337/365/Happy Free-for-All

In September I wrote a letter to one of my authors, Bob, who writes charming letters, another man who refuses to enter the computer age, but a few weeks later the letter came back to me, and I checked with a co-worker to make sure I had the address right, same as in the membership file, and they indeed matched, and Bob doesn’t have e-mail but I just couldn’t bring myself to dial his number because I was frankly afraid he had died too, and for awhile I checked the obituaries, but there was nothing, and I think the reason I didn’t call was because I couldn’t take the news of one more person gone, but today, when I went to work because another friend/author, Peter, was dropping a painting at the museum, Peter arrived, and Sara looked out and said, “I think Bob is with him,” and he was with Peter, so Bob is not dead (he said the mail’s been a problem since he’d had it forwarded to Maine all summer), and Bob’s not-deadness made me extraordinarily happy today, plus in the past he’s sent me articles about John Prine and Neil Young and other musicians, so I got to tell him that I was finally going to see the Rolling Stones, and he told me that the last time he went to see the Rolling Stones…well, of course, he’s seen them multiple times. Of course.