I did it.  I finally got so mad that I cried.  I got so mad that I hung up on her, and slammed the phone down.  I cried.  Even more, I cried infront of my kids. 

I’m just hurt.  I’m hurt that she went off the deep end and the rest of us have to pay for it all.  My daughter suffers through missing her, my son hasn’t seen her in almost a year, and doesn’t really know her.  I’m hurt that she’s supposed to be my best friend, the one I can talk to about anything, and now, I can’t, and I feel very, very alone.  I feel abandoned by the one person who was never supposed to do so. 

I’ll be fine.  I always am.  This one, I hate to say it, may take a little longer to pull out of.

My how time passes, changes things, life. 

It was good to see you today.  Good to see you standing there looking happy and healthy, looking like…. you.  I realized about halfway home what it was that I kept trying to figure out but couldn’t quite get.  You hugged me.    You’re not a hugger.  At least, you weren’t the last time we saw each other.  It was nice.  Good.  Right.

I’ve missed you, and while I knew that there was a part of me that missed you, I didn’t realize how much I’ve missed you.  How do you do that?  How do you make me laugh?  How do you create nerve and unease, and complete comfort all at once?  Mystery prevails.

It was good to see you, really.  Painful in a way.  Not in a way that makes me regret it.  Just….. it’s like looking into a crystal ball of what could have been, even knowing now, that it wouldn’t have been right, it could have… BEEN.  You asked what I was thinking about, and I said nothing.  In reality I was thinking of you, and how easy it was to be with you, at least after the first 5 minutes.  I was thinking of what it could have been like.  I was thinking of the way even after all this time there’s something there, and that there always will be, and how it’s something I’ll never be able to act on.  I was thinking of how good it felt to be in Kansas City again, with the trees like they’re on fire and the world at my finger-tips.  I was thinking of how life changes and passes, so quickly that you don’t even know it’s happening, and all this time is wasted.  I was thinking of how we need to make lunch a regular event.  Maybe not every few weeks, but more often than now, every 4 years is a long time.  I was thinking how it’s odd that there was a time in the past 4 years that you were not a part of my life and how empty that makes things. 

How do you do it?  How do you make me think?  How do you make me wonder what it is that you’re thinking when you’re staring at me, not saying anything and knowing that I’m not going to ask what you’re thinking about. 

I’m tired, very, very tired.  But I wanted you to know what was going on in my pretty little head.  And, if I didn’t say so earlier, thank you for lunch, and thank you for saying things like “beautiful” even though you know I won’t believe you. 

It was good to see you…..

I know it’s been a while.  I know that I haven’t been loyal to those who care enough to come here and check things out day after day to see if I really have bothered to write anything new.  I’m sorry for that, for you. 

Life has been busy.  It’s been busy with work, kids, and the thoughts that constantly run through my pretty little head.  It’s been hectic with trying to keep up.  Just trying to stay above water. 

I have nightmares on a pretty regular basis these days.  Dreams so vivid that I wake up in a cold sweat, on the verge of screaming at the top of my lungs.  Colorful, dark, and desolate things that make me fear for the lives of those I love. 

I’ve always believed that I’d lose those around me that I care about most.  Those whom I know I couldn’t live without.  The ones who if they leave before I do, I’m destined to stay in bed for months on end not getting up, not living any more.  And those are the dreams, in vivid detail, that have haunted me the past few nights.  

I’m sure it’s lack of relaxation.  Entirely too much stress.  Maybe it’s just fear of myself and the way I have a tendancy to destroy the good around me.  No matter the reason, it scares me.  And I don’t want to be alone in my fear, in my hurt.  I want to be in the arms of someone who actually cares, who’s strong and will keep me safe, rather than my having to always keep those around me safe. 

It’s time for bed now.  It was time an hour ago, but to close my eyes is to bring my worst nightmares to life.

I have a hard time not being a racist to some degree.  There’s a part of me that wishes that weren’t true, but then the other part of me that says “you wouldn’t be if you didn’t have a reason” kicks in. 

