A rainy September day...

September 17th, 2020

It has been months…maybe even years since I have written merely for the sake of writing and the emotional disgorgement of the things that I no longer need or want in my life. A brief respite from the chronic evil that lurks within each case I have worked, the depravity of the killers who have preyed upon the innocent and the endless pain of those left behind to deal with their carnage. Their weight, has become part of my chain.

A breather then, dear Lord.

A month or two of just living and not consuming or being consumed by the responsibility of others fears and forgiveness.

The trials of this year—nay, the last decade have brought me from one reality to an altogether different one, where incarnate angels who once danced only on top of Christmas trees and Holy cards now grace the edges of my front lawn and whisper in small voices in the night…who carefully craft my every thought and present visual cues that casually embroider my every moment of existence now. The numbers... the images... the patterns...the ever amazing Holy Shit' moments, as they have become known by my followers.

To them…my gratitude, my wavering grace and my joy and pain.

I have taken a breather from the literary world to tend to my own emotional garden for a season. The leaves have begun to turn…to dot the feathered pine straw and paint the endless gray of asphalt that takes me from home to places that keep me busy but perhaps not fulfilled.

Today with coffee hot and temper cooled, I will try to walk into this season with a happier heart and a kinder soul. I have missed the influence of those who have taught me patience, the gift of laughter and the kindness of silence, when sometimes bitter words would rather break the bull works of my tightly clenched lips.

In these last few months of induced solitude, I am reminded of a poem written by Rod Mc Kuen…

"Caught in the quiet

Off on our own

Coming together…

Leaving alone"

And how is that possible…to be more alone, even when alone, we are never alone?

There have been moments this year of unanswered certainty and uncertain answers that have betrayed one another and my flimsy desires; mostly out of my own ignorance. Challenged by external forces, I painted myself on different horizons because I thought they were the only horizons left to me and then, a tap on the shoulder showed me another path I had not thought possible…or necessary. And yet the very moment that path was presented…I knew it was the only road home and the absurdity of it to all others would never matter.

Because I have learned, what truly matters…is only what matters to me.

So, I apologize…

To God, to the universe, to myself and to those who will never know the silent aching suffered for or because of them. I forgot they were gifts. I forgot I was a gift. Time has a way of trading our emotions as commodities in some unending twist of fortune that we fear we cannot control and yet, that fear directs its very course.

To each a season...

I will miss the sand, though it was never really mine to own.

I will miss the wind, though other trees will bring it to me.

I will miss the sun and the shade, though they are omnipotent and not mine to direct.

But maybe, I will miss the me I was here most of all…and yet, in truth…I know she has already left me.

Already the path has begun to change, along with the season and I know that it is time to go. The roads will change, the scenery will be different and I will learn to love that too. A new view from my driver’s window…a new hour of bewitching, as the sun finds its sweet spot in the Western sky. The moon will strike new obscurities across the lawns in the crispness of fall…altered definitions will begin to draw another portrait in the quiet voids of winter…the gravel misplaced by eager and willing tires will become my newly cherished mosaics and I will joy in the depth of the evergreens and the ever grays of a new landscape, when the rains find no reason to relent. All this too, shall become a part of me. The rustic stones I leave behind will give way to the pocked pallets’ of salted slate that will welcome me to a new but older front door that will test my emotional balance—if I dare to look back.

If I simply breathe and stop for just one minute to embrace the passage of time…well-worn boards will shift under the weight of my beloved furniture and anchor my heart to new shadows and new perceptions that will burst forth from the other side of foreign windows. Old memories, like old curtains will fade and all will become part of the landscape of my life; threadbare and well-traveled. I will come to treasure them, as have I the reflections of deep green waters dancing across my ceilings on their way into the night. For me, the frenetic ripples will forever rest there at the edge of a frame, as I can never return. But the universe will replace these small treasures with something else...something bittersweet.

Perhaps a soft snowfall will make for better footprints than sand, taller trees for longer shadows to match hard-sought wisdom in my later years. Them and me, one day to lay exhausted at the edge of the woods together, both knowing that we have done our best to share the light that trickles ever so sweetly between the edges of our weakened limbs.

Another sip of coffee...

Another memory...

Another adventure...

Another chance to just be...me.

Just a thought on a rainy day in September, 2020.