Both Sides Now
We came back because you wanted to die here.
Your attitude showed off a sort of noble stiff upper lip that I never knew existed. You said it plainly and without any fear.
"If I get worse, Dally, bring me here. I want to die under this tree."
All you wanted was the tree, but I bought ya the house; four acres of land and a fuckin' pond, too, because the bastard owner didn't want to part with the place until I took everything off his hands. I curse his ass out every time I have to milk his cow.
But it's worth the money, to be here.
You've always been the brains of this outfit, babe; who knows money better than you? Who can quote Shakespeare from memory? See, without you I'd be a heart without a brain, and I'd waste myself in a week.
I used to bitch about it: us only having 'one good year' together before we got tested. I didn't know back then that you'd live more than ten years. I'll say right here that I cried like a baby when I heard you had tested positive and I was negative. Why not me?
The doctors were confident you could fight it, and we were brave in the beginning. You were, more than me, but I tried to put on a good show for you.
Then the parade of drugs began, and the violent reactions; I wished that they were happening to me instead of you. But you never stopped believing you would get better. Me? I was scared shitless.
You said that you wanted to keep wrestling, and I almost called you on that promise we made at our Commitment; no hurting yourself. But you did so beautifully that no one even noticed.
Until you got that hardway cut during the TLC match a month ago.
Well, shit hit the fan; I thought Vince was going to dump you, or the both of us. I know people probably told him to. I was shocked that he kept the both of us on pay.
But he won't let you back in the ring. He'll let hard-core drug users fuck around in there...Yeah, I'm going over the top again. I can get where he's coming from...but you love that business.
You just said "O, it is excellent to have a giant's strength, but it is tyrannous to use it like a giant." Measure For Measure, instead of Henry III.
Hey, shit happens for a reason; like me getting injured. If I had to trade in my career for that minute in the doctor's office last month when the doctor told us that the drug cocktail you're on is extending your life; that you could liver another fifty years on it. And when I was alone that night I cried like a baby again.
I still get pissed off when people act as though AIDS has been cured; we both know that, even if the drugs work really well, you're still positive, you still have side-effects. Some of these kids are so reckless, so stupid; they don't know how scary it is to wait for the results of a test..how hard it is to track down every lover in your past history and tell them that you may have traded a life-threatening illness.
It's turning into the best time of our lives; you're a professor, teaching doctorate courses in Shakespeare, and I'm working with my charities, booking speaking engagements. It's got me believing that there is a great plan out there, and that things work out after all. We've been living in at that house, the one I bought for you to die in, for two years.
Just like Roddy Piper says, "Just when you think you know all of the answers, I change the questions." Or, to quote your Joanie Mitchel, when I look into your eyes, I realize that "I really don't know life at all."