Elton John - Sixty Years On - 1970 - the music in my head

Apocalyptica & James Hetfield Metallica - Nothing else matters ''mix'' b...

Phil Collins I Wish It Would Rain Down [RARE CUT]

It was as if each of the ones who had gotten away returned to visit and ask how he was doing, all with the utmost sincerity and genuine tenderness over the course of those three previous days. He was fine, just a bit overwhelmed.

A Setback Or An Opportunity To Get Things Together Even More?

He was he realized after talking with her that he was a little sad, a bit disappointed that she wouldn't be coming his way- at least not in the time frame which he had expected. But could that actually be a good thing?
Did it actually give him more time to get everything together and more time to just know what he wanted before she did actually arrive. A year and a half sounds like a long time, but he'd already been waiting for six months and that time had passed rather quickly. He had in fact begun to worry a little that he might not be ready, that there were simply too many loose ends to pull together before she was in town. So this was really a reprieve. He had tried to tell himself that the night before as he lay tossing and turning, but it took hours until he finally fell into a state of relaxation and then eventually sleep. He mourned what he thought of as the loss of another woman he hadn't ever had to begin with. But by the next morning he was ready and able to write about it. But surprise, surprise the whole thing had prompted him to begin the day by writing to someone else. Writing to someone with whom undone business seemed even more pressing and immediately important. He imagined telling the one he had mourned the loss all about the others, but that hadn't yet happened. He had instead been going down a list of other women and writing to them. Some he ended up saving for later or only writing a brief now instead of an essay or even a poem, but he hadn't as yet written to her. Perhaps it was because he knew that she was still away, but maybe it was because he had already given her a considerable block of time the night before, and didn't know if she even want any further contact at this moment. Or maybe it was because he had said so very much to someone else- someone he hadn't thought he would write to for several more days.

He didn't know, but at least a part of him was glad about finally writing to this other woman. It was so long overdue. Not saying anything seemed like an cowardly omission. But he thought that once he shared that with her, he'd also share the information with the other two. He did love each of them, all in slightly different ways.It was almost a past, present and future set of circumstances, almost. Almost, but not quite.
It would have been more convenient if that had actually been the case, but it wasn't. I was the kind of thing which made him wish he could take the kayak out on the water and just float in the quiet beyond the surf line, so that he could think, but on that day and even into that evening there was no quiet or calm in his local waters. Still the urge continued to pull at him, to call him toward the water. He felt compelled to face his destiny regardless of the weather.

As he prepared to launch at dusk, one of the last of the life guards on duty did all he could to dissuade him, but no.
The sea was not to be denied.

Catarmaran From His Childhood

The Revelation

It had taken quite a while to set in fully. The nature of his awareness had been incomplete for some time, but had continued to build, little by little. He understood what had happened and what was happening at that moment. He realized that he was comatose, and felt that he could find his way back and out the door to his earlier life, but he wasn't quite ready to return. He was learning so much. Seeing connections between seemingly unrelated people and events. Things which had puzzled and troubled him were finally beginning to make sense. He felt his real body smile, and was aware of the others watching and the hope which that one small gesture gave to them. For the first time, in a long long, time, he felt thankful, and happy to be alive.

It Had Been A Beautiful Day

 There was nothing out of the ordinary on that last walk together. Perhaps the Sun was a little brighter than usual, and made everything, including the truth about us a bit too clear to overlook any longer. It was a little sad, but not so terrible because we both already knew. We had tried our best for quite a while, but then just began to pretend. That had become our life. But that time was now over, and there wasn't much left to say- just some wishes that this or that had been done differently, but as for the outcome, that we didn't dwell upon or try to change. For the most part we hadn't really struggled. We'd just grown more and more empty. In some ways we were both victims of modern life. Always racing off because of some absolutely critical deadline, never feeling that there was enough time for what we really wanted. And when there was finally a moment or two together, feeling somehow at a loss, not quite knowing what to do after doing the only thing that still came naturally.

a slight awakening?

