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Beauty is a mighty weight when really seen in its completeness.

I Walk the Line

I watched a movie tonight and I could only think of you. I remembered how you would sing to me and I would smile. I remembered how you danced with me and how we would laugh with joy as we spun and twirled until we were out of breath.  I also remembered how we know each other and what we have been through.  I remember the lives we have lived even though they weren't lived with each other. I remember when you told me you loved me and that you never said it again.  I remember how after you said it I felt your regret.  I can feel the joy intermixed with the heartache that I've felt in the arms of my friend.

The memories are so vivid that I can taste the Lucky Strikes in my mouth and feel the bits of tobacco on my tongue because I could never learn that twirl you do to the end.  I feel that emotion of frustration within me as if I were in that moment now.  I feel the joy. I feel the regret. I can hear the music and the song you sing and I am in your arms once again. 

I can feel myself being mad at you for being intoxicated and obstinate, and being independent and stubborn. Wait, that last part was me.  I can also feel the connection between us and I forget.  I remember the moments like they were yesterday of feeling like we were as one. I forget that you have this other life that I was never a part of.  I forget that you existed before I met you.   I think it comes from where and how we met.  It's almost as though you are a character that just appeared one day in the book I write about my life.

I did not know the day I met you that you would be more to me than just another person in that room.  That is the place I was in when I first met you.  I can only begin to imagine what place you were in even though I listened and heard the pain emanating from within you. I would see pieces of you in people I met through everywhere I traveled from that day onward.

The day I saw you again I felt a spark and realized just how much I missed you. I remember the day I started to pull away and I even knew why; I couldn't stop myself.  Did you know I was pulling away? Did you know I left? If you did, did you know why?  I cannot imagine that your conclusion would have been correct. Unless, that is, that you remembered what a stranger was saying so long ago as she talked in circles of fear and neglect amongst the thoughts of the terrified within that room in which we first met.

No road can be traveled to reach you at this moment; no letter can be sent.  I miss my friend and I cannot tell you that. So, I sit here on Christmas Eve as the clock turns to midnight writing to you knowing that even if you were on this continent tonight, my friend wouldn't be here to dance or to sing to me because your life is elsewhere and also because I left. 

Lost and Found

 

For those who search for what I've found
I sought for life's answers abound.
As I lay awake in bed at night
I search the world to see the light.
I know not what I'll do
but I make my lists to see things through.

I try and try, yet I make mistakes.
I search my world with all it takes.
I've learned a lot,
but my travels aren't through.
My life is just now starting anew.

I hold what's dear close to my heart.
My world just seems to fall apart.
My life has never been as it seems.
I lie in bed and search my dreams.

One day I dream to be happy and free
and to know myself just as Me.

--Me

Memory Book in My Mind

  
Laying here in the dark I flip through the memory book in my mind. The still shots and video play one by one as I pull them up to remember friends, places, and moments that have passed by. They are all there reminding me of courage, friendship, kindness, bravery, zest, freedom, audacity, goofiness, and fun. I feel the laughter that made my cheeks hurt, the hellos and goodbyes, the birthdays and the ceremonies, the trips down memory lane with old friends. I see stills of people only seen once that burnt into my soul. I see the pictures of the trips I took. I remember the time my mother woke me in the middle of the night when it snowed; we played in the flakes and giggled together as we snuck through the cold wet night.   I can hear the rumble of the car and feel the chill of the night through the window as I saw my first glimpse of the moon in the sky.  The moment of awe when I saw my first Leonardo da Vinci painting in the Hermitage and the minutes that ticked by as I wept in the presence of my favorite Monet in the Guggenheim are textured with life and beauty.

I feel the emotions and sensations of every scene. I can smell the wonderful scents of grandma's cookies and the orchid scented air with the first breath I took when stepping from the plane in Hawaii. I feel the heat of the heater on high with the wind blowing through the car in the old Taurus (so it didn't overheat) on an August trip with an old friend. I remember moments that made my heart skip and made the world feel still just because someone I admired spoke to me or whispered my name in kindness. I feel them all as if I were amid each moment yet again.

This one particular book is filled with reminders that life is filled with the little moments that make everything else seem worthwhile. No fire or natural disaster can take this book away. It is mine to hold on to. It contains the stories of my life.

Our minds hold our memory books from the beginning to the end.

42

How many people are trying to find their place in this world? How many have given up and are just here awaiting the end of their lives?  How many of the people do I see everyday go to sleep with a smile on their face or cry themselves to sleep, whether it be aloud or in their soul? 

Could this actually be Heaven or Hell, or even purgatory, a waiting area for our souls, trapped inside these physical temples of our minds?  Where are we? What are we?  We are humanoids on a tiny blue dot in the universe.  Do those questions even matter?  Does it matter that some of us spend our days and nights trying to understand the meaning of life?

I Googled the meaning of life one night.  The question was populated already.  How many others had searched for this answer on the Internet, the least likely place to find it?  I'm not sure there is an answer, at least not one that will make sense to any of us. 

Maybe our time here is what we make of it.  Maybe we are just suppose to be kind to each other and be a community of one?  Part of the problem with that is that all communities have outsiders, bullies, traitors, and thieves.  Our micro and macro communities (from our individual selves to our entire planet) have trials and tribulations.  Eternal and everlasting peace is not possible here on the tiny blue dot, nor within ourselves. All peace is temporary and sweet; from a quiet moment of enjoying a piece of warm pie, to a long walk on a sunny day, to countries getting along. 

On this planet, it is temporary.  Even what people consider to be Heaven and Hell is exclusive to those that follow certain paths.  What does this mean in regards to peace on earth or even within ourselves?  I'm not sure. I do not have these answers.  I have just many questions and speculations.  I search for the answers and I do not know why; and I question that, too.