Heather's awake!!

i just went to see her and while she still has tubes for breathing and therefore can't talk, she is awake and responsive. she kept squeezing my hand and i felt such warmth and life coming from her. i joked about her dad and my mom trying to set each of us up with young doctors in the hospital and she reacted in heather fashion and i felt so lucky to get to make a joke with her.

it has been a stressful week and a half but also an illuminating one. life is precious and we are so fortunate for all that it is. it seems we all lose track of that sometimes and focus on small things that went wrong in our day. sometimes we even think they are big things, like having our car broken into or getting rear ended or getting a bill we can't afford to pay in the mail. but if at the end of each day we still have all the abilities we had when we woke that morning and our friends and family are all intact, we should celebrate that our biggest problems are so minor.

thanks Lloyd and Bonnie for keeping her in your prayers, it means alot to me.

This is a picture of my cousin Heather and I with with our little cousin Donovan at Cory and Skie's wedding dinner about a month ago. This was the family dinner I recently mentioned where I felt alone. Heather was one of the only parts of my evening that did not feel so much that way and that is always the effect she has on me. Though I am blacksheep, with Heather, I am not.

Heather was in a very bad car accident a couple of days ago and is in critical condition at health science centre. they don't know if she will live and if she lives, there is brain damage (they cannot say yet to what extent as they are keeping her heavily sedated to try to minimize the swelling of the brain) and she has broken vertibrae and it is possible there could be a spinal cord injury, but again, they can't tell yet. i have no eloquant words to say today, it's so jarring. it is terrifying and i notice that my mind does not allow the reality that it has even happened to sink in 90% of the time. the moments where i really take it in, i feel scared and sad and i want so badly for her to be okay. she's a really really fun girl, full of life and she makes you happy to be around her. i really want her to recover in body mind and spirit and i just wanted to ask if you guys would think of her in your prayers because i feel like she needs as much prayer as this world can muster and i feel like she is meant to make it through this.

somebody asked for some old writing..

hmm.. seems like a lot when i scroll down, but that's what happens when you start looking through old notebooks i guess. old writing is plentiful and strange to look back on. even stranger to post like this. anyways....




i will stand
reeling with patience
armed with a sky behind
that is the color of tranquil
water
in dreams
when you dive through it
and sunlight filters
like smoke signals
in the evening
at the bonfire
we all fell
and did we appreciate
the thrill of it all
or did we just
land and stand up

(where are you now
and do you think of it?)



*****



i'm turning your face
into rain
and a smile
filters through the gloom
of this house
four walls surround me
a window
a door
which leads to more walls
more windows
more doors
eventually they lead to you




*****




travelling backwards
(is forwards a motion?)
leaving metal pieces
in time with cotton
sliding on wet wood
you cringe more
than you smile these days
is it something i did
i wonder because that
is what you wonder
at times like these
wondering how to get you
to speak to me again
to smile into me
again
it turns.
i fail to see which way
search memory
i must have passed a sign
the moons height and direction
must mean something
on this night
i roam away from you
you always warn me
about the beast
always tell me
don't get hurt
when did that stop
worrying you?
flesh is not always
the only sign of pain
flesh and pleasure
are not always
a sure sign
of love.



*****




i am leaving now. not this party. not this street. not your house. i am leaving. you ask me why. i must have answered you in my head, you stood there waiting long after the question. i answer, because i have already left. of course i am still here. you see me and i could still feel your hand if i would touch it. but i have begun a departure. back to where i left off and forward from where i am. direction is of no matter.
but of course my silence is all you can hear, you have not yet crawled into my unspoken words. they remain only my own when you don't answer.
these days are your own.
why does there have to be the time between. the time between our words. the time between when you and i leave and when our bodies part. what should we do with this time? should we make love while we can. or should we scream at the walls from seperate houses. then we would never hear how much we could hurt each other.




*****



layers of paint
upon your bedroom walls
your life has changed
since striped wall paper
i want to scrape it all away
layer by layer
and find out
every memory
long since painted over
the day
anger
(yours or theirs?)
punched a hole in the door
you never told me
what shape the shadows took
at nite
or what under water games you played
when the color was blue
or about the frogs you killed
by mistake
and then surveyed
the bucket
of grey, matted death
in the backyard


*****




sitting idle
the engine's running
just waiting for the windshield
to clear
we're very good at making silence
awkward
and you're very clever
at avoiding guilt
with your kind smile
and lighthearted humour
right before you speed away
in your car,
leaving me in a cloud
of exhaust,
laughing at me
laughing at you
we are so alike.