For some time there had been a great stillness, much to the concern of Mike and the others who were on the outside trying to peer inward. What they didn't realize was that he was and had been at peace during this period. That had crossed their minds, for at first he had seemed rather agitated. And simply seeming physically more relaxed was a comfort to them all. They did notice the change, but over time just got used to the calm, and then eventually began to fear the worst.

Now for the first time in weeks there was an ever so slight stirring within him.

He was attempting to speak to her, imagining his monologue, “I do love you still, but-”

and he hesitated further even in this deep state of quiet. “ It-

it just seems like you are so, so far away.”

Just Drifting Is OK

There wasn't much time left, but the very determined driver, Mike Barr was almost at the clinic. He could "feel" just how close the situation was. A very literal life and death race against time.

But the unknown passenger was still back out on the water. That's what he thought. That's the way it seemed. The sea was pretty calm once again, but it was cold. He believed he was in the bottom of the inflatable kayak. He was now and then aware of the water that sloshed back and forth all the time, but for the most part he didn't really notice it that much. He was a bit depressed, once again. He had been before, a couple of days earlier, but had managed to right himself and then felt much better for a while. But now he was sinking again and not really trying to help himself. He had so little energy to begin with, but even if he had felt stronger, he didn't see the point. He was OK with just laying in the bottom of the small boat and drifting.

The New Girl

Mike came to a section of road which wasn't so bad, relatively speaking. He made good time.

It seemed that the sea had calmed, but he wasn't really paying attention. His thoughts were elsewhere. He still didn't understand completely.

Why would someone as young and beautiful as Billie want to focus so much attention and affection upon him. It had at first thrown him off balance. Later though, he had gotten used to it and was often left longing for more as things tapered off, but then it had returned to normal for a while. Her interest in him seemed to rise and fall like a tide.

It was a low tide, and he couldn't help feeling a little sorry for himself, that he had lost something, but it was something he had never really had. And she was after all really just a distraction (sorry Billie) but it was true. She was not the one. As cute and creative and perpetually curious about everything as she was, so genuinely beautiful inside and out, she was not The One. In another life she might be.

In this miserable existence, Ingrid was The One. Nearly everyone at work knew that too. But all the hugs and kisses from Billie didn't go unnoticed. Some people even worried that Ingrid's feelings might be hurt if she ever saw it. But he had told her about it, almost as soon as it began. All she said was, "I guess that's just the effect you have on people."

His neighbor, Lydia, the soon to be therapist thought he should forget about all of the women he was attracted to from work and just go out and have fun, without worrying so much. She thought he should just go out and have lots of sex, with many different women, but not including herself.

The two of them had a history. He had started to fall for her, but she wasn't interested. In fact she had been abundantly clear in that matter. He got the impression that if he had literally been the last man on Earth, she still would not find him attractive. For some reason though, she did like having him around now and then, but not for anything remotely related to sex.

Lydia had actually written and then crossed off the names of four women from work that he was or had been attracted to. She liked helping him with organizational tasks. He had the capacity to be more than a little scattered at times. And Lydia had been helpful with some major projects in the recent past. Quite often, unless he was deliberately paying really close attention to details, and setting up a timeline in order to complete all the necessary steps, he could forget some very important tasks. He could and had done things which were helpful in terms of organization, but that was not his nature. He was usually more inclined to just float along, until he had to do something.

Later he found himself wondering why it had been so important to cross off those names. He thought he knew what she would have said, but was there anything more?

The next day when he was with Ingrid, he found himself saying, "How could I ever stop loving you." as he watched her work. When she noticed him, she said, "What?" and he just said, "What?" right back. She smiled. He wondered if she could recognize the look of love in his eyes.

He suspected that she knew everything. They had never even come close to saying anything close to I love you. But he felt certain that she knew and accepted things as they were. But that was because he never asked for anything more. He didn't tell her that when he walked into the room and she looked so, so beautiful. He wanted to take care of her. He wished that he could take away her troubles, if not all, then at least some of the things that sometimes seemed to weigh so heavily upon her shoulders.

He had gotten pulled in before, hoping to save some little bird with a broken wing. But that had never worked out in spite of his good intentions. Most of the others were simply too damaged by the time their paths had crossed. And at this point in time, he was in his own way pretty far gone too.

