8:18 PM

perspicacious - (per-spi-kay-shus) adj. having or showing great insight

Purple sky tonight. 

Crickets have given up. 

Geese made a practice run today. Now, they move field to field. Preparing for the long haul. Fly and rest. Fly and rest. Building stamina. Gathering coordinates.

And here I am. Making my preparations. Coming upstairs every night to meet here, with you, so that we can get some exercise. Some food for thought. Thought for food.

How many more words? How many more days? When it’s time to go what will be left?

Let it go, Stevens. Let it go.

She is perspicacious. And she doesn’t even know it. The way she writes. Her smile. The light she turns on when we touch. Accidentally. Or purposefully in passing. Two bodies wanting nothing more than to try. What might fit? How can one tell? Why not give it a shot? These skies won’t be purple for long. Soon, the geese will not fly. And eventually, our time will run out. We won’t have the desire like we do now.

It is self worship through the glorification of the female species. Object. Status. Class. Or is that what they want you to believe?

All I know, and all I can be sure of, is that she inspires me. Pushes me on. Encourages and cheers me. Without saying a word. The simple fact that she’s here is all that matters. In the lit match. The burning wick. The flickering light.

Summer. Dying out. Autumn rising in morning fog. An appreciation of this warmth is growing.

~ k.j.

11:42 PM

ken (ken) n. the range of sight or knowledge, beyond my ken. ken v. (kenned, kenning) to know.

Is someone getting the best of you?

Who or what have you given yourself to? And why?

What have you wasted? Where have you been? Where are you, now?

And she sleeps. Under skies running blue with the end of summer. Changing. She grows silently. Blooms in dreams. Absorbs the deep. Wakes to the mirror. Finds the strength. Begins again.

Another wrinkle in time. Days turned gray. Sight turned inward. What will be is not as important as what is.

She walks through it. Past unfamiliar faces. Connected to others by the loneliness she feels. But she walks on. Stronger. Aware. Involved in the intimacy of making love alone. In daydreams. Memories. The moment.

How did we arrive here? How did we come to this life of becoming? When will we find the peace we need to simply be the Being?

She’s opened the window. Pulled back the sheets. And she has found me. In the fading sunlight. The coming winter. The coloring of leaves.

She has the best of me.

8:20 PM

shilly-shally (shil-ee-shal-ee) v. to be unable to make up one’s mind firmly.

Shilly-shallied tonight. Here at the computer. In front of the screen. Reading news. Visiting websites. Feeling tired from a good solid weekend of outdoor fun, unable to decide if I really want to write.

I think it might be a good idea to stretch the mind muscles before going to sleep. If I don’t do some clearing, it’ll be a rough transition.

We drove forty miles. From a party in Alpena. To her family’s camp. Through Hillman. Into Royston. It was dark, but her family had lights on. Big flood lights shining over the horseshoe pits. Lights on the deck, on the house, and glowing inside.

"There are a lot of people here," I said.

"I told you my family would be here."

And she had. She mentioned that there would be family. Kids. Aunts. Uncles. A bit of everybody, but as we got out of the car and all eyes were on us, I couldn’t believe how many there actually were.

"Hundreds of them," I said. "Hundreds."

She laughed, walked ahead into the open arms, toward the smiling faces. And I followed.

There weren’t hundreds. But there were at least fifty. Nice, kind people, who accepted me as if I was one of their own

"Have a shot," her old uncle said.

He held the glass out in front of me. Smiling.

I thanked him and drank it down, and it tasted like gasoline. Diluted in wood-smoke flavored water.

"Delicious!" I said.

He laughed, gave me a hearty slap on the back, and before I knew it I was surrounded by Uncles, cousins, and family friends. Men drinking, throwing horseshoes, listening to a country music station.

She was sitting on a lawn chair. Talking with her Mom, Dad, Aunts, and cousins. Smiling. Laughing. Radiant in the edge of the light. I wanted to go to her. To sit beside her. Hold her hand. Revel in the happiness. But I had shoes to throw. People to get to know. We would have another time, I thought. We’d be together again. At another gathering before summer winds down. Or at a fall festival. Possibly a Christmas party. We will steal secret glances across a crowded room. Smile. Hold each other from a distance. Cherish our accidental unity. Two people coming together. Learning complex and intimate details of each other through simple, every day situations.

So, I played the game. Listened. Learned. And filled up on observation. When we stumbled into the camp, through the kitchen that smelled like chili and homemade bread, then past the rows of bunks filled with bodies sleeping, and we came to our place - an air mattress with two pillows, a sheet, and a warm blanket that her Dad had put out for us - I felt at home. As if everything in my life up until that moment had been meaningful and true because it had brought us to this one place we belonged. On this particular summer night. Together.

