"When you're in jail, a good friend will be trying to bail you out. A best friend will be in the cell next to you saying, 'Damn, that was fun'."
— Groucho Marx
“And Max, the king of all wild things, was lonely and wanted to be where someone loved him best of all.” Where The Wild Things Are
In the quiet of the evening I send my soul searching for yours and ask that it remind you of how two hearts stopped time. My eyes are shut but my heart is open and all I can do is hope that this time you will let yourself hear what your heart is saying.
This wish of mine stems from the dream we once shared. It is powered by both lust and love, heart and hope. It is a moment in time that remains framed in memory and formed from the fabric of the truth that we wish was and not the fiction of what wasn't.
Lost in a wilderness of wishes and wants I wander alone and uncertain wondering if the north star that once guided my heart can be lit again. Will you ignore my entreaty and defy that which we both knew to be true. That which once was can be again but this time bolder, richer, fuller and more rewarding.
There is a price to be paid for all that we wish, all that we seek and all that we hope and if you would but give me your hand I would pay it without question.
These dreams I dream and these visions I see demand a real response. I cannot extinguish the fire that we set nor quench the thirst that your absence has created.
And so I find myself still dancing in the fire.I burn and I ache....alone and apart.
Hand outstretched, sweat pouring down my brow I reach for you. I hold faith that our fortune was not fiction and trust that which was still is.
I cannot ignore this feeling nor pretend it doesn't exist. I cannot, will not and shall not. I would rather fail and fall than fall and fail.
"Come let me love you, let me give my life to you let me drown in your laughter, let me die in your arms let me lay down beside you, let me always be with you come let me love you, come love me again."
Annie's Song- John Denver
I don't have to tell you these things because you know them. I don't have to tell you these things for any other reason than you should know. You should hear out loud what your heart has forgotten and what time and circumstance have interrupted.
Yes, interrupted because you know as I do I that some things cannot be broken. Things may happen and events may suggest otherwise but the heart knows what the head refuses to accept. Logic and reason are not applicable here in the traditional sense of the words.
And to try to apply them is folly. To suggest that fate relies upon fact is indeed the biggest science fiction of them all.
There are moments and memories of moments that we cannot ignore. You should know that you are not the only one to fight these battles or feel these frustrations.
And if you would let yourself be freed from the shackles that you have affixed around your head and heart you would open your eyes and see mine staring back at yours. If you would take my hand and trust your heart we would do what we have always known we could.
It doesn't have to be a Whiskey Lullaby. The middle and the end of this story remain unwritten.
Your cheeks flushed with the night
We walked on frosted fields
Of juniper and lamplight
I held your hand
And when I awoke
And felt you warm and near
I kissed your honey hair
With my grateful tears
Oh I love you, girl
Oh I love you” For Emily Whenever I May Find Her- Simon and Garfunkel
Ten thousand years a boy asked a girl if she would take his hand and let him love her. Ten thousand years ago he kissed her once and wondered how he had ever said I love you to any one else.
He wondered because he had never felt so much love for anyone else. Not for his first love or any other. This was a feeling like no other he had experienced. That scared the boy more than he could articulate, describe or understand.
The girl in the story had no such troubles. She knew what she felt and knew what she wanted. She didn't need to process or sort through her feelings. Sometimes it frustrated her to see the boy she said was the love of her life be so close and yet so far away.
But she knew that sometimes boys needed more time than girls and she was willing to wait. It was just a matter of time before he realized that no one else could take care of him the way that she could.
That didn't mean that he didn't make her crazy because he did. He was a master at annoying her and he knew it. Normally that would have been the kiss of death for him except she couldn't stay angry at him. It was uncanny how easily he charmed her.
He knew how to press all of her buttons and he knew how to make her feel simply....wonderful. It was infuriating not to be able to stay angry with him.\
But how can you stay angry with someone who knows how to open your heart with a word and whose presence soothes your soul. You cannot and you don't.
At least that is what you think and what you feel- but sometimes things happen.
"If I could
Baby I'd give you my world
Open up
Everything's waiting for you
You can go your own way
Go your own way
You can call it
Another lonely day
You can go your own way
go your own way"
Go Your Own Way- Fleetwood Mac
They say that hindsight is twenty-twenty but whether that is true or not remains in the eyes of the beholder. Really it all comes back to perspective and the man who had been the boy readily admitted that he didn't have as much of that as he wished.
The girl and the boy who had loved each other with passion and promises never to let go had moved on and let go of that which had kept them together. The faith they held in each other had been tested and they had failed the test.
When push came to pull and pull came to shove they had fallen. Fingers that had been intertwined and hands that had been held were no more.
Time passed and the man wondered and wandered where it was he would bereft of the rock that had kept him centered. Slowly he crafted a witches brew of sadness, frustration and anger not recognizing that every drink was a poison that hurt his spirit and harmed his soul.
She was gone and though he had chased after her she had refused to listen. His heart told him that she wasn't really gone and that her silence was her defense. It argued against letting go and told him to give it time.
But his head called his heart a fool and named him weak and worthless. It deemed him a dupe, a chump and a silly knave who needed to get his priorities straight.
