sounds familiar

I woke from a dream early this morning and the words, “The moon is laughing at us,” were on my dream tongue.

I’m not sure what it meant in the dream, but it was curious enough that it kept me awake and I thought about it for a while in the waking world. Why would the moon be laughing at us?

I decided that the moon, up in the sky with such a great unobstructed balcony seat to the play of humanity, is laughing at us because it’s a comedy, or maybe a tragedy.

We’re toiling, we’re angry, were unfulfilled, we do the opposite of our hearts just like the silly characters in the dramas. From the moon’s perch the busyness on Earth is a grand choreography, a pantomime communicating our base desires for companionship and love & everything that gets in our way.

The moon sees the full story arc, including all the self sabotage along the way. And man, that’s worth a laugh.

Rubbish, but it’s going. Love.

A wonderful several days in the city.

Seeing New York be itself, so jammed with people and cars and buildings, walking around its guts, atop its internal organs, breathing the city air and eating city food, I saw that same theme again – there is so much to do in this world.

I’m not unhappy at all with how the first nineteen years of my working life have gone, I just feel more strongly every day that there’s literally ∞-1 other options out there. As long as the family life can tolerate a change, there really is a buffet to choose from.

And when we got back to the RV it felt like home. Sharaun got a big new rug the other day and I really like how much it’s changed the feel of the main (only, really) space. It’s warmer and it removes some of the generic feel, says “lived-in” and it’s nice.

Today we’re on the road again. Moving further upstate, into the Finger Lakes. We’ll stop for a grocery run along the way. I don’t even know where we’re sleeping, but we’ve gotten way better at starting because we want to move in a direction rather than get to a specific destination.

Peace.

.

This morning the fog was so thick around the RV that it felt like complete isolation, alone in the clouds. If not for the trees’ vertical slashes of dark, we could imagine ourselves asea, surrounded by leagues of empty.

The air so wet it dripped steadily on the roof as it condensed on and fell from tree limbs above. Loud popping sounds, irregularly spaced. We have the curtains drawn, over the blinds, keeping out the cold and in the warm. Geese honk from behind them.

This wild place, so near the bustling human hive of New York City, and other places like it also only minutes removed from civilization, give me a good opportunity to do quick A/B comparisons. And for me, wilderness and removed wins every time.

This change of scenery continues to feed me and change the way I think about things. Like what’s important and how we’re shaping our children while we still can. I’m going to find a way to continue. Not the trip, but the spirit.

Kisses.

How long is a week?

In my experience, a week can go by in a flash. Starting with a 6am Monday meeting with the east coast and ending with a 4pm Friday update to executive staff. Bookends to a five day blur of shifting emergencies and people issues and deadlines and bewildering changes in direction. And then it’s Saturday morning again and if you’re lucky you don’t have any weekend calls or work and you can decompress.

Also in my experience, a week can last a seriously long time. Enough to attend church on Sunday in central Pennsylvania, lounge on the beach for a couple days in Delaware, ride a steam train through Amish country, eat at an Amish smorgasbord, and attend church again before entering New Jersey. Three totally distinct changes of scenery, hundreds of miles, several games of Skip Bo with your wife and two bike rides with the kids.

B-weeks for the rest of my life, please.

Hugs.

Maybe if I just keep growing this beard, get it nice and ragged, unkempt, a twisting wiry bush of this way and that, maybe then the corporate world can’t take me back.

“Him?, No, he’s much too wild for a cubicle,” they’ll say behind the HR two-way mirrors. “Agreed. For goodness sake he looks like he’s about to spritz himself with deer urine and go kill dinner for the next month.”

“Sadly I doubt spreadsheets can ever hold his interest again, he’s been spoiled.” Being too rough and tumble for it, they’ll regretfully have to release me.

“Did you hear about Dave?,” they’ll say to each other in the aisles, taking a break from genuflecting before fat rolls of money money. “I heard he grew this massive shitpile of a beard and they wouldn’t take him back, told him him to clean out his desk and turn in his badge.”

Nearby heads prairie-dog from hiding positions below four-foot dividers, chiming in with what they know. “I heard he reeked of patchouli and was talking about his soul!” Timid chuckling, furtive glances, a general insecurity.

Into legend, then, I’ll pass. The guy who couldn’t climb the ladder anymore for tripping over that shitpile beard. And is he even bathing daily? Isn’t that in Scripture? Bathing daily? Pretty sure it is and comes with a “thou shalt.” What the Hell does he have to be smiling about, anyway?

Hurriedly walking between meetings, “What’s he doing now anyway? How much does it pay? What do you mean he said he doesn’t care? If he’s not counting dollars how does he fall asleep at night? Sheep? Like the fourteenth century? God did you see that absolute shitpile on his face?”

“I heard he gardens and is writing a book,” hand on belly to soothe cafeteria indigestion, “Bet there’s just bags of money in that.” Timid chuckling, furtive glances, a general insecurity.

“Yeah. That beard and that trip ruined a perfectly good capitalist.”

Changed plans and came back to Pennsylvania Amish country vs. going to Philadelphia.

We drove through on the way down to Delaware and it was just too beautiful to not stay in for a few days. Of course today is thunderstorms all day so the place had a different cast to it than.

Moods are contagious. Especially moods bottled-up in two hundred square feet, where they are on full display and don’t have anywhere to hide. Yesterday the sour mood here was a pandemic to our little world.

I woke up in a bit of a funk, thinking about mortgaging my soul for a paycheck again once this trip is over, knowing there are better ways, and wishing.

Sharaun was unhappy with the results of her lunchtime stopover hair appointment in Dover. Some stuff is harder from the road, consistency in this area is one.

Both kids were in full protest mode at school, Keaton being particularly challenging. I know selfishness comes as a package deal with kids, but it’ll be nice when their self-awareness develops sufficiently that they choose to act for the best of the group.

At the end of the day I pulled out the awning to fend off rain and sat outside under it in a camp chair, needing some removal from the shared space. Sat and listened to innumerable birds in Spring song and tried to shake it off.

Peas.

Pine pollen swirls in thick clouds like yellow smoke. My phone us dusted with the stuff as I type.

A fat red snake moves easily through the sand and disappears into a patch of dune grass seemingly too small to hide in.

Another frustrating morning with Keaton. Tooth and nail and weeping and gnashing of teeth. Seems every few weeks. I forgot how hard it is trying to become an adult. I try empathy but she’s not stable enough to recognize the kindness in the heat of her emotion.

Fingers are greasy black. Raised my handlebars and tightened Cohen’s chain for the ride into town. Wasn’t happy as I worked and a foul mood always makes a poor effort, nicks and scratches and bruised knuckles. Rubbed some sunscreen into yesterday’s burn so it doesn’t get worse on the ride.

Leaves in the sun without glasses like pointalism. Old Glory stiff in the breeze and a layer of yellow snow blankets everything.

Loves.