Closure

8 months, 5 days.

January 2nd to September 7th.

We'd endured 5 months of long distance, 3500 miles of driving, 1400 miles in flight, hours on the phone, parent-imposed curfews, a summer of work - not play, finals week, midterms, two moves, family members departing, pleasant surprises, gifts, emergency lunches, thrift shop trips, walks, piggybacks with sisters, a mission call, sushi, picnics - both sunlit and candlelit, slurpees, a first (and second and third) taco, movies, car cleaning, sunsets, moonrises, a roommate's wedding reception, libraries, reading under a trampoline, sunsets, moonrises, hikes, adventures, getting lost, getting found, ward hopping, homicidal mothers yelling EY!, indian food, implications, selfishness, forgiveness, selflessness, miscommunications, falls, band aids, private whispers, screams of delight, exhaustion, promises, plans left undone, plans completed, exhilaration, love.

I've never felt this way about anyone before, and I fear I never will again.

Last weekend as we held each other on my doorstep, it felt different. I loved him, but didn't need him. Things were ending, whether I wanted them to or not.

Last week as I'd walk across campus I'd see couples holding hands or lying in the sun. I hated them. I hated them for having something I couldn't. My Scott was gone, but on Saturday I'd show them.
This week when I see a woman leaning her head on her man's shoulder, her eyes closed; when I see a couple necking passionately in their own owrld in the middle of the bustling hallway, there was no jealousy. There was no hate. My Scott really was gone.

I was expecting to break up with him, not to break up with each other. It was entirely mutual, unlike the inception of our relationship. He was always the first to pick me up, drive me home, put an arm around me, hold my hand, say "I like you," then "I've fallen for you," then lean in and kiss me. At the beginning he invested far more far quicker than I, therefore I wasn't expecting him to be done before me. I was expecting to lay it all out, step aside, and let m stubborn, insistent side carry me through the subsequent and expected waves of misery.
No, he knew it had to be over, just as I did the last night we saw each other.

At times I wish I had my tenacity on my side, but it's lain dormant as of late. Instead there's something else, something deeper. Something that says "I don't know what's going to happen tomorrow, much less in the next couple years, but it'll be all right." I'm sad, but I'm not morose. I'm not curled in a fetal position surrounded by a halo of chocolate wrappers. It just feels right, and my tenacity isn't insisting that I be wrong.

Scott has been my best (albeit only) boyfriend, but also one of my best friends. He is my best guy friend, and one of the best men I've ever known. Despite his protests, he has been the absolute best I've ever had.

Scott, I love you.

Thank you for teaching me how.

Best February Ever

February is always the time when it won't snow, and the snow won't melt. It feels like winter will never end, and the cold wind will never stop blowing. It's the month to crave watermelon, lemonade, and corn on the cob. It's midterm season. The nights still start early. The mornings start early too. Earlier than I get up...

Maybe that's why this February seems different from the rest. Maybe it's because I'm out on my own. Maybe it's because this year midterms actually mean that the semester's half over. Maybe it's because I am actually in a relationship. Maybe it's because I'm in a relationship that is mutual and both of us are happy where we are. Maybe it's because I'm living on my own.

Regardless, I've got a bucket of chocolate next to me, a new teddy bear to cuddle, and it's not unbearably hot in my apartment.

Quite honestly, I'm glad my boyfriend lives two hours away. It makes the time we have together special. And that time together is usually on the weekends when i refuse to study. which means our time is both special AND unstressed!

my boy can read my mind. If i didn't like it so much it would almost be scary.
my boy makes me laugh. which is a far cry from what the last few could do.
my boy speaks fluently to my father.
my boy will let me bite him.
my boy knows what really matters and will put that first.
my boy loves me for who i am, and doesn't ask for anything else.

thank you scott. thanks for everything.

Because I CAN

(CNN) -- Was it a theft? A prank? A roundabout effort to bring some holiday cheer to the police? Authorities in Harwich, Massachusetts, are probing the mysterious appearance of a piano, in good working condition, in the middle of the woods.

A police officer examines an oddly placed piano in the woods of Harwich, Massachusetts.



