sleep does not find me
Sleep is taking longer to come this evening. Usually, it's Shaun who prowls the house with lights low. Tonight, it's me, and I've a business to run tomorrow and an early-morning run to take with my love. In years past, I tossed and turned, gnashed my teeth and greeted the dawn with a naked face, scrubbed free of sleep. Since Shaun, since this huge love that looms over me larger than anything else before it, I sleep soundly. Quietly. My fingers form sentences of calm on the sheets; toes curl comma-like into other phrases. My mind's been occupied, not in a bad way, with possibility. Last week, I was in a strangely sunny Seattle, and Shaun called to say that he'd gotten more grades back from law school. Multiple As and he's only got another year left. Then, we gather up ourselves and our possessions and head westward, where I will write and finalise the plans that have been hatching since I arrived here. Being patient is difficult; I've never been known for being particularly patient. Less than a year at this point, beautiful beginnings and a culmination. Earlier, I read through these journals and the handwritten ones and saw the growth, the truth. I wonder if I could write the things now that I did then. I was so brave. I think that I could still unfold those petals now. The desire remains.

It was good to see those journals. The awkwardness, the pain bared willingly and openly, my wild gypsy life both before and post-Arco. All of it exposed. My freedom to express myself and display vulnerability. The many lives I've lived in this one, long body. The many more hiding at my heels. So tonight, I make a cradle of my hands and invite the stars to take a seat. I comb the mermaid-tangles from my hair and rinse the sea from my mouth. Every little dream is becoming a reality, and I am a softer shade of sweet than I've ever been before. Don't mistake this for being content. I am simply ready for what comes next. I am ready and unconcerned as to how it will impact anyone else.

awake awake awake