An encomium was, In Classical Greek and Roman culture, was a speech in praise of someone. My good friend Jeff Fitzgerald often listened to me talk about my love of rhetoric. We lost touch, and I always intended to reconnect with him. This month I learned he’d died. I had to write an encomium of him, because I process my thoughts and feelings in writing and through the organizational frameworks rhetorical thinkers devised.
In September of 1999, I had a seizure in alcohol withdrawal. My extended family had come for an intervention, alerted to my condition by my cousin and one of my best friends. I woke up face down on a pillow on our back patio. My aunt, Sughra, was stroking my hair: “Do you know what happened? You had a grand mal seizure.” I’d seen it coming, but I also thought: ” It won’t really happen,” despite worsening and worsening withdrawal episodes, Delirium Tremens, having to drink so much to keep the withdrawal at bay, I was passing out everywhere and throwing up constantly. I went to rehab at Father Martin’s Ashley in northern Maryland. It saved my life.
When I came back, my therapist said, “You have to get a job.” I did—at the Cosmetic Center, a Columbia discount cosmetics retailer close to my home.
Enter Jeff Fitzgerald
One day I went outside for an allotted 15-minute smoke break. There was a very handsome man—tall, dark hair and eyes, fair but olive skin, wide-set eyes, a scoopy noose, angular but somehow soft chin and jaw, and a star-of-the-football team smile. He was standing outside the store next door, “Annapolis Lighting.” His family owned it.
“Hi, I’m Jeff,” he said, smiling, and we shook hands. To a touch-sensitive person like me, those things are electrifying seals of deals.
I loved him already. Over the next few weeks, we’d schedule our smoke breaks to coincide. We got to know each other. He’d gone to Mt. Hebron High School; he had a wife in the military; and a cute, little paunch that I thought was so…well, cute!
I was in the process of gender transition, though even today I identify as half gay-man and half trans-woman. He was so sweet and tender, but I always felt like, “Don’t look at me, Jeff.” I hadn’t started hormones or laser hair removal. Once he called me for a ride home from somewhere, and I was unshaven. I said I’d pick him up, but there was one rule—he couldn’t look at me. He said, “Anything you need.” And I looked over at him a couple of times. He really wasn’t looking at me, but of course not out of contempt. But because he was a good friend, and that’s what I’d asked for. I wanted him to see me as the gay-man-trans-woman I wanted to be. Just when I met him I’d started the “real-life test”, wherein you live as your preferred gender for at least a year before therapists will refer you for hormone therapy and then surgery. He already saw me for who I was, which was incredibly meaningful. The years of bullying, self-hatred, debating how to end the unrelenting pain–he helped me begin to heal them. But when he called me for that ride, I hadn’t shaved and had to pick him up quickly.
What’s Your Number In Heaven?
I still keep in touch with several of his friends. But, Jeff, I want to keep in touch with you. I do believe there’s no such thing as death. Life is all our perception. There’s not only any such thing as death, but no such thing as reality. A theory in physics now posits that everything that has happened, is happening, and will ever happen is happening right now. Time is just a convenient way to organize our perceptions of reality.
So I know right now, I’m holding a Coke with no ice and lemon from Panera nearby, we’re smoking outside Cosmetic Center and Annapolis Lighting and laughing about some silly thing.
A week before writing this, I learned he’d died of an overdose. We lost touch, and it was so long ago, I can’t remember so much of our friendship. And now memories are all I have left. I always would put on my to-do lists: “Get in touch with Jeff!” But I didn’t have his information. We’d met when email was still new! There were no smartphones or apps. Hearing how he died, every time I think of him nodding off and going to sleep forever, it feels like a punch in the gut, and my eyes well up: an opportunity lost to reestablish a close friendship that changed me for the better.
I hate that I’m so mad at him. How could he do this when I always meant to reconnect with him? To his family, his wife? The thing is, I know he cared about them all so deeply, he’d never hurt them intentionally. But I know better than anyone—we addicts and substance abusers never mean to hurt people. It just happens. I wish I knew his wife and parents, and if he had any kids. Just so that I could tell them I knew him and his big, true heart. And he was amazing. But so many of my memories are gone.