Discovered by a woman who was walking a trail, the Baldwin Acrosonic piano, model number 987, is intact -- and, apparently, in tune.

Sgt. Adam Hutton of the Harwich Police Department said information has been broadcast to all the other police departments in the Cape Cod area in hopes of drumming up a clue, however minor it may be.

But so far, the investigation is flat.

Also of note: Near the mystery piano -- serial number 733746 -- was a bench, positioned as though someone was about to play.

The piano was at the end of a dirt road, near a walking path to a footbridge in the middle of conservation land near the Cape.

It took a handful of police to move the piano into a vehicle to transport it to storage, so it would appear that putting it into the woods took more than one person.

Asked whether Harwich police will be holding a holiday party in the storage bay -- tickling the ivories, pouring eggnog -- while they await word of the piano's origin and fate, Hutton laughed. No such plans.

Harwich police have had some fun, though. Among the photos they sent to the news media is one of Officer Derek Dutra examining the piano in the woods. The police entitled the photo "Liberace."

A good friend just sent this to me, knowing my penchant for pianos, strange occurrences, and forestry.

The thought that comes to mind is for my dream house, which WILL include a round living room whose walls are entirely windows. In the exact center of this room will grow a tree. A tree whose leaves inspire the Greeks, and whose bare branches scrape ones soul. (also can't be fruit bearing... Cuz I don't want fruit rotting in my house. And it can't be poisonous for dogs, but i digress)

Beneath this tree will sit a piano. Not just any piano, but a Black Steinway 3/4 Grand Piano.

(Not like this one.)

And I will be happy.

And I'll hang white string lights from the tree...
And I could build a treehouse in the tree...
And I can rake my living room in the fall...
And if its a flowering tree I'll play my piano in the midst of cascading petals
And I'll play my piano in the midst of cascading leaves in October
And the moon will shine through my transparent ceiling and I will play for her, just as she has played for me.



And it's totally never going to happen.
but a girl can dream, right?

we are not alone.

he calls himself god's version of a crash test dummy. a sick and twisted soul.
i don't see that in him.

what do i see?

i see a confused child, wondering, wandering.

he has some inclination of where to go but he gets distracted by shiny things along the way.
he picks up the glitzy trinkets, fingering them, awed by their brightness.
he forgets that it's just the trash left over from another person.

the trash consumes his vision, his hands, his mind. he sits down on the side of the road and just stares.

sometimes he realizes that it's crap, and moves along a little farther. he keeps walking a little bit. until he forgets what's trash and what's not and picks up a sequin shard and marvels at that instead.

sometimes he finds a truly fantastic piece of trash, marvels at it longer, and then puts it in his pocket to take out occasionally while walking.

the thing is he's so fascinated by the crap in his hands, in his pockets, that he can't look up. He can't bear to see what makes the shiny things shine in the first place (the sun)
he can't bear to see the true beauty around him - the beauty he can't take with him, the beauty that is even more so when he keeps going further.

i know he's seen glimpses.
but his pockets are simply too full.


STRIP IT OFF AND RUN NAKED. I DARE YOU.

i know you know you want to.

you can know what it's like to be free.

i promise.

raptures and reveries

one of my dear friends recently said that she thinks that heaven must feel like getting into your bed after a long day.

she's right. it does. and yes,
i know what death feels like.

i was walking in the cemetery after dark. alone. it was mid-october.

i felt, i felt, nothing.

i couldn't feel my hands at the end of my arms, nor the toes at the end of my feet. but i wasn't cold.
and i didn't care.

i walked on, slowly. not wondering at it, but just taking it in. i didn't need to think about it.

i could see a full 180 degrees around my head, every angle with equal clarity. i didn't need to look over to see it, my mind simply concentrated on that spot and i knew what was there.

i was still alive - i could only see 180 degrees. i knew that if i had been dead i could see the entire sphere around my head. if i was dead i'd be able to see the ground below me concurrent with the sky behind me.

i walked on, hearing the sounds around me. i had no reaction for them, for they didn't matter. they weren't distant, i was.

i didn't need to breathe.

nor did i need my body.

it was like falling asleep after a really long day.