Mini-Episode: Farewell Dimitri

FAREWELL DIMITRI

[“Charlie on the MTA” plays.]

Various voices

This is…

This is…

This is…

Greater Boston.

[Footsteps down a slope leading into the abandoned tunnels.]

Bernie—Josh Rubino

Wow. In there, huh? That is awfully… isolated. Oh… gated. Hm. Awfully imposing. And with all those chains, too. Not sure how I’m meant to get in there. Let’s see… oh, it just came right open! Look at that. Not really locked, just kind of staged to look like it. I suppose that makes sense, what with someone living down there and all.

[Horrible creak as the gate swings open.]

So. Just have to head down in there. Into that dark, abandoned, underground tunnel. That’s fine. Totally fine. Yup. Nothing to worry about.

[He doesn’t move.]

Come on, Bernie, pull it together. Deep breath. You’re a proud mail carrier from a long line of proud mail carriers. You go where the job takes you. And, sometimes, the job takes you to unexpected places. Unexpected, terrifying places.

Bernie, stop dithering! You made a pledge. “Neither snow nor rain nor heat nor gloom of night stays these couriers from the swift completion of their appointed rounds.” Well, this counts as “gloom of night,” now doesn’t it? So it won’t stay me from my swift completion. That’s just how it is. So hop to it! Right. Here I go.

[He crosses the gate and walks some way into the tunnel.]

Hello? Anyone home?

[Keeps walking.]

Oh… I think I see a light! Hello! Mail call! Just your friendly postman with a delivery! I’m just coming down the tunnel! Please don’t, uh… eat me… if that’s the sort of thing you are.

[Tentatively turning a corner.]

Hello…?

[A rustle of movement.]

Dimitri Stamatis—James Johnston
Wha…? Oh! Oh, uh… hey! You?

Bernie
Oh, hello there, didn’t mean to startle you! I called out, but…

Dimitri
Oh, sorry! I had headphones on. Just getting caught up on the new season of Lower Decks. I have to admit, I was skeptical of a Star Trek cartoon, but then I heard there was an episode with Tom Paris, so you know, at that point, I had to… and I know, it’s not the first time, there was the old Animated Series of the original, but you know. Just not how I think of Star Trek.

Bernie

Right… I’m just here with a letter for you.

Dimitri
For me?

Bernie

Are you Dimitri Stamatis?

Dimitri

…yea? How on Earth did you find me down here?

Bernie

Oh, just followed my postman’s intuition.

Dimitri
Nice! Can’t beat a good gut intuition for getting where you need to go, right?

Bernie

Well, that’s often been my own experience, but different people have different ways. I have to say, this was a strange one, though. It’s not often I need to make more than one attempt, but the first time I tried to deliver this letter, I found myself in the North End, standing on the street. But by the time I got there, the ol’ postal tug had completely dissipated, and I couldn’t find any sign of you. It was the strangest thing!

Dimitri
Oh, no, it makes complete sense! See, I was living in an abandoned Olive Garden food truck, and you probably just found the place where it used to be parked. But then it vanished one day. I don’t know if it finally got towed or just stolen, but it was gone, and so I very abruptly didn’t live there anymore. I bounced around for a little while before coming back here again. You got here just in time, too… I just got a lead on a squat over in Somerville that I’m planning to check out tomorrow.

Bernie
Oh, that is a relief to hear! I was worried that the old noggin compass might be getting faulty. That would be just awful for someone in my profession! But now I’ve got an explanation, and it surely sets my mind at ease. Anyhoo, I’ve got your letter here. From Michael Tate.

Dimitri
Michael, really! I wonder why he didn’t just call?

Bernie
Well, he sent all these letters before his recent troubles. Locked in an office for a spell, as you know.

Dimitri
Yeah, that was something! It was a lucky thing I found him before it was too late.

Bernie

That was you? Well, now I just have so many questions!

Dimitri

Oh, it wasn’t much. I just followed my instincts, and then there he was. You know how it goes.

Bernie

Well, how do you do! That’s fascinating. And you’ve never worked in postal service?

Dimitri

Never! I use it plenty, though.

Bernie

Well, it’s always a pleasure to meet an appreciative customer. And speaking of… here’s your letter.

Dimitri
Thanks! If you don’t need to rush off, you can help yourself to some coffee. There’s a pot over on the hot plate there. Just brewed it.

Bernie

Don’t mind if I do, so long as you’d welcome the company. And if you don’t mind sharing, I’d be awfully interested to hear what Mr. Tate had to say to the man who rescued him!

Dimitri

Yeah, let’s give it a read–make yourself comfortable! 

Michael Tate—James Oliva
Dear Dimitri…

As I write this, I am having an experience unexpectedly similar to some of your own recent adventures. Not long ago, you were trapped in an isolated Alaskan compound, isolated from everyone you love, with no connection to the outside world save for a convoluted, one-way system for sending handwritten letters out to the unknown. I, too, have spent many months in isolated captivity, and am now relying upon a similarly-convoluted communications system to send my final letters out into the world. I don’t know if this letter will reach you, or if I’ll still be alive by the time it does. But if I have not yet been found before you’ve read this, I hope you will come look for me. If anyone can find their way here, I have to believe it’s you–after discovering Atlantis of all places, locating a secret passage behind a kombucha machine in a small press publishing office should pose little challenge. 

I’m not sure if you know that I was living with Leon for several months prior to his death. I was unemployed at the time, unexpectedly laid off by the company we’d both been working for. It wasn’t my fault that I was out of a job, mind you, but it was certainly my own fault that I wasn’t prepared to deal with that kind of crisis. I had no savings, no financial cushion. I’d never been good at long term planning or reining in my impulses. Instead of a retirement plan, I had a 4k television, a mint condition copy of Tales of Suspense #57, and honestly, the best thing I personally owned was a collection of autographed life-size standees for the complete cast of the original Ghostbusters.

