Cut Short

They're all leaving as I arrive. He sits, alone, near the smallest pane of plastic. He looks at me, noting the distinct contrast, all the while knowing he only has one more stop. Two more sit down on the lower platform and spark up a cross aisle conversation. They're all wearing winter caps, reminding me of my full exposed scalp. She cries, over and over again. At first I think no one else can hear her. I study the portrait of their eyes. A glimmer. An age. A french word I don't know. I knew that they heard it in every vein. I knew they've heard it so long now it just lives as a white noise in their lives. Columbia, next stop.

Underneath modern day obelisks, they all stand alone at arms length. 

*This went on for six more paragraphs, now lost in technology*

Fortnight; or "Missing a fictional flight"

The moon is an incredible thing, both cyclical and constant. The moon will be new at 10:29 am Friday December 11th. This is a welcome change. Thanksgiving brought about the full Beaver Moon, which has not treated me well. Perhaps the Cold Moon will be different. I guess we'll know in two weeks...

Last night I was late to catch a plane. I was frantically trying to pack for a weekend trip to Chicago. I couldn't figure out what to pack so I started loading duffle bags into a suitcase. Our flight was only 90 minutes away and we'd still not left West Seattle when I realized my ID was still at the bar from the night before. I ran the two miles to recover the identification to find that the junction was in the middle of some sort of winter street fair. Shortly after we caught a bus to the airport. The driver was sympathetic to the situation and decided to take us directly to the terminal with no other stops. I was already on the tram when I realized I had forgotten my boarding pass. Then I fell asleep. I woke up at a bus station outside the airport. The possibility of catching my flight was all but gone at this point. I lit a cigarette and took a moment as I walked back towards the terminals. There was a scene in the parking garage where the elevator took me to the wrong floor. I was running through the halls, bags falling out of my suitcase. I finally made it to my flight, tired and wheezing from all the running. "Cutting it a little close aren't we sir?" "I can't believe I made it!" "I'll just need to see your boarding pass." I'd never went back to get one...

In 2007, as a christmas gift, a friend adopted an Orca for me through the WWF. I have a certificate on the wall in my office to remind me of this. I often wonder if my Orca is still alive or how many other people "adopted" the same one....

Jai guru deva om.,..

Antipodes; or "Leaving the Kalahari on Christmas Eve to save a dying alien."

It's been a while since we've talked. I've been okay, how are you? Thanks for asking. I hope you're okay too...

This used to all come so easily to me. I could sit down with my morning coffee and ramble on between phone calls for hours. The topics never mattered. Politics, life, writing, fate. Everything was available and equally enticing. Lately it all seems trivial and overwhelming, condescending or conflicted. I fear the encompassing weight of life has finally killed my youthful optimism and fed it's remains to the ravenous dogs of reality. Maybe coming back here is my way of attempting to recover that mangled corpse from the canines jowls. Is it worth the risk? Worth exposing myself to the full brunt of vicious possibilities that surround us everyday? For what? A meager chance to revive something natural selection has already deemed unfit for survival? Even if I'm successful, what do you do with a half eaten alien too beautiful to exist in such times?...

As I glance over the posts I've left here before I find that many of the images are gone. The words still remain and with them I believe I can remember what the photograph would have been. There's no way to know for sure though....

I poured a cup of black coffee from the french press on the granite counter top, studied the flowing liquid with determination and reverence as the white mug slowly filled to just below the brim. Grasping the ceramic with both hands, the warmth transferred to my palms as I raise the mug to my lips. It is far too hot to be consumed yet, so I hold the mug just on the edge of my lower lip and inhale slowly the smell and the heat.
"Why are you waiting?"
"It's far too hot to drink yet."
"But you hold it so close to yourself? Wouldn't you be better leaving it on the counter till it's cooled?"
"Then I would never know when it's ready."...

Love is a funny thing. I've thought I was in love before. I tried so hard to love some people, to be exactly what they wanted and needed from me. I'd have crossed the Kalahari to prove my devotion, not to them, but to myself. I wasn't in love with them, I was in love with the idea of being in love. It has taken me a long time to figure that out and I'm still not fully sure I understand it or even if it's relevant to my current position. Perhaps when the magicians arrive with the rising sun I'll ask them...

Christmas used to be my favorite time of year; the trees, the lights, the overpowering display of mans dominance over the arriving darkness of winter. There is a cold dry feeling in the air that brings a childhood nostalgia for everything that shimmers and comes packaged in vibrant colors. It's been three years now since I've felt that way. It now stands as a memorial to some of the hardest decisions and most difficult times that have come to pass. But for all the turbulence brought by recent years ending, I'm still here...

"This isn't the first time I've seen you here"
"I've come for many years."
"I can see you're different this time."
"Is it so easily identified?"
"With eyes like mine it's easy to see when you carry the weight of your existence as a burden. You no longer carry that weight the same."
"Was it so clear to everyone else?"
"It doesn't matter anymore. You're free."

The alien is worth saving...