Was I visited by a ghost?

I’m might have been visited by a ghost last night. I hope I was.

Here’s the backstory. In my community college days, my best friend at the school was a guy named Roy Vincent Diga. He was an extrovert who adopted this poor introvert and helped me be more outgoing. To the best of my research, he was taken from us by cancer a number of years ago. But back when I knew him, he was one of the funniest, most positive, and dirtiest guys I knew. We met in a writing class and we’d crack ourselves up co-writing some incredibly dirty poems. The one title I remember most easily is one called “The Monster in My Pants.”

There was nothing sexual between us, but we could combine our two 22-year-old minds into the mind of one uncensored 8th grader.

Last night, as I was falling asleep, my brain went to its second favorite bedtime thought pattern after monsters… regrets. This time it was when I was hanging with a woman who we both met in the writing class. I’d developed a MASSIVE crush on her, but never had the self confidence to even try to take things to the next level. She never really got the chance to “friend zone” me because I did it to myself.

I remembered a time when we were drinking and she started talking about how her new workout routine had really done wonders for her behind. Then she said “touch it, see how firm it is.” At this point, if I were an anime character, I would have gotten a nose-bleed and passed out. Instead, I hemmed and hawed and finally prodded it nervously with the tip of my finger.

So my regret engine dragged that out of the past and started having stairway moments… thinking what I should have said or done instead of what I did. One thing that came to me was to put on some Ryan Reynolds style charm and ask “can I talk dirty to you while I do it?” Then, of course, I started thinking about what I’d have said.

I came up with a clever compliment and suggestive follow-up, refined it a bit, and suddenly my mind started putting it to music. I started working through it some more as the opening to a song. Now I knew two things:

1. I didn’t want to forget this.
2. If I didn’t get it out of my head and onto “paper,” I was going to keep on going over and over it and never get to sleep.

I know, dirty and sexy are not words people associate with me. But one of my goals for my music are to make it fun, make it crazy, go to places with it I’d never go in casual discussion. I felt this could be a great option for doing that. That’s why I had to save it.

Because turning on my bedside light could bother my wife, I took my phone into the bathroom, sat on the edge of the tub, and added the opening verse to my note-taking app. I closed the app and went back to bed. But my mind wasn’t done with it yet. I started coming up with more verses and had to go back to the bathroom, sit on the egde of the tub, and add them.

I went back to bed again and yet another verse, sitting on the edge of the tub.

As I was headed to bed from the bathroom for the third time, it occurred to me that this was SO much like the stuff Roy and I wrote in college. Then the thought entered my mind that somehow his spirit detected me thinking about this former classmate of ours, heard me thinking up a pick-up line, and he came to visit and collaborate with me again. It made me feel both happy that I felt like I could feel the spirit of this wonderful old friend and sad that it’s the only way I could hang with him now.

With my inner voice, I thanked him for visiting, for helping take me to that creative space we used to share, and I told him I missed him. After that, I was able to get to sleep.

I am on the fence as to whether the human soul is mortal or immortal. I see no evidence for immortal and have some level of belief that the afterlife is an invention to scare people into being good (and give money to their house of worship). But much like I prefer to believe our universe isn’t an accident, I prefer to believe that our best friends and family members can commune with us as more than just echoes of the past. I have no logical justification for that belief, but it’s comforting.

So, was I visited by Roy’s ghost, or did my silly and dirty verses just associate so strongly with my memory of Roy that it felt like he visited? I probably won’t know until I can ask him in person on the other side. But until then, I miss you my brother and thanks for helping me write this, whether through your past influence or your presence last night.