Jonathan keeps us all together

About a week ago, maybe less, I got a text from my father while I was at work. You got a package from someone. What? Who would have sent me something? My mind raced as I tried to think of someone that cared enough about my life to send me a package, and so I asked Dad where it came from. Utah, was the reply. Who the heck do I know in Utah? I'd been to Utah a few times in the past couple of years, all to see Jonathan play at Kilby Court.

The first time I ever saw Jonathan in concert, I chatted up a guy also angling to get to the front. This is because a) I am chatty and b) I am ninety times chattier with anything concerning Jonathan. He was the one that had taken his family. And they hated Jonathan. I thought this might be legitimate grounds for divorce. The next time I came down, I saw him again, and chatted him up even more. For sake of argument, we'll call him Mitch, because I'm not sure how okay he is with me plastering his name all across the interwebs merely to tell my fuzzy-feelings Jonathan stories. My little sister had brought her camera and meant to get a ton of pictures, and I offered to send Mitch a CD of the photos. We talked about music and what I liked and he liked and my paper on Judaism and music where I talked about Jonathan and Bob Dylan and Leonard Cohen. i'm not sure he ever agreed with me on the Jonathan and Bob angle, lol.

A little after that concert, just around my birthday, Mitch sent me some CDs of brilliant musicians that I had never heard before. I sent him my deepest thanks and a CD of the photos from the concert. And I thought that was the end of it.

I came home that day, after tormenting myself with wondering who sent me something all the way from Utah, when suddenly the memory of Mitch came back to me. As I tore open the package, I saw a mailer, with a very nice note written on it from Mitch, saying he had seen my photos on Flickr, and he'd seen my "shrine", and had these photos that he had always meant to put up, but never got around to it. I opened that mailer and gazing up at me are two amazing promo photos of Jonathan.

My heart got the big ol warm fuzzies. I may have teared up, though I will probably deny this for the sake of coolness. And as I prepare a box of Montana goodies for Mitch (because I have nothing sufficiently cool that is Jonathan-based), I can't help but think of how our shared love of Jonathan keeps us all together and makes us all a part of his deeply-felt, inherently good world.

I promise to stop sounding like a hallmark card now.