just a roller coaster...

today was a day filled with lots of wonderful things...

bloody mary's at the pub...

a day at the orchard...

presents from the gift whisperer...

amazing friends that make my stomach hurt from laughing so much...  corn and penis jokes...  music of mother jane...

but then everyone leaves and i think about how much i miss this smile...

and how this smile is a million miles away...

and this smile is a million miles away too...

and how this smile is leaving tomorrow...

and how this wonderful, amazing, kick ass woman is sick...

but then i get a text that says "you got good friends... family...  me to carry you"...

and i think about walking into this empty house that's not empty at all...

i have this face...

and this face...

and i can still hear the laughter and feel the love that has always and will always fill this house...

and i am home...

just watermelon...

people come and go...  some stay for only a short time...  some longer...  some never leave...  some leave and come back...  this is a story all about how (how many of you have the fresh prince of bel-air song in your head right now?) watermelon was in my life 10 years ago and has now resurfaced as heather...  we lived at applebee's...  kinda like we live at the pub now...  i'm sensing a pattern...  anyway - watermelon was one of our favorite servers...  she was our friend inside and outside of applebee's...  we loved our watermelon...  and we kind of knew that her real name was heather...  kind of...  this was before smart phones and facebook and all that other crap...  so however it happened - we stopped going to applebee's and watermelon stopped working there...  we lost touch with everyone that worked there...  i thought about trying to find her but how do you find someone named watermelon or heather when that's all you have to go on???  so imagine my surprise when, out on a friday night at the fest of ales, i get a friend request from heather kimberling...  staring at the tiny little profile pic on my phone thinking - heather kimberling...  why do i know that name???  is that???  no...  i'm sure it's not...  but it kinda looks like...  then i see the message attached...  OH MY GAW watermelon!!!!!  holy crap it's watermelon...  yes... Yes... YES i will be your friend...  look at her page - she's at the fest of ales... WHAT???  i'm here...  don't move...  i'll find you...  i was so excited i almost felt like the beggin strips dog...  a lot of things have changed over the past 10(ish) years...  her smile and laugh are exactly the same...  we both have changed and grown (i think)...  but we have remained true to who we are at our core...  heather has experienced the loss of her brother and father...  i have lost both of my parents...  i find great comfort in talking to someone who is not experiencing the exact same loss as i am but who knows exactly how i feel...  i have a tendency to wallow in my own self pity...  let life get me down and keep me down...  heather will have none of it...  that honky calls me on everything...  and yes watermelon - i just called you a honky...  no self pity when she's around...  pretty much what i'm trying to say, in my own long winded way is

heather - thanks for coming back into my life...  it's friends like you that make my heart happy and i love you oh so much...

for you and your sisters...

i carry your heart with me(i carry it in
my heart)i am never without it(anywhere
i go you go,my dear; and whatever is done
by only me is your doing,my darling)

 

i fear no fate(for you are my fate,my sweet)i want
no world(for beautiful you are my world,my true)
and it's you are whatever a moon has always meant
and whatever a sun will always sing is you

 

here is the deepest secret nobody knows
(here is the root of the root and the bud of the bud
and the sky of the sky of a tree called life;which grows
higher than the soul can hope or mind can hide)
and this is the wonder that's keeping the stars apart

 

i carry your heart(i carry it in my heart)

 

- e. e. cummings ~