slow day.

and it makes me just ache for the days i spent adventuring with these lovelies...

oh, chicago.

chicago....

you & i used to be at odds. i resented you for stealing her...the girl my heart swells up in thankfulness for. i thought you took her from me. but i watched her & what she became in your care. i watched how she grew & how she began to discover her own beauty...the beauty she was created for. & i grew thankful to you. i grew thankful that you guarded her but freed her at the same time to help her discover that her beauty was inspired by Love.

so thank you, dear chicago.

i can't wait to roam your streets with her. i can't wait to see how you captured her heart. i'm coming to you with my eyes, ears & heart flung open to discover your adventure. my skin tickles with the anticipation of what your grass will feel like as i lay on it, listening to her voice trace the many stories of you & her. i'll listen with gratefulness and take careful note, eager to share them when i return to my own love, diego.

i'm coming for you, chicago. meet soon.

we held our breath too long...

we hoped for something that couldn't be.

and now our chests ache from holding our breath for it too long.

love is a mix tape.

my favorite book. ever.

it's a story of love & loss...relayed through something i'm passionate about.
90's music.

love+loss+90's music=me weeping & laughing & oh so glad that someone else gets it.

"it's too late to sleep anyway. the coffee's gone cold, so i just heat up another pot. tonight, i feel like my whole body is made out of memories. i'm a mix tape, a cassette that's been rewound so many times you can hear the fingerprints smudged on the tape.

press play.

first song, side two: r.e.m.'s "man on the moon." did renee ever make a mix tape without r.e.m.? a whole generation of southern girls, raised on the promise of michael stipe.

i now get scared of forgetting anything about renee, even the tiniest detail, even the bands on this tape i can't stand-if she touched them, i want to hear her fingerprints. sometimes, i wake up in the middle of the night, my heart pounding, trying to remember: what was renee's shoe size? what color were her eyes? what was her birthday, her grandparents' first names, that willie nelson song we heard on the radio in atlanta? the memory comes back, hours or days later. it always comes back. but in the moment, i panic. i'm positive it's gone for good. i'm shaking from that sensation now, trying to remember some of this music. nothing connects to the moment like music. i count on the music to bring me back-or, more precisely, to bring her forward."

-rob sheffield.

learning love.

Painful as it may be, a significant emotional event can be the catalyst for choosing a direction that serves us—and those around us—more effectively. Look for the learning.
— Louisa May Alcott

thank you for you. though our story is a sad one, i'm glad for it. i'm glad you showed me beauty in places i had forgotten to look. you won't be here anymore. you won't be in the car, sitting next to me. you won't be next to me on the bench, or on the couch, or laying next to me on the ground. but you'll be in every book i read, and the songs i hear. you'll be in my tears and in my laugh. your voice will tell me that i'm the most cared for person in the world. you'll be in my hand as i reach out to shake other hands...and i'll say, "hello. this is me." little will they know that what i mean is that so much of this is you.

one day i'll meet him. and i'll tell him stories about you. i'll tell him how gentle, kind, humble, patient and beautiful you were. he'll fear you at first. he'll fear never knowing my heart like you did. but soon he'll thank you. he'll find you in my questions. he'll hear you in my answers. he'll smirk as he sees you in my abandonment to joy. he'll weep with me as he sees you still in my tears. and he'll thank you for making me. he'll thank you for holding me when he wasn't there for me yet. he'll thank you for caring for me and hurting for me, before he could share my life with me. he'll thank you for fighting for me before he could tell me that i was worth his all. he'll thank you. because he'll know that so much of this....so much of this is you.

courage, kind heart.

“To let go isn’t to forget, not to think about, or ignore. It doesn’t leave feelings of anger, jealousy, or regret. Letting go isn’t about winning or losing. It’s not about pride and it’s not about how you appear, and it’s not obsessing or dwelling on the past. Letting go isn’t blocking memories or thinking sad thoughts, and doesn’t leave emptiness, hurt, or sadness. It’s not about giving in or giving up. Letting go isn’t about loss and it’s not about defeat. To let go is to cherish the memories, but to overcome and move on. It is having an open mind confidence in the future. Letting go is learning and experiencing and growing. To let go is to be thankful for the experiences that made you laugh, made you cry, and made you grow. It’s about all that you have, all that you had, and all that you will soon gain. Letting go is having the courage to accept change, and the strength to keep moving. Letting go is growing up. It is realizing that the heart can sometimes be the most potent remedy. To let go is to open a door, and to clear a path and set yourself free."
-unknown

img: http://www.flickr.com/photos/29285032@N08/

love after love: derek walcott

the time will come
when, with elation,
you will greet yourself arriving
at your own door, in your own mirror,
and each will smile at the other's welcome,

and say, sit here. eat.
you will love again the stranger who was your self.
give wine. give bread. give back your heart
to itself, to the stranger who has loved you

all your life, whom you ignored
for another, who knows you by heart.
take down the love letters from the bookshelf,

the photographs, the desperate notes,
peel your own image from the mirror.
sit. feast on your life.

-taken from http://or-so-i-feel.blogspot.com/2009/04/love-after-love.html

today i miss him...

today i woke up and stumbled into my bathroom....when i opened my eyes and looked up, i saw him. i saw him in the downward stumble in the outside corners of my eyes and in the plumpness of my cheeks and in the shocked gaze at the mirror. i see myself becoming him & it both delights and scares me.

it delights me that i don't have to wake up in panic that i've forgotten him, because as soon as i get to the mirror, there he'll be.

it scares me because i don't get to hear what he says about this me...the me that weeps for the lost days and the me that rejoices when i recognize his spirit swelling up in me greater with each day.

some days i wish he'd just show up and laugh with me...or at me. they'd equally delight me. other days when all i can do is mourn...i wish he'd hold me and tell me that there's something better coming. when i catch myself whistling...i wish i'd find him joining in with a triumphant grin...glad that his little girl can finally produce more than hot breath with her rounded lips. i wish i could share him with my friends. i wish i could share him with the world. i wish they knew that he was the best person i ever knew...even when i didn't know it.