~ k.j.

10:16 PM

selenology (sel-e-nol-o-jee) n. the scientific study of the moon

No moon study tonight. The clouds have us all wrapped up. Insulated.

I watched them gather from my place on the deck. Notebook in my lap. Book on the railing next to me. Gray and white clouds coming together over the holy land. Some others creeping in over the horizon. Pink. Orange. Red. And I sat there thinking how nice it was. Breathing. Watching the land be still. Hearing silence. So quiet that there was faint ringing in my ears.

Like now.

Some sound that is not only outside, but inside. Energy meeting. Existence shifting. Life coming in. Life going out. Give and take. Build and destroy. Live and die.

Have been thinking about growing old. Paying closer attention to old people. The way they move. Slowly. Painfully. With walkers. Canes. Holding someone’s arm. And I think about how hard it must be to be dignified. To walk around with so much inside of you, and want to talk and share, but to have nobody that will listen.

I was in The Owl yesterday after work. Stopped by to visit with a friend. We were watching boxing on television, making small talk with the bartender, a gorgeous, young dark haired girl, when the dinner crowd arrived.

On the screen. Two young men. Gloves on. Pounding out a beating.

In front of me. Brown eyes, nice lips, a warm smile.

Beside me, my friend, dazed from work, from the every day life, sipping a beer, smoking a cigarette.

To my right. Rising up from a table. An old man. Shaking. Taking baby steps. His son, son-in-law, or grandson with a big smile on his face, holding the old arm, guiding him. Protecting him from harm.

That’s how it is as we age. We gain knowledge. Learn from life. Have more to offer, to give, to share than any other time in our lives, yet we shake. We wobble. And stutter and can’t find the right words. So, we are guided. Set aside. And we become tokens. Symbols. A way things used to be. And we’re forced to be silent. In the world we helped build, the life we helped to survive, we are pushed aside. Forgotten. Replaced by steady hands. Run over by youth.

I don’t want to grow old. Don’t want to be guided. Protected. Helped. Don’t want to become a Sunday visit. A family reunion. A funeral day for someone to take. But what can we do?

There is nothing to be done. And that’s why it’s so important that we learn now. That we learn how to listen, observe, and share. What we are, we must maintain. What we’ve loved and believed, what we’ve known and have lost, is what we must carry. Alone, or in company, with dignity all the same.

~ k.j.

8:43 PM

cicatrix (sik-a-triks) n. the scar left by a healed wound

Candle burning. Night cooling. A step. A step. A step. Away.

It’s gone, but it remains. And it rises.

A distracted day. Pleasing others. My clock running out of time while part of me lives in the past. Under the influence.

I can’t remember what she smells like. It’s hard remembering her face. But I remember the comfortable feeling. I remember moments. Vignettes of my life. Instances of existence that may not have been real at all. When you’re under it, full of it, wound up in it, it’s often hard to know that you’re struggling. It’s impossible to believe that you’re not in it. You know that it’s where belong, drinking it all up, but you can never know how it will end.

And, like everything else, it ended.

She was leaning over the sink, lining her eyes.

"I have gold specks in my eyes," she said, and she put down the pencil and moved her face closer to the mirror.

"Beautiful eyes, that’s what you have."

I said this and moved up close behind her. I wanted to see what she was seeing.

"Don’t touch," she said.

And touching is exactly what I wanted to do. Because somehow I knew that this would be our last time together.

"Just a little before we go?" I asked, as I put my hands on her hips.

She put her hands on the edge of the sink, arched her back, and rubbed herself against me.

"No," she said, and when our eyes met in the mirror, I could see she was serious.

"Why not?"

"Because. I can’t."

She never could. And yet we did. Many times. In the townhouse in Little Canada. In the condo in Brooklyn Park. And two days earlier in my little upstairs apartment in St. Paul. The same place we were now in. But tonight, before we were to meet friends at a bowling alley bar, we didn’t. She couldn’t.

"I need to work things out," she said. "I won’t be able to see you anymore after tonight."

What she needed to work out was her marriage. Only four years along and two of them spent sleeping with me.

"It won’t work," I said. "Try all you want, but it won’t work. If it does it’s because you’ve given up."

I moved away from her. Sat on the edge of the tub. She went back to looking at her eyes.

"Don’t say that. You don’t know what we’ve been through."

As much as I wanted to talk about it, to try and make her see why it wouldn’t work, that she was giving up and doing what she said she’d never do (go with the flow - be what others wanted her to be), I didn’t. There was no use in it. She was determined. Guilty. Obligated. Marriage, like life, was what you made of it. That’s what she said. And now, with her standing there, as beautiful as ever, concerned with gold in her eyes, I could feel us slipping away.

