playlist

it's okay if it feels tragic. this whole blog does. it's supposed to.

accompanying music found here.

get out of your head

It could be that maybe you find an anthem for the thing you put down which still sits on the back porch step. Day four feels tragic. You should find Picasso and give him the pack. But are you in a sense helping to kill him by doing that?


Possible next step. Get out of your head. Write about someone else.



Today I am grateful for a job, for several assignments, and time to do them.

some people make it look so easy

if all of a sudden you feel a little crazy, it is to be expected. getting here took a long time and changing your mind feels like an abrupt halt or slamming on brakes. like saying, "wait.what?"

but it's just day one and you didn't smoke.
so, that counts.


Today I am grateful for how the nerves in my body have reached the surface of my skin and how my neck feels good if I squeeze it. I am grateful coffee still exists and how iced lemon water tastes best when drank from a Mason jar. I am grateful she feels better, too.


Tonight's music needs to calm and sedate as if it was brought to you by Chantix, but really it was brought to you by Nora. So, yeah.


(also, thank you for reading. I kinda like that it's just us here.)

crutch

I'll carry around the lighter today. Tap it on the desk. Feel how it moves between my finger and thumb. Thinking about using a straw as well. Something to naw on. If needed, there's always the letter.


Dear me,

Get over it. Get to work.

Seriously,
me




Today I am grateful for the promise of a week, for the less dramatic side of me.

good dance of rid

When you finally get here it's hard to leave. But you have to 'cause Monday. What you needed was sleep in two hour increments and again when you thought about the work you should be doing.

Sunday afternoon we'll get back to it.

And you lost your best friend who really wasn't a friend at all.
So yeah, sleep was the good dance of rid.


Today I am grateful for a choice.

it's okay to feel bad

I mean to tell him that the your should be you're but what does it really matter. Only to those of us who seem to be picking apart everything into mistakes needing correction. Always grading.

Until your last photo, your last article for the week.

Today I am grateful for a bed, four pillows, two blankets, and one beautiful air conditioner.

gratitude credit

I mean, if we're doing this for the sole purpose of getting something in return, that somehow as humans we're wired or designed that way. That even if the most unselfish act is entirely selfish for the way it makes us feel, I would like to use my credit, or whatever's left of something I may not have used.

I want to wrap it in a beautiful white box with a classic red bow.
I want to use my best handwriting on the card.


This box contains:
Whatever I've done that may have been right,
Any credit I've earned or been given,
This box contains any mercy, any grace.
I have too much.
You can have anything I haven't already wasted.



Today I am grateful for the way she answered the phone, for her laugh. For once me not trying to avoid something.

that that he did for his kid

It's a comic strip about her and him.

Today I am grateful to know a dad and his daughter.

day one, sneaky

You had to trick yourself to get here.
Tell yourself you're going to get a picture.
Then return home to share it with someone.



Today I am grateful for a boss who understands, an hour spent bettering myself, and an old camp.

guaranteed

This guy.


Did I just try to distract us from hiking?




Today I am grateful for distractions and the kindness of those who allow me to be distracted by them. For a hill, a countdown, a rainy weekend.

sunday

Rest.

on the return to Como (list)

I have to walk in on my own.
I need the first night alone.
Take photos.
Pray.
Sit on the porch.
Listen to the fountain.
Listen to music.


Grateful for tough questions.

the ostriches

"I'm sorry you feel that way."
                      Bill Burr



I was going to make him watch it. Tempted him with a morning movie, rain, food, and ostriches. Nothing worked so I called her and asked, "Am I a monster?"

She laughed.

"Hear me out."

"Okay. I'm listening."

"I seriously just want to make him do something."

"Like what?"

"Like watch Bill Burr because he liked comedy."

"Okay."

"Why do I want to make him do something if he's already doing what he wants to do."

"I don't know."

"What's Mark doing?"

"He says he's taking care of my pool."

I laughed.




Today I am grateful for grapes, cherries, chicken in the jambalaya, and all the tap water anyone could drink, an awesome friend who listens to my absurdity, and the upcoming call from a kid who may have teased that I only have room for one man in my life.


No, no, no. I only have room for one great kid and never am I not grateful for him.

just a short this hurts

We're at the stage of Go, Hokies. When Beamer was there before even the eldest Vick came. When the last thing you have left is a football game. Virginia is for lovers was one of the first things I said. What a ridiculous thing to say, but it's the state that should be blamed. Or a time or place or who knows what that was, but I do know it stung.