He normally didn't feel that he had much left to give to another person. But these little ones, their young students, in need of a helping hand had the capacity to draw him out, when most others no longer could.

But what he wanted, what he hoped for was someone who was happy and bright, who radiated love and positive energy. That's what he had seen when he first met Ingrid. She always lit up a room and made everyone feel better just because she was there. People noticed and missed her tremendously when she wasn't around.

But over the couple of years they had worked together, as he and Ingrid got to know and trust each other more, as they each shared little bits of their own stories, it became clear that at times, in spite of public appearances, each was often on the brink of going under.

He had wanted to just say to her, "You are always so beautiful. And I miss you so much when you're not here." He had learned from past experiences that he needed to resist such impulses. He had learned the hard way. Twice, No three times he had frightened away women who were interested and open to him, by saying too much too soon in those early stages of the relationship had ruined everything. Another woman had actually told him that he said way too much about his feelings. It made things uncomfortable. He remembered Michelle saying "Just keep it in the air." but in their case, he had already said too much and things were doomed, but since then he always tried to remember her advice. He had been careful around Ingrid for some time, from the first moments that he found himself attracted to her.

He missed saying things directly at the moment when he felt something, but still found opportunities, acceptable ways of paying her compliments. Thus far, he hadn't scared her away.

But more important to him, he hadn't made her uncomfortable. She didn't want to add more stress to her life. There was already way too much of that.

When he thought about the prospect of pulling back, and trying to forget what he felt, it was not so much his own feelings that he was worried about. He suspected that she would feel like he was upset with her if he suddenly stopped paying attention, and trying to do little things for her when he could. She accepted what he did because on some level she appreciated it. She was glad that there was someone trying to watch out for her. She could feel hurt if it suddenly stopped.

He couldn't imagine stopping unless she asked him to.

Copyright 2o11 Craig Parks

Bad Timing, A Recurring Theme

It occured to him that a number of his past relationships had been cases of bad timing-

When both partners wanted to be close to the other,

but at differing times.

Or when one had had some minor lingering reservations which held things back

and because that delay, a certain amount of beneath-the-surface resentment began to build and get in the way, again at a time when the other person was feeling quite differently, in fact, finally ready.

It had happened a few times.

Everything had now quite suddenly become completely clear. It's hadn't always been. One case had really stood out, but the others had taken more time to recognize the dynamic. There had been little hints of awareness, but really it had taken until now for him to actually put it all together and see that it was a pattern. He might be able to go back in time and fix things, if he ever made it back, but at least he could learn something from his gigantic blunders.
Being hopelessly lost in a kayak might actually be a pretty good form of therapy. He smiled and wondered what Lydia would think of that. She was his neighbor who was a grad student in psychology working on her Masters and MFT License.

Being out here was bringing up a lot of stuff. What he didn't realize, because he was completely delerious was that he and the kayak had actually been washed ashore. He had landed in Baja California. It was an isolated stretch of a very barren Mexican coastline more often frequented by sea turtles than humans. Fortunately for him though, someone had noticed the kakak more than an hour before and got to the still living, but unwakable person just as he was dumped out of the kayak as the waves rolled it over and over.

Not eating for as long as he had made him considerably easier to carry, but Mike Barr was still in pretty good shape and could have managed someone quite a bit heavier. You never stop being a Marine, even when you finish three tours and then retire from the fire department, and then move to another country and eat steak and beans most of the time. Mike watched the stranger dream as he loaded him into the back of his 4x4 Ford 25o. Over the years, he had done what he could for others, in his own way trying to balance things out. Mike had become a paramedic after leaving the Corps as a highly decorated sniper. The word was that he had never missed. That had been enough for him. He had been able to take a certain amount of pride in his "work"until he one day when he shot someone who turned out to be an innocent- not even a soldier. What got him most was that stupid intel officer afterwards, acting as if it was nothing at all

Mike knew immediately that there was not much that he could do for this guy. His truck would make it to the clinic twenty some miles to the North even though the roads were still muddy from a very rare five days of rain. Mike had a feeling that the stranger was dreaming about a woman, and he was right.

