27 October 2012

dreams

getting old isn't fun.  no one warns you of what a challenge it is.  I try to make the most of it & remain as cheerful as possible as one friend after another exits.

but as I age I've come to appreciate the wonder of dreams.

last nite I dreamt I was back in Kent & spent a day at the library.  there I encounterd people from my past who mean so much to me -- such as Dean Keller & Wendy Ma. & in the context of the dream I went back even further.  apparently there was some sort of conference at the library that day.  from across a room I thot I saw Jan Denman.  by the time I got thru people he was gone. but then in the dream I began speaking abt him.

almost as soon as I got to Kent in the fall of 1961 I began working on the newspaper -- the Daily Kent Stater.  Jan was a year older & had been on staff longer but we immediately became friends.

as I recall that friendship I think I may have uncoverd the trigger for his appearance in my dreams.  there have been quite a few stories lately abt the 50th anniversary of the Cuban missile crisis.  & as I recall the one collaboration Jan & I had was a major story on campus reaction.  I remember that Jan -- who was capable of great excitement -- was beside himself with worry that the world was indeed on the brink of destruction. we went around interviewing faculty & students.

I think it was Jan who brought the original cast album of "The Fantasticks" to the paper's office in Merrill Hall.  we playd it over & over.  he & the late Bill Bierman & I often went to the movies together.  I recall our conversations abt "Phaedre" & "David and Lisa." & somewhere in the recesses of my mind there was a drunken nite of political chat at the Rat with Craig Stephens.

as far as I know the only photograph of us is this group shot of the DKS staff which appeard in the yearbook:



after graduation I had some letters from Jan & then as often happens we driftd apart.  then in 1993 I did a search.  he had been a high school English teacher in northern Ohio. I was able to find a phone number & calld him to reminisce.

in this last dream his appearance was brief.  but it was a connection to a friendship that had great meaning for me at one stage of my life.


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