It was August. Warm and sultry, the night air so sweet. There were stars for miles. Some lunar calendar will probably say my memory lies, but I recall a moon bright enough to light our path. It was the kind of night I’ve craved ever since—warm enough to walk late into the night, late into the future, talking until it is no longer late, but early. Secrets told and kept and loved. And I can look back and see what should have been obvious: this night was the beginning of everything.

But it felt like such an ending. I remember standing there, clinging to you, my arms wrapped around my best friend. Underneath your down-filled coat I could feel your heart beating, never suspecting the cause. Running my fingers over and over the coarseness of the twill of your jacket—it’s a physical sensation that is embedded into my core. So soothing to hold you, to hear your heart, to trace figure eights in the texture of your clothing. Even then, I was seeking patterns I could recognize.

So we stood there for hours. Our faces turned up to see the sky—bright, bright and yet, the stars couldn’t outshine you, even in the dark. You were such a giant. So full of life and hope and boy were you dreaming that night. We stood there, hanging on to our childhoods. Holding back the change tomorrow held. To separate colleges, in different countries. We could not be going further from each other.

It was August, warm and sultry and tomorrow you were leaving for college. And then, then you changed my world forever. You kissed me.

I didn’t expect it. I didn’t expect you. It wasn’t sweet, it wasn’t tender, it wasn’t hesitant, it was nothing I expected a kiss from you to be. Who was this man kissing me? No boy I knew. That kiss, that kiss was powerful. It ripped wide my expectations, it tore away all my preconceptions, and it told the truth even you didn’t want to admit. We were saying goodbye, but you’d been harboring a lot more than friendship. And judging from the state of my knees, you weren’t alone.

I wasn’t ready then to love you. But I couldn’t ignore the power of that kiss—and it would eat away at me until four months later it would occur to me, that glorious you were probably kissing other girls that way. The very thought made me jealous! I was always slow to figure things out.

I have to tell you—and yes, maybe I need to tell the world—nothing has changed. Baby, when you kiss me, I still feel like my world is being ripped wide open and exploding with potential. You believe in beauty and truth and all that is noble and when I kiss you, I believe it too.

I’m still weak in the knees at the very thought of you. At eighteen I didn’t know that you could fall so completely in love with your best friend. I couldn’t know that tracing patterns on your jacket, standing in the moonlight, counting stars would be the beginning. I couldn’t know that your kiss would set me on the path to my LIFE. But what I did know, was that you were a giant.

And baby, when you kiss me, you still are.

So for you. . . Happy Anniversary.

Someone tell me how I feel
It’s silly wrong but vivid right
Oh, kiss me like the final meal
Yeah, kiss me like we die tonight

Cause holy cow, I love your eyes
And only now I see the light
Yeah, lying with me half-awake
Oh, anyway, it’s looking like a beautiful day

When my face is chamois-creased
If you think I’ll wink, I did
Laugh politely at repeats
Yeah, kiss me when my lips are thin

~~Elbow: One Day Like This.

Miss Sophie’s new t-shirt

It’s the smell of potential and possible delusion. Welcome to Friday afternoon, dear readers. I’m dreaming big already. I have plans and good intentions and right now, it all seems doable! So, tell me what  you’re doing to feed your soul this weekend, and I’ll be back tomorrow to tell you about my little experiment in canine couture. I promise, it has nothing to do with etsy.

I love this photo, even if it is completely disingenuous. Looking at it, you might think that blue skies have arrived here in the northwest, but that wouldn’t be true. Instead, we got a rare sun-break Sunday. Long enough for IZ to mow our lumpy yard despite his head cold. Long enough for me look busy snapping photos instead of weeding our overgrown flower beds. But not long enough to fool anyone into thinking warmth is on its way. Certainly not long enough to get me out of my funk. I’m waiting, Spring. And I don’t like to wait. Margaret was right to dub this month Junuary!

Anyhow, I don’t have much to say. Vicki dropped by to tell me to update and now she’s taunting me with the backsides of Sun Bears on her site. OH THE IRONY. As I’m a compliant first born, I tend to do what I’m told—especially when told by an authority figure. I’ll let her explain what makes her the boss of me, because I sure as heck don’t know! So, I’m blogging about our cold weather and the lack of sun. And she’s visually cracking wise about her weather. I resent that, darling. I DO!

Except I don’t. I adore Sun Bears. I adore the sun. I adore the BEARS. And Stanford sucks. Ahem.

So, this photo… I was trying to snap a photo of a mysterious Columbine that sprouted up in my front planter. I didn’t plant it. I suspect renegade vermin poop. I figure, if deer are going to munch the heads off all my flowers, it seems only fitting that they might plant something in return. It’s a small gift and since this town won’t let me hunt inside city limits, it’s going to have to do.

