She stands over me like an angel from my past. Boots to her knees and flowers in her hair, she is a vision of beauty and innocence and purity and happiness.
She stands over me, a sharp contrast to everything I am now.
She kneels down and takes my hand in both of hers.
She whispers that she loves me and begins to cover my hand in kisses.

I close my eyes and, just like that, the world is gone and all its cruelty is gone with it.
I hear nothing but her whispers and I feel nothing but her soft lips on my skin.
I let my eyes slowly open again and see her smiling down at me, her beautiful green eyes filled with love and caring
I try and smile back, to tell her how much I love her, how much I need her, how, without her, the world was empty. But I can’t.

A Lesson As To Why You Should Check Your Mail Daily as Well as Double Checking Zip Codes Before Mailing Things





Part One: Checking The Mail



I was busy on Saturday. That's nothing new for me... I'm a happening guy, you know... well, I worked from 10am until around 6pm, then drove down to S. Tampa to meet the Watsonian Wonders for some dinner. Originally, we were going to go to Cappy's for some pizza. Jason and I went there for lunch one day a while back, but Jen never made it, so it was going to be her first time. That was the plan, anyways... and as you know, things very rarely go according to plan. Somehow we ended up craving barbeque, so we went to a place who's name completely escapes me at the moment. It was a Very mom&pop kind of place. Not bad, either. Not the best in the world... but not bad by any means.

After dinner I drove back up to my neck of the woods to watch some UFC beat downs at Gators Dockside. No, I did not get any wings. No, there was no "scooner" sauce involved, but it was still a good time. I got to watch a guy who looked a little too much like Chris get knocked out. That was a good time.

By the time I was pulling in to my appartment complex it was after 1am and I REALLY had to pee. I had a quart of Iced-T while at work, 3 more glasses of T at dinner and half a pitcher of beer and a glass of water while watching the fights. I was BURSTIN.

Sunday was spent hibernating until I had to go to work to do inventory, then at work doing inventory. Nothing too exciting there. Watched a bit of a movie, did some reading, went to work, counted things. Lots of things. LOTS. Then went home, ate dinner and crashed.

Then came Monday morning. Training down in S.Tampa... I always misjudge how much traffic there will be, but always fear that I will err in the wrong direction and be late. So I leave early. But wait! I'm driving by my mailbox.... I could check it... that would delay me a few extra seconds... I'll do that! I park my car... get out... get my mail key.... open my mail box.... smile. What's that in my mail box? It's not junk mail... it's not a bill... it's not ESPN the Mag... it's not a movie from Netflix... what could it be? It's a box!

Yay!

I got a box!

A small box....

But a Box!

I snatch it out greedily and rush back to my car before anyone can steal it away from me. Granted, its 9am and there's not another person in sight... but you never know.

I sit in my drivers seat with my package in my hands and a smile on my face.

I open it slowly, as if that would somehow build suspense.

I see the note, hand written, and let out a little laugh.

"Happy Purim Love A+C"

Under the note was a plastic baggie filled with Hamentaschen.

My aunt and uncle overnighted me homemade cookies. :)

Thankfully I checked my mail after only a few days as opposed to the week it sometimes takes me!

...

Okay, it's late. I'm tired.

...

ok... it's late... i'm not tired... but i should go to bed anyways. that means you don't get part2 tonight. I wore myself out a bit sending an email earlier, so I'm not up to typing anymore.



Oh, and for those of you keeping track! I'm on 18th Floor by Blue October. 23 songs down, 3594 to go....

she tore apart my paper heart and let the pieces rain down on the street below like confetti
....
I wrote that this morning... not sure why, but I had the image in my head when I woke up. I was in an apartment overlooking a city street. It was relatively early in the morning.... I was in an open living room clutching at my chest, looking up at her. She was on a balcony about ten feet away from me, tearing up my heart (which happened to be made out of paper) and letting the pieces fall to the street below. A group of people in suits stopped as they were hit by the falling pieces and looked up to see a steady stream of confetti falling from the sky. They dropped thier briefcases and started dancing while I fall to my knees two dozen floors above them.
... so yeah, that was the image stuck in my head as I ate my breakfast.
....
I've decided to play a little game, let's see how long I let it last.... at 10:57 tonight I reset my iTunes playlist to include every song on my computer. I sorted them alphabetical by song and turned off shuffle and repeat. Let's see how long it takes me to listen to every single song on my computer without skipping. That's going to be the hardest part... not skipping. But... we shall see. I wasn't paying attention, so I actually started at the end of the alphabet, so right now I'm listening to 5 Times Out of 100 by HotHotHeat. Now comes 2 different versions of 45 by Shinedown. First accoustic, then not. :)
...
I've noticed that I overuse the smiley face. Totally and completely. I mean, I use it in emails, blogs, texts, ims.... everything. In fact, I've been known to use it multiple times in a single text. I think I need to temper my smileys..... I think. Here's the thing, though. I really do smile a lot. I mean, a LOT. My cheeks hurt today. Not because I was pretending to be a chipmunk and stuffing my cheeks with cashews... nay... they hurt because I was smiling, grinning and laughing all flippin' day. For serious. They hurt. Maybe I'll try not to smile at all tomorrow and see how it goes.
...
And I'm staring down the barrel of a 45.... swimming through the ashes of another life... no real reason to accept the way things have changed... staring down the barrel.... and I'm staring down the barrel of a 45 and now I'm swimming through the ashes of another life and there's no real reason to accept the way things have changed staring down the barrel of a 45----------
...
ok, tonight is going to be a multiple blogger... first this one, and then the next. I just wanted to get some random stuff out of the way before I got to my real blog. Not that this blog isn't real... it's just that the other blog is going to be a story and i didn't want to clutter it up with other random thoughts, though I'm sure while I'm writing I'll be distracted and write random things in it or not have it go the way I mean it to go or maybe some other strange transgression.... who knows? Not me. and I'm pretty sure YOU don't know either.
...
Actually, before I even go write that blog, I'm going to write an email to a group of people on FB. yay email!

