A Newspaper

Tim and I went to a bunch of different McDonald's restaurants today in an effort to burn through some coupons we had. At the final stop, the drive-thru lady asked if we wanted a free newspaper. Always eager to hoard free things, Tim gladly accepted it.

It's rare I even look at the front page of the newspaper, let alone read it. I've never in my life sat down and looked over every page, but I felt compelled to do so for this particular newspaper. I didn't really read any of it. I just looked over all the columns of text, scanning for anything of interest. I skipped the sports, the NASDAQ readings, and the obituaries.

As soon as I skipped the obituaries, I decided I'd better look over them. What if someone I knew had died and I'd never know about it? That's always been a sort of irrational fear. I can't really say why. Anyway, as it turns out, someone I knew had died. A man who was my psychologist when I was a kid died of leukemia (if I remember correctly).

It's a weird sort of thing. As a kid, getting your mind analyzed is one of the most irritating things in the world. I hated going. I hated his dumb games and how he tried to dredge up memories I didn't want to talk about. I'd like to think that I would have turned out the same without him...that he had no bearing whatsoever on my life.

He likely did, though, and that's kind of weird. I barely remember the appointments themselves. I mainly remember hating going. It's odd to think that someone I very much disliked in the past may have actually helped, and now that person is gone. It's strange to feel neither happiness nor sadness over someone being dead; surely most people feel something. What is there to feel when you don't even know how someone influenced you?