*****





we have already decieved each other
through thoughts of strangers
driving with us in our cars
laughing and falling
into snow
and feelings
deeper than these
we stick to the main roads
freshly plowed
evidence of who has been here
becomes shrouded
search harder
the details are hard to see
try to track down
the owner of each footprint
you will never know more
than their shoe size
and where they were walking
between snow falls



*****



there is a hole
in your jeans
on the left thigh
and i don't know you
so i imagine
a piece of your history
i imagine the cigarette
that fell
from your unsteady hand
at a party
two years ago
where you knew everyone
by name
and the music was too loud
but you could care less
your last beer
is too warm
for your liking
you've got candle wax
dripping from your fingers
(red)
llke blood
and you didn't even feel it burn
through your intoxication
although it remained
beneath your fingernails
for days
and you smiled
when you realized
the hole
left by that cigarette
it adds character
you said
now they are your favourite pair



*****




fall will tell me
every year
what you meant to me
i will slide closer to you
or take one step back
through an imaginary door
to be alone
to be free
to be alive
to be with another
to be still
to shiver alone
and sigh with relief
to take inventory
of my past
and move on.
i never hated you
and i didn't mean
to be so cold

in some ways
i can imagine
that your jealousy
would not exist
and that you would fall with me
every september
with every leaf

it's the winter that challenges my imagination
as i fell everything die
as our freefall ends
in a dull thump
seperated
(i'm not sure if you land
or the wind picks you up
and takes you into a new life.)



*****




i am going to find you
everyone i lost
everything i regretted
i am going to come to terms
you will come around
i have the means to make you see
and i will learn to use it
i will teach you plenty
even you who is so stubborn
you will learn from me
as i have learned from you

i know this
because fall came
right on time again
because the rain began today
and i saw every drop
on the pavement
and no matter who my mother is
i can see this
and the leaves will always be
this beautiful
when summer goes to sleep

(so quickly she slips away
and steals the warmth
from our section of the earth
and allows us reason
to find warmth in each other)

life is not always easy and we don't always get to have what we want when we want it. it is hard learning that and even harder living it. on your own, it is hard enough, but when another person is involved it is all that much more difficult. there has been a rise and fall in the last year that has left my heart wanting to learn more. wanting to do the right things. wanting not to take lightly matters that have a strong (or minor for that matter) cause and effect. it's important to listen to your own instincts. not to push them away. at least that is what i believe and it's all i've got to go on. it's all i know and it is what i gave up a soul mate for. it's so hard to convey to someone why it's so important to you. how much you would hurt yourself by pushing past your instincts. he doesn't know you that well, but you almost believe you wouldn't recover..

and so i will attempt to practise patience and allow life to take whatever course it is meant for. i trust that more than anything else and i truly feel it is all i have.

my other newest friend

this week has been filled with nice things. the piano came and i began lessons and practicing everyday. work has begun to pick up. and i made a new friend. and it's so nice. there is something very enjoyable about the companionship of someone new. you're not used to their words and it is nice falling in step with someone. it's nice to check the weather forecast at 5:30 in the morning to plan a day to go to the dogpark together. it's nice to drive back from a family dinner which you attend solo (all the while feeling solo though you don't normally) to sit on the porch with your new friend. to sit on the piano bench with your new friend and be at ease the way you couldn't be with some of your old friends, though you know he is talented. and to laugh in delight at the sound of the doogie howser theme song coming from the piano in an informal lesson.

maybe i will erase this post but i just wanted to say that it's nice. i don't mean i want to date him.

i just want him to be my date for everything maybe.

but it is late.. i should sleep.

my newest friend..

i have recently welcomed a piano into my life and i am filled with excitement and slight trepidation at the task of learning it. i look forward to having something to practice daily. it may sound strange, but i need to practice practicing. so that i might learn to practice other things that are more subtle than an instrument but just as lovely.