The sea seemed very rough now. Harder than any other time he remembered. That last wave had been a big one. Mike felt bad that that last bump had caused his passenger to become completely airborne. He felt the truck dip as the dead weight landed hard in the truck bed. The mattress which was there in the back in case of "emergencies" did little to comfort the blows the stranger was taking. Ordinarily, Mike would have automatically slowed down considerably, but he sensed that his foundling was slipping away more and more with every minute. He stepped on the gas and drove even faster. Fifteen more miles of tough love.

Copyright 2010 Craig Parks

Chapter Two-Where Are You, Marilyn?

Marilyn?
Is that you?"

He hadn't yet noticed the water
sloshing back and forth, washing over him,
nearly filling the inflatable kayak.
He continued in his half-dreaming state
which was now more or less permanent.

Yesterday he discovered that he no longer had a paddle,
but had forgotten about that once again.
It did come to him now and then, but no longer caused him any distress.
That particular point was no longer of interest and had drifted away. All of the earlier tension and fatigue was gone.

He was happy floating. He was good at that. It's what he had done all his life.
He may well have been one of the genuine masters of letting go and just going with the flow.

He had always meant to write more about the "Flow" state.
He had listened to the book on tape by that name long ago and found it interesting that some business-types had finally taken notice of that sort of thing.
The flow state had always been something that artists and writers slipped into-
as they immersed themselves completely in what they were doing.
He had written some additional material related to the topic with the intention of sending it to Fast Company.

He had once hoped to become a regular contributor to that publication and to Punk Planet. He thought that would be an interesting combination. That would help him keep things balanced. But Punk Planet was no more- out of business for some time now. It was still interesting to think about. He had always meant to read We Owe You Nothing, just to really see exactly where the editors were coming from, but that hadn't happened.

Oh well, another item for his endlessly long list of books to be read.
Someday - Maybe Someday.
He had also meant to read Flow again and take more notes this time.
That reminded him that he wanted to try to line up an interview with Yvon Chouinard for the next time he visited his daughter up North. But there was never enough time. Those trips always seemed so rushed- up and back. Why was there never enough time in life? Time enough just to think.
Oh, it just hit him. He had time now.
It was great. Great.

Why was he even here any more?
He knew that he belonged up there in Northern California, or maybe out in the desert.
That's what he had told himself for so long.
But new and old places no longer felt magical, the way they once had.
Was he just burnt out on everything?

He still collected possibilities in his head. He always thought of new things to do,
but nothing really excited him. Nothing turned him on or lit any kind of fire within.
Had he just been alone for too long? Was he too far gone and completely hopeless now?

Why was he here? Why were any of us?
That had been one of his first questions- back in his meditation days.
Over the years he had felt that he had various basic answers, but after a while nothing seemed substantial enough and he found himself wondering about the point of everything more than when he was younger.

Why was he here?

And why had he headed out to sea when he knew everything would be closing in on him?
He had asked himself that a few times in the days which followed.
The answer to a different question came to him at that same moment.
Could an off-hand remark, maybe not even related to his ramblings posted here and on his other blogs be the cause of him pulling several chapters of his writing?
Is that what had left him feeling that there was nothing more to say? Apparently it had.

Had he in a manner of speaking painted himself into a corner-
by taking the position that writing would be the center of his life? Perhaps a bad analogy, but you get the idea.

What if nothing worth writing came to him anymore?
Or what if what he had to say was just too upsetting
for those around him, or too revealing?
Choosing to make yourself naked, publicly, is a personal decision, but most of the time our stories are not just about ourselves alone.

There are other characters in our real life dramas. When we write about ourselves, it quite difficult not to drag others along with us as we exercise our need to disrobe publicly. And exposing too much about someone else is not always OK. It would be safe to say that most of the time it was not. He remembered an interview with another writer (was it Joan Didion? He thought so.) saying something about writing being a process of selling out your friends. At the time he hadn't wanted that to be true. He had felt a lot of resistance toward the idea,
But-
was it true? Was it necessary at times and just too bad for your so-called friends.
Was there some other way of telling your story without including the part they played?
Did he need to ask permission?

