A Midsummer Night's Poem

Our skin was slowly turning apricot,
because it was never meant to be brown.
We let the colors swim before our eyes,
drinking white wine out of paper cups
and counting freckles until the world turned upside down.

Our heads ached because sleep eluded us in the night
taking a vacation from keeping us warm.
You shivered in the dark and I felt it in my bones.
I held your hand at midnight and you didn't refuse,
Placing kisses on my temples to ward off the pain.

We called each other Victorian names
drank tea on the cold sand
and laughed at the oceans roar.

Its been three weeks since I last showered in non-bacteria infested water.

I was in a book store tonight,

and one of my friends read off a cover a shocking statistic about friends who last more then ten years. We all laughed, and then another said, "Well, we've lasted seven years."

And then my mind crashed into a hypothetical wall and exploded.

Seven years. Is that really how long its been since I wandered into the huge block of cement called Tottenville High School? Seven Years since I wore Bebe shirts and listened to Good Charlotte. REALLY? When did I get old enough, hang on mature enough, to have seven year long friendships?

And then I went on to think, my new friends are already three years stale. That caught me off guard. Three years is sometimes an eternity. Three years can change your life. My "new friends" have stuck around for there abouts three years now.

I am not grown up enough to start being an adult.

Wisdom from last summer,

Last year, between May and December I read a lot. I also made the decision to document some of the more moving passages I found. I want to put these here. One quote from each book I wrestled with.

"There is enough love in this world for everybody, if people will just look."
-Cat's Cradle

"But most of all, above everything else, who in the Bible but Jesus knew - KNEW - that we were carrying the Kingdom of Heaven around with us, inside, where we're all too goddamn stupid and sentimental to look?"
-Franny and Zooey

"Actual happiness always looks pretty squalid in comparison with the overcompensation for misery. And, of course, stability isn't nearly as spectacular as instability. And being contented has none of the glamour of a good fight against misfortune, none of the picturesqueness of a struggle against temptation, or a fatal over throw by passion or doubt. Happiness is never grand."
-Brave New World

"You risk tears if you let yourself be tamed."
-The Little Prince


"...when the point is there are times when the world is in flux and the right voice at the right time can move the world."
-Ender's Game

"The America I loved still exists at the front desks of our public libraries."
-A Man Without a Country

"Jesus was a living baby once. He went barefoot like we do in the summer."
-A Tree Grows in Brooklyn

"Everyone on earth has a treasure that awaits him."
-The Alchemist

"Its all like the ocean!" cried Dostoevsky. I say, its all like cellophane.
-Breakfast of Champions

It's true. Never a truer breath was ever breathed. "The Lord giveth," I say.
-As I Lay Dying

"Do your own bit of saving, and if you drown, at least die knowing you were headed for shore."
-Farenheit 451

"I wanted to be one of those people who have streaks to maintain, who scorch the ground with their intensity. But for now, at least I know such people, and they need me like comets need tails."
-Looking for Alaska

"Give us your hand. Look ahead. It is our own world, Golden One, a strange unknown world, but our own."
-Anthem

"to the person in the bell jar, black and stopped as a dead baby, the world itself is a bad dream."
-The Bell Jard

"Its living up to being happy that's the difficult part."
-The Time Traveler's Wife

"You said I killed you - haunt me then! Be with me always - take any form - drive me mad! Only do not leave me in this abyss where I cannot find you! Oh God, it is unutterable! I cannot live without my life! I cannot live without my soul!"
-Wuthering Heights (Oh Heathcliff...)

"Life is a gift horse, in my opinion."
-Nine Stories

And then from someone I have much to learn from, Stephen King, I have three wonderful quotes:

"I'd think, this isn't the way our lives are supposed to be going. Then I'd think, half the world has the same idea."

"Just remember... Dumbo didn't need the feather, the magic was in him."

"Writing is not life, but I think that sometimes it can be a way back to life."
-On Writing

And that's it. Seven months of acquired wisdom.

I was sitting in our white washed pews yesterday and I thought about what we're saying when we talk about God. My hands were folded in my lap and I was staring at the eaves, not at my pastor's preaching face.



And I thought, loneliness.
Loneliness is what we're talking about when we talk about about God.
How all of us are lonely.

All I can think to say today

My basement smells damp.

I generally have a certain fondness for my basement. It has orange walls and pictures of flowers hanging up. The furniture is all a wickedly dark wood and I like it. The windows, however, are raised so that I can see a tiny piece of my driveway, and through this window the rain tends to leak.

The rain will leak in on summer days like this one. It has been raining on my island for what feels like ages. The sky may not have any blue left in it, so full of gray it has been. Yesterday I sat on my bed and watched the rain just fall. It wasn't the kind of rain that frightened. It was just there and I knew that it was keeping me inside.

My neighbor stood on his stoop with shorts on and a cigarette between his lips.

Thirteen dogs walked by in an hours time.

I don't know why its been raining so persistently, but I certainly wish it would stop.

Circa 2006:The Product of Notebook Searching

The first time we broke up he was smoking a cigarette. I remember because he kept looking at its lighted end instead of into my eyes. He never said any words that would make it final, and that's probably why it never was. He said, I won't be calling you anymore. He said, I hope I didn't hurt you. He whispered a lot and I stared into the sky because it was setting and before I knew it he and the lighted end of his cigarette were walking away.

the second time we broke up I was the one who did it. I drove to his parent's house and it was all business from beginning to end. I smiled at the end and he frowned. I kept eye contact. He wasn't smoking because he hadn't smoked in months. I congratulated myself on my way back to my car that this time, someone had said the words that needed to be said. We can't do this anymore.

As I pulled away I waited for him to do something. Take even one single step toward the car. But he didn't. He didn't even wave. I turned my eyes to the rear view mirror.

He would smoke again that night.

I have a sunburn

Its kind of funny actually.

Yesterday (the first nice day we've had) I dragged my chair outside next to the pool and proceeded to get lost in the music of my iPod while the sun warmed me. I was wearing a new bathing suit and and there was an ice cream truck driving circles around my house. A friend sat with me by the water and it was lovely. Later, I went inside, changed, and vanished for burritos with friends.

I didn't realize until I got home just home red my shoulders had gotten. And quite frankly, I didn't notice until this morning just how red my entire upper body was. I didn't realize until tonight just how much the sunburn stung when I tried to rub aloe on it.

But its okay. Its painful, but its okay. It means summer is here. It means my hair is slowly getting blonder. It means sand will soon be in between my toes.

Ah. Summer.

There are often things I would like to say here that I struggle with for one reason or another. I often feel like the things I want to say are things I shouldn't. Or rather, they're things people wouldn't want to hear about. Or things that are better kept inside to ponder.

Because of this hesitancy, and my desire to remain safely away from any pity parties, I will say what I want to say like this.

I love long conversations. I love really thick socks. I love freshly washed hair. I love powdered donuts and the havoc they wreak on your fingertips. I love quirky handwriting and aged notebooks. I love the ocean and chlorine. I love the color tongues turn after eating cherry ice. I love laughing with somebody else.

Now what I want to say is that I want someone to love these things with.

Words for today,

"Cause I built you a home in my heart
With rotten wood, it decayed from the start."