I stood up. Put my arms around her. She stiffened. Leaned back so that her ear touched my lips. She breathed a deep breath. Her body relaxed. I could feel her heart beating.

"Are you ready?" I asked.

And I watched her in the mirror. Her eyes closed. Lips slightly parted. Waiting.

~ k.j.

10:42 PM

logy (loh-gee) adj. (logier, logiest) lethargic, sluggish, dull. 

And here comes autumn. A season that reminds me of everything. All days. Cold. Warm. Dark. Light. Autumn with her loud change. In temperature. Wind. Color. Raging against the old house. Whistling through the trees. Bringing me to a place that is no longer summer, nearing winter, and far away from spring.

Death is in the air. Hiding in hot chocolate. Buried in sawdust during wood cutting. Disguised in the leaves while we’re hunting. Silent while we cheer at football games. It is now, as summer fades, that we do our absolute best to stay busy. Yard work. Canning. Haying. Preparations for the dark days ahead. When we’re locked inside with others and locked inside ourselves. We are in a stepped-up state of denial, filled with necessary action.

Autumn is beautiful because it is our last respite before the dying season. It is our time to reflect and look forward. It is our personal acknowledgment of our mortality. Something we cannot escape. A part of us that frightens us, yet moves us to create and do the best work we can.

It is the time now, before autumn, as well as the season of change itself, when I write the most. When ideas come in flurries. When the drive rises. It is now that the battle begins. I am settling into my stronghold, bracing myself for what is to come.

~ k.j.

8:47 AM

guttersnipe (gut-ter-snipe) n. a dirty badly dressed child, a street urchin.

Was supposed to have spent yesterday at a party. Shooting clays. Throwing horseshoes. Playing cards. Eating food cooked over an open flame. Drinking. But I didn’t. I’d wasted enough time Saturday night. Pretending to have a good time, drinking, carrying on. All for the sake friends united - celebrating friends.

I know my limits. There’s only so much time I want to spend on the surface. And I’d had my fill. Still have it. Am full on the surface dwelling, and could use a nice long bout on my own, plunging the depths.

That makes people uncomfortable.

I ought to just let loose. Live a little. But all the phony, cordial bullshit is meaningless to me. I’ve done plenty of "living it up" and "having fun" and all it ever does is make me feel empty. Standing in a crowd, or on the edge, listening, drinking, taking it all in, hoping for something - a spark of insight, some glimpse of growth or change - but there’s nothing. Aloof, or paying close attention, it doesn’t matter - for the most part, people don’t change, and most of us don’t grow. We hit an age, a life stage, a personal ceiling, and we stop.

And this is fine. To each his own. Do what you want. Read. Fish. Play computer games. Raise a family. Become conservative. Liberal. Vote a straight ticket. Wait in line. Consume. Consume. Consume. Certainly, somewhere in all of it, some internal growth must be taking place. We’re just unable to see.

With changes in place and in time, with changes in circumstance, people must experience some growth. The bitch of it is that people aren’t able to recognize it, and they aren’t able to convey it to others. Nobody wants to sit down with friends and say, "Hey, I experienced some substantial personal growth today!" That’s absurd.

Instead, we talk about the career - we like it or we don’t.

We talk about houses. We’re buying, selling, adding on, remodeling, or refinancing.

We discuss children. How many. Their ages. And how smart they are.

And we’ll throw something else in for good measure. A fishing trip. Going to camp. The rising price of gasoline.

We ALL do that. That’s how we interact, relate, and connect. That’s how friends stay friends. Probably why some marriages last. It’s easier to survive on the surface. Where there’s light, and everybody knows everything by the same size, shape, and name.

The important thing, the essential part of sustaining the continuity of the everyday life and surviving it, is not to talk about it. Do not talk about it, and don’t write about it. And that can be avoided altogether by simply not thinking about it. And, as I move through these days, hearing and seeing - down dead-end roads, on my own near the edge, or mingling with the crowd - I recognize that most of us aren’t living. It’s too hard to truly live. To be alone and comfortable with thought. It’s too difficult to think below the surface and then have enough courage to share. It’s best if we simply live and die.

None of it matters, anyway. Right?

We all wake to the light one day. Full of potential and hope. And then we’re educated. By family, teachers, church, corporations, and it isn’t long before we’re fulfilling the expectations of others, living out their hopes and dreams. Our core is lost. Sinks deep. And because we’re so distracted by what others have directed us toward, because we are so consumed with consuming, we forget how to breathe below the surface. We grow tired and weak, and we live insulated lives - safe from sight - all of us living everyday life. The same.

~ k.j.