Maybe,

theoretically,

if you cared anything about the relationship.
But in his life he had felt that he'd asked permission and followed the rules
and thought about other people's feelings far too much.
More than he ever should have. He had always put others first.
He had always tried to be helpful and considerate.

He was still glad he hadn't lived a life of stabbing others in the back and fucking everyone he possibly could have,

but even so,

things could have been different-

maybe better.
At the very least a lot more interesting.

There might have been a different balance point.

There were times when he made a decision entirely on his own,
FOR another person,
out of some sort of misguided sense of kindness,
because he thought they were just too vulnerable,
but then they ended up resenting him and becoming annoyed.
Some of them had really wanted to feel a little physical as well as emotional comfort from him,
and in a lot of those circumstances, he had withheld it.

In those situations, and there had been a few,
he had taken the position of knowing what they needed-

knowing what was best.

It had at times cost him the friendship,

It had also in each and every one of those passed up opportunities,
cost him a great deal of immediately available pleasure.

He had been so stupid sometimes.

Where had that come from?
Passing on something they both wanted and perhaps genuinely needed at that moment.
So, so stupid.

So overly cautious.

He could have made himself and at least some of others much happier.

He was genuinely perplexed. He didn't understand why or how he had gotten stuck in that pattern.
"You have been alive a long time now." He said to himself, "Haven't you learned anything?"

It was time to begin just doing things.
Like going after whatever and whoever he wanted.
Even if there were obstacles or other people in the way.
He shouldn't always be so accommodating,
so willing to give up the lions share- the best of everything to someone else.

Deep down he knew he could have just about anything out there, or anyone.
He had had a conversation about that with Aurora, one of the women he worked with.
She asked him, out of the blue one day, if he believed that a person could go after and get anyone
they wanted. He considered her question for a moment and then replied, "just about."
She agreed. You could have almost anyone out there
if you want to REALLY go after them, without any holding back.
They both added that you might sometimes find that you didn't want them after you got them,
but that was another matter.
They had both had that experience.

Later he realized that Aurora might want to sleep with him.
He did at times find her attractive, and thought it would be fun, in the moment.
She would be a playful, very affectionate lover, but he still wasn't sure about it.

He was doing it again! Just thinking about everything too much.
He probably hadn't shown enough interest, and had blown his chances.
He hadn't passed her test and now she had lost interest. But he didn't think that was really true.
She was still hoping that he might really come around or at least be more openly playful with her,
the he was with some of the others.

He suspected that if they did end up in bed, Aurora would want to talk about it with some of their friends. He had been right to not just jump into her bed. That would ruin everything.
The dynamics at work would change so much.
Having people wonder about something or even suspect it was one thing, but knowing was another.
People who were now playful might stop, but then some others might start. What to do? What to do?
Well, he couldn't do much from out here now could he. Problem solved at least for now.
He wanted to think about something else- something more important.


The other day he had met a very attractive and interesting young woman,
younger than he would normally ever consider, but she was quite brilliant.
He could feel that about her.
For a split second he had without even meaning to mentally plumbed her depths
and could feel her reaction. Simultaneously fascinated and frightened.
He saw her reach out to her nerdy boyfriend, for reassurance.
She moved closer to the young man in a vain effort to contain her response.
She had taken refuge with him about a year-and-a-half earlier
and began telling herself again and again that she loved him.
And she did, but that feeling offered her an additional measure of protection, which she needed.
She was hopelessly drawn to, but also terrified of the worldly reaction to her extraordinary physical beauty.

In the course of their conversation, she had expressed her discomfort with someone else she had met who instantly wanted to "go deep" without any small talk. She was laying out the ground rules.
It hit him like a lightning bolt that just because someone was "deep" it didn't mean that they wanted to go there instantly with just anyone else who had that capacity.

It also hit him that the small talk which he usually found to be so boring was in a sense analogous to foreplay. It was important and necessary-a part of the whole process. He hadn't ever realized this.
With most women, with most people in general, he usually couldn't wait to get passed the small talk
and get down to business. But there had been a couple of exceptions.
With them, he had enjoyed every step of the way from beginning to end.
And these were the ones he remembered most. This girl was a genius- a master teacher.

