Four Walls II: Destination...Or Hallucination?

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It's funny to me that the one paragraph that was my last thought, an after-thought, really, is what keeps me daydreaming on my bike ride this morning. Comments from readers and friends spurring me on in my thinking, my processing, my feeling. Two men in my life who mean much to me responded to my writing. Their responses were quite different. I'm mulling over their words, his words, his words, and his/his thoughts, perspective, feelings. Suddenly it is so clear to me.

I remember a day in San Francisco a few years ago. Sitting back in the apartment, windows open to the brisk autumn evening fog. Listening to the sounds of a concert in the park. I remember thinking "Oh, I should go to that concert, they're right there!". The music rippling through the breeze and into my heart. I relaxed into the love, my soul whispering, "Oh, my gosh, it was such a joy." The memories warmed me as a blanket wrapping itself around me. I was there again. I lay back listening to the faint sounds drifting across the fields, soaring over the lake, music, the joyful cheering, friends and lovers cover the ground enthralled with the music. "Incredible." Slowly, sneaking into my head, crawling under the surface, "I don't HAVE to do go there. Just because I've done it before, just because it was lovely then." I already live in the memory, the love of all the other times.

This morning, I think I recognize that in my longing for a partner, a lover. Really, my true love came to me more than once, in different packaging. We dream, we love, we sing, we dance, we shed tears together and laugh at the possibilities. Each moment, every touch, the tiny-est hush of love. "Oh, yes, that was wonderful. It is."

My one true love is with me always, each and every one of them. Each different as night and day. I don't need to keep looking for it, him, or him, or... The love is mine to keep.

My life now is such that I could almost explode from the love that surrounds me, holds me, lifts me up. No need to go looking for it. I shake my head in disbelief that I would walk right past it.

I wouldn't, couldn't fly with a dove. I shouldn't, mustn't, bypass my love. It's right in my fingers, in so many flavors I could scream.

Four Walls

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"Life is what happens when you're busy making other plans." John Lennon

I've had few years of living by myself. Each and every one wonderful, filled with warmth, happily dancing through skies dotted with lyrical life lessons. Living within four walls. Peace and quiet. Happy laughter, joy, tears, beginnings and endings. Marriage and partnerships, yes, have been a big part of my life. History lessons. After a while, 'the children' grew up, sprouted their own wings and flew off to their dream-scapes. I sung the joy in the watching.

Very soon, through a series of changes, I will have family living within these four walls again. I find myself full of such joyful anticipation in their company, each of us leaning on our love, strength and patience as our walls no doubt fill with expansion.

Coming down the pike is a good lesson in interdependence vs independence. Society has encouraged independence for such a long time. As I look at it with wiser heart and older vision, I think we're missing out. The stories that each of us share every day, the generations melding together in daily life. Not just on a holiday weekend that is quickly over and done with, arms filled with goodbyes 'til the next time.

As a friend so accurately put it, bringing the tribe together, even for a short time, paints such a smile on my only slightly wrinkled face. I can't wait to enjoy each and every minute we have together. And yet, I'm already planning my own travel again, giving them space, gaining my own.

And Yes, I must admit, I still long for that one true love who wants to spend the rest of his life with me. Because of who I am. Because we love and treasure the company of one another. Fun, passionate, philosophical, kind, patient. The one who will do anything to have me around. So far, that guy has eluded me.

Oooohhhh, I think I see a new headline, I hear the walls bursting open...

Dinner Dancing

The evening ends, brightly blooming into night. Exhausted, excited all scrunched up. How can we be so tired and have so much to say and have so little energy left for which to wrap up? Life is a million moments racing through our day.

Loving tunes young women and old sing out with every sweet breath as they sigh at the full moon. The moon. I belongs to every set of eyes in the universe. You. Me. Her. Him. Them. Us. Pain eats at me when I think of the simplicity of it all. And how terribly sad it is that so many don't see it. I understand love. And peace. And I understand when it's missing from our life, and the world that wraps us up in it.

Hoping. and running. laying and rolling. skipping. riding. loving. love-ing. loving with every bit of your heart. comes so naturally. to me. to you.

Thoughts fleeing. write about work. write about life. write about love. write about broken hearts. broken dreams. rainbows. a cool river in the heat of the day. a tire-swing rolling out across the rippling coolness and dropping me right into the current.

Fear, longing, anticipation. Joy. Love. Excitement. Happiness. wet. dry. sober. drunk. high. alive. alive. alive. alove. a-love. alone.

Painful. Again. Why? Why not? travel to foreign lands. Afghanistan. Thailand. Brazil, Peru, Chile, Argentina. Cuba. philippines. Coventry. Adana. Liege. NYC. Aspen. Perth. seaside, mountain streams, snow covered peaks.

laying my head down for the dreams I never know.

The nothing. the whole ball of wax.