I’ve never been good at controlling my impulses. That’s something else we have in common.

We’ve known each other for a long time and, and I know that it was very, very purposeful how Leon introduced us. I was still early in my recovery from alcoholism, but Leon had seen something else in me that he recognized. Something he thought you were better equipped to talk about. And you were right there for it, completely ready to discuss your experiences with a total stranger. I don’t know that I’ve ever adequately thanked you for that conversation. You opened my eyes so much, and it really has made a difference for me.

Believe it or not, nobody had ever thought to suggest that I might have ADHD before that. It seemed so obvious in retrospect. So many things made sense in that light–the difficulties I had in school, my awful, awful financial planning… and, of course, my addiction. That’s an aspect of ADHD you don’t hear much about… how it can reinforce an addiction. How hard it can be to stay on the wagon when your whole decision-making process was a tangle of chaotic impulses before you ever picked up a bottle in the first place. How the impulse itself is… is part of the addiction. Following an impulse just feels good. There’s such a feeling of relief in it, like you’re releasing some huge buildup of pressure. And resisting one is like… I don’t even know… like dragging your feet on sandpaper. Do it too long and you just fall apart.

It’s so hard to even know the difference sometimes, isn’t it? Between a decision and an impulse. Sometimes all the thought you put into making a careful decision is really just rationalization for the impulse you’re already following. Other times… it’s tempting to write a misguided action off as an impulse, when, really, you made a bad decision fully on your own volition. And sometimes the impulse and the decision just lead you to the same place anyway. That’s how I got where I am now. There was an impulse. But I saw it and recognized it. And I decided to follow where it led.

It’s funny how two people can have the same problem in such different ways. You’ve never had the struggle with addiction that I do, but you’ve always said driving puts you into instant sensory overload. So far as I know, you’ve never driven a car in your adult life. I like driving. I feel completely focused when I’m behind the wheel.  And you know one thing I’ve never, ever done? You know, despite my impulse control, despite my problems with alcohol? I’ve never driven drunk. That’s one place my impulses always steered me right. I get a few drinks in, and my brain kicks in with, “hey, it’s just a three-hour walk home from here, I bet that would be fun!” So I guess, thanks for that one, brain.

And, of course, our strategies for managing our ADHD could hardly be more different. You tried medication, and told me all the ways it made your life easier, the chaos of your brain more manageable. And even so, you consciously planned a life that worked with your impulses rather than against them. And me… I chose a traditional career path, and an array of carefully cultivated systems… calendars and to-do lists and mantras… to keep me organized. I never did try medication. Maybe I should have. I don’t know. But with my history of addiction, and my parents’ history of addiction and… well. I have a hard time trusting that the solution to my addiction was another habit-forming substance. I don’t know. Maybe that’s the wrong way to think about it. But that’s what I’m afraid of…

Anyway, my larger point here is that there was something very fundamental that we had in common. But the way we’ve lived with that thing are very different. Neither one is right or wrong… we just have to find what’s right for us.

Leon was worried about you and Nica. He was worried about how long you’d gone without talking to each other. And how each of you felt abandoned by the other. There was always so much the two of you had in common. Traits Leon never shared or related to. You both craved excitement and uncommon lives. You both wanted the world to be full of surprises. But because the two of you were so similar, you were terrible at predicting each other’s actions. You both saw those similarities, and so tried to extrapolate from what you knew of yourselves. And neither of you accounted for the differences. Nica was afraid, and so couldn’t imagine that you weren’t. You felt restrained, and so couldn’t imagine that Nica didn’t. She was never going to feel that sandpaper under her feet, and you were never going to stop feeling it. But neither of you wanted to admit how different you really were, because admitting that meant following different paths.

But.. being on different paths doesn’t mean you can’t still be part of each other’s journeys. It doesn’t even mean you can’t be headed toward the same direction. It just means you’re two different people trying to find your own right way forward. And it’ll just be that much easier to support each other once you acknowledge that you need different things. Because that will let you each give the other what they need, instead of always trying to give each other what you need.

Anyway, some of those were my insights, and some of those were Leon’s. I hope both were helpful. You were a great help to me, Dimitri, and I’d really like to be able to return that favor. And I know it would mean the world to Leon to see you and Nica reconciled.

In the meantime… live your best life, Dimitri.

I love you.

Your friend,

 Michael Tate

Dimitri

Wow.

Bernie
So, I suppose he was right about you being the one to find him.

Dimitri

Sort of. I wasn’t even looking for him, and I never even saw any kombucha machine. But yeah. And still alive, too.

Bernie

Was his advice as helpful as he’d hoped?

Dimitri

It was. Probably in more ways than he intended.

Bernie
Oh?

Dimitri

I was on a submarine last time my meds ran out. Couldn’t exactly get a refill. And, uh… I kind of forgot after that. I’ve been off my meds for a couple of years now. It’s… probably time I took care of that. Especially if I’m going to be any help to Nica.

Bernie

You… got on a submarine? And that was with your meds?

Dimitri
Eh. They don’t make me a different person. They just give me a little more agency over which impulse to chase, instead of needing to chase them all.

Bernie

And you chose… a submarine.

Dimitri
My dude… I can’t imagine ever not choosing the submarine when a submarine is an actual option on the table. I mean, except…

Bernie

…yes?

Dimitri

Well, except for right now. Right now, Nica needs me. So I’m not going anywhere.