Like the first half of a football game when you're winning but not by much and halftime is when you pull every struggle, every victory, every defeat you ever had inside you and dare I say it,

Rise up. but not with him.


You have to. or not.


Today I am grateful for the lessons tonight's win taught me.

it's all about home, man

You can feel it.

why he wears flip flops

They are brown with braiding, a nice leather sole made for a guy whose feet can be trapped in boots up hills and out in the woods. He puts them on for an occasion. A slide his feet in forward motion, keep going till he's laid back on a couch. His feet crossed in front of him. Toes and tan and smooth skin. It's quite beautiful.



Today I am grateful for an alarm, for ibuprofen, for a friend who asked about him and one who wanted to know about his shoes.


Remember this? I showed it to him.

it's a privilege

It's a good sign. He smiled.
It's crickets and quiet and noticing how beautiful it all is.
We laugh because it's gotta be good for you every now and then.

It's a truck in the yard.
Flip flops and a porch.
Sharing steps with a man.




Today I am grateful for our hike.

laugh out loud

She is going away for a short reminder of all the reasons she loves him. The way he can be with the grandchildren, the way he can be with the kids, the way he sneaks down the hallway and jumps out to surprise them. "Boo," he says.

Some things just make you laugh out loud.




Like the little girl who now follows your camera around, and some of the funniest photos are the ones where she seems to be standing by everybody individually. You can't help but love her.




Today I am grateful for how the hours pass.

people projects can't stop counting

She says appreciative at the end of sentences and I understand. It's a lunch and questions and getting to know each other. I look forward to it. She's real in an in front of you way. She dresses like a rockstar and has the energy of a lot of horses. Eating while we're talking will be a frenzy, and I'll enjoy writing about it.


I could be enthralled with him. Because he calls before he was supposed to and we sound old because we feel age and we agree. We like who we are and where we'll be. That wasn't always easy.

We simply plan to walk.

"What do you love about it?"

"It's just that I wouldn't change anything. I mean, I didn't do what all my friends did, but I do what I want to do and my life has been good. I've got good friends, good family. I love what I do."

There is a warmness to him, a kind soul and spirit. A be and let be type of music, but I don't dare ask yet. It was just one phone call which for me is pretty much a date. So the walk will be our second one.

How many dates do you have to go on before you ask,

"What do you listen to?"

Can you fall in love with a person's music?

What I hope he says is, "Crickets and ceiling fans, the air conditioner running, and someone who loves what they're doing."


Today I am grateful for the ability and the time to hear and see the people around me.



(maybe I can get him to agree that he'll think of me if it ever rains on a Sunday afternoon)

ignite the imagination

He's dreamy in an outdoorsy way. The closest thing I know to Mickey Smith in this county. And I don't even know that to be true. I obviously have questions to ask him.

...like...


What is it that you love about it?



Would it be too much to ask that he tell me a story?


Today I am grateful to now know that there is no need to plan everything because good can happen even without me trying to plan every moment of it.


Or bad. I don't know. It's just a hike.

life is a circle

Same song.
Different weather.

all love is tragic

It's the perfect call on a perfect day at 5:29 a.m. He needs me, and I need to be needed.

"Can I edit photos while I do that?"

"Sure."

"Do you have to listen to me?"

"Sure."


Today I am grateful for a place, a space, an old friend.





It could be that my mouth gets me into trouble.
That may be why I want to keep putting a cigarette in it.
Ridiculous notion I would have a clue on the method behind your madness.
But I still open it, my mouth that is.
Opening my mind before my mouth would be advisable.
I'm trying. my best? trying, I guess.


Grateful for people who are tolerant of me.







It's today already.
Let's you and me call this one the day we can do anything.

selfish day

Here we are in our favorite place outside a brick building parked perfectly.
No air, no radio, little light here.
I create a crisis in my head pretending to lose my mind just so he'll calm me.

And he does.
So I just start writing absurdities.

It's okay. I am not going to quit my day job or night job either.
I just like having him here.


Today I am grateful for time to feel.



It is just a little for creativity, for thinking to yourself, "Man, that would be awesome."
So you do it.
And it's the best part of your day.
Because it's the way they say them, the words you ask them to say.


Today I am grateful for what feels like a gift.




It's the phone calls, the sleep.
It's doing everything to please them because pleasing them pleases me.


Today I am grateful for the opportunity to please them/me.




