Last Words

I’m that woman in the car next to you at the stop sign.

I didn’t pull forward immediately and you honked to let me know you were waiting on me. 

I get it.

We’re all on a schedule, some tighter than others. Some less forgiving. I get it.

You drive by and I note the ear thingie. Blue tooth.

When I was born, the phones were big and black and heavy. They were fixed to the wall. There was no call waiting or forwarding or voicemail.

Just plain old ring ring party line.

My dad is going to die. 

I am going to lose my father. Maybe today. Maybe tomorrow.

You’re sitting next to me in your army ranger uniform and you fidget your wedding ring with your thumb. Whatever you’re thinking, be thankful. Be thankful you’re going home to a spouse. Be thankful.

You called me this morning and I was a little bit scatter brained and you sighed. I know. I wasn’t on point. I wasn’t super sharp. I hesitated.

I’m in a hotel room on an island 4000 miles away from my kids.

And my dad...

I left him a message this morning. I love you, Dad. It might be the last words he hears me say. 

You know what? Whatever you said to your dad or your spouse or your kid last....those might be the last words they hear you say. Make them count.

And one more thing...

Look at the person next to you. You don’t know. You just don’t know what they’re dealing with. 

Be kind. Smile. We are all just one breath away from forever.

We Were Supposed To Grow Old Together

Driving around the north shore of Oahu today, I couldn’t help but note the dichotomy of the scenery, with jagged mountains vaulting into the sky, piercing the clouds on one side and the ocean foaming and clawing at their base on the other. In between, in the middle of a mighty battle, the highway meandered naively through bohemian villages filled with architecture that never left the 60’s. Tiny huts nestled alongside billionaire’s estates without a care.

There was a time I would have envied the money. I would have felt the unfairness of being born without a silver spoon. 
But not today. 
Today I envy the huts. 
Not so much the homes but what I imagined behind the peeling paint of the walls. 

The husbands and wives who have grown old alongside one another: couples who don’t notice the wrinkles or the grey hair because it happened slowly and alongside a lifetime of memories.

I envied that.

I wanted that.

I was supposed to grow old with my lover who called me by a pet name and knew how I liked my coffee and never left me in care of the keys.

Those couples in the hut - they have something that is beyond value. They have something priceless. 

And yes. Today I envied them. I envied the hell out of them.

Aloha

  

Aloha.

Hello and Goodbye, all at the same time.  

I ought to be good at it by now. God knows I’ve had enough experience...

And yet, saying goodbye is still so fucking hard. Too hard.

Damn.

Today I start my Aloha tour, touching base with the places and people who have meant so much to me these last few years. 

Places and people who have changed me.

For the better I hope.

Places I’ll never see again.

People. 

Sigh. Damn again.

Sitting in the airport, I can’t help but think of five years ago when I arrived on island wearing a sweater and jeans and boots and make up and all the things I haven’t worn since that day.

I was wrapped up so tight. 

So uptight. 

I didn’t know how to laugh or play or relax. 

Hawai’i has taught me those things. 

Lying on the beach beneath a gentle sky with the sand warm beneath my skin... feeling the ocean tide pulling away my stresses, I was changed. I am changed.

I belong here now. In some strange way, I will always belong here.

And like every other time I have fallen in love, I’m leaving it behind.

And some people wonder why i am the way I am.

This.

This is why.

A lifetime of saying goodbye is why.

Damn.

The More Things Change ...

Hi again. I used this blog throughout the transition from married to divorced to single to ... me. And I used it again through my transition from the working girl to career woman. I never thought I would come back to this place, but here I am.
I’m transitioning again and I’m so not comfortable with it.
I’m also a little bit bereft I guess.  I lost my best friend and that loss definitely left a mark. But that’s a tale for another time.
Ahh.
Like so many times before, I’m jumping off into the great unknown. Except this time it is an unknown that I actually know a little bit about. I know there will be religion. And winter. And traffic and cities and people and all the things I left behind.
Wish me luck.
I’m going to need it.