i will enjoy today, looking at the beautiful beast in my home as a world of possibilities. tomorrow my lessons begin and the world of possibilities will crash down around me as i struggle to learn the most simple of things. thus the beginning of the frustration that normally stops me because my mind is grasping at the possibilities in my head that my hands cannot produce. this time i won't stop. i've written down now.

today the piano is beautiful to me. tomorrow it will be uncomfortable to me. and the more time i spend uncomfortable with it, the closer i will be to the possibilities in my mind. for the first time in a long time, i look forward to feeling uncomfortable. the piano came to me at a perfect time. thank you amy.

today summer fell away and the air got cold again. it was nice wearing socks and putting the heat on in the car after the dog park. a box in my basement revealed itself to me, in honour of the change of seasons, a photograph i thought i'd lost.

it was a photograph of john taken when i first met him six years ago. it has been in the precious things i've lost category for years. it was taken from afar and in my mind he was croutched down cooking us dinner over a fire. my mind froze that frame on its own. the photograph is of him croutched down petting one of sonya's dogs. we were beside the yukon river and one of the dogs had pups. i can still remember how to get there through the campground and then the forest and along that path. i can remember how one of the dogs got away once and we did not recognise it so free until it followed us home and we made dinner over the fire. i can remember missing him when he went away.


i can't write very much more about it for now. it's hard seeing that picture. no one has ever had such a profound effect on me and it's hard to see an image of him when it first started. before he chose a path. when we still could have walked it together. but we didn't and now we'll never go back because we can't.

and as much as it hurts, i don't even want the hurt to go away. it hurts when i can feel myself learning from him and i don't want that to stop. he took time everyday to teach me and he came to my city to live beside me for a bit. if it stops hurting i'm afraid i will forget to keep learning from him..

i have been realising lately i fear the dissapearance of poetry in my life. i somehow thought that it has to go away one day, like peter pan. it just occurred to me that it doesn't have to. you just have to work hard to keep it. you have to never stop going places you've never been, never stop doing things you've never done, never stop inviting great people into your life whether for a day or a lifetime. you have to not let your career or your partner or your "roles" in life define you away from yourself. you have to bring all of those people/things into who you are rather than evolving away from yourself. do things a different way than you think you're expected to if you have to. everyone will survive.

and it is a relief to realise it. by acknowledging that it is possible to keep that alive, it gives weight to its existance in the first place. someone suggested to me once that i "need" this stuff in my life with a slight negative undertone, the way you would say someone needs drama in their life. and i have thought about it on and off for awhile now, pondering the possibility that they are right and that i am setting myself up for dissapointment when "real life" takes over. but i have come to the conclusion that i do "need" this stuff in my life because it is real life. life can be whatever we make it. i hope to always choose poetry.

the challenge lies in not losing sight. forgetting. getting caught up in day to day and not even knowing that you are starting to believe a new definition of life or of yourself that is really just a coping mechanism. i realised on orcas that i had begun to do it to an extent and though it is frightening that we can do this and not know it, it is also comforting to know again that we can do whatever we want to do if we don't let others set our parameters. it's just not always easy, but that's the difference between never growing up and growing up without ever losing the child in you.

zackarya

travolta and his truck

from the plane after leaving the island


i made it to orcas. there's not much i can say but to say it was nice. zack met me at the ferry at nite and he was wearing a cordoroy vest. there was a nap by the ocean and a small child put her hand in mine and then our hands in his and kissed both lightly. they do both enchant me and as suspected, going away made me sad.

so that is all i will say for now. my nicest memories of zack in his cordoroy and our nap at obstruction pass.

i left by a small 6 seater plane which is probably best. i sat shotgun and joked with the pilot and laughed to myself that i'd been there at all..

i needed to seperate a post that is only to continue on. but these get posted in reverse order so if there is a reader, the reader should start with the post below.

anyways, it was amazing. it still amazes me. it still hangs in the air above us. i won't say what other words were there. i allude to nothing because together they neutralize.

i can sort of see the lack of sleep in my words, but i dont' mind so i'll keep going. i almost need the freedom this kind of tired brings because my mind has been wearing on too many details lately.

