Dreams

Dearest June,

My dreams are vivid and sometimes when I wake it takes a moment for me to figure out where they start and where they stop because they feel so real.

I hear the echoes of the voices of those who were with me, smell their scent and feel their touch. I lie in bed, sometimes eyes open, sometimes eyes closed and take a moment to let it all settle inside my mind.

Occasionally I am certain what happened is a preface or prelude to other things that will be. You may think me crazy, but I have dreamt of being with you more than once and some of those times did come true.

You may see we love or loved each other so deeply and passionately there wasn't anything special about it and perhaps you are right. But perhaps I am too.

Maybe both can be true.

Had another one of those not so long ago, only remember pieces, fragments of images and mostly go off that crazy gut feeling of mine.

So here I sit staring out the window wondering whether what I see, feel and think is likely to go in particular and specific directions. At times I feel so much like it is just me against the world and then again I feel like I have a ton of support.

Maybe both can be true here too.

Something tells me it won't be long before I get some answers. Something tells me I am going to get to experience some serious highs and some serious lows. I'd prefer to be in the middle, but we don't always get that chance.

I'd tell you I want a hug and maybe something else but you already assume that so I'll just leave it unsaid and let you wonder if I am leaving it to your imagination or something else.

I need to stop fighting online with some of these Trump supporters, They are too fucking stupid to see  reality, but I am too dumb to just leave it alone thinking that maybe I'll reach one or two fence sitters and push them back towards the light and away from the dark side.

-Johnny

Face To Face

Should I tell you what I think would happen if we were alone and face-to-face or should I let you guess what you think I think will happen.

You probably think it is something about love or sex or sex and love.

Could be.

Could be something different.

I could surprise you. That might be how you ended up naked once.

Or maybe you surprised me and that is how I ended up naked.

Someone once said that they don't like getting naked as a middle aged person. It sort of bothers me because I know what I once looked like and how I want to look.

But getting naked on that deeper level is far more interesting and far more frightening to me. It is a flame that makes me run away and pulls me closer all at the same time.

I wonder if you remember my scent.

I wonder if scent drives people--not perfume/cologne but something like pheromones that we may not necessarily know we are smelling.

Depth is what I seek more than anything else.

That castle was deep and the residents were too.

Shallow is dull and mundane.

If you can't push to reach the deeper places you miss out. Stuck somewhere between Neruda, Marlowe and Kipling I hear a million echoes

“I love you only because it's you the one I love; I hate you deeply, and hating you Bend to you, and the measure of my changing love for you Is that I do not see you but love you blindly.”

"And I will make thee beds of Roses And a thousand fragrant posies, A cap of flowers, and a kirtle Embroidered all with leaves of Myrtle;"

"NOW this is the law of the jungle, as old and as true as the sky, And the wolf that shall keep it may prosper, but the wolf that shall break it must die. As the creeper that girdles the tree trunk, the law runneth forward and back; For the strength of the pack is the wolf, and the strength of the wolf is the pack."

This and that floats through my head and I remember I could be a poet, the ability is within-all that remains is the choice to do so.

My eyes close, memories flow through it, a raging river of thoughts and ideas asking for decisions to be made.

June In Spring

Dear June,

I play around with texting or calling you and asking you out to just talk about life. There are moments when I miss you terribly and I can't help but believe you miss us too.

I don't ever question my ability to reach you via my online words because I know you will always appreciate my writing. I know if nothing else you'll be one of my biggest fans there.

But let's put all that aside and say I understand people change and that things change. I understand I could be off on lots of things and the fucking lunatic. But I also know you called me the love of your life and that you don't just say things.

So I am certain you love me, might not be in love but love me nonetheless. Hell, that won't ever change for me. I'll always love you, is it in love now? Hell if I know. I frankly keep that door mostly closed.

But I also know for me the fire could start pretty quickly and I suspect it could for you too. Maybe we'll find out and maybe we'll never know. You taught me more than a decade ago that I can't predict or control much. All I can do is walk my path and see where it leads.

So as much as I want to get the answer to whether kissing you will provide an immediate electric shock for both of us I will sit still and see how life unfolds.

*****

All that aside I know you understand what it is like to have a sick parent. Given the very bad situation  I stare at now I wonder if I offered enough support when you were going through it with your dad. I hope you feel like I did because it is brutal.

So sometimes when I think of calling I think about prefacing it by saying I just want to talk about sick parents and how strange it is to see the strongest men we know deteriorate in ways we never believed possible.

It is probably why I have begun pushing myself harder to reclaim certain aspects of myself. I can't stomach the idea of being incapable of doing some things. I am so much less physically than I once was but that is a guy who had no responsibilities and spent two hours a day working out.

So I can give myself a break and say I don't have to be who I was at 20 but I can be close. I can put myself in a position where age won't take it all away. Or at least I think I can.

I can't say for certain without experiencing it, guess I can do my best and hope it is enough.

That is all we have got.

*****

Can't believe how big our kids have gotten and how close we are to entering the next phase. Funny to think about how that is going to happen regardless of any choices we make. Funny to see these babies become real people who make choices about what and who they want to be.

It has gone so very fast and it is not going to slow down. Been a hell of a ride and who the fuck knows where it is going to lead. I sure don't. Got some ideas but all they are ideas.

Time for me to get back to some things. Life has been really fucking good and really fucking hard. Good thing I am stubborn enough to not just give up and smart enough to understand I know nothing. That combination seems to work.

And now I have been far more open than I ever planned or expected to be in this post. Shit, I was surprised again. Ain't life a hoot.

-Johnny