This Columbine is magical. It’s really dainty and delicate but difficult to photograph. In desperation, I shoved my lens beneath it and snapped the photo. The flower, obviously, blurred. And it’s apparent that I need to prune our variegated willow. But that sky. . . that sky sings to me. And for a moment, you know, I almost thought I had found a patch of blue to carry me. But it didn’t last. I fell into the grasp of a capricious lover and knew rejection. Grey skies have returned and I’ve been compelled to put on socks. I hate socks. Spring will not stop toying with me.

Summer, on the other hand, is tender. She is kind and she caring. Warm and benevolent. She takes her time. She doesn’t rush anything, savoring every moment. She sings bird song and smells of jasmine. She doesn’t blow down houses or flood plains. She never toys with your emotions. You know just where you stand with her. Lovingly embraced, adored, appreciated. In her eyes, you are always beautiful with your brown toes sticking out of your sandals. And even though you know this love you share will not last forever, it doesn’t matter. You’re not thinking about that, anyhow. You’re too warm to care. Too happy to notice. Too content, if that’s possible.

Summer is tender. But I fear she is going to be late this year. I fear she wandered off to some tropical local and cannot be bothered to return. I fear she is cavorting with some other lover, some other person who always looks beautiful—their brown toes sticking out of their sandals.

I fear she’s figured out that I have ugly feet.

There’s a freak-out brewing at my house. At my house.

So, new couches arrived yesterday. Yes, our oldy-mouldy basement couch is still propped up, all cattywompus on the porch. I should have taken a photo of it instead of this new obsession of mine: the candle makes me happy, the couch makes me laugh. I keep trying to convince IZ that I’m Southern enough to have a couch on my porch, who cares a Foxtrot what the neighbors think. He keeps looking at me, with that look of his, and then he affects the “therapist talking a person off the ledge as seen on CSI NY” tone of voice with me, “Uh. . . no.”

Apparently, he cares what the neighbors think of him. I already know what they think of me, and let me tell you: a couch on my LAWN would be fitting. Ahem. So, if the couch is still flashing its underbelly at the neighborhood by tomorrow afternoon, I’m going to arrange it artistically on the porch and then glare when IZ suggests we move it.

Seriously, you shouldn’t judge a girl by her silver ballet flats and Bombalicious lip gloss—just because she knows how to accessorize doesn’t mean she can’t enjoy a little trash decor now and again. Oh boy, I really shouldn’t listen to Social Distortion and blog at the same time.

So, yep… new couches. It wasn’t what we’d planned to buy this summer—but what can you do? We did some quick shopping for what we could afford at the moment and we settled on a couple of couches that will transition into the basement/entertainment center eventually. We went with leather, because IZ likes it and why not buy something that will work downstairs later? Seemed like a good solution. Sometimes, you have to be practical and well, this buys me more time to wear IZ down on the concept of chintz. Every time I suggest big cabbage roses in balmy tones of aqua and beige he looks at me with that look of his, and then he affects the “therapist talking a person off the ledge as seen on CSI NY” tone of voice with me, “Uh. . . no.”

But I am not so easily deterred. And believe you me, I have my ways of making him talk chintz.

The new couches mean a change in our siting regime. Animals are no longer permitted to sit on the couches. They are very MUCH not allowed to pee on th em! Snickers is not adjusting to this as easily as Miss Sophie; but then, my dog is superior to his cat. We’ve established this. To prevent any more expensive accidents, Snickers is spending her evenings sequestered in the gym. She isn’t complaining and I’m not worrying and that’s going to be the way it is for evah!

I’m liking this no animals on the furniture rule. However, I’m making an exception to the sitting rule for the boy because he makes me laugh when he says things like this:

Me: (rocking out to AudioSlave on radioio) You know, it’s pretty sad when your mom who is nearly 40 is hipper than you are.

Boy Wonder: You’re not hip. You’re hippy.

Ha ha ha… he can stay. Ahem, but if he pees on the couch there’s going to be a freak-out at my house.

I’m going to like having a sister. Thanks, Marie!!

So, miss me?

I sometimes wonder. Not about you missing me, but about my increased absences. But then endings are often beginnings. And I should really stop watching sappy movies about endless, great, epic love because I start talking crazy talk about quitting blogging. And you and I both know that’s not happening any time soon, despite my walkabouts in the real world.

I really should write something.

I’ve been home a week now. Ok, a week and two days. But I’m far from recovered. There is so much to tell you, I hardly know where to start. I’ve learned a lot about myself in the past two weeks. Most of that I processed with my Spiritual Director. But I will share this with you: I am quickly growing weary of flying. Weary of traveling. And I have an abiding hatred for the TSA. You want my lip gloss? I paid $10 for it at a drug store… It’s call Nude Plum. It’s NOT a bomb, dude. GET A GRIP.

Ahem. Look at the pretty flowers. Where was I? Oh yeah, homebody girl. This is not new really. I’ve struggled with agoraphobia most of my life. I hide it well. My parents thought it was just an obsessive need to decorate my bedroom to look like a 20 something’s apartment. I lobbied for my own bathroom and an exterior door. They ignored me. Still, I never wanted to leave.