Dancing In the Dark
I told Jeff that one of my true loves was going dancing, so he took me to the after-hours club 1722 in Baltimore for the first time. That place became the setting for a lot of bad things for me eventually. But not with Jeff. I always felt safe with him, like I could explore life if he were by my side being the protective, genuine friend he was. He introduced me to his friends. Boy, did people flock to him to greet him–such was his magnetism! Handshakes, hugs, pecks on the cheek. And smiles–you couldn’t be around him and not smile. He walked with purpose, but not swagger, through the labyrinthine inside of1722. I felt like I’d follow him anywhere.
Now I think one of the other reasons we instantly connected was that we hid our pain. I surmise he was one of those people whose heart broke early on because he saw all the tragedy in life. He saw the beauty too, but he was too smart to not see the tragedy. We never talked about that, I’m just guessing.
And he could see my constantly-broken and mending heart. On one of our smoke breaks he turned his to the side, put his arm around me, and said, “Come here…just come here!” He gave me a big side hug. Why? Just because, he said. Then I started to choke up, so I called him a “big Irish lug.” We both laughed. I don’t know what cologne he wore, but he wore the perfect amount. I smelled it that day. It was a short hug, but I just wished I could stay safe in his embrace longer. I took out a Newport and lit it up. He was kind of surprised that a fragile person, 5 feet six inches and 110 pounds soaking wet, like me smoked such an intense cigarette. He pulled out a Marlboro Light and suggested I try one.
“I would,” I said, “But, Jeff, once you go menthol, you never go back.”
Related: The Woman Who Can’t Forget
If he is still here or there or whatever physics is saying, then I’d like to get to know him again–and tell him about me, too! How I’m a writer. I love sitcoms and dream of writing for TV. I now do like my Coke cold (still no ice, though). He said the first time I ordered a Coke with no ice and lemon with him at a sit-down Panera lunch break we coincided, “Why do you want your Coke warm?” I rolled my eyes at him and said, “Jeff: it’s still cold. It’s just not all watered down with ice!” I can still see him smiling at that and giving me a sheepish, childlike, “Oh.”
Since I heard he was gone, when I pray—I’m a Shi’a Muslim and I pray multiple times per day—I say: “Jeff, I know you can hear me. You’ve got some explaining to do when I see you in heaven!” Of course, he really doesn’t, because I’ve struggled with addictions, so I know how it is. There’s just no way someone so sweet, kind, and full of so much love and loyalty would owe me any explanations, truth be told. Even though I still feel mad at him, I could never stay mad at such a darling person for long.
I do have other memories of him, but some are so quotidian and others readers might interpret as his having done something wrong—but not to anyone else. To himself. People are judgmental. Jeff so wasn’t. He would never judge another person and had never treated me or any other person (to my knowledge) with malice. It’s just not possible. He was so respectful, deferential even, I would say, “Jeff—get meaner.” We both thought that was pretty funny. That first time we met, he practically bowed when we shook hands, and not just because he was tall. I could tell by his expression he was just a kind soul who was truly happy to make a friend. I thought, “He sees me, this awkward, gay/trans, Pakistani kid. But none of that matters to him. And we’re becoming friends because he knew my heart was genuine and full of elation and devastation all at once, like his.” At least I hope he did. Yes, he did. He wouldn’t align himself with someone he didn’t believe that about.
If that physics theory about everything that ever happened or will happen is happening right now is true, then maybe I don’t have to miss him so much. Our friendship is still there. He’s still here. And in his charming Maryland accent, he’s saying something like I believe he once said, “That’s cool that your studying English and journalism.” He’d ask me questions about my studies. One time, I was like, “Well, since you ask…” and went on some long speech of my absolute love of rhetoric. He was looking at me like it truly fascinated him, not because he was simple and was thinking, “Oh, weird, I never thought of that.” But more like, “Yes, totally. Tell me more. I see it!” He was intelligent. Like most good-looking people, I’m sure some thought he was just a pretty face. But he was a fascinating mind and golden soul.
I do remember he held doors for me, just because he was so in tune with others’ needs. He’d laugh at my sarcastic comments and dumb jokes: “Ugh—this real winner of a customer threw her card at me when it got denied. Like her poor financial skills are my fault.” I remember him letting out a laugh then that surprised even him. I used to bristle at unsolicited advice, but when he said to me, “Don’t take it too seriously,” I appreciated it. I started following that advice too.