And yeah. We won. So there's that.

false advertisement

notalove song

miles in a day. the never ending debate.

Twenty-six miles with thirty-five pounds on his back. The inclination is as much as they call it the stairway to heaven. He missed those two top points because in the foot placement, rock facing, trees marked way, he forgot to zag on the zig and ended up in heaven just off the trail a bit.


I yell out to the office, "He's out of the woods." They are all concerned mothers, and we're just making it day to day. There's a general whoop in acknowledgment and I get on a bus with air. Twenty-six miles is nothing for me. I think I'm going to tell him that when we talk this weekend.



Today I am grateful for miles in a day and for the different ways we can spend them.







He doesn't show up and there seems to be a crisis somewhere. I don't dare ask. I just say, "Let me know if I can help." In that moment all I can do is allow him to be who he needs. I think that must mean you know it is in love in a possibly not infinite but definitely not greedy way. Though I must admit, I've begged to see him.

"Anywhere, anytime," are words that do not shame me. They reveal a vulnerability of the most horror movie anything can happen path to a sure awful place.

There was only one question I had decided to ask after I jumped from behind the restaurant's front door and yelled, "Boo," when he entered.

No, I wouldn't do that. But he would have laughed.

There was only one question, and from someone who tries to consider herself a writer, you know it had to be a good one. Much scarier than jumping from behind a door. I had already planned the sabotage. The question he had to look in my eyes to answer would have only contained the following words,

"Mickey Smith. You have to say it. You have to tell me over a small filet and a shrimp poboy why, oh why, dear sweet man, could you not love Mickey Smith?"

And he would have laughed again.

And then said it.

And that would be the best lunch ever.

But it didn't happen so I sent a letter.

Grateful that he will read it.

hack of a writer

It's a bustling office with foot traffic like an afternoon school pick up. And if there is anyone who's going to help you get through this, it's the people in this room and the guy in a tent on a mountain tonight. I wait in the hopes I don't get in their way asking for as little as I can when they get a break.

Man, I feel needy to want to help them.


Today I am grateful for people.

playlist no. stop counting

The Lumineers//Live in New Orleans//Full Concert on YouTube

don't fall in love with a writer

She loves writing a love story and could be slightly obsessed with endings. And music. And every love song is a love song to you. And you leave today. And she's scared to need you.

But that has created something that is more remarkable then she's ever seen.
And what if all you both were ever doing was writing a story.



Today I am grateful to understand that I am not the only one who needs you and well, you're you. sweet.


Still one of my favorite love songs here.

simple feels good

Today I am grateful for honesty, for open minds and doors, for how we both laughed without saying a word. For air conditioning, water with ice, and a car that made it home.


This day called for a tiny desk.

playlist

Hate myself for loving them.
But I like songs about stones.

but what if that was really the photo

It's like taking your last photo in direct sunlight and then walking into a restaurant, pulling out your camera, turning it on, pushing a button, and realizing you're now indoors and thinking, Oh well, that's trash.

Then getting home and realizing you like the contrast.

dare I admit

That I am as excited and nervous and impending beauty in love with nine hours from here.
So enamored that I may not get any sleep.



Today I am grateful for a struggle created from within.

From
It's fixin' to happen
to
Shut up.

steered

Today I am grateful for those things that steer us. Lunch under tiny lights with a friend, dinner with many, volunteering, a phone call from him, her involvement, and how a day off becomes a day on when you finally lay your head on the pillow thinking I did okay.


Darling you're with me always around me Sunday music.

push pull

It's the ocean in November. Backpacking on a beach when the wind is heavy and cool and your favorite hoodie and the birds and the sound is original music. Four days of walk, write, camp, complain, sunscreen, water need, and shoes for the sand.

Oh Dear Sand, I do not want to be your enemy. How many miles can we complete?



Today I am grateful for plans and a boss who understands that need.

what if

"I'll take care of my responsibilities on this end,"
was the most romantic thing you ever heard a man say?


And your most romantic reply was, "Please edit me editing you."



Today I am grateful for what I've learned from an excellent teacher.


Cue music.

acting like this means something

Today I am going to think of her and how she smiled when I bragged to her mama on what she had done. And if everything falls apart and nobody comes and the air conditioner goes out and the lights don't work and we have to use our safe word, I am going to be grateful that we took this opportunity to establish it.




I am already grateful for a phone call, a text, and laughter. That stuff is gold.


Also, today's first song. Didn't see that one coming.