Katie's Wedding....and Change.

I am Katie’s parrain, which, in Cajun French, means “godfather.” Her Dad and I attended the police academy together a lifetime ago, when the world was new. There we commenced a friendship that has never flagged or faltered, even after 32 years. I was there when Katie was born and I stood at her christening. During the ensuing years, I watched her grow from a rambunctious toddler into a beautiful, singular, soulful woman.

Tonight, in the small, quaint Louisiana town of Washington (astride LA 71 between Opelousas and LeBeau), I went to Katie’s wedding. As I watched her dance with her husband, Gabe, I marveled at the changes occurring over the years in this small slice of my life, changes which seemingly passed in a twinkling. Seeing me in the crowd after her dance, Katie angled over to me, beaming that marvelous smile and gave me her special hug.

“I’m so glad you came,” she whispered.

“Wouldn’t have missed it, kiddo.” I answered, feeling barely contained emotion vibrating just beneath my skin.

In the quiet of the late evening, I am home alone now. The temperature has dropped into the upper 40’s, a perfect excuse for starting the first fire since last winter.

There’s nothing like an evening wedding and a late night fire to get one thinking about life and change.

The one immutable rule of life, never subject to change, appears to be this: Things change. Robert Frost articulated the corollary to this rule: “In three words, I can sum up everything I’ve learned about life. It goes on.”

Tonight was about change. So was yesterday. I’m betting tomorrow will not be much different in that department either. Most of us do not care much for change, inexplicably preferring to dance with the devil we know. When change comes nonetheless, as it inevitably will, it is often jarring and unexpected. Other times, it happens so slowly that---when you finally notice that something is different—you are captured for a time within a bubble of reminiscent wonderment.

The fire chuffs within my big brick hearth. I stare into the sparkling heat with my laptop on my knees and chew on these random thoughts. There was a time when a tumbler of good Irish Whiskey would have been in my hand, but my life changed in that regard on April 19, 1993. That was a life-change that seemed so radical when it occurred. I recall wondering if my world could survive a life without alcohol. (The low odds of my surviving WITH alcohol in my life did not seem to even enter my mind at the time. Funny.....)

Of course, I did survive it, although viewing that transformative miracle in "survival" terms seems silly now almost 17 years down the road. I did not merely "survive" the change. Instead, the change saved me and ---at 37 years of age---I was lifted into a more evolved place where honest personal exploration could finally commence. And then the hits just kept on coming, as they used to say on AM Radio. The subsequent changes marching into my life ---even the ones seeming tragic or frightening at the time---look quite different now as I gaze at them in the rear-view mirror.

Significant changes are present again in my life –-- unexpected changes involving friends for whom I feel abiding warmth, affection and respect. It also involves an institution which has touched my heart so deeply that the experience is totally unparalleled and I will search ever in vain for words to explain what it means to me.

It was not change I sought. The truth is I did not even idly wish for it. (Those who speculate otherwise have no idea what they're talking about.) Instead, the change came briskly on the wind, like the down of a thistle. But, here it is and I find myself uncharacteristically serene about what has come on the wind. I have no fear or anxiety. I feel no weight of pessimism. Tonight, reflecting on the changes in my own life, the strident pessimism of others seems counter-productive and dramatically contrived. Plus, having more facts at my fingertips now, I know that their sturm und drang is either misplaced or parochial. Thus, "issues" identified by misplaced critics are entitled to no priority of thought or action. They are entitled only to an honest audience.

I will do my very best with this most recently arrived change...something I'm better at as I've gotten older. I marvel that Darwin was more on-the-mark than even he could ever know when he wrote: “It is not the strongest of the species that survive, nor the most intelligent, but the one most responsive to change.”

Sinatra is on the CD player, singing Dream……the young Sinatra, the wildly popular bow-tied crooner who recorded for Columbia Records, before the Decca years and before HIS life changed. No one can sing a Johnny Mercer chart like Frank:

Get in touch with that sundown fellow
As he tiptoes across the sand.
He's got a million kinds of stardust
Pick your fav'rite brand, and

Dream, when you're feeling blue.
Dream, that's the thing to do.
Just watch the smoke rings rise in the air.
You'll find your share of memories there.

So, dream when the day is through.
Dream, and they might come true;
Things never are as bad as they seem
So dream, dream, dream…

Katie, I’m thinking about your wedding tonight. I’m also thinking about the arc of my life – that portion behind me and the part yet ahead. I say, as change has come in the past, let it come again. Let us change and evolve. The changes before have made me a better person and delivered a life more wondrous than any I could have ordered up on the front end. I am confident the changes yet to come will be no different.

Let us all change in positive, loving ways. Let us do it honestly and with true hearts. Let us make amends where they're needed and be quicker to forgive than to joust.

And, let us dream.

J.R.