Patrick

"All energy flows according to the whims of the Great Magnet."
-- Hunter S. Thompson, Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas
"Stuff your eyes with wonder . . . live as if you'd drop dead in ten seconds. See the world. It's more fantastic than any dream made or paid for in factories."
-- Ray Bradbury
"Like the wind crying endlessly through the universe, Time carries away the names and the deeds of conquerors and commoners alike. And all that we are, all that remains, is in the memories of those who cared we came this way for a brief moment."
-- Harlan Ellison, Paladin of the Lost Hour
“The only people for me are the mad ones, the ones who are mad to live, mad to talk, mad to be saved, desirous of everything at the same time, the ones who never yawn or say a commonplace thing, but burn, burn, burn, like fabulous yellow roman candles exploding like spiders across the stars and in the middle you see the blue centerlight pop and everybody goes "Awww!”
-- Jack Kerouac, On the Road
In Memory of Robert J. Mallin (1984-2007)
A roman candle.
Mourned. Missed. Celebrated. Loved.
The sole scion of his heritage, last and only son to bear his family's name, Patrick Gerard was raised by folk of modest Midwestern stock, the kin of Kansas farmers, in small down America amidst the verdant scape of the pastoral countryside.
His youth was littered with dime stores and soda pop and block parties and yard sales and church socials and thrift stores and comic books. He drank lemonade in the scorching summers. His trusty dog and his cats were his most constant of companions. He loved the smell of musty old books that he read with a flashlight under the quilted covers in his bed. He loved the crunch of leaves and the crackle of frozen puddles as he stepped on them. Most of all, he loved running defiantly into the wind on warm days until he felt a chill and a tickle in his stomach -- and sometimes past the green blur of grass and trees, he thought he could see the stars and felt as though the wind was strong enough to lift him from the ground.
Some nights, he collected fireflies in grassy fields beneath the harvest moon and secretly hoped that he came from the stars.
Mostly, though, he collected butterflies deep within his bosom. A creature of anticipation, he frequently walked on the tips of his toes. He was restless wherever he was -- and his family moved often. Some nights, only the gentle hum of his parents' car rattling against him as he reclined in the back seat of his parents' car could lull him to sleep. His mind raced with questions like, "What are shadows made out of?"
As he aged, his blond locks formed a dark mane. His eyes grew wild and tired. His mind raced with questions. He became lost in daydreams frequently. By the age of twelve, he wore a uniform of sweatpants, tee shirts and Velcro sneakers. He could lecture his peers on Einstein's theories of Relativity and he was beginning to shave but he could not swim or ride a bicycle and he was a dozen years away from a first kiss. He was tall and gaunt and bespeckled and, mostly, weird and aloof.
As the years continued, he filled into his frame and fell into friends. He fell in love a time or two as well or, at least, he thought so. He certainly felt full of love for the world in spite of its differences with him and the sight of some girls made him light headed and hyperventilate. He learned to dance and learned that he loved an audience. He learned to make music and play drums and shook a tambourine with glee at high school sporting events. He was an editor on his high school newspaper, an artist -- both digitally and with pen and ink -- and an actor. He was even rapidly becoming an underacheiver as his straight A's started to slip and he longed to get out of school and out of town. After all, he topped the charts in all the IQ tests and indexes and examinations; why wasn't he ready to take on the world?
However, time and again, he would learn through trial and error that he was not ready. However, along the way, from job to job, in and out of college, at parties and on strange adventures with even stranger people, he did gather more friends and experiences and a greater appreciation for the ways in which the world moved. Through it all, he maintained close contact with one friend, Jeffry. It was Jeffry who met him at 3am at Waffle House to discuss the nature of the universe or explain the idiosyncrasies of girls and dating over a cup of coffee.
However, there were many other cups of coffee and many other friends. Patrick knew that he could always turn to his friend Andrew for a cup of coffee or an adventure -- and many other friends as well. Slowly, through the coffee and conversation and failed starts, Patrick came to recognize the vital anticipation that ran as an undercurrent through his zigzagging life.
Moment by moment, it had crystallized on the streets of Ireland to the distant hum of drunken carolers, on a long and lonely hike down an interstate without a jacket, amidst the gentle laughter and hot tears at funerals, with a first kiss in a damp, grassy field covered in dim bonfires, beneath the lights of a stage and a stadium, at a surreal rave in the heart of an urban hub, in a restaurant full of joyous rage and racing pulses, amidst the trolleys and sea breeze of San Diego, in hotel lobbies and convention centers and art exhibits and classrooms and on the grass beside a lake, watching spotlights chase eachother.
And each time he stood on the cusp of awareness, he lost it and fell into confusion and anxiety and frigid, trembling isolation. But he was certain that with each loss, he stood the chance to come closer to that perfect day or that hearty laugh or that strange awareness that tauntingly hid from him on the next plateau.
And even now, at night, when he is half asleep, his hands rise up -- reaching, climbing, reaching, grasping... His smoky, sonambulatory gaze searches for that next clue, that next puzzle, that next step, that next glimmer in the greatest scavenger hunt of all.
And so, he finds himself chasing fireflies all over again, forever and ever and ever across the corridors of creation...