Teen Spirit

Seeking the source of pain and its solution

L to R: Thierry Donard, MFT, Francois Lamotte, Joachim Hellinger somewhere in South America after the accident.

It happened in a nightclub in La Paz in 1992. The architecture was classic, maybe European, or Greek, whatever, downhill from the impoverished Altiplano, at lower altitudes where the narco dollars flow and northern, western culture hit the social scene. We were wasted, having just watched our dear friend Francois Rickard drown before our eyes. He landed his parachute in Lake Titikaka too far offshore to rescue him. We were helpless and fate exacted its ugly toll. So that night we drank. We started with Pisco Sours then hit whatever was most effective regardless of the taste.

When the first chords of "Teen Spirit" hit the club's sound system I head-butted Francois Lamotte, the assistant director of the movie we were making, and then embraced him as we slammed towards the middle of the dance floor. Joachim Hellinger joined us in the makeshift pit and we purged the energy of loss and grief and anger, united by experience, traversing nationality and language ... English, French, German, it didn't matter, the emotion welded us indelibly, and forever. We smashed our chests and heads and fists against each other, deep in the crowd of souls who were working out their own shit, searching for the source of pain and its solution.

I will never forget those guys or the hours when we processed our love and loss, exposing our hearts, our souls. We survived those hard days but I understand now that it might have been easier for us if we hadn't.