so the day of work and leisure and the night of rain and john and files and late night errands.. i have enjoyed it all. a 3 am phone call. a running engine on the street.. a whole world goes on while we sleep.

it's quiet and i'm not sure of what to expect of my holiday. i dont' like that word at all, but i'll use it. i go with no expectation and enough time to explore a place i've never been on my own. i'll pick the place when i get there. i have forgotten to tell those i'm visiting that i am coming. mostly it will be a visit and i am happy for that. i miss my Dylan. i was there at his birth. he is my closest connection to some things. and his face is beautiful when he lights up and loves you.

and when the visit is done, i will let myself travel a little. even once back in gimli.

i should sleep but i want to write more some day about why i am torn. it is not in the obvious way or about the obvious thing. and i may not be torn at all, perhaps just curious and a little intimidated by direction.

good to have some time off.

john says..

well, i leave in several hours and won't list what i have done today in preparation nor what i have to do before my flight leaves in the morning. i will say that there is time for one or two hours of sleep in between and i couldn't ask for anything better.

it seems so appropriate to board a plane tired and worn out and ready to give in to the time off. i have enjoyed my day so much, long as it may be. again, to list details would maybe not be right. it was so much work and so much leisure all at once. a concerned being would have not stopped for leisure and been in bed by midnite but i am not concerned. it rained most of the night. i'm not sure when it started, sometime while i talked to the australian.


John says:
sometimes i feel old without you.
Susan says:
sometimes i feel lost without you.

John says:
it was good to be in love
Susan says:
it was amazing to be in love.


...

i don't know what to say other than it's getting colder out and the cool air and subtle change of season brought me away and home today.

i can say this here. i miss the australian. not all the time but sometimes. i miss him when i don't know something. because i know he knows. i miss him when he thinks about me because i can feel it.

we talked tonight and it was painful. such beautiful words.. i didn't expect it, but from out of nowhere it hit me. he spoke so gently and i just kept learning with tears running down my face.

sometimes sweetness drips down into your hand. sometimes your hand touches a face and it's just that there's a fire dying out in the fire pit and the lights are reflecting off of water and you've got that sweetness in your hand. and that's all it is is sweetness in your hand for just a moment.

and sometimes, though this is seperate, someone else tries to wash that sweetness off of your hands. for themselves. and they say that it is for you, but it is mostly for them. because it was only a sweet moment for you. one you wanted to enjoy. and you do your best to understand and so do they. but you wonder at these things. it's only human either way you look i suppose. just dangerous to get too precious about things.



and the contrast is suddenly stunning to you. one more thing settles and you let him sit with it. no need to defend or align yourself with him. you never did either of you any favours that way.

i drove by it all on my way home.

life returns to normal when hitch hikers leave and then you kind of miss them..

but what is normal really? life is full of enchantment. the drive to gimli was good. amy came with and we sat on the patio and made friends with rodney, who i called rocky for most of the time until he asked for paper and a pen and said, let me write down my name for you. he also added his number which was cute of him. he said he owns more movies on tape then anyone really. cam was working and came to sit with us here and there on his breaks. cam is nice to be around. rocky (rodney) ordered onion rings and i said, that's alot of onion rings for one rocky and someone at the next table smiled and repeated it to themselves. there was an elvis impersonator on stage at the festival and fire twirlers. sean doesn't like when people flood into this town in the summer, but i like it. i love when places come alive.

we sat and watched the end of a janis joplin movie on the beach where they set up the screen in the water. willow walked to the end of the pier and back with us and then played along the shore in the waves in the dark.

i love that i will wake up here tomorrow and not head back to the city for work. stay all day and into the next. and soon sean and i will take possession of the new place and fall will start to happen. we will have a woodstove and beautiful floors that dennis made from salvaged wood. winter will be nice this way. work is slow in winter and i can come out more often.

so i guess sometimes people come in and make your day really great. make you want to go to the corn maze with them or watch the janis joplin movie on the beach with them or go to the ruins with them. but they leave and you just go for a drive instead. stop the car when it strikes you to find things to stain your walls with these days. drop your keys between the house and the step and then get them out again. pretend you don't notice that the nights are getting a little colder.

this life...

