Rocks and things
By LEON YOUNGBLOOD
My friend Jules visited after a 10-year hiatus. The fellow is worth a few lines.
I’ve known Jules for over 40 years, now, and we do have things in common, I guess. In many respects we seem to be too much alike. We could be twins, in fact. We share the same birth date down to the hour. We resemble each other physically, we have similar interests, we are not geniuses with money, we are friends—but some have suggested we are the “alter egos” of each other.
It’s a minor thing, a little, insignificant thing, but friends have pointed out that when Jules and I were in our early-20s, I was making a career of college while Jules and a cohort were in a South American banana republic plotting the overthrow of the reigning government. It did not work. Although that particular country’s militia was small, its police force wasn’t. Unencumbered by conscience, the police could handle usurpers, especially usurpers who did not speak Spanish very well. Jules and his fellow revolutionary soon came back home with their tails tucked between their legs. Jules resumed his business studies; his friend changed majors and studied law.
As I’ve said, it’s a minor, insignificant little detail, but does this South America venture (and other extreme differences) makes us alter egos of each other? It’s simple, really: Jules was born to be wild, I was born to be mild. Opposites attract. There is no cure for any of this, but over the years, Jules and I became stabilizing influences upon each other. In my case, Jules would stir up adventurous notions that had been repressed, and I would do things not illegal, but certainly out of character. And when Jules was with me, he seemed less inclined to blow up things. When we were together, we seemed to realize our excesses, recesses, regresses, abscesses, and any other cesses that prevented us from actualizing ourselves, as per psychologist Carl Jung.
I know this is wordy, but bear with me. All this happened back in our college days. Jules and I thought we thought deep thoughts, but we were young, and we were fools fresh from the farm. We did not realize, you have to be at lest 64-years-old to know everything, but we claimed this distinction when we were only in our early 20s. It’s funny, but our “know it all” attitudes were why Jules got mixed up with South American politics and why I stayed home.
Our reunion began at one of the nearby parks where Jules was staying, camping in his RV. We visited a while over coffee; then, it was time to show off Briar Circle. Driving through the woods, I proudly offered little details at certain sites, e.g., “This is where I saw my first bear, a 780-pound cinnamon brown,” and “This is where I saw the mountain lion, 19-feet long from his nose to the tip of his tail,” and “This is where I killed the timber rattler.”
“How big was he?” Jules asked.
“Only 7-feet or so. He was a little one.”
We got to the shack, Jules saw Doris’ Pond, we hiked a couple hours—the usual entertainments when company visits. Eventually we went back to the RV, and as we were stepping inside, Jules said casually, “I’ve got some stuff for you.”
Jules started coffee as I settled at the table. My host produced a shoe box, and as he opened it, he said, “It’s mostly rocks. You will remember them, though.”
I did indeed. The first thing retrieved was a stone axe. I was with Jules when he picked it up in a plowed field in northwest Florida. There were a few familiar arrowheads, too. The large quartz crystals came from our trip to an Arkansas mine. The trilobite fossil from Texas was broken—I found that one. A smooth stone was my gift to Jules from my 1973 trip to the “Holy Land.” Stones were free and all I could afford for souvenirs for friends. There were a few photographs, a few sketched postcards, three bullets from a Civil War battlefield. We had good times finding all this. We reminisced, and Jules finally said, “They’re yours if you want ‘em,”
My expression warranted an explanation. Jules merely said, “I have cancer.”
Isn’t that’s the way it is? I still don’t know everything. At least I did not know what to say to Jules.
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