Summer Beginnings

Drunk off whiskey and quiet in the corner, I frequent at parties where I'm given the opportunity to simply observe. Things get hazy and I begin to dance, it's always the same. I've grown older but my habits, my kicks, my routines never seem to falter. I'm enjoying this new summer skin, it's beginning to fit quite nicely. Recognizing the ironic parallels between 11 months ago and now, I smile and take another sip. I look around again and find a familiar face. We walk outside and I'm handed a cigarette, seemingly out of nowhere, which I accept for a couple of drags before handing it back. I lean over the porch and look down at the bottomless stairwell. More time passes-minutes or hours, I can never be sure-and we're walking through the streets hand in hand. I am careless and run through stranger's yards, curiously poking at their belongings as if I have the right, climbing over their swingsets. I am taking off my shoes and walking on the cold cement. I keep dropping the left shoe. Suddenly we are inside and I see the Walt Whitman poetry book next to the bed. In the morning I focus on nothing but the legs overlapping and the sunlight streaming on the sheets. The soft orange sheets. They are really beautiful sheets. And all I can think is, "wow, if only everything were so simple and easy, if only people were always this relaxed and unconcerned".

In the plane over the ocean I could not bring myself away from the window. The city, lit up, seemed so innocent and calm from 30,000 feet in the air. That's what everyone says, isn't it? Yes, I'm sure it is. But the same cliched and old thoughts loop through my mind nevertheless and I think about the filth of the city, the scum and the danger and the violence and the ruined lives of abandoned and broken children. Those awful thoughts seem ridiculous, impossible even, from the sight that I'm seeing from so high up.

Back on earth the ocean was lapping at my feet, and I enjoyed a thoughtless afternoon with a book. I did not think of you, or what the next few months will bring, and I did not wonder if the worry pressing upon me would ever subside. And that was good. I swam deep down to the sandy floor and focused on the muted nothingness, letting my body float for a moment. The clearest my mind has ever been was when my ears were full at the bottom of the gulf. So summer begins and the next step is to box up my life and carry it approximately one hour to the north, where I will be greeted by a new job, beautiful girls, and bottles of wine. I imagine our back yard, one of us lying on the hammock and complaining about heat and the others gathered around the grill with frozen drinks and perplexed expressions, wondering if we know what we're doing, not exclusively referring to the grilling we're attempting but in our lives overall.

I'm not quite sure what has changed in me but it's something really great. I may not conform to the traditional lifestyle of others, but I am happy. I am working hard and playing hard and kissing handsome strangers, and for now it is beautiful and just what I want.