In search of quality.

My living room matches my mood perfectly this morning. A sleeping donut of a dog curled on her pillow by the fireplace, occasionally raising her head to see if I'm still sitting here, still typing. A steady rain is falling this Friday morning. I am feeling especially reflective, recalling a long conversation with my (former) office husband,  "J."

Kindred spirits are we, but with painfully different habits. He teases me about being a loner, preferring my own company many times over the allure of big groups or as another friend would say, "meat space." He, on the other hand, is a loner uncomfortable with a space uninhabited by great and superfluous distraction. What a dubious contradiction. We watch, we take copious mental notes and try to download everything into some sensible format that will better aid us in our study of people. Always searching. Always curious. Always inquiring. He laughs at the human condition. He tells me I take it too seriously; take it inside myself too deeply. He is probably right.

Still, when he's had his fill of it and the residue starts to leave an undesirable sheen on his skin, he seeks me out and admits that he's lingered in the wading pool a bit too long.  I hover closer to him than most, because he reminds me of my other half. He feels so familiar to me.  His tenderness is a distant reminder of the love I lock away in places I don't make public. J says things, processes things in the same manner that love does.

He is tired, he says. People are a disappointment to him, he says. He can't seem to find quality people. I smile a melancholy smile, and ask him where he's looking. He says there are none. How many days have I felt that? I tell him that's it not that there aren't quality people in the world. It's never that simple. There are three sorts, I think. There are quality people, trying to move through this world authentically and be honest and open about who they truly are. And then there are quality people hiding behind painted masks, afraid to come out into light. Afraid they will be rejected. And then...there are the lost souls. The ones who lost any semblance of quality a long way back with no desire to regain it.

"J" works in a bustling club in the land of deviance and hedonistic pleasure. No, literally. He's in Las Vegas. I wasn't being dramatic. He is the doorman to an exclusive spot, making absurd amounts of money as he picks and chooses who walks through the doors for a night of whatever. He keeps an eye on the crowds, taking his copious Libran notes. I tell him he will be hard pressed to find the quality he says he is seeking, there. He says he knows that. Doesn't expect to find it there...but isn't it anywhere else? Isn't there any quality anywhere?

Everywhere but the places we look, I reply.

We talk for well over an hour, the pace of our conversation rising and falling like silk dancing in an ocean breeze. I enjoy him in ways I once enjoyed another. His innocence and his wisdom. I sit with my own melancholy after we've ended our call. J calls me "kiddo" just as he used to. I feel J searching, just as I feel his. And I know there is nothing I can do to fix it.

All I can do, is smile and appreciate the lessons. Love with a clear mind and open heart. The rest, really isn't up to me. It never was.