Time passed and the war between heart and head continued. Heart swore that some nights under cover of darkness she would come looking for him. It said that if he closed his eyes and held still he would see her come looking for him.
Head laughed at this but heart cursed and swore again that it was true. "She loves us still. Remember she told us that she would never be the first to say I love you. This is the same. She is waiting for us to contact her."
Head laughed again and told heart that he was a bigger fool than he thought.
Later on in the quiet of the evening as the lights went out and the world went dark heart and head heard soft singing. As they drifted off to sleep head conceded that maybe there was something more to what heart said, but when daylight came head pretended that he had never admitted that perhaps heart was right.
"She packed my bags last night pre-flight Zero hour nine a.m. And I’m gonna be high as a kite by then I miss the earth so much I miss my wife It’s lonely out in space On such a timeless flight"
Rocket Man- Elton John
Those words used to have more meaning and more resonance than they do today. Used to listen, close my eyes and remember the quiet Sunday mornings of days long since past. Breakfasts, lunches and dinners where we did nothing but stop time and share the moments.
Not much that you can do in space than live those memories. When you are hurtling around the cosmos at the speed of light you don't have the option to stop and turn around. Can't find a friendly gas station attendant to give you directions back home. They don't have florists that provide you with an armful of flowers that you can personally deliver.
It is much harder to present that personal touch when you are so far away even the math geniuses don't really understand it. You can write the most beautiful, heartfelt letter ever but it doesn't carry the same punch as the look on your face.
"And I think it’s gonna be a long long time Till touch down brings me round again to find I’m not the man they think I am at home Oh no no no I’m a rocket man Rocket man burning out his fuse up here alone"
Sometimes you think about how far you have come and you smile because you are that much closer to where you are going. That wistful smile that washes across your face is the reminder of the pride and satisfaction you take in your job and your journey.
Life isn't quite what you want it to be but you know that you are making progress. Every day it comes one step closer. And you think that maybe this is what it means to have faith. You think that maybe it is all about believing that each step has meaning and that one day you'll reach a place where you won't feel so much regret.
It is something that you actively work on. There is no place for regret in life. You know this and you have lived it....before. Now you need to learn how to live it again. Now you need to remember that sometimes heroes fail and that failure doesn't have to be forever.
Yet you feel that tug from down below and you remember that some losses aren't easily forgotten. Those pictures keep appearing because something or someone is trying to tell you that this one thing is so significant you cannot walk away from it. You cannot ignore it.
"Mars ain’t the kind of place to raise your kids In fact it’s cold as hell And there’s no one there to raise them if you did And all this science I don’t understand It’s just my job five days a week A rocket man, a rocket man"
Men are taught to hide that softer side. Told to be hard and to be strong. To be otherwise is to be less and no matter how much new age crap you read you can't figure out how less is more. Or maybe you can. Maybe you can come to accept that this is the path you are on and if you keep pushing you can influence it in more than a small way. Maybe if you keep walking you'll find that trail again.
Faith. It all comes back to faith. Faith in yourself and your convictions. Trust your instinct and your abilities. Believe. Live and learn how to love again.
And the story goes like this. It is almost 3:15 and you are working on 3.5 hours of sleep. It used to be a lot easier to get by on that little than it is now.
But you were 25 then and now you are 42 and some things are harder to hide. The lines in your face and hair that no longer completely covers your head bear evidence that time has not stood still. Not to mention your eyes, which seem to be missing some of their twinkle.
You are not really sure because you don't stare at them but you figure that with the weight you have been dragging around for so long there must be some impact. But what you really hope is that they show more determination and fight than anything else.
That is because you are a scrapper. Some people crumble when life gets hard. They lie down and pull the covers up over their head and pray.
Not you. You don't know how to give up. That has been among your greatest strengths and greatest weaknesses. Still, you prefer to think of it in positive terms because your attitude helps to dictate what happens.
When you think about the recent past you shake your head. Grandpa died, your sister got married and then you moved. And just when you thought that life was slowing down you got word about friends.
One lost her nine month old son and another one told you about how her mother and little sister died two weeks apart.
But that wasn't it, not by a long shot. One of the boys called to say that his girlfriend's cancer treatment isn't working any longer- the docs say that she has about a month.
And then when you really thought it was slowing down your brother-in-law got sick is lying in a bed in the ICU. Your little sister is freaking out a little bit and so is your nephew.
You have spent your entire life looking out for your little sisters so you put on your Big Brother Flak hat and took her under your wing. Because things happened so quickly your nephew heard terms like respirator and living will- terms that a fiver year-old shouldn't know.
But he does and he knows that they are talking about his daddy. So you put on your uncle hat and did some silly tricks that distracted him. It almost worked but then he got scared and started crying.
He wanted his mommy and nothing you did could make him feel better. Eventually his mommy came back from the hospital and they both slept at your house but you heard her crying in the bathroom.
You'd fight this illness yourself. If you could make it manifest itself in a corporeal form you'd take it on head to head and you would win because that is how these things go in fantasy. But this is real life and you don't know what will happen nor do the docs.
They have their expectations but you aren't willing to rest until you see a real recovery so you keep doing what you to support them.
And in the quiet of the dark you look out into the blackness and give thanks that things are as they are and not worse.