It seems like sometimes there are things that aren't meant to be had. The world comes so very close to reaching a certain point, and then it shifts, it turns, and a new path is begun.

Watch the day and all it brings and welcome the night in to your arms

Pieces of the puzzle fall to the floor and get swept away leaving the pictureboth incomplete and perfect.

What can you do with a sentimental heart?

I life my head up and look around and see exactly what I've seen before.

Your tentative hand brushes against mine and sets the world on fire.

so close to sleep... darkness... fingers can barely move across tehk keyboard.

copy. paste. delete. wash. rinse. repeat.

good night, world.g'nihgt world.

What's the point in having a sky if it isn't to hold all the stars at night, to shed light during the day and pour down a little rain every now and then?
...
I remember once, when I was six, a hurricane blew through Long Island. That was definitely not an every day occurance up there. At the time, it was just my mom, my sister and I living in the house on Newton Ave. I remember being so excited. I'd never seen a hurricane before. I didn't even really know what one was. All I knew was that it was windy and raining all day long. Late in the afternoon the winds picked up and battered the house. The power was out. We were staying huddled in the dining room, one of the only rooms without windows. It sounded like the coming of the apocolypse. At one point everything seemed to get louder. A door that was left open upstairs Slammed shut. Another flew open. We ran upstairs to find that the windows in one of the bedroom had lifted themselves open. We decided that the house had better judgement in such things than we did, so we threw some towels on the floor in front of the now-open windows and ran back downstairs.
And then came the silence.
The eye of the storm.
My mom told me it would happen... that there would be an eerie calm... and then the madness would begin again. I didn't understand. How could there be a quiet at the heart of such terror. And then it came. Silence. Even the sun came out as if to taunt us with what a beautiful day it could have been.
I'm not sure how we convinced her to do it, but during the eye my mom let us open the front door and stand on the porch. The neighborhood was still there. No houses blown away. No trees lifted from the ground and strewn across lawns. Even though it sounded as if an army marched through our front lawn, the grass was wet but not trampled. And then my mom ushered us back into the house, back to safety.
For the second time that day, it seemed like the big bad wolf was outside our door trying to blow, blow, blow our house down. Huddled with my family around a kerosene heater and a battery opperated radio, I curled up in a blanket and fell asleep as freight train after freight train roared down the street.
I woke up the next morning in my bed, tucked in like it was any other morning. I threw on some clothes and my socks and shoes and ran downstairs and out the front door.
Something was wrong. I new it immediately, but couldn't quite place what it was. And then it hit me. The house across the street was gone. Well, not gone, exactly, but hidden. Apparently the ivy that covered ever inch of the house blew off, but stayed intact. It was ripped away from the house and was standing as a giant wall in the middle of their front lawn. It was pretty cool. Shortly after I walked out, I could hear the sound of the chainsaw as someone from inside that wall of ivy decided that would be the most satisfying way to get out. The only other damage from the storm was to a garage down the street. An oak tree, apparently, couldn't quite withstand the winds long enough and toppled down during the night and felt a garage would be the best place to land. Better the garage than the house.
....
So... what made me write about a hurricane when I was 6? Well, I don't know, really, but now that I'm done, I guess I'll say that the point of the story is this:

Sometimes life will decide to blow your whole world away, but we are strong. And we have chainsaws to hack through the ivy that might stand in our way of recovery. Chainsaws are kinda badass like that. Be that chainsaw. Rawr.

I take step after careful step as I walk closer to the edge of the world. The ocean rolls into the shore ahead of me.
I look over one shoulder and then the other.
I am completely alone.
Slowly, I close my eyes and breath in deeply.
The smell of the saltwater reminds me of home.
The breeze is crisp and cold, so I pull my jacket close around me.
The waves crash beneath my feet
People laugh in the distance
But I stand alone and silent in the night.
I take another step along the pier
And another.
The sounds, the smells, they are the same here on the Pacific as they were on the Atlantic.
So much of life out here is the same
But so much of it is so drastically different.
The beach is to the west, not the east.
That is something I have yet to get used to.
I take another step
And another.
I open my eyes again and look over the edge of the pier.
I only have one, maybe two more steps until I am no longer over the beach
Only one or two more steps until I reach the end of the earth.
The end of This Earth
And into a new beginning.

I walk into a bookstore.
I begin to browse, though I'm not really looking at the titles.
Just moving my fingers over the spines, waiting until one feels right.
My hand brushes over book after book until it just seems to rest on one.
I slip the book from the shelf and read the title.
It looks so familiar.
My heart starts to beat faster as I sink to the floor with the book clutched in my arms.
I sit down in the middle of the ailse, surrounded by shelves of books
I run my fingers over the cover.
It feels as if that book has been searching for me just as I have been searching for it.
I open the cover and begin to read.
I start the first story
And I realize that I've heard it before.
I skip to the next, and it is the same.
Story after story, I've heard them all before.
They are the same words.
They are the stories she whispered to me as I fell asleep.
They are the poems she'd leave for me in my shoes.
I don't know how I found the book
Or how the book found me.
But I sat there and read it from cover to cover
And back again.
With every word I read I can hear the sound of her voice
And she is with me again
As if she'd never gone.