driving home

I saw the sun rise today. It's pink hues backlit the San Gabriel Mountains. I remember mornings when I was younger, laying in bed and watching the light (the miracle of light) gradually give shape, color and texture to the objects around me. How strangely they emerged from obscurity, carved out of darkness.

There's something beautiful about the world at rest, before the house stirs and the mechanics of our daily lives are set in motion. The streets are empty and the birds have not yet begun their chirruping. It was like that this morning. Driving home with the windows down I could feel the moisture in the air. Cool and clingy, it was dew settling on every still-calm or sleeping thing.

flowers from the Faire

Yesterday I had a hard time. I was having a hard time and it was looking like I might not find support. But support arrived. It arrived bearing gifts of affirmation. It arrived and didn't shun me for being a mess. It arrived drinking Pellegrino and smoking cigarettes. It arrived. It looked me in the eyes and told me I was worthy of love. And when, at these words, I began to cry, it kissed me. The kiss of kindness and understanding. So much so that today I am still tempted to believe.

Hope is a delicate thing.

It is also a hard thing.
How difficult it is at the onset to let it into your heart.
Your stubbornly armored heart.
Then it is harder still to hold onto.
And before all is said and done you may be asked again
To muster your courage.
For the hope that has to be let go of.

picking up the tab

Yesterday's rejection was the realization of one of my worst fears. So much so I have to ask myself if I didn't somehow make it happen. But, once I begin searching my faults for answers, I never seem to stop. There are too many to keep account and besides, on our own it is nearly impossible to have the full story.

But it's true that what we don't know about ourselves can hurt others. Avoiding putting people we care about through unnecessary pain is not the only reason for deep introspection and soul-searching, but it's not a bad one either. No one else should be asked to pick up the tab for our troubled histories or the agendas of our never-quite-satisfied personalities. 

I see in myself an inclination to avoid responsibility. But I want to be the kind of person who runs to, not from, these. Runs. I'll never accomplish my Aim if I keep moving in its opposite direction.

born to nun

For a long time now I've held the belief that continuing to pursue my Aim in any real way requires a life of abstinence from romantic love and the long-term company of another. Sometimes I believe it is because I am unsuitable, sometimes I believe it's because of a lack of suitable partners. I'm not sure it really matters which, probably neither is the case. And why I decided this would be my sacrifice, I'm still not sure. But sometimes I wish I would just let it go. 

On this day I tangoed. You must really love something to endure dancing not one, but three songs each with Mr. Sweaty-Shakes, Dances-So-Close-I-Can-Taste-His-Cologne AND Kama-Sutra Man. I'm not at all sure on this night I fully embraced the concept of "suffering cheerfully", but at least I know where I can go to practice it - along with my back ochos and molinete.

On this day I was forced to ride a creaky-ass bicycle to Abbott Kinney where I had brunch with another under a canopy of bougainvillea whilst sitting on a milk crate next to a leaky faucet and about 15 hungry finches eyeing my grub. It was a lovely day.

the fool

On this day I renewed my wish to keep an open heart in the face of things shifting and uncertain. If I stay present with myself and with others, if I trust what I've learned and who I am, things tend to work out. If, in the course of following my heart, I appear foolish to others, this is a consequence I am ready to accept. Today.

On this day I was fucking moody and surprised at how maladjusted I seem to be to EVERYTHING.

On this day I knelt in someone's lawn and prayed in the moonlight.

On this day I was happily distracted by the seeds of some rare and nasty malady taking root. It could simply be infatuation or, dare I say it, some deeper, longer-lasting kind of affection. Time will tell. 

reaching out

Yesterday I practiced guitar in a new room. At first I only saw how the light fell on everything, how beautifully and gently it brought the things around me to life. Then my attention wandered outside to the birds and the stirrings of a Sunday afternoon in the neighborhood. I realized that the sound from my guitar can be like light too, touching everything. And through it, the fingers of my attention, like appendages, reach out beyond me. How playing need not displace a single bird song or shift a ray of sunshine. That music can go wandering, barefoot, from the heart without bending a leaf or snapping a branch underfoot. How full and grateful this makes me feel. 

I almost left you

last night
without reason.
You would have
come out and
found me gone.
Light touches all
manner of flesh
indiscriminate
and even,
illuminated
for a moment
by love. 

singlular

For every man I've ever truly loved there is a corresponding part of me that could almost separate itself from the whole in order to make him happy.

Except I can't. And as long as I'm living in this same world which requires that I be singular, that I be a whole and even more than that - a more whole-er whole than I thought possible - there's no room for splitting off and other worlds, only this one. It's all I have. And I'm so, so sorry. Can I ever stop being sorry? And will anyone ever forgive me for not being enough?

tango - men and women

Tension holds the dancers in place. Intention and direction get them moving - one active, one receptive, but both equally empowered. Music guides the way.