And On Your Left: Wall Sconces!
And: A Limerick About My Friend, Del. Eric Ebersole (D-12)!
He gave me a tour of the inside of Annapolis Lighting once. He told me all about lighting, lighting fixtures, and even the sales of their products. I’d always feel shy when he did such kind things, because I’d never thought I deserved them. Then I looked over at him smiling and thought, “Maybe I do deserve this kind of kindness.” That’s what a true friend does and did: made me believe in myself because he did. When I told him that even though his lesson in lighting interested me, I don’t know if I could learn it well enough to sell as he did. I saw him once through the windows of Annapolis Lighting and he was deep in conversation with a customer. I stood there so long that he looked up, smiled, and nodded even as he continued talking to the customer.
“You should quit Cosmetic Center and come work with us.” I said, “Jeff: I know nothing about lighting.” He said, like a kid who just came to fun, new understanding, that he’d teach me. I knew there was light inside him, so he could.” He never once said a cross word about a customer; the long hours, or thankless work of retail, or working with or for family. I could tell he liked it, in fact! I always wanted to say to him, “No, but if you could do what you really wanted to do, what would it be?” Then I’d stop myself, because it was so snotty and condescending. I let a comment like that slip once. He laughed, because laughter came easily to him. He didn’t answer, just looked at me with his big, dark, gentle eyes. He did a sort of shrug-type thing with his muscular shoulders.
I assume the dress code at Annapolis Lighting was business casual, because of his terribly endearing outfits: a button-down shirt; khakis or the like; and rounded toe, black Balmoral-style shoes. I could smell his clean skin and clothes even on our smoke breaks. I was so happy he didn’t put too much gel in his hair, a classic guy move that always irritated me. I was like, “He knows I don’t want him to wear too much gel.” I laughed and he asked what I was laughing about. I said it was nothing, but told him he had such nice, thick, dark hair.
“Jeff, you have a thing…on your…”, I said, when I noticed a piece of thread stuck to his chest. “No…more to the left…just let me…,” I pulled the piece of string off, brushed off the spot it had been stuck to, and we both smiled.
“There,” I said, “Good as new.” He really was.
Jeff was exceedingly polite and conscientious. He never tossed his cigarette butts on the ground. He’d put them out and throw them away in the trash can in between Cosmetic Center and Annapolis Lighting. At Panera, he took big, manly bites of his sandwich, but chewed slowly and with his mouth closed. I took big bites of my sandwich too, but I always talked with my mouth full. He’d smile and exhale briefly through his nose to let me know a reply was coming, but only after he’d finished chewing.
What he never did was anything sleazy or disrespectful, or anything that made me aware of my differences. I still told him all about my sexual and gender identity issues, being Pakistani, Shi’a Muslim. He’d look and nod as if to say, “I see you.” I’d think about how my father would say, “You shouldn’t make someone you’re talking to feel any different than you.” I even made one of my bad jokes once and said, “Jeff, I know you’re talking to my dad!” He chuckled, shortly and warmly. He looked far away then. But just for a moment. Then he was back, here and now.
I guess I do remember more than I thought of our interactions. One time there was a sheet of ice in the parking lot in front of our stores. I got in my car after my eight-hour shift that ended at 9:00 p.m. My windows were covered in ice, too. I noticed the parking lot was moving past my eyes, and fast. I’m slow with these things, so I thought, “Weird—I wonder why it looks like the shopping center is flying backward —oh my God”! My car was in reverse and sliding on the ice at warp speed toward the doors of Cosmetic Center and Annapolis Lighting. I slammed—and I mean slammed—on the brakes. Nothing and no one was hurt. I was terribly shaken up, though. I ran back to Cosmetic Center. I had to tell someone. The door was locked. I knew banging on it wouldn’t help.
Jeff was coming out of Annapolis Lighting. I grabbed his forearms, which were soft yet so muscular, revealed by a light green shirt with the sleeves rolled a third of the way up. “Oh, my god, Jeff! Thank god! I was just sitting there and my car started flying back in reverse!” I looked right into his eyes. Even though it was dark, I saw his adorably concerned and protective look. “It’s OK! You didn’t hurt anyone or yourself. He gave me a side hug and said, “I know.” And as one of my best friends, Amy, said to me recently, “I know is another ‘I love you.’” I knew just by how kind he was to me, someone he’d just met in the last few months, that he must have taken his time but then easily expressed his affection for those he cared about for much longer, like his parents and wife. He wasn’t like me, who started with the ‘I love yous” five minutes after meeting someone and being mad if they didn’t say it back. I knew Jeff cared, though.
