I’m saying goodbye to an old friend.

            My friend probably doesn’t realize it and if he does, no big whoops. He’s not a reader of these missives, joshes me about their production. “The world according to Carll,” he grins, “– so what’s new?”

            I don’t dislike my old friend or blame him. Interest in my thoughts is not a precondition of intimacy. Some of my favorite souls don’t value speculation. Henry I love, for example, though he talks only dog.

            I’m not mad at my friend or even miffed. He’s done nothing wrong. I just don’t have time. As my available hours dwindle, the pressure on me to “make something” of them ratchets upward. Also, thanks to these missives, my roster of new friends grows quicker than Jack’s beanstalk. It’s not easy to make fast friends fast, but every day, it seems, it’s happening.

            Time with my old friend used to pass pleasantly. We were drinking buddies. He was ever ready with a quip or news scrap. In crises, he volunteered. He’d give me, he promised, “the shirt off his back.” Maybe he would have – I never asked (and our tastes in shirts differ).

            The cost of maintaining this friendship is negligible, so why a break? Why not let this relation drift from view, like so many others? With how many fine souls have I “lost touch” over the years? One of the manifold glories of these daily greetings is the retention of connections I’d have otherwise lost. Now we need never say goodbye.

            I X my old friend from my charmed circle for clarification. The eight billion persons on the planet I separate into categories: the few I care about and the multitude I don’t. Among that multitude are many whose friendship I’d prize, but they don’t have time or maybe we’ve never met. No matter – there are only, as the phrase goes, so many hours in the day. My living intimates I hover over, like a sheepdog his flock. They command – another resonant phrase – my attention. One is either in or out of this group. I need not disclose or certify admission to my private club, I trust you know. If you’re out, you’re out, exiled to my vale of indifference; your story’s no longer my concern.

            Call this process emotional economy. We all do it, consciously or not. Some fool themselves about the extent of their admirers, mistaking Facebook likes for true liking. They bank false coin and boast of their wealth, much as Trump inflated his financial worth. One pities them (unless they’ve snookered you).

            Others have no idea they’re loved. They rate true gold holiday gelt, poignantly discounting their appeal.

            I feel guilty booting my old pal. We had fun together once. But these days I crave soulmates, not drinking buddies. An OK encounter isn’t good enough. I pant for the heat of passionate affiliation, not body to body, but soul to soul. Oh to love and be loved! And if that’s not happening, I cut my losses.

            I do the same with dead makers – with comparable remorse. I don’t linger with the so-so. Either book – or painting – or music grabs me or to hell with it. In my hurry to triage, I make mistakes, do insufficient justice, but better that than the alternative. Should I reread Shakespeare or wrap my head around Aphra Ben? Sorry, Aphra.

            Human life is a series of hellos and goodbyes, each transition a drama, where two become one or one two. Reading these words you enter my halo of hello. Welcome. May I take your coat? Good morning.