7:29 PM

Word of the day:

burble (bur-bel) v. (burbled, burbling) to make a gentle murmuring sound, to babble.

Not much burbling tonight. Not yet. Once this rain soaks the place. Fills depressions, runs down the sloped road, and into the ditches - then we’ll have some burbling. Little babbling creeks. From the sky. To the earth. And to the sky again.

Jets are roaring through the sky tonight. From the base, only a few miles away, doing maneuvers through the cloudy gray. Practicing. Flight and fight. And it won’t be long, and they’ll be off duty, and they’ll make their way into town on a Thursday night, searching for some relaxation. Some fun. Most likely, they’ll end up at the place I’d like to be - JJ’s.

But my discipline begins. After a day of work. Exercise. Eat. Then get to business. Believing that being here, putting words to paper is better for me, better for you, than being at the pub. Drinking. Conversing. Relaxing. Decompressing. Having fun. It might be a tough run tonight. It might not come easily. But it will come. And in the end, we’ll all be better because of it.

That’s what I tell myself anyway.

Being passionate about something isn’t always fun. More often than not, it’s work. Certainly, the work is worth it. After all, it is the simple act of creating which moves me in ways I’ve never known. It’s not about getting paid. It’s about something else. And part of the beauty of it is that I’m not sure exactly what it is. If I did know, I doubt I’d be here as much as I am.

Besides...these days, I’m willing to be disciplined. The little writing that I do share, that pops up here on this site, is because I know you’re coming here. And to me, that’s all that matters. Someone’s out there. Following words. Coming along for the ride. A walk. A run. A look inside. We’re here together. Believing in each other.

Shared trust. Common desire.

All we want is to be known. Not famous. Not rich. All we want is that feeling. The safe, solid feeling you get when somebody finally gets you, and makes you realize that you are not alone.

So - chin up. Keep the faith. See you soon.

It’s time for this writer to get writing.

8:28 PM

To be connected to the change of seasons, part of the earth, existing outside myself, within you...that’s how it feels. Tonight. Another workday past. More of my life passed away. Sitting in the soft glow of lamplight reflecting on the ceiling. A black-and-white picture framed behind glass. Watching me.

DANGER

UNSTABLE EDGES

DEEP SINKS

That’s what it says.

And so we sink.

The urgency has resurfaced. Out of danger for the time being. Aware of unstable edges. But pushing on. Looking forward to the deep sinks. Any piece I can find. Mine. Yours. Ours. A writing life. A life of inner light shown out. Over and over again. Yet people pass.

Lost in 9 to 5.

Bound by 5 to close.

One day, we’ll stumble home. Recognize the places we’ve come from. Touch the faces we’ve taken for granted. Hold the hands we’ve let go. One day, it’ll come. And we’ll be safe. We won’t have this nagging ache. This sense that things aren’t right.

And it’ll be here. On this plane. Not buried in the past, or disguised in the future. It will be now. There’ll be a click. A snap. A pop. And somehow, we’ll wake. All of this dreaming will stop, and what we’ll discover is what we have. And what we have is what we are.

Stop.

Step out of the dark.

Move through the light.

Atoms against atoms.

Force within force.

We are tied together.

By sky.

Sun.

Earth.

Tide.

All of this wide, wide wandering can stop.

The answers are the questions.

Unabated. Fulfilling. Real.

We cannot be still until we can separate.

From our expectations. From order. From what others want us to be.

There is danger.

We walk on unstable edges.

We need the deep sinks.

I’m filling up. I’m ready. To hold her. To help. To share. And all is quiet tonight. She and I asleep under the same stars. Lullabied by our familiar sounds. Air in. Air out. Heartbeats keeping time. Ticking away. Our constant reminder.

None of this lasts. So reach deep. Hold tight. And breathe.

~ k.j.

9:14 PM

Word of the day:

perineum (per-i-nee-um) n. - the region of the body between the anus and the scrotum or the vulva. perineal adj.

Now, let’s give an example of perineum as used daily conversation:

                    "Hi, Bob."

                    "Well, good morning, Sandy! Great to see you!"

                    Sandy, catching whiff of something funky in the air, moves away.

                    "Oh my God," she says. "What’s that cologne you’re wearing?"

                    "Cologne?" Bob asks.

Sandy hurries to fill her cup. Pours in a load of sugar. Tosses in several spoonfuls of creamer.

                    "Yes, that smell!"

"Oh that! It’s my perineum! I don’t like washing down there..." then, leaning toward Sandy and whispering, "It chafes."

                    "Dear God," Sandy says, gagging as she walks away.

Oh. Come on. You always wondered what it was called.

