, even though I declared in the letter that we would celebrate her birthday this June. The thought leaves me heartbroken.
So what to do about this unsendable letter?
It finally came to me. I will burn the letter allowing the smoke to carry my words and thoughts into the heavens, and perhaps Lorri will receive them.
The Old Blog in the Desert 