“For better or for worse.” Well, no one has problems with the “for better” part. They just throw that in at the ceremony because they want to seem at least partly optimistic about what may be in store for the happy couple. Everybody who’s watching knows damn well it’s the “for worse” part that will cause the divorce, if it comes, swiftly or slowly, as the case may be.

The boundaries of relationship are defined by the sharing of pain. Marriages implode when a business goes bankrupt, when a partner gets sick, if a child dies. Suddenly the intimacy of the shared pain becomes too much for one or both to bear and the union must be dissolved. Remember Newty-Newt Gingrich dumped his wife and took a mistress when she got cancer? (I love to pick on the Republicans of course, but many a Democrat has deserted a spouse when the going got tough, remember J&E Edwards?)

Scott had a close friend who deserted him when he got sick. Suddenly Bobby just wasn’t around any more. The sicker Scott got, the more invisible Bobby got.

Scott was hurt by it, deeply, no question, though he rarely mentioned Bobby. He understood that Bobby lacked the willingness, or, perhaps, simply, the capacity, to share in his pain. The rest of Scott’s friends, all of whom were fiercely loyal and would have done anything for him, were witheringly critical of Bobby and spoke of him in tones ranging from disapproval to shame to condemnation. But not in front of Scott. Not about his friend.

It was tough for me to understand, because the sicker Scott got, the more loving he got, the more he opened his heart, and consequently, the more privileged I felt to be his caretaker. The tougher his day, the more treasures it seemed to hold for us, the more we appreciated our roles in each other’s lives. I felt so proud and happy to be The One making soup for him. (And I make fucking good Italian-boy soup.) I was the one who shared his greatest fears, his worst nightmares, and his most wretched fevers. I was the one who got to hold him if he broke down. And on the rare occasions when I broke down (the crying thing wasn’t usually my style, especially in front of him—typical man) he would hold me and stroke my head and say, “Let it out honey, go ahead and let it out.” And because of all the shared pain, I also got to be the one who shared his greatest joys: his sweetest kisses, his most grateful smiles (which lit up a room like fucking fireworks), and his most riotous laughter. For worse, or for better!

A few days before his death, Scott asked me to go over his will with him, as there were a few precious items he wanted to make certain there would be no hesitancy on my part to distribute according to his wishes. Chief among them, a beautiful 36” x 48” landscape that had been part of his grandmother’s art collection. It was a truly lovely depiction of a delicate waterfall splashing over a field of greens: forests, emeralds, chartreuses. It hung directly across from his bed. He fell asleep every night with that vibrant terra firma in his eyeline. It was to go to Bobby.

I wanted it to go to Irwin, and had lobbied Scott for that. Irwin had been loving, loyal, and present. No, Scott said, there was another painting for Irwin, (which I knew), a tiny little painting of a fishing boat in a New England harbour. The landscape was for Bobby.

Yes, I said. Yes. For Bobby. And Bobby received it.

I too have a close friend who has deserted me, whose limits for the sharing of my pain have fallen short of my expectations, and my friends and loyalists, like Scott's were, are appalled. But I am not the man Scott was. I am not as patient, not as forgiving, not as willing to accept the loss of a trust I wrongly believed would continue.

But I will get there. And I will get there because I am still, and especially, grateful, fourteen years after his death, to have Scott’s example to follow. That beautiful guy.

And far, far beyond the reconciling of this small disappointment in the greater scheme of things, I am grateful (stunned really is more accurate) by the unconditional affection and the loving support for my autonomy, and for my sanity, from the other fifty? sixty? friends and students and family, who seem to have either no limits, or an astonishing willingness to keep pushing their limits farther and farther away, stretching their boundaries to share my struggle, and to show me their love, regardless of how it may hurt.

You affirm everything I have believed is good and true about the nature of acceptance and the limitless possibilities of unconditional love. And that feels fucking good. Really and truly gooooooooood.