"Letters from Ian"
An Internet correspondent, Ardis, with my agreement started a serialised
story of our correspondence on her site, It began like this:
I have never understood why it is that we periodically encounter
certain individuals with whom we instantly know we have shared some bit of history in the
past. I have; however, learned to relish those reunions and to cling to them for as long
as I am allowed. I think of them in terms of "spiritual loans"...brief reunions
with a loved one I once knew, either as a friend, a sibling, or perhaps, even a lover. It
matters not which it was, but that it was, and that I am comforted in knowing that no
matter how limited our union may be at this time, that some day, once again, we may turn
round a corner, or back unknowingly into a stranger, and there that familiar face will be
smiling out at me from yet another disguise.
And so it was with Ian. We are still learning where, and when, and how it was that we knew
each other, but instinctively, we knew through the ease of the conversation, through the
understanding of what the other felt, through the appreciation of being able to share a
personal thought that we were positive no other could comprehend without thinking us
having gone mad.
It is like that with friends, other souls who have been a genuine part of us. They never
really leave us, in spirit. We carry always that trace of them, that whisper of their
memory, hidden deep within us, waiting until we are permitted to enjoy it again for
another momentous occasion.
It was boredom, or so I thought, that led me to Ian again. A late Friday night that sent
me to the Internet in search of some enjoyment of beauty in a gallery of photographs, or
poetry, or some heady subject that I had always intended find the time to pursue.
At his website, his interests, the flow of his words, the content of the images that he
sought to project to the world were uncannily similar to my own. I was looking for a job,
some new spark of excitement that might permit me to utilize more of the creative talents
I felt I needed desperately to develop. "What a team we would be," I remember
thinking. "What couldn't I offer to a company such as this whose own thought
processes so clearly reflected my own."
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