Posts Tagged ‘jack’

Jack & Grace

Wednesday, February 2nd, 2011

Jack

“The leaves of our blessed lives fall to the ground and if we’re wise … we gather them in a pile and keep them safe lest the winds of forgetfulness blow them away.”
— Philip Gulley

Jack’s one of a kind, many times over. Ever since our days together at East 15 Acting School, I have known some of these Jacks. Each is a leaf in my blessed life which I now gather in a pile lest my winds of forgetfulness blow them away.

Jack the caring curmudgeon;

Jack the exasperated deflator of theatrical pomposity;

Jack the seeker of honesty;

Jack the Dad who loved and tried;

Jack the earnest conversationalist;

Jack the skilled stretcher of a dole cheque;

Jack the lifelong musician;

Jack the succinct sage;

Jack the ‘Technique’ Alpha to the ‘Method’ Omega;

Jack the mate to troubled teens;

Jack the punk;

Jack the best Bad Fairy ever;

Jack the burner of sofas;

Jack the closet cowboy and Western lover;

Jack the sharer of large bar tabs;

Jack the perpetual wearer of Doc Martens;

Jack the loving son in the RAF club;

Jack the encyclopedia of popular music;

Jack the groom whom I best-manned;

Jack the innocent who asked me how the internet worked;

Jack my friend who died and left a hole in many lives.

More by heart and guesswork than reason, I sense Jack carried more than most could manage or fully understand – melancholia echoing from a different time, frustrations with why the world didn’t work his way and some deep dislocation that he could never seem to express.

In a world that leaks and dribbles grace into the cracks of our indifference, Jack had a bruised and persistent grace that touched those who chose to look below the surface. Jack’s grace was in his reflection and kindness, his music and his passion, his mad-cappery and his jester’s japes and the brutal honesty of the friendship we shared.

I trust that as ‘The Old Rugged Cross’ plays for Jack next week, God takes Jack at his word and extends His unceasing grace to my gracious friend.