Back on the parking-lot-turned-ice-skating-rink, he saw me to my car and opened the driver’s side door for me. I got in, again feeling like, “Why is he so kind to me always?” He leaned down and looked at me with one hand on the door.
“You’re OK? You promise?”
“Yes, I promise.” And despite that harrowing incident, I smiled. And I felt myself blush. “Jeff, remember what we talked about: get meaner!” He said it was one of my best lines and deserved to be repeated. Intelligent people are often funny and appreciate others’ humor. And so Jeff did with me. He shut the car door, but I opened it quickly and said, “Wait—what do I do now?” He motioned for me to get into the passenger seat. He drove the car, with effortless aplomb and handled it bizarrely well as he pulled up to a non-ice-covered spot. He didn’t say anything and just got out. I climbed back into the driver’s seat.
“Jeff,” I said, “I’m so grateful.”
It’s Icy Outside, So Get Inside
“Anytime.” He shut the door. I opened it and followed him, turned him around, and propelled him to my car. This wasn’t easy! He was from hearty Irish stock, broad-shouldered and firm. He always wore a button-down shirt, khakis or the like with a belt. You could see his physical strength through his clothes.
“What are you doing?” he asked, and I could tell he was smiling even though his back was to me. “I’m driving you wherever you need to go. I’m not letting you walk anywhere in this frigid cold and ice.” He thanked me.
Also: Derek Skye Villaverde, Mr. Gay Maryland 2022, and a Lesson on Family.
I want him to be here now, to find out all he’s capable of and explore—like he made me comfortable doing in his presence—all he wanted to know about. I was always was in awe that he seemed to like sales. Well—he was good at it! And it was his family’s business. I could see he was really proud of that and wanted them to be proud of him. When he gave me that tour of the inside of Annapolis Lighting, he told me a long but interesting tale on the intricacies of light, dark, the interplay of the two. I found it fascinating, but not just because I’m sort of nerdily in love with random knowledge, but because his genuine interest in it made it more compelling. He was so enraptured with it that he wanted to impart that wonder to me. We passed by a mirrored light and I saw my reflection, which looked bored and disinterested. “Jeff—thank you for teaching me about this! I look bored, but I’m not.”
“I know,” he said back. I was so relieved to hear that. I knew he could tell my sassy attitude a lot of the time was defensiveness. He was very sensitive, I thought. I hope no one’s ever hurt him with betrayal or dishonesty or cruelty (I’ve always watched a lot of soap operas!).
Why An Encomium
The ancients recommended the encomium include: descriptions of good looks (he had ’em); external circumstances, such as family, education, social affiliations (he knew so much and cared deeply about so many people); and achievements (he worked hard and he was generous with his love and caring), according to Classical Rhetoric for the Modern Student, Fourth Edition, by Edward P. J. Corbett and Robert Connors. Often, an encomium was delivered at a funeral, the most famous being Pericles’ Funeral Oration, which was a speech about those who died in the first year of the Peloponnesian War. “Thucydides reported it in his history of the war,” one of my rhetorical mentors, Professor Robert Gaines, told me. If I had been to Jeff’s funeral, let alone read these remarks at it, I would have broken down. So I wrote this article–about how much I cared about him and why. I wanted you, reader, to know, just as Thucydides lauded those who suffered fatalities in the first year of the Peloponnesian War: he was awesome. I hope I memorialized him in the way he deserved.
And, Jeff, I like myself now. Thank you for helping make a person I like because you were–are–my friend. I know something now that I didn’t then: that Jeff was the first person I was in love with. Really, truly. Because I was me for the first time…really and truly.
I’m grateful for your readership! Check back with me each week here at politicalpoetrypastiche as my linguistic, literary, and generally loquacious involvement in local politics takes on a mélange of prose and poetry genres. After all: All Politics Is HoCo-al™. Join me on Facebook here, find me on Twitter at @politicalpoetr3, and follow me on Instagram using the handle @politicalpoetrypastiche.