I had this idea that I’d add a word of the day to the site. Decided it would be the first word that my eyes came to when I flipped open the dictionary. So perineum it is. 

And who says learning can’t be fun?

Another fine night. 

Dusty white moon. Cool air. 

Feeling my old gal, SLEEPY coming on pretty strong right now. Guess I’ll unplug and give her the business.

Keep on keepin on...

~ k.j.

11:37 AM

Sunday sermon

When you live in a place like this, there aren’t any excuses. You are what you are. What you discover. It’s up to you whether or not you choose to learn and grow. Unfortunately, there isn’t a lot of growth around here.

Not external growth. We don’t need Red Lobster, Target, or American Eagle. What I mean is internal growth. For the most part, people walk around showing their shells. The outside. Some exterior that they think people want to see. But what we want is on the inside. What we need is that thing which beams hope. It’s infectious. A smile spun from the deep.

What I’m trying to convey isn’t selfishness, self-centered talk, or self-importance. What I’m trying to do is show a connectedness. How we are related. That experience isn’t something superficial. That between life and death, there is much more than distraction - an existence which is much more important than any real, or imagined, afterlife.

I was born in Alpena, Michigan. I left. And now I’m back. The old house. The church with the crooked steeple. Graveyard on one side. Wide-open field on the other. Dichotomy. I’m on a dead end road, but I’m connected to a busy path. This waking and sleeping - lives and deaths - have me here. With you. And what we have is now. A day as important as any. We must choose.

So many people sink. Give up. Peter out. They plug through days without thought. A routine. The same day lived over and over again. Make money. Pay bills. Drink. Watch TV. Shuffle along. Play the roles others have made for us. Pray to God. Punch in on time. Believe things will be better on the other side.

It’s bullshit. Something we tell ourselves so we can sleep at night. Something we need to believe so that we keep ourselves manageable. So that we’re quiet. Think alike. And go with the flow.

If we are conscious about discovering what it is that we have, who we are, then we don’t need much. But sometimes it takes a lot of distraction to get back home. There needs to be loss, instability, chaos, in order to rediscover solid ground. The place you came from. Not a place on a map. A class, or an institution. But the hope. The freeness.

I know. It’s difficult to pinpoint. Hard to understand. Seems impossible to sit still when all around us everyone is telling us to move. To become. To consume. But sometimes it’s best to remain calm. To fight the good fight on your own terms. On your home turf. To arrive at a place where there is no work-shopping, hob-knobbing, and where the only person challenging you is YOU.

~ k.j.

8:08 AM

in morning

When I get into bed, I read and write until I’m good and sleepy. Then, I shut off the lamp, and stare at the ceiling. Until my body feels peaceful. I listen. To crickets, the wind, rain or snow. Whatever happens to be outside my window. Last night, there were coyotes. Not far off. Yipping, howling, yapping. I closed my eyes. Said a prayer, and did the impossible task of trying to calm my mind. As usual, the thoughts, images, sounds - all of it - took over, and I was off for my nightly ride. Dreams. Nightmares. Fantasies. Vivid and intense explorations of people, place, and time. Today, I wake exhausted.

In the mornings, I drink instant coffee. There’s no sense messing around. It’s just me, and lately I’m maxed out at cup three. Fill the cup with water. Heat it for a minute and fifteen. Add the grounds and sip. Like now.

Sometimes, on Sundays, I’ll fire up the coffee pot. And maybe in the winter more often. That’s when I’m usually in for the long haul. Writing for hours. Then reading to forget about what I’ve just written. It’s good to write a story then push it away for a while. In fact, it’s probably the most important part of writing. The time between draft and revision. That’s probably where those nightly rides come in handy. The mind digests, uses what it can, and does away with what it cannot. I have yet to decide if the dreams, nightmares, images and sounds of sleep are what I need to keep, or what I need to flush out of my system.

I brush my teeth four times a day. Once when I wake. Once after the coffee. Once in the afternoon. And once before I go to bed. My teeth aren’t perfect, but I want to keep them. Crooked or straight, having them in thirty years will sure beat the hell out of gumming my food.

I had a girlfriend that hated how I brushed my teeth. Too fast, she said. And it really bothered her too. Borderline fury. That’s what she had. She’d growl at me if we were in the bathroom at the same time.

"Who taught you how to brush your teeth?"

"Nobody. This just works for me."

I smiled. Opened wide. Moved the brush so fast it was a blur of plastic and foam.

She walked out of the bathroom. Dressed. And she was gone.