Days later he mentally thanked her. Their paths would cross again, he was pretty sure of that.
Neither would have to engineer another rendezvous.
It would just happen in spite of the many miles which separated them.
He could feel it and knew she did too. And next time there would be no apprehension, no reservations. There would be small talk, but also some deep diving too. Nothing more was going to happen.
Nothing that anyone else would be aware of. They understood each other. It was nice.
They both moved on for the time being and went back to their regular lives- content.
A little happier and more complete because they had met.
It would be too difficult to try to explain anything more.

Should he have really pursued her? Should he have exposed their subsurface activities to the small world around them? No, that's not what either would have wanted. They both liked being able to slip in and out like this. And have the true nature of their new relationship known only to each other.
He was doing what he wanted. Perhaps he had always done that, but without even realizing it.
There had been similar, beneath the surface relationships before.
They had often been better and more problem free than what most would consider a real relationship.
It was better this way. It was always perfect- with no down side.

He could easily write about these people too.
None of the problems associated with writing about your closest friends.
He wished that that was easier.
Sometimes he just wanted to say how much he loved someone.
Writing about Marilyn was fine.
Time had made it all safe.
What he had to say would not bother her.
And she already knew everything that he might possibly say-
Everything that he felt.
That was not a problem.
It was just their history. A few fondly remembered moments,
even the painful parts were now cherished artifacts.

But what could he say about Claire?
Almost anything would be too much.
It could ruin everything. That's what he thought.
He had a gift for saying too much too soon-
a long history of telling someone how amazing and beautiful they were-
before they were open to hearing such things.
He would have to be content with small talk for a while longer- maybe even forever

with matters of real substance very few and far between.
He had no real hopes for that situation.
There was nothing to be done.

But that was not true
He had already done more than he probably should have.
But it seemed to be OK.
Claire hadn't complained or seemed uncomfortable.
Only once had she asked him to stop. And he did.
With Marilyn had hadn't been able to contain himself,
to stop saying how he felt about her, and it had been too much for her.
Because he cared so much for Claire, he found a way to rein himself in.
He did wish he could call her, right then, out there on the water.
Maybe to say what he had left unsaid.
Maybe it would be OK as a good bye- as his last words to her.
But his phone was back in the car.

It had probably been towed away by now.
The registration was out of date. He hadn't been able to pass the smog test,
because the check engine light was on. He knew how to reset it, but there was something wrong with the diagnostic unit on his car. It wouldn't display the fault codes and you had to do that first in order to reset it. Oh well, he wouldn't be needing it any time soon, but still, he didn't really like the idea.


Saying something, almost anything about Claire,
especially in one of his histories of misadventure would be too much.
His most recent attempts to conceal her identity would be deciphered by Maddy soon enough.
She was one of his  previous muses, his favorite model,
and at one time the most frequent reader of many, but not all of his first drafts.
She would figure it all out. Maddy could be quite determined.

He had decided to rewrite five chapters of Low Tide Desparados, in the hope of keeping Claire's real identity a secret. Figuring it out would be fun for Maddy, but once that was done,
she would be faced with the decision of whether or not to inform that real, live person
who was behind the Claire facade about what he had shared with the world.
Not that there were so many readers.
But it was the idea-
the public exposure of some very private matters.
He remembered at that instant that he did not like the prospect of Aurora talking with their other friends about something that might take place between them.
Almost everyone at work knew he had it bad for Claire, but it seemed to be OK
because he didn't go around talking about it or trying to get her to actually do anything.
She might be really upset with him if she recognized herself in one of his stories.

Would it bother her?
Would she be pleased?
Would it even matter at all?

It seemed that saying anything more would be too much.

There were plenty of others to writing about.
Plenty of fish in the sea.
Most were now "historical" figures-
though some were actually still around. The relationships had changed.
Some could actually still be possibilities if he ever made it back.
And if he ever opened himself to someone other than the impossible ones such as Claire.
No more about her- at least for now!

