My Friend, the Marine.

Friend,

It's so weird to see what used to be my friend. What is now substituted with a man bearing a temperament that matches the uniform which he now wears: staunt and unnerving. Hands trembling from the rigorous regiment that he endured for months, nerves pinched and plucked from the vigorous vice-grips of boot-camp; where he emerged triumphant and meritorious.

The Marine. The Marine of Paris, Kentucky that used to play online with all of us, that used to skate with all of us, that used to joke with all of us, that used to be one of all of us. Now, he is just the one. No longer one of us, but one of the all that we are not. One of something higher, greater.

I've known many military personnel, hell, half of my family served, and I never so much as bat an eye to them. I see them daily, hear them weekly, and write to them monthly. But this...this is different. Vastly independent. Oceans apart from the shores that we know and give office to.

Handsomely-dressed. Senses refined. Body melded and mended after strenuous exercise day in and day out. Sharp as a blade from the whetstone: a fresh Marine. Truly dressed to kill. I see him now as I have never saw him. Foreign. As if he was restored to a state that he was never previously positioned in: which battles the very definition of "restoration." He was never dilapidated in the slightest, never old or worn, never ruined nor stained. So what is he now?

I see his face, I read his name on the tag strapped to his right, but I am not before my old friend.

This a new, refined man. No longer a boy. No longer the boy I hung out with years ago. He was once part of the all and is now aligned with the few. The few. As the mantra goes: the few, the proud, the Marines. Wow. Doesn't really hit home 'til it hits home.

Weird thing, pride is. I am not proud of him. Why? Because I didn't help him, I never aided him in any way--besides talking about it when it was just a fleeting thought--however I have this...this feeling of pride? I dare to feel proud of him for the accomplishments that he acquired on his own? I have the audacity to feel this plastic emotion? What gives me the right to feel like I supported him, when all I did was sit back and watch and entertain the occasional thought of "I hope he's okay." Never acting on that thought by picking up a pen and translating my thought to paper like I do daily. Sure, I've had struggles and have been busy, but that is my friend. And I never made time for him? Now, here I am, sitting not even a few inches away with the bitter taste of a reluctant hug lingering in my mouth and I still use the word "friend." I am not that.

Friend is a word that express mutual likeliness and calls for cooperation: friend in short is not a singular term. The passivity that I demonstrated took away the right for me to call him friend, and I am sure he feels someway that accompanies my psychosis. All of the words from him directed to me are detached and quotidian, part of a routine appearance that needs to be kept up to keep the masses happy.

I will say this: I am sorry, Private First Class Jordan Beamon for not being that friend I wanted to be, and being the friend I was and am. I apologize for not holding my end of the bargain of what is friendship. I apologize for the sense of worry and hope that will be sent with you when you are called to service. I love you, dude--with love being a lofty word having separate and equal connotations--that's how I feel. I use this genuinely. 

You look good in that suit, man. You deserve it, earning it and the pride that is sewn within every fibre. You will serve as an example for my sons or daughters that will (hopefully) come.

What will they call you? Uncle or my friend? Will it be senseless caterwauling? It solely depends on you. The word "my" shows possession, so naturally I would avoid using it but sadly its the only way to show that I know who you are...even though I don't. Not anymore.

Congratulations, my friend the Marine. Though my congratulations serves rather extraneous, I hope you take my state of mind into consideration. I hope you...you marinate on what I've said. Let it go deep into every orifice of your body and sink into you from the outside in. Embrace them. Enable them to soften you up and allow the hot friction released from my pen scraping my paper to cook you. To broil you. To burn you from the inside. I want you to feel more than the heat, because I felt much more. Much more than a stationary hot sensation in my chest, lips, hands, legs, throat, even my fingertips. This corrosive, trenchant feeling inside the hearth of my breast that caused me to do some...rather unseemly things. You can always feel regret when you are at the cusp of doing the act worth regretting. I'll live with this. That's all I can do. Sorry can't cut it, and sorry won't.

I said it just in case. You said it was alright. Did they teach that in the Marines? Forgiveness? Wish they taught absolution, friend. But even then absolution doesn't wash the slate clean; we just like to believe it does. I'd like to believe. Believing makes things easier. But I wouldn't want this to be easy. If there was absence of struggle, that would mean that I never cared at all. That the fire inside fizzled out, if it was there to begin with.

I promise that it's here. And wen I say I'm sorry. I hope you let it grill you like it's been grilling me.

Love you, man. Sorry--Marine. 

Sincerely,

The Remnants of a Friend