kept and kept.

Finding myself in everything.

Myself.

Wow.  Am I self-involved?  Narcissistic?  Probably.  I guess.  No.  Please, no.  Probably.

– Your blog is very personal.

– Yeah, I guess it is… I don’t know what else I would write about.

Is it a sign of uneducatedness to only write about myself?  [or is the give-away the word “uneducatedness”?]

Is it completely vain to think you’d care?

Welp, it’s all I know.  So, right now, it’s either that/this [me] or nothing [not me].

[in chronological order of the day… this day!]

Finding myself in the book I’m reading.  A book that could become a favorite…

Everything is Illuminated by Jonathan Safran Foer.

Hard [yet amazing] reflections/recognitions of sadness, love, inspiration, loneliness.  And laughing.  Laughing out loud.  Loving.  Towards a book?  What?  Judge me.  Try.

“If we were to open to a random page in her journal – which she must have kept and kept with her at all times, not fearing that it would be lost, or discovered and read, but that she would one day stumble upon that thing which was finally worth writing about and remembering, only to find that she had no place to write it – we would find some rendering of the following sentiment: I am not in love.”  [page 80.]

Finding myself, the younger [the better?] me, in an email.  In a picture.

Momma and Mary Kelley.

Mary Kelley.  The woman who lived across the street for as long as I can remember… until late high school.  That’s when she moved to Houston… where she is now… at age 90.  Momma visited her and sent me this picture.  [p.s. could my mom get more gorgeous?]

I started crying.  Crying again now.  Mary Kelley.  Wow.

I went to her house almost every day after school for some time in grade school.  She taught me how to play Hearts.  She taught me how to play Dominoes.  [and then a dominoes game called, “chicken foot.”]

She gave me any treat she had, anything I wanted.  She let me play with all her son’s old toys.  [which were SO COOL because they were all so old, so priceless, so loved and kept.]  For a long time it was her and her husband, Harry.  [yes, mary and harry… and [i kid you not] their son, larry… but larry was older and did not live with them… only visited.]

This picture.  I was brought back to those times.  Those cards.  Those candies.  Those toys.  That morning.

The morning I saw blue and red lights flashing in my window through the darkness of early.  I went, looked out.  There was an ambulance at the Kelley’s.  Mary, standing in her night gown, looking into the back of the ambulance.

Harry died.  In his sleep.  Of natural causes.  Hard.  Me being young, but understanding sadness and hardness and that things weren’t fair.

Visiting Mary more often… or trying.  More cards.  More candies.  Sarah being old enough to come over… play Hearts with us.  Mary and me kicking her ass… then remembering that she was, like, eight… and letting her win.

Then getting too cool to go over to her house after school.  Not riding the bus anymore.  Getting rides home.  Then Mary moved.  Sadness.

Now she’s 90, legally blind, but as beautiful as ever.  Amazing.  Strong.  Witty.  Loves.  Loved.  Gosh, wow.  Beautiful.

—————————

Finding myself in the movie I watched tonight.  A movie that could become a favorite…

“I suppose I do have one unembarrassed passion. I want to know what it feels like to care about something passionately.”

“And neither the flower nor the insect will ever understand the significance of their lovemaking. I mean, how could they know that because of their little dance the world lives? But it does. By simply doing what they’re designed to do, something large and magnificent happens. In this sense they show us how to live – how the only barometer you have is your heart. How, when you spot your flower, you can’t let anything get in your way.”

“You are what you love, not what loves you. That’s what I decided a long time ago.”

And then a song, for good measure…

An old favorite with newness…

Self-involved?  Who?  Me?

nah...