21 August 2003
1 month after
Jim,
You once told me you decided not to attend Nello's funeral because Nello wouldn't be there. And you didn't want to see the people who were there. I am now put in the same position. The discrepancy between the public, official view of reality and the unseen truth is a harsh one, and it haunts this moment. If you were here, I would share my perceptions with you as you would yours with me, and no one else would be able to understand the truth we'd know beyond what both official society and the left could perceive. No one completely understood the meaning of what we did with the Institute (or the inner meaning of our relationship), however they benefited from and loved and supported the Institute. As I always insisted, there is a meaning beyond sociability, a deeper dimension not perceived. I, basing myself on a very different temperament from yours, refused to define this reality in terms of personal associations. Nonetheless you could see the discrepancies between your own inner view and the persona you presented to the world, while navigating those discrepancies in your characteristic extroverted manner. You loved my objectivity, even when I let you have it on a regular basis, and we achieved a transparency and objectivity in most of our communication we could find in few other places. Now I am left alone, and I am forced to carry on the dialogue in my mind alone, with what I can retain of our past conversations that were not committed to writing. Much of your first-hand knowledge will disappear. I will conserve what I can, though it may prove much too painful to explore with the necessary thoroughness all the regions of my memory. I will have to carry this loneliness to the end of my days, because I will want to discuss everything with you, and you won't be there.
I could not cry for you until this moment . . . . I have too much tough business to take care of, too many impossible tasks to undertake. I don't want to think of your smile or your warmth. Then I might allow a human reaction I can't afford to indulge.
I know that if you were here, you'd know what I was thinking and how I would perceive the inner truth of the situation that no official memorial could or would articulate. The truth must be preserved for the future somehow. Maybe someday someone will understand what we shared. There are those who care enough to know there was something there worth supporting, as there are others who have already betrayed it.
There are many more specifics to be said, but were you here I would not need to say them. The details can be filled in for posterity another time. This statement should say what no one else would think to say.
I wish I could protect you somehow, and I wish you could protect me. No matter what happens, at least I can say, I KNOW.
What else can I offer now but my tears?
Goodbye,
Ralph
Note: With the exception of an omission indicated by ellipsis, this is the text of my farewell message to Jim, interred with his ashes on August 22, 2003. — Ralph Dumain
Jim Murray Memorial Address by Ralph Dumain
Memorial Tributes to Jim Murray
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Uploaded 5 November 2003