But lately, it’s not being fearful of the wide wide (and dare I say, RUDE) world. No, I don’t panic in the white, white of sunshine because I live in a place where there is NO sunshine. It’s not the fear of the new or the undiscovered. It’s not fear at all. It’s fatigue. People, I’m tired.

I don’t know why, really. But I’m finding reasons to stay in, reasons to hurry home, reasons to hole up in my own world. And that, that is frightening. Because it doesn’t have to start with fear to end there. I know this only too well.

I’ve been rationalizing. I’ve been telling myself that I’m just on word over-load. My family, heaven bless them, is a chatty and opinionated clan. They are also the definition of INTENSE. I’m the calm one. Yeah. And let’s face it, weddings are stressful events even if they aren’t contentious. So, I know I’m overwhelmed with the amount of talking and listening that I’ve been pressed to do.

And if you’ll forgive me an aside: you know, I struggle with this aspect of blogging. Words on paper are my preference. In fact, IZ and I spend a great deal of time talking in IM. That may seem odd, but words coming at me from all directions leads to sensory overload. And I’m introverted enough that it makes me exhausted. So blogging, obviously, works for me. However, it leads to a perception that I find difficult to bridge. My family, whose memory of me is dimmed by years of living at a distance, read my blog and see the chatty child they remember. They have no clue that I’ve grown into an adult who values silence. New people assume I’m full of words because my blog is full of words. And DANG people, if I don’t feel the need to step into that perception in person. When I don’t, (and yes, there are times when I sit back and watch) the inevitable contrasts are drawn between who you meet and this person writing. I suppose it isn’t news that I’m uncomfortable with both the contrast and my inability to sync those selves.

But all these words… all these words are in my head. And if they make it out into a blog post, they’re still not me relating. They’re me writing. And they’re you reading. It’s the space between I can’t control.

So, I’m tired. Very tired of being who I am not, not really. Or, maybe better, I’m worn out being a louder version of who I am. A wordier, chattier, more present person that I really am. And that has me withdrawing into my inner world. A world where the words never make it to paper, but are jumbled and turned and pointless soup. Until even I can’t stand the sound of them and I finally fall silent. Really silent.

Scary words, for me. I can tell you I value silence. And I do. But there is a huge difference between silencing all those external frequencies and this silence I’ve been marinating in. The similarities to my old agoraphobic self are not lost on me. So I am taking a step outside my inner stew and writing. It’s just one step out of this silent house. And the sunlight is blinding. I hear, though, that your eyes do adjust. Eventually.

And if you’ve read this far… a reward. New Music. No video yet, but the song is cool.

So, I finally scored a treasury on etsy. Go click and make me famous. Pretty please?

You arrived! And you both were simply radiant! Blessings on the journey.

I suspect tomorrow cannot come too soon for you, little brother. It is an express bullet train at rush hour for me. Blurry. I feel blurry. 

There are so many words I should have for you. Wisdom from  an elder sister and all that. But I find, the girl with too may words, that words have quit me in this moment. All I have is what I feel for you. Which, is immensely painful and special and turbulent and fierce. It is FIERCE LOVE. Fierce love does not like to be limited by definition.

And so I give you what I have:  my deepest admiration for the human being you have become. And for the becoming that has cost you. Your arrival at tomorrow was not by accident—but it wasn’t all by your choice either. Sometimes, what defines us as human beings is not what happens to us. But what we do with what happens to us.

You do not realize it now–how could you? You are blurry too, more than ready for tomorrow. Eyes focused on the light that is coming. But I know this.  You will speed through the day and tomorrow will remain for eternity as the marker of the beginning of your new life together with Marie. You will be you and you will be completely reborn. And you don’t even know it.

But I know, I know that the man you will be at your 25th wedding anniversary, the man you will be in 50 years, the man you will be tomorrow— that man arrived today. He arrived in the way he looks at the woman he will hold for an eternity. He arrived in every step he took to get to this moment. He arrived when he made this choice and he arrived when she said, “Yes!”

Tomorrow is coming and while I may not be ready for it, I know deep in my soul that you are.

I love you, Mark. With a fierce and undying love. 

This is just a small reminder: tomorrow is the National Association of Letter Carriers Food Drive. This year, perhaps more so than in any year of recent memory, food banks around the country are in desperate need of your contributions. Many warehouses across our great land are empty! With gas prices at a record high, more and more people are relying on local food banks. Working people like you. Food banks are pressed beyond their ability to serve and in many communities people are being turned away.

This food drive is always on a Saturday and I don’t know about you, but I tend to get busy and forget these things. So, this reminder is as much for me as it is for you. Please remember to leave your non-perishables for your carrier tomorrow. Every can helps.

(and just so I don’t forget, I’m leaving mine on the porch RIGHT NOW!)