I listen to NPR when I’m in the car.  I don’t care for much of the music world these days and tend to leave my CD’s in the house where I listen to them on the weekends and in the afternoons when I’m alone, so NPR it is.  Today, they were doing an interview with a man from the Latino Media.  This interview shouldn’t have bothered me, but it did.  It got under my skin and I actually had to turn off the radio out of anger. 

I know America is a supposed melting pot of cultures and beliefs, I know that if that were not the case, neither I nor my husband would be in this country right now.  He’d be in Scottland and I’d be in Germany.  But for him to speak, with pride, of the fact that in just a few short years the popluation of the United States is going to be dominantly Latino bother’s me. 

It wouldn’t bother me if it were a situation where these people where coming here legally, going through the citizenship process and getting good jobs because they’ve worked for it.  But the fact that a lot of, if not most of, these people are coming here illegally, and then stealing jobs from the people here who don’t have them, and need them, makes me really angry.  It makes me angry that he thinks that it’s a good thing that in “96 Al Gore refused to interview with the Latino Media on his road to the White House, but now both candidates have spoken with these same people, and these people are actually going to take credit for whomever wins the election, no matter who that person is. 

Maybe it bothers me because I can’t get help from my Dell Technical Support from someone who’s not named something Arabic.  Or maybe it bothers me that I go to get lunch and I get treated like dirt because I’m the white girl being served by a hispanic girl.  Maybe it just bothers me, that so many people in our past worked so hard for racial equality, rergardless of race, and now, it’s being reversed and turned around. 

Point being, it bothers me, and I wish they’d all just go home.  Call me bitter.  I’m good with that.

If I tell you that I feel alone so much of the time, don’t mistake it for being unhappy.  I’m not unhappy.  I love my husband more than I’ve ever loved anyone.  He’s a good man.  He’s intelligent and funny, he takes care of me and the kids the best he can.  But there are times when I think he just doesn’t get it.  Times when I say something about how I feel and it just doesn’t register.  It’s all about what he thinks is best, and never about what may be best for me emotionally or mentally. 

It’s tiring trying to make it all okay for everyone else.  To make sure he’s happy with what he’s doing and my daughter is satisfied with her life, and my son is content.  I’m screaming inside and feel like I’m going to explode any minute now. 

This makes me feel better, because it’s how I feel right now……

Angel's on a subway
She's buried in a magazine
Stuck inside a replay
Of someone else's dream

Prophets made of paper
Don't tell her anything
She wants something just to save her
So she lifts her head and screams
She lifts her head and screams

"I don't know you
But I love you anyway
I can't see you
But I hope you're here to stay
I don't know you
But I need you here with me
Cuz I'm falling down
I'm falling down"

Now, Angel's on a runway
Looking for a big jet plane
To take her to a new day
She won't be back again
She won't be back again
And she says, 

You're on my side
You're just in time
I'm on my way
Don't know who you are
But I want you back again

I caught a smell of you today when someone walked by.  It took a moment or two for me to realize exactly what the memory was, and who it belonged to but when it hit me, it hit hard. 

It took me back to a time when life was simple.  When you came to town for random visits without calling to tell me you were coming.  You’d just show up at the house and I was always so surprised.  I remember those summers well.  I remember you and your strawberry blonde hair and blue eyes looking at me when you were behind the camera, my hair still long and still very blonde. 

My mother still has a picture you took that summer haning in her house.  Me in white shorts and a navy tank top laying in the grass.  It was bright outside, probably late afternoon, but something happened with the shot and it looks like it’s dark as midnight and you can only see the little yellow flowers in the grass… and me. 

I remember that year like it was yesterday.  It was the year I was young and in love with someone I thought I would always have.  I thought you and I would end up together, that’s just the way it was supposed to be.  The summer I was 16 I was already calling your parents mom and dad. 

You ran off and joined the navy.  Broke my heart.  And it was over.  We talk now and then, but never the way we used to.  I’m better now, but every now and then, I come right back to you….