joey loves fiona

I miss my best friend Joey.

As the time since his death grows close to a year, I feel it more and more.  Like the numbness and unreality of it are finally gradually wearing off.  I’m still grieving the loss of who I was at 21.  I wonder how long it will take to grieve my best friend.  Maybe grief doesn’t end, but lives on inside as a sturdy little house you build from the pieces left behind from the emotion-quake, where you can sit and safely feel without getting crushed.

I didn’t always think of him as my best friend.  But he was, and I’ll tell you why:  because he was the only friend I had who would take it upon himself to praise me, mock me, get angry at me, laugh with me, pray with me, learn from me, teach me…geez, the list could go on forever.  Joey was my best friend because he took it upon himself to lift me up or wound me without apology.  He spoke his mind and shared his feelings always.  Our friendship was life-giving because we weren’t afraid of killing each other with our words.  I never realized how much I relied on his blatant honesty to orient myself at times.  Am I being foolish?  Do I sound like an idiot?  Is this a good decision?  What do you think about that album?  He overflowed with opinions.  Though he definitely could make damaging decisions for his own life, his words — even when derisive — were always full of some sort of wisdom.  And love.  His parents raised him better than any other person I’ve ever known, and gave him a true richness of character which he shared without reservation to any and all.  I still find myself daily wanting to ask his opinion on things.  I have some great friends, but few to none with the years of shared experience and background and personality that allows them to say whatever the hell they feel like to my face.  I just now realized what it was I missed most about Joey, and that’s it.

About 10 years ago, when I had my webzine, I had a great new writer contact me and want to write for it.  His name was Worthington.  He only submitted one CD review as far as I can remember.  I begged him and begged him to write more, and he said he would, but he never did.  My writers lived all over the country; I didn’t know any of them personally.  Eventually I found out that Worthington was actually Joey.  He named his band House of Worthington; I think that’s when I figured it out.  It took me a few months.  We got a big laugh out of that.

Anyway, I was thinking of that review this week and looked it up.  It’s the review on the left, of Fiona Apple’s second album, entitled When the Pawn Hits the Conflicts He Thinks like a King What He Knows Throws the Blows When He Goes to the Fight and He’ll Win the Whole Thing Fore He Enters the Ring There’s No Body to Batter When Your Mind Is Your Might So When You Go Solo, You Hold Your Own Hand and Remember That Depth Is the Greatest of Heights and If You Know Where You Stand, Then You’ll Know Where to Land and If You Fall It Won’t Matter, Cuz You Know That You’re Right.

Yes, that is the full name of the album.  It’s usually known as When the Pawn Hits… I don’t think I ever listened to it, but I’m definitely going to grab a copy now and see if I can hear what he heard.