You never know what’s going to touch you, I guess. Sometimes it’s the standard things: a beautiful sunset or sunrise, a slow drive down a quiet street with falling blossoms, holding one of your kids’ hands. (And just because they are “standard” doesn’t mean they aren’t brand new and special and huge every time.)
But sometimes the greatest “touches” are the ones you don’t see coming.
An old friend from school emailed me a few months ago about a friend of his who was very sick, but was a long-time fan, and they all wanted to come see me at the D.C. Improv when I was there. (A great club, by the way, one of the really good ones. Rings like a bell. Constructing a good comedy club is really a mystery, in shape and height and material, but when they really work it’s like the inside of a fine violin that’s absorbed a lot of beautiful music. One more thought: I love large theaters, too, and I’ve worked a lot of event rooms in hotels, and they can be both great and awful, but, in the end, I think jazz and comedy are essentially intimate forms that work best in clubs.)
Another quick word about something. It’s a tiny bit awkward to toss away the phrase “long-time fan” or anything to do with “fan”. I’m not shy, but it’s a deep compliment that I think has less to do with the performer than we think. I’m the lucky one here. If I was given, through luck or design, some sort of ability, and I’m not so completely dumb about it, and I work on it, and it gets pretty good, and over time people see it and like it, then this is something I really believe has been done together in the largest sense. I’m grateful beyond description and very happy about it.
Anyway, this man is Doug Astion, and he’s been in my prayers ever since. We all went out after the show down the block for a lemonade (literally; that’s not code for a drink; no quotes around it; we really went for a lemonade), and he was such a fine, interesting, joyous man – with a wife and kids – that it stuns us all in the “healthy” world to think that this fine person in is immediate and grave danger.
We’ve emailed each other a few times since, and I felt myself instantly his brother, and I know it was mutual. He’s been a heroic fighter, and had a very rough few weeks, and the doctors don’t know how long he has. Days, weeks. His birthday is July 5th, and they hope… Oh, who knows what they hope. (Nothing against them, it must be a hard job at times like this.)
Perhaps, even those of us who don’t pray and don’t have the feeling for it, can just think of Doug and all those who are in dire need of a great burst of healing light and energy. Perhaps it’ll even work for some of them.
It does, you know. Sometimes it does. Very rarely, but you know what I mean. Every so often the doctors walk into someone’s room, and suddenly he’s sitting up doing a crossword puzzle and asking for a pizza.
Have a good day, and be grateful for it.