That’s how it ends. I know how it ends. Very familiar with that territory. It’s the beginnings I’m not sure of. The tingle of familiarity. The rush of physical attraction. A touch. An ordinary moment that somehow feels intimate and lasting. I can recognize potential beginnings, feel the nibble, but I’m always slow on setting the hook. If anything, for the next beginning to come, she’s going to have to arrive in a rush. Slap me upside the head. Paint it on the side of my house. Look me in the eyes and say, "Hey, chuckle-head, HERE I AM!" Otherwise, it’ll be another ending before it even begins. She’ll take the line and run, and run, and run. And I’ll be left on the shore with an empty spool, useless rod in my hand.

Fishing. That’s something I’m going to do more of now that I’m on a better path. There’s nothing like it. And for me, unlike a lot of nim-rods who must catch or kill to have success, I simply enjoy the act. On the shore. Breathing the air. Listening to the water. Watching muskrats. Birds. Crayfish and turtles. To me, it’s the BEING THERE, that counts. And if you can enjoy that, you’ll have success. A better frame of mind. More trophies to show.

Lots of people after trophies these days. Wanting success. Surrounding themselves with belongings, allowing themselves to be distracted, losing sight of the simple things. Important things.

~ k.j.

9:49 PM

Still amazes me when a story comes. Always begins simply. A vision. An image. Everything builds up. The experiences. Good days. Bad days. Sobriety. Drunkenness. Companionship. Loneliness. Rest or insomnia. A smile from a pretty girl. Her touch. The smell of rain. A cat’s meow.

And tonight, loafing in the basement, napping with the television on, it came to me. A little bit of light. A spark of hope. An image of a man and his son. After the rain. The boy wanting to pick night crawlers. And I sat down and the story came out. Just like that. It’s still in its infancy. Certainly, tomorrow I’ll wake and revise, but for now I think I’ll let it breathe. Just for you.

CLICK HERE to read the story.

Not sure why I wrote such a story. I haven’t got kids of my own. Haven’t got a wife, or ex-wife. I have picked worms. I have walked outside after the rain. I have watched. Listened. Observed.

Maybe I’m getting old. Guess we all have biological clocks. Something inside ticking. Pushing us ahead. Into and out of relationships. Into and out of love. Who knows? Maybe this old boy is succumbing to things he cannot control. Something internal.

Geezus.

- k.j.

2:52 PM

Summer breeze. From the green field across the road. Through the old window screen. Through the dusty slats of the window blinds. Into me. Breathing it all in. More life. Dusty or clean. Cold or dry heat. Another day. Seconds. Minutes. Sun up. Sun down. Breathe in. Breathe out.

Didn’t make it to Kalamazoo last night. Was supposed to drive down after work. To visit my brother. Was tired, truck was running like shit, and was low on dough, so I opted out. Got the truck home. Tinkered with it. Got it running better. An hour later, I found myself at JJ’s with my brother and sister-in-law. A good friend of mine and his wife and daughter joined us. Was a good time. Especially with the kid there. She’s four or five, and having her around is a great reminder of how beautiful this life can be. Kids are so honest. So open. Free.

I don’t know that I’ll have kids of my own. The life I’m living isn’t good footing for the solid family life a kid ought to have. And God knows, I’m not in the running to get married any time soon. Not when I already have a wife. This life-long bride - Writing.

How I ever got so involved with her, I’ll never know. But she’s here. Every day. Bringing out the best of me. It gets ugly sometimes. Very ugly, but we always make it through. And we have made some beautiful children - the words, sentences, stories and poems.

***

"All I want is to be happy."

That’s what someone said to me not so long ago. She was taking dirty glasses from the bar and washing them. I was standing there. Drinking a double-vodka tonic. Playing Keno. Listening to her.

Four of my numbers hit. I was feeling pretty good.

"Isn’t that what you want?" she asked.

She had stopped washing. Had dried her hands. Was pulling her long hair back into a pony tail. With her there in front of me - the smell of her and her hair so pleasant - and the vodka hitting my bloodstream, I felt good. Happy as could be.

"Do I want to be happy?" I asked.

She gave up on the pony tail. Let the locks fall onto her shoulders. Smiled at me.

"That’s all I want," she said. "Just to be happy. Isn’t that what you want?"

I wanted to say something about feeling happy. About being happy. Tried to imagine myself someplace else. Maybe with her. In a car. On a nice, long drive, listening to music, looking at her out of the corner of my eye, feeling safe and at home knowing that she was there.

I wanted to tell her that being there, listening to her, seeing her, made me happy.

But a customer came up. Needed a pitcher of Bud. Two mugs. A book of matches. So I didn’t say anything. And she went about the business of the beer, the frosty mugs, and pointed out the big basket of matches on the bar.

The customer, a young fella - all bronze muscle, and pearly whites - didn’t waste any time. He leaned over the bar and started telling her how beautiful she was. Wanted to know what time she was getting out of work.

