Legacy.

Recently, an Internet friend of mine passed away while on vacation in Hawaii. I had never met him, but had the pleasure of a number of online chats with him and his girlfriend, as well as the odd e-mail or two. To describe him as a "free spirit" would be akin to saying Rupaul is "ever so slightly effeminate". His Facebook status constantly made me think that perhaps I wasn't quite making as much of an effort as I should to see the world, experience its wonders, and marvel at creation in general and that I was- in fact- a lame-ass peon servant to a very Arthur Dent-ish existence (prior to the arrival of the Vogons, of course). It was only fitting then, that he should leave this world in one of the most fantastic looking places on Earth, doing something he loved.

Being the free spirit that he was, our topics of conversation ran the gamut of all we felt was important to discuss. Sex obviously came up. A virgin at the time, I was willing to receive some advice as I was soon intending to make a few changes in the hymen department, as it were, with the man who would later become my husband. He told me one of his favorite things was for his partner to do, and I took that advice, stored it somewhere in my mess of a memory bank and left it there untouched for a little while. When I finally remembered it, my man was rather pleased. So was I. I've been doing it ever since.

After my friend died, it was rather depressing to no longer see Facebook statuses such as "motorcycling here", "traveling there" and even more depressing to see the posts of those who knew him better, lamenting his brief 41 years on this planet and the regrets and the haunted memories and restless dreams... But then one night, I was making love to my husband. And I did that thing. And I smiled. In fact, I couldn't stop smiling.

He would have been proud to have left behind a legacy such as this.

If only we could put all these parts of a person that we each receive together to make that person whole again.