Hmmmm. He couldn't help wondering what might be said about him
if he just disappeared and was never found. What then?
A few would wonder what had become of him.
Some would be sad.
Some who didn't know would be annoyed-
that he had never written or called back.
(Some did seem to feel pretty entitled to attention.)
But they were not the ones who mattered most.
He had the feeling that if anything did happen,
all of the really significant people would somehow know.
They would sense it, even if they never heard anything.

He felt certain that Marilyn knew at that moment.
She might even be trying to save him once more, just as she had before.
He had had a number of conversations with her in the last few days.
She knew all about Claire.
She understood and in a way, approved.
They were alike in so many ways.


He hadn't gone looking for either of them.
In both cases, he had more or less given up on relationships and ever feeling genuinely connected with someone when he had been struck by lightning-
when it just seemed to hit him from out of nowhere.

Claire had been as much of a surprise as Marilyn.
He had never had any illusions about either being perfect. That had happened a couple of times with others, but not with them.
What had happened with Marilyn came to be because they understood each other in ways that no one else ever had. The same thing had happened with Claire. .
"Sorry Kid" he said to her mentally, "Guess I can't help myself. Hope that doesn't bother you. I try not to let it show too much." But he knew that at times, it really did.

Things in both women's lives were now once again up in the air and filled with uncertainty.
Neither was quite sure what to do.
In both cases it had nothing to with him. It was just life.
The daily struggles and little disappointments and never ending demands on their time all took their toll.
And that made the interactions with the others in their lives more and more difficult.

It had the capacity to ignite fights, large and small, even with those they had once passionately loved, and maybe still did somewhere back in their deepest recesses. But there was almost nothing left. So much of the time they just felt empty. After taking care of everything that needed to be done, there was almost never anything or any time left just for them. It was sometimes so sad. And there was no one they could really talk with about it.

And it wasn't that they really wanted to be alone,
but sometimes the thought of solitude
and getting away from all the stress
and accumulated baggage seemed so appealing.

Most of the time they felt like there was really nothing to be done-
That it was hopeless.
That they were stuck,
and things might always remain that way.

They both knew that he understood what they felt,
for he had once felt it too, but they also knew that he was not the answer.
That he never really could be. They were in such different places in their lives.
And that understanding was not the same as loving.
Still though, none of them had been able to resist
trying on the possibility
of really being together.
If it somehow ever could work out,
overcome the most obvious obstacles like age, and of course ignite the flames of passion
it might be better than anything any of them had ever known.


We all have our ups and downs.
Even dream girls have unwanted things to deal with in their real lives.

Things weren't going so well for any of them.

They had all at different times in the course of that day thought of each other.
Marilyn knew that something was wrong,
but she also sensed that he was not afraid,
that he was at peace, so that was one less thing to worry about.

Claire wasn't sure why she had thought of him.
She wondered if deep down she felt a little guilty even though there was really no reason.
But she couldn't really give it more time. Her attention was needed elsewhere.
She thought of him for a few more seconds,
remembering something about a project they had worked on together,
but then her attention was catapulted away. She was once again off and running, or more like flying-
trying to keep up with everything in her life. One of her children was calling her.

He thought of Claire at the very same moment. He decided to try as much as he could to keep from projecting himself into her life.

He loved her, but he knew that the kindest thing he could do was to NOT think of her.
Was he deciding for her? Not giving her the choice?
Maybe, but he was right about this.
Right then, it would only make things worse for her.
He would try to just wait until he actually saw her again, if he did.
And say no more until then,
otherwise it might weigh her down even more.

It is important to see where someone is at and what's going on with them before you just dump your stuff on them.
He would try once again to contain himself.

Was he just imagining these women?



Were Marilyn or Claire even real?
Had any of the others been?
It was getting more and more difficult to be sure.
But he remembered them. He did.
In the last few days he needed them all
more than anything, even more than he needed a paddle.

But he was trying to let go.
He didn't want them to feel smothered by his needs, even from a distance.

He was letting go.
He was drifting away.
He began to focus upon his breathing.

Copyright 2010 Craig Parks