>
willow and i picked up a couple of hitch-hikers on our way back from gimli yesterday. they stayed with me until this afternoon and it was so nice to return the favour for all the people who were so good to me when i was hitch-hiking (or travelling by any means for that matter).

it's hard to know where to begin really. it would be hard to know where to stop as well. so i guess i will just say that life carries people along in such a gracious way sometimes. we had such a great time the three of us. red was coming from tree planting and going to chicago and detroit and other places you should never consider hitching and he will be in my thoughts while he attempts it. francois was coming from whitehorse and going back to quebec city. what else do i say? they were unexpected in my day and i in theirs and we made lunch together and dinner together in my home and hung out on the porch together, went to the windsor and were blown away by the drummer in the blues band that played. i love the moment when you all realise that what you are hearing has just surpassed extraordinary and we all make noise at the same time. every moment was as it should be. and then some.

this is what i love about life. red coming in this morning after a walk to say "looks like it's gonna be another hot one out today!" in his immensely innocent way of speaking which is so lovely and funny at the same time. francois being as sweet as he is in his french accent and the way he sings while he cooks.

there is something beautiful about two strangers being in your home, one cooking food and singing in your kitchen while the other lights candles and loves life enough for everyone. i am blessed to have people like this stand on a road inviting their way into my life for a day.

my previous post has magically disapeared after clicking delete. it was rubbish. good to write some rubbish sometimes just to see it in plain text to know what it is. there were grains of those words which are true and fair. i am better to look at the reasons i would go. i would go because it is a place i love. because travolta was a good friend to me and a gentleman and because he showed me orcas. i would go because life is too precious to let little things stop us. i would go because i haven't seen the ocean in years now. i would go because the first time i saw the ocean i was in a cab with travolta and suddenly the ocean was there and i asked the cab driver to let us out there not knowing where we were and we both got out and ran in. i would go because i have not gone in a long time. because good people are rare and i love smiling at an old friend.

orcas

travolta called. zacharia p. leck. from orcas island. it is the best place i have ever been. i dont' know if i can describe it. it's a small horseshaped island off the coast of washington. i arrived on a boat and had to switch boats at another small island on my way. on the island before orcas, travolta showed up to meet me unexpected. i had met him on the train the year earlier. him and matt and i became fast friends and travelled from toronto to vancouver together. matt went up vancouver island fly-fishing. travolta was going to seattle to an underwater welding school. i wandered around out west. and the next time i was out there i contacted him and he said, let's meet on orcas. so i went.

back to the island before orcas. he found me and we must have just smiled. i made friends with a dog and we got on the boat and the water was the bluest i had seen. on my way over, i felt how good the place i was going to was and i was completely at peace. he had an old 67 truck and we drove around the island. we stopped in at people's houses who we didn't know and made dinner and drank wine. we camped at one end of the island. on easter morning zach hid an easter egg in his touque for me.

i won't get into the intensity with which i felt that peace because i don't think it can be described. strange and wonderful things happened and the whole thing was like a dream sequence. even the photo's i have look like someone climbed into my mind while i slept and took pictures.

four years ago travolta called and left me a message that he was passing through winnipeg and said when his train would be in. i got to the station late or the train was early and i couldnt' find him. i asked everyone where he was, all the other people on their one hour stop. i made friends with a group of people who all met travelling and for that hour i was away. the people at the train station were paging him and trying to help me find him. they could see it. i found him just in time. he came up and hugged me and picked me up right off the ground, over and over. everyone around was smiling that we found each other. i said, stay. he said, come. we both wanted both. one of the train staff told him to go get his bag off the train and stay with me. they let me past the gate with him and we got on the train together and sat on the train with each other and it was amazing. we sat there and wanted more time. he went and i stayed and i have not talked to him since.

until today. i had tried a few months ago to reach him but it was an old number and he has always been all over the place. sometimes he's in a jungle somewhere, sometimes he's in other countries. sometimes he's on orcas where he was born.

he has a daughter now. she is 3 and a half and he lives next door to the mother on orcas. they are not together, but it's nice that they live right next to each other and their daughter gets to have them both near.

but now i want to see his daughter and i want to see him and i want to see orcas again. so i will go. i got off the phone and looked up flights. i want to be away. i want to be on orcas. so i will go.

i should go soon.

