Excerpts from free writing

smell the trees, let the ocean wash over you, drag you out and drown you like flotsam and refuse. Salt your body, lie fallow so you'll be of no use and maybe then you'll finally be able to do what you were born to.

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Are there words anywhere in this notebook worth a damn? not in the distance. Maybe when I get further from my writing of the last few days, I'll appreciate some of it.

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Maybe the mountain stream water could fix me. Maybe the trees could shelter me from the storm inside me. I could remain evergreen like them, rooted, grounded, swaying in the wind, letting the fiery passions pass through me when they come. Drop cones left on the table, my creations a small beauty, not the tapestry on the wall, but the reminder on the table, the gravel underfoot. The fog blurs the lights, the snow covers the needles, drenching the world in white, and finally winter returns to grant the heavy sleep of musty blankets, alone.

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I need to remind myself to think like an ocean.

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What would I say if I could speak twice at once? I love you, you hurt me, I can't tell the two apart. Love me like a douse with water, fire put out, nothing new to talk about. What happens when we break the things we love? Mend it like it can't be replaced, trash it like cheap plastic; no user-serviceable parts inside.

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Spring is sprung, the rain getting into my shoes as I walk. What was my imagined conversation? It's all me ranting, "I've never been able to tell anyone before" "I'm glad you told me" "will it all be okay in the end?" "I'm not the one who knows" "I'm glad I'm the one you told" I want to sleep like I mean it, lost in the dream, switching to decaf, Rested on the level of my bones in a way I haven't been in years.

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I promise I'm not sore. I am just out side the door. I will not become my father's son.

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Maybe I'm an ideal you cannot reach, either. You're a nice fantasy, but the real me is somewhere else. Somewhere in Brit giving a conference talk in his pajamas, in playing a light jam with Nate, in sitting with Noelle on the couch. A place I feel at home and appreciated for who I am. I was never going to host a big party, but I may be able to manage a small one. I'm much closer to a book clubber than a night clubber. I'm growing into myself, and you couldn't be me as much as I couldn't be you.