I don’t remember when I met Clifford Cantor or how, it just seems like I always knew him. He was one of those kind of people: familiar. He would pick me up from my apartment in the Miracle Mile district in his Cadillac and we would drive around the city of Los Angeles listening to dirty gangster rap, windows down, AC on. He was funny and we laughed a lot – well, mostly it was I who laughed at his sarcastic, sassy ass, self-deprecating humour. We’d go eat Thai food. We’d go to a meeting. He was kind. Kind in the way that many people don’t know how to be – he made you feel okay, even if you felt like nothing would ever be okay again. He was handsome in that Jewish Prince-handsome-kind-of-way. He was generous. He always opened the door for me. He never let me pay. He never let me pump my own gas. He let me cry when I needed to and I never felt judged. Yeah. He was that kind of guy. Kind. Compassionate. A sardonic tongue with a soul as sweet as honey. Cliff was a friend to me.
I guess I thought he’d always be around.
I’m not sure what happens when people die. It’s a concept I’ve wrestled with since my best friend, Juli, died at the ripe ’ol age of 13. This notion, this action of death – it, like, it, um – haunts me. So today, as I sit here thinking about life and death and Cliff and how nothing seems to make any sense sometimes, I remember our laughter, the drives through the Hills, the repose I felt when I was around him – and find comfort in the fact that knowing Clifford Cantor changed me. He existed in this time-space continuum, on this pale blue dot and I was one of the lucky people that got to know him. I loved him, I did – and goddammit, I wish I woulda told him this more recently. But isn’t that the way it goes sometimes?
Oh Cliff: We will all miss you so. Godspeed. Kisses. Good wishes. Thank you for every last ridiculous fucking thing. I will think of you often and when I do, each thought will surely be accompanied by a stupid smile and a little bit of regret.
©littlebrownbutterfly