the complex

I had a friend. Mark that, HAVE a friend, who had been pulling away of late. So I asked her what was up and she told me they had been on a bit of downward spiral.

I've seen downward spirals. Downward spirals of self-immolative madness that end in total derailment of one's life, even jail or death. Having been married at one time to a woman in active addiction I know a lot of people who have been to dark corners. I spent a fortune on counselors, treatments and even the occasional lawyer for a DUI (yes, the irony is not lost on me). Many of my best friends in LA are recovering addicts, mostly as she had trouble hanging with people who didn't understand the process and the program.

One of my best friends from high school died a few years back of AIDS. He was an alcoholic and had been on a bit of self-destructive spiral when he became infected. He started letting his friends back into his life only as the end approached. I watched him die and tried to sort out whe and where I might've been a better friend to him, perhaps even keeping him from this end.

I have a reflex to jump in and save peopl when they start to fall. The Superman suit in the back of my closet gets used a bit too often, in most people's opinions. But what do you do when someone you care about is spiraling down? Walk away? (Pop psycjologists and dangerous amateurs will tell you yes, to avoid making them (and you) co-dependent, but this negates human nature and, yes, Christian doctrine ("Yes, Jesus, you know that if you sacrifice yourself for the sins of all mankind they will just keep being assholes, you're just letting them off the hook for their conduct," I am sure some well-meaning person who had learned some buzzwords for $24.95 at Borders Books said to him...))

So, back into the suit? Yeah, I know, she's a friend and beautiful and dark and we all know where that usually ends up (as James Taylor sang "Sweet dreams and flying machines in pieces on the ground"). My ex (the addict) once told me I didn't love her enough because I helped other people, she confused my charitable impulse with my passion for her, and I learned in that moment that she didn't want me, the man, the poet, but me, the champion, all for herself. Nice, but twisted.

The heroic impulse is a pain in the ass, it is an addiction. Like most addictions, it cascades and grows. Once you save one person, you have to save another, then small groups, finally armies and nations. It doesn't stop. Good comes out of, for sure, but it takes a mighty toll on the guy in the suit. I am at the point in my life where I have options, to wear the suit or not, to walk away and trust to my legacy to do some good, or to get involved (often a thankless role, anyway). But how do you walk away from someone in real pain, when something you might do or say (even by passively listening) might help them?

And she is beautiful.

Where'd I leave that effing cape?