Together We Can

We’ve come into town (Mobile) to spend the night. Chad (my brother) is coming down from Auburn tomorrow to have lunch with us. I miss my mom.

This house is nice. It’s an older home and y’all know how I love older homes. You might actually not know that about me but if you don’t know me that well, the continued pretend intimacy I share with my readers will at least let us act like you knew that already. I’ve always liked antiques, not necessarily because of monetary value but because I love objects that have a story– even if the story is factually unknown to me, I am an empath and the unspoken stories of objects (like this bed for example) tell my heart the stories my ears will never hear.

(I don’t like that I called it “pretend intimacy.” It’s not that at all. What I share with my readers is real intimacy, even if I don’t know you. It’s a form of it at least; even if it’s just that I continually allow myself to be vulnerable to you. And, mostly I’d just like to say, I appreciate you.)

Back to old houses and old furnishings:

Sometimes it’s those stories that find their way into my writing– my poems and my scripts– in ways that I don’t understand.

I feel free and happy tonight. I feel loved and taken care of. I also feel deeply sad and lonely. My mother is not alive on this earth in the way she has been my whole life and there is part of me that feels like a lost boy– a boy lost like as if my mother had left me at a much earlier age. I’ve been warned against (and now understand) by a friend of mine who was an orphan as child about saying that I understand what that feels like just because (as an adult) my parents have both died. What I will say is that my “inner child” (Christ, what a cliché) feels like an orphan now. I’m sort of scared here without them, especially my mom.

I went to a support group meeting for veterans tonight. There was another vet there who talked about losing his mom. There is power in common experience and further power when those with common experience (such as military service) also have other things in common (like burying one’s mother). I love this Marine even though I just met him today. I care about his willingness to serve the nation; I care about his sadness at losing his mom; and I care that he too once self-medicated his pain with alcohol. I care that we’re both doing it sober together.

The great thing about kicking that “I got this on my own” bullshit to the curb is that there is little that can’t be faced if we stick together.

I hope you’re not trying to do this alone. I hope you’re reaching out.

See y’all tomorrow.