I turned away. Sipped my drink. Watched the Keno screen. Hoping that one day my numbers would come up and I would learn a little more about happiness.

***

There. Came out quickly. A little big. A vignette. Maybe one day it’ll be something more. For now...

best,

9:32 PM

Dark clouds moving in. Can smell the rain coming. Thank God. We need the rain. This heat, this dust, the brown grass - all of it needs the rain.

To sleep by the sound of raindrops. That’s what I want.

Being brutal tonight. Going through old stories and making them new. Some of them should have never been published. But now, they are in good hands. Better hands. More careful, attentive, patient hands. And soon, they will be in your hands. Am going to put together several new stories and several of the old stories and make a "best of" collection. Which is really a "best - as of right now" because one thing is for sure - the more you write, the better you get.

My supposed departure to Kalamazoo is fast approaching. About a month away. The closer it gets, the less I want to go. I’m sure that the MFA experience at Western would be a good one, but I’m also sure that if I stayed here in Alpena and worked harder, I’d be just as fine.

What it boils down to is this - I’m getting tired of moving. Seems like I’m just getting settled in again, developing new friendships, interests, and gaining ground, and soon I’ll be starting all over again. Sure, it’s never too late to start anew. Certainly, there are things that Kalamazoo has to offer that I can’t get here. But let’s not forget this...we have all we need. Tucked deep inside, we have all we need.

In reality, I don’t need to go to graduate school. I’m not big on hob-knobbing with intellectuals, and I don’t like to write for workshops. And in all, I think Hemingway was right...

"If any sonofabitch could write he wouldn’t have to teach writing in college."

It would be a mistake for me to believe that if I don’t go to grad school I’ll be missing some last chance. That’s bullshit. The truth of the matter is that grad school will help me because it will give me a fresh perspective. But if I was really working hard and putting forth the effort I need to, I’d be freshening my perspective no matter where in the hell I am. Western will allow me to make contacts. Supposedly. But in reality, the contacts I need to make aren’t in school, they are in the publishing world. I ought to be sending my fucking stories out to agents, publishers, magazines. But I’m not. If I never make it as a writer (make a living as a writer) it’ll be because I haven’t tried hard enough. There’s a chance that my writing will be read when I’m gone, and that’s the only thing I can really shoot for. So, I guess I’ll keep writing with the hope that somewhere there are readers with enough inside of them to get it.

Well shit...there I went. Jerking off again. Flapping the gills. Blah. Blah. Blah. There are a hell of a lot more things to be concerned about in this life than my own little world.

Georgie nominated a fella for the supreme court. Nobody gives a shit.

Wally-worlds keep opening. Mom and Pop shops keep closing.

Gas prices are rising, but everyone’s getting grand employee discounts on gas-guzzling SUV’s.

Celebrity gossip about Pamela Anderson and Tommy Lee? And it’s making the "news"?

How goddamned distracted are we?

- k.j.

10:22 AM

I’m 32 years old. Open to just about everything. Getting a bit set in my ways, but what I’ve learned is that there are many ways. Not much for dinking around anymore. If I believe in something, want something, am interested in something - if I want to say something - I do it. Go for it. Life’s to fucking short to be dilly-dallying around. I’m aware of nuances. Slight changes. Differences. I’m more trusting of my perceptions than I used to be.

So, I told her - straight out - you are the most beautiful woman in the world. Because, honestly, she might be. Holy hell. And a girl doesn’t walk around all beautiful like that because she wants to be ignored. That’s not how it works. Birds have bright feathers. Bears stop and paw. Lions roar. We walk around showing of our arms, chest, ass, and legs not because we don’t want people to notice them, but because we do want people to notice them. And I noticed her. Like I always do. And finally, I thought it appropriate to tell her.

Certainly, nothing has changed, and I wasn’t expecting change. Not expecting anything. I’m still here. In my old house, next to my old church, sitting in my boxers, with a load of morning laundry chugging away downstairs. She’s probably waking up with her boyfriend. But I’m there. Tucked away somewhere in her head. Maybe her heart. And she is a little changed. Who knows? Maybe when she gets out of bed and heads for the shower (to let warm water touch that pretty face, to soap that glorious body) she might stop and look in the mirror - and maybe she’ll see what I see. Absolute, pure beauty. A gleaming beacon of hope, radiating from the inside out.

Or maybe not.

And that’s fine too.

Goddamned hot. Again. Sticky. Muggy. Want to sit in the lake all day and stare at the waves. Would like to take a cooler of beer to the beach. A cooler of beer and some submarine sandwiches with crisp lettuce, cool tomato, and mild peppers. And a book. And my notebook. And I want to sit there all day. The whole damned day. Away from everyone and everything. And I want to write and be cool in the lake breeze and I want to think about her. About Alpena. My family. My friends. And I just want to BE on this hot summer day.

