Landmarks

I have been awash, away.
A river of cardboard boxes, paint rollers, memories, plans.
I have been wandering aimlessly crosscurrent, barking my shins on the newness of things.
At some point I picked up my feet and let the current take me where it would.

It has taken me away.
Away from endless words and constructions of small sentence empires.
Away from the interior decoration of my own skull and into the other muscles in my frame.
The ones that scoot and lift and tote and adjust and fold and hang and sweep away the debris of change.

My words have leaked outward into the necessary conversations of conversion to a new locale.
The words to comfort, soothe and share excitement with tiny people overwhelmed.
The words for new things - that bit of hardware that holds a drawer in place, the properties of machines that cut grass, the jargon, syntax, rhythm, grammar of finding a toothbrush, a cherished doll, a clean pair of socks.

I have floated and tossed, awash, away on the strength of will to do this one last thing before I sleep.
My life preservers of ibuprofen, glucosamine, chondroitin, tied together with an Ace bandage to hold in the tiny screams of old injury - they float with me, crashing into the mattress every night to sleep with mouth agape, arms outflung, dreamless and sinking, sinking, sinking like a well-tossed stone.

My life preservers in the daylight hours besides an endless stream of coffee are the crooked smiles and still-small hands that seek comfort in my own, the strong back and quiet patience of a man who rises early, works a day, comes home and works another day again before he gets to sleep beside me.

I have been awash for days, neglecting things that matter for things that matter more.
I have come ashore in a new place, different from where I started, but my senses remember this is a place I've stood so many times before.
I have come ashore with creaking joints and have prized apart my rusted chest of words. It screams and groans with the effort and resists the light of day.
I tire with the effort and make excuses to walk away, to leave it where it sits, to convince myself it does not contain treasure but only silt and slime and small dead fish who lost their way.

I have sat on this stubborn, heavy trunk I carry with me everywhere I go and gazed into the foggy night of acquiescence and there, like beacons in the distance, a steady winking string of lights that flash and catch my eye. These are landmarks I know, they are the presence of a familiar, comforting path, not so far away as it feels.

These are landmarks. These are you. Your words. You continue through the night. Your struggles, preoccupations, triumphs, mundane - they are not mine, but they continue on simultaneous, steady and intermittent, the blips on sonar that show the contours of a shoreline that I've been drifting right beside.
They are you.
Standing there and patiently blinking until I realize I'm not drifting.
I'm tethered not so far from shore.


This is dedicated to the loyal readers and writers who have inexplicably shared this whole writing escapade with me thus far. With special thoughts for Deb at Kicking Corners who is working down to a final deadline and asked for others to share what inspires us along the way. Without a doubt, my inspiration comes from all of you. You who read and share and believe what I sometimes find impossible - that I can do this writing thing. You who write and share and say amazing things in ways that I never even considered before. I love this cacophony of voices more than I can say.

When Words Fail

Words are my medium. The ability to construct sentences and string them together and convey some sort of message is kinda my thing. Sometimes I'm quite good at it. It is often soothing for me to sit and write. My preferred method is good old journal and pen, but the computer works, too. I've been recording observations about people and life ever since I could hold a pencil. I can't really remember a time in my life without my journals. My silent friends that beckon, open leafed with blank pages for me to fill; or that sit patiently where I left them, never complaining if they're neglected. My empty space to let off fumes, make lists, think in ink, to doodle, rhyme, jot, scribble, store important scraps of other paper, to bleed. These reams of playgrounds for my words, where I can make them twist, jump, spin, climb the monkey bars and slide. But sometimes, as soon as I get to these magical play lands for words, the words just sit down and pout. They don'wanna come out and play! [Insert stomp and pout here]

I get pen-tied for any number of reasons, most of them mundane. Regardless of the cause, the effect is always the same. The words are swimming for their lives in all directions, just churning the murky waters of my brain. It's like a shipwreck in there. All screams and bobbing body parts and splinters. The lifeboat's gone mysteriously missing, so the only sensible thing to do is to let them all drown and then pick over the carcasses later for treasure. 

Today's one of those days. But it also happens to be Day 4 of NaBloPoMo and I'm determined to see this thing through. I've been rendered speechless today by the nattering of a thousand things that will not wait their turn for my attention. So while I wait for them all to settle down and stand still, I'll let the Brothers Avett do my talking for me. Those sweet boys from North Carolina hang out with me in all kinds of weather, but they really came through with flying colors on this otherwise gray day. Here's the song they sang for me a lot today. 

"Decide what to be and go be it."