I tried, the day Gideon died, to get his obituary into the Times. I found I would pull all sorts of backdoor tricks for friends, especially sick friends—tricks I’d never once considered for myself. I was told that the paper’s art editor must approve the listing of any dead artist. The obit editor explained, “I’m afraid I never heard of him myself. We only have room for major painters. Your friend, what was his name again? Yes, nice name. I’m sure a fine person but didn’t have significant New York representation. A Boston artist mostly. No important museums. Just not well known enough for us. But I can give you the extension for the notices.”

“Do, please. Now, the Notices? Because all this is new to me.”

“Yes, the paid-for obits. ‘The shorts.’ You ready to copy?”

So I at least got Gideon on record. For a mere two hundred and fifty-nine dollars, he finally arrived into the Times. Though below, of course, and in smaller print. It didn’t seem right, Gideon’s only staying down in the Personals. He’d never graduated, never became—above, free—News.

—Gideon, we still talk about you all the time.

But here’s the question … here’s the question once you multiply our darling pal Gideon by ten, by Robert, by Marco, then four times ten … toward the two million. Here’s the question. What to DO with a decade and a half of their phone numbers and street lore? What’s to become of this now-pointless information?

I must decide: Shall I leave these loyal dead in my address book? Of course, I want them there. But bumping into them daily, each hooked to his final comet trail of medical 800 numbers, still stops me cold.

It’s a minor yet momentous choice. There are memories that cannot be refiled, cannot be surpassed by contact with new people. I want to send a petition somewhere, to get my circle back, to settle them around that table for one more cafe latte, one typical, ordinary between-things day. A partly cloudy Tuesday might be good. I would send this petition direct to Management, were there one.

Do I sound bitter? Do I care? Well, yeah, as it happens. But, one problem with surviving: you risk seeming either self-congratulatory or somehow, your own lucky self, very wronged. Instead of being left here grateful, you’re stuck with a brittle sort of veteran’s pride. It’s like those folks who did not name names to the House UnAmerican Committee; it makes you recast yourself as Joan of Arc and all the rest of them—cans of lighter fluid.