In Waves

Orphan Puppy gets sick in the night. Spends hours pacing and by morning we are on high alert, our hearts breaking before our eyes, as she hangs listless from her bed. We prepare ourselves, yet again, and I go to work with heavy steps. But by afternoon, she is back to pitter-pattering around the apartment, inhaling food and wagging her tail at every flicker in the lights. I laugh, relieved and delighted at her antics, and she spends the afternoon snuggled next to me as I work. These days are tough our emotional sanity, but every good day in the wait, is still so much better than the alternative.

And suddenly I sit here with an airplane ticket in my inbox. The greatest solution to every itch, to every dead feeling, to every restless fear. A deadline looms, more like a promise than a stressor, and I ready myself to write lists and check them off in time for departure. I run through the nerves that need to be stretched, and paint the romantic images of spring in France to tempt my palate. France, spring, wine, work. Open roads and people to win over. A project of passion in the making, the passion long since there. I know there is much work to be done before this trip, I know there are obstacles to overcome. But the trip is worth the effort. The Trip is always worth the effort. That's what makes airplane tickets sparkle so.

Mantra

Every morning a new pillow, a new layout for the mapping. We wait for our next flight and cannot for the life of us remember if we’ve been there before. In thirteen years too many places seen and every ocean looks the same. This looks like that time I was living in Spain. This looks like when we drove through California. Tastes like chicken. Remember?

And still all I keep thinking is how little of this world I’ve seen. How short the life and how long the road.

If I want to see it all, I’ve no time to settle.

I’m grateful the question's been put to rest.

On Sand

Beaches. Stretching into foreverness, beaches. Miles of sand, squeaky sand under my toes and we never reach the end of it. We pass by the beach with the lifeguards; it is crowded. We learn to read the rip tides and stay on our unprotected stretches in solitude. It will tug at you, but if you survive, you are glad you went there.

We move in to the only inhabitable restaurant and bar in town; when they try to close up, we try to order another bottle. We end up bringing it with us when it's too late to stay: how young the bartenders. This is youth; we are too old to do it over. Stepping lightly onto the beach in the dark, we bring our screw cork with us, and the light house in the distance guides us. Somebody has built a fire but we stay in the black ink of our corner, drinking dredges and filling our clothes with sand. Bruises appear on my body but laughter bubbles in my chest. How dark the night, how light the evening.

If I could stay in this alternate reality forever, perhaps I might. Perhaps I should have, when the chance was offered.

What I've learned so far, is it's never too late to take your chances. It's really only you, who stand in your way.