If I ever get words permanently tattooed on me they are going to be Bruce Springsteen lyrics. No lie.

Me, taking both of my friend’s hands in mine: “Look at me. Look at me. Do not get in a car and drive until you’ve sobered up. I love you.”

M____, proud owner of a pickup truck from 2001 that is older than they are, who has been drinking heavily from probably the time they woke up yesterday morning until several hours past sunset tonight, and the night is young: “of course not. I love you. Drive safe.”

M___, completely sober for like two years, on his third redbull energy drink of the evening, lost in a haze of vape juice, deep scar gouged across the space above his left eyebrow from the time he got wasted and tried to drive home and then turned the wrong way onto an expressway off ramp and very nearly died: “haha yeah.”

Me: “okay! you two have a lovely evening. don’t do anything I wouldn’t do”

ah! that seems to have worked

we are so fucking back

Looks like my blog needs some kind of software maintenance, not entirely sure how to fix it but none of the normal functions are working as they should. Checking to see if this works

“What I would say is not a dogma of faith, but my personal thought: I like to think hell is empty; I hope it is.”

Pope Francis

“What other people think of me is none of my business.”

Forbidden worlds do exist and there are doors that allow you to walk from this world through to the others. Some of the doors are locked.

There are people who will open the doors to the other worlds from the inside but won’t step back across the threshold to this one. There are people who will open the doors from the outside, but won’t ever step across the threshold to the other worlds again. There are people who will tell you the doors are there, but won’t open them. There are people who will tell you the doors are there, open them for you, hold the door to let you through, and follow you into the next world to show you around, guiding you, maybe letting you explore on your own for a while, making sure you know your way back through the door to the old world if you aren’t having a good time. There are people who walked across a threshold once and never came back. There are people who only return from other worlds once in a great while on special occasions.

There are people who only visit the other worlds on special occasions.

There’s always some random guy who will give you a set of keys but won’t tell you what it’s supposed to unlock.

There’s probably somebody trying to bypass the doors altogether and sneak in through the bathroom window.

There are people who know the doors are there and can no longer get through.

Most people, if they even know about the doors, won’t admit the doors are there.

And then there are the people who walk back and forth among many different worlds, all the damn time. And it shows.

Some of the worlds bad. Others aren’t, but a lot of people say they are.

Some of the worlds seem bad at first but turn out to be worth a visit.

Some of the worlds seem just fine at first glance.

“Ugly ducklings don’t turn into swans
Glide off down the lake
Whether your sunglasses are off or on
You only see the world you make…”

Magnolias.

Drifting off to sleep. Jaw nestled into the crook of Steve’s elbow.

“So what were you like, when you were the same age as I am now?”

Pause.

“Um – weirder. Much weirder.”

“How so?”

“It’s difficult to describe.”

(Cannot fathom what he means by this.

How could he ever have been weirder than he is now? Not possible.

I say this with love.)

Staring up at the ceiling in the dark, murmering aloud –

“I wish I could meet him.”

No answer.

On the brink of sleep.

“All day permanent red
The glaze on my eyes
When I heard your voice
The distance caught me by surprise again
And I know you claim
That you’re alright

But fix your eyes on me
I guess I’m all you have
And I swear you’ll see the dawn again

Well I know I had it all on the line
But don’t just sit with folded hands
And become blind
‘Cause even when there is no star in sight
You’ll always be my only guiding light

Relate to my youth
Well I’m still in awe of you

Discover some new truth
Now is always wrapped around you
But don’t just slip away
In the night
Don’t just hurl
Your words from on high
Well I know I had it all on the line
But don’t just sit with folded hands
And become blind
‘Cause even when there is no star in sight
You’ll always be my only guiding light

If we come back and we’re broken
Unworthy and ashamed
Give us something to believe in
And you know we’ll go your way

‘Cause I know I had it all on the line
But don’t just sit with folded hands
And become blind
‘Cause even when there is no star in sight
You’ll always be my only guiding light.”

Mumford & Sons. “Guiding Light.” Second track on the Delta album. November 16th, 2018.

Discovered via the dedication in one of Steve’s books, published in 2021.

Sitting in a coffee shop close to home, reading a novel. There’s a tired looking mother here with her two kids. The younger daughter – long blonde curles, big brown eyes, probably like four or five years old – discovers a chess set in a box at a table with a surface that has been carved into a chessboard design. She doesn’t fully understand how to play the game, but she admires the chess pieces in her tiny hands and then arranges them vaugely on each side of the board. She wants to know which pieces are the king and queen, and which is which. At first her mother is too tired and busy to play, and keeps asking her daughter to keep her voice down. Nobody here gives a flying fuck if her daughter’s voice is too loud.  The child’s laugher shimmers; her voice carries across the room like ripples on a pond. It’s a cozy little space, only a few people here – working, visiting. The playlist in the background is all Lighthouse and the Dave Matthews Band and the Goo Goo Dolls and U2 and the Verve. I am startled by the realization that this woman who is here with her children can’t be more than a couple of years older than me.

Eventually she gives in and plays a game of chess with her daughter, letting the child take all of the bronze colored pieces from her side off the board one at a time even if that isn’t how any of this works. The child gleefully enjoys winning.

Sat here watching this out of the corner of my eye, carefully not looking at them. Pretending to read a book. Definitely not tearing up, not even a little bit, because why would I do that? It’s only an endearingly cute scene in a coffee shop.

The mother puts away the chess pieces in the box, holding each of them in her hand, admiring them quietly, cleaning up after child as though she is embarrassed. I don’t know her and I’m so shy and I don’t know what to say but I want to tell her not to feel as though her children’s voices are too loud.

I left home when I was seventeen
I just grew tired of falling down
And I’m sure I was told
The allure of the road
Would be all I found

And all the answers that I started with
Turned out questions in the end
So years roll on by
And just like the sky
The road never ends

And the people who love me still ask me
When are you coming back to town
And I answer quite frankly
When they stop building roads
And all God needs is gravity to hold me down

Alison Krauss. “Gravity.” Lonely Runs Both Ways. 2004.

“So are you ready for this thing called love?
Don’t come from you and me, it comes from up above
I ain’t no porcupine, take off your kid gloves
And are you ready for this thing called love?”

Been stuck in my head all day