~ k.j.

"Daddy, let’s pick night crawlers."

His eyes are big. Brown. Like his mother’s.

"What for?"

He does a little jump. Claps his hands.

"For fishing!"

My boy. Five years old. Tickled with the notion of traipsing through puddles, picking slimy worms.

"But we can’t go fishing today," I say. "Mom will be here soon."

Undefeated. Still brimming with smile. Another jump. More clapping hands.

"We can go next weekend!"

"Okay, buddy. Let’s get something to put them in."

It doesn’t take long. He runs to the kitchen sink, reaches way up high, and takes a cereal bowl from atop the stack of dirty dishes.

"We’ll use this!"

He grabs his baseball cap from the table and runs out the door. Barefoot.

Dark is coming on and I know Anna is already on her way. In her boyfriend’s car. A sleek, sporty deal, that’s always shined up and spotless. And she’s dreading the drive down my dirty little dead-end road.

She’ll arrive shortly. Within minutes, I assume, because it’s Sunday night, and she always comes early on Sunday night. It’s so they can go for ice cream. A little family tradition that we had together, but that they now have on their own.

I walk barefoot through the wet grass. Searching the yard. Under rocks. Near the sidewalk. But there aren’t worms anywhere. When I get to the flower garden, the one Anna had labored over every spring and summer, I stop.

Two sunflowers have found a way through the tangle of weeds. Their big, colorful heads droop. Water drips from the yellow petals. Slips off the leaves.

Kneeling in the driveway. Cereal bowl in one hand. The other fishing around in a puddle. My boy pulls worms from the water. Holds them up to the sky. Lets them stretch out. And looks at each one as if it’s the first worm he’s ever seen.

"This is a big one!" he says, putting it in the bowl and running over to me.

And it is a big one. Twice as fat and twice as long as any of the others he has. In all, I count five.

"How many have you got in there?" I ask, crouching down.

He sets the bowl on the ground. Takes them out one by one. They twist and writhe in the gravel and sand until they are so full of dirt they can’t move. My son picks up each one, brushes it off, and counts as he puts them back into the bowl.

"Five!" He beams. "One. Two. Three. Four. Five!"

"Boy, you sure can count well."

"Dan has me count everything," he says.

My heart plummets. But I smile. Tussle his hair. Pull him near. He smells as beautiful as he did the first day I held him. Four years ago. Like yesterday. Sitting on the edge of the hospital bed. Looking at his little pink face. Anna’s hand on my back. Her head on my shoulder.

Dan is the new man in my son’s life. He wakes early. Makes pancakes and smoky links. Squeezes oranges for fresh juice. On the way out the door, to his six-figure career, he kisses Anna’s cheek. Gives my boy a big hug.

"That’s good," I say. "Count all you can."

It is all I can muster.

Thunder booms. He looks into the sky. Smiles wide.

"No lightning?" he says.

I want to look up, to watch for the burst of light in the dark sky, but I can’t because I hear Anna coming. She has turned onto my road. Is taking it slow. Making sure to avoid deep puddles and soft spots.

"You can’t always see it," I say.

"What?" he asks.

"The lightning," I say. "You can’t always see it."

We stand up. Anna pulls into the driveway. She looks radiant. Better than I ever remember. She smiles at him. Toots the horn. Waves.

He is all smiles. Waving back. Jumping. Clapping those little hands.

"Ice cream!" he yells. "Ice cream!"

I pick him up and hold him toward the sky. Swing him in big circles. He giggles. And it’s the best sound in the world.

"Come with us, Dad!"

I stop the circles. Bring him down. And I hold him. Breathe in as much of him as I can. Because I know that these days will not last.

"Maybe another time, buddy."

He wraps his arms around my neck. Kisses my cheek.

I let him go. Onto his little bare feet. He runs away into the house.

There is a short moment while he’s gone and it’s just me and Anna again. Our eyes meet in the raindrops. Through the car’s tinted glass. She gives me a little smile. Flashes the headlights three times. Our little sign. Hello and goodbye.

He runs out of the house. Still barefoot. Carrying his shoes in hand.

"Bye Dad!" he shouts. "Love you!"

I wave. Watch him get in and kiss his Mom on the cheek. She hugs him. Kisses his forehead. He buckles up. They back out of the driveway. Pull onto the road. And then, they are gone.

Above me, the sky lets loose. Lightning flashes. Raindrops fall. And I stand in the driveway. Holding the bowl of worms. Counting the seconds until thunder booms.