life is beautiful sometimes.. i decided at 10:30 last nite to drive out to gimli. i drove in darkness with lightning as my landscape. no rain, just lightning in a dark sky stretched out before me. all around me. i arrived to a note on the door "we're at the beach". and so willow and i went to the beach and the waves were big and we all swam. instantly we were all away from everything usual swimming in the midnite with the waves and the stars and lightening. and we'd laugh..

it was a night with good friends and summer and funny things. i woke up and did not rush back for work. instead rob and susie and i went to indio's while sean slept. we ate on the patio. we read the paper. we were just there. happy.

back to sean's, we all napped and then went back to the beach. i felt work leave my body and my body relax. we all went for dinner and there was a dragon fly on the fireplace on the patio. i came back a couple of hours ago and one side of the sky was rain in the distance like slow motion, on the other side a rainbow. behind me the sky was the kind of dark i love. pthaloe. ahead it was a blue sky. i passed mustard fields after rain. it hurt and i smiled. i faltered and tried to stop stopping.

i came home and spoke to the australian on skype. i have avoided skype for every day since we ended because we fell in love in those days. but he wanted to test his new mic. and just as i suspected, we fall again. we both won't say it, but we just can't help it. we try not to say such nice things to each other. we try not to fall in love with the words on the page and the voice on the other end. i said, i hear your accent when you type. he said, pretty laugh. we tried our best, but we can't help it.

so far my holidays have been stunning..

if i could go, if i could stand before you just one more time, i'd want to bring with me talents i don't have. i'd want to bring landscapes we've never seen. i'd want to bring a rain storm and strike it up at just the right moment. i would be the conductor of an orchestra. i'd watch your eyes look out from under eyelashes and i would smile and you would smile and our soundtrack would play and we'd fall down happy.

it would be just like last time.

i just realized that i don't equal faith to him. i represent a betrayal to his faith and i don't know quite what to do with that yet. he said: "I know I can't get what I want or need by talking to you, but I'm doing it anyway". it occured to me a moment ago how absurd it is in my world (and i acknowledge that it is just my world i speak of) that two people can be in love and bring life to each other the way we do and a difference in religion is a wall (!) even though when it comes down to it we live by the same moral cloth basically. i thought that faith is blind. it doesn't matter what you call it. you do your best to live a good life, do right by others and not cause harm and not judge. does it matter what you call it? do you have to call it anything? if there is a force that drives you, something larger than yourself, does it matter if you can't name it? why does he keep contacting me if he can't get what he wants or needs? what is it he wants? why does he need me to worship the same way he does? what if i want to do it in fields and rain storms quietly on my own? am i wrong for that? does it have to be organized? the answer for me is no. i am most content to find my spirituality in the life around me without naming it. what perplexes me right now is that the spirituality that he has chosen is not welcoming of me however i find it in my life. what i have found - and i am never done learning - but what i have found so far is that spirituality represents non-judgement among all the other things it represents. it is one of the big ones. and yet, judgement has been set. i don't make the grade. so why keep talking to me? i dont' mind - i'll accept whatever presence he offers in my life, this is just a thread of thought in my mind. i don't even mind that i dont' make the grade, i just feel like pondering the situation for a bit. holding it in my hand and turning it over curiously wondering at it. it seemed that he was not happy. that he missed me. that he was confused. "just that I know I can get language from you" he said. when he asked if i felt the conversation leading down the path of desire he followed with - ( will she answer truthfully and how will i know? ) i love that. i love the way we speak. the way we backspace. the way we can't help it. but that's messy and he likes clean.

even if he came around. decided it didn't matter, i would know that would change. i would know that it does matter to him and i would not attempt to ignore that. but regardless of the fact that i would not be with him again, i don't want anything else. how do you top that? how do you even come close? i do not say that i will never be with anyone again, just that i don't want it now. and i don't want it soon. i fell in love. with someone who made me a better person. with someone who i always thought i must have imagined. i thought maybe the sun dipped behind a mountain and cast the right shadows and we must have said the perfect things to each other and we must have both been far enough from home to feel such peace. but i will always feel that peace with him, mountains or no mountains, home or far away, young or old. i wanted to see him age. he will be beautiful old.

i want to backspace most of this. there will be heavy editing in the days to come.