Autumn

I've moved into a new apartment, something smaller, quieter, more to my liking. I had a wonderful space over a very loud bar that got louder as the year crept on and finally I relented and had to move. I lived there for fifteen months, which is the longest I've lived under any one roof since I was three years old. It was the first place that was my own after my divorce. I didn't really want to go, but I'm happier with where I am now; it's better for me.

The moving process was challenging as is often the case, but I'm sort of a professional at this now. I have sort of decided though that this is a profession I want to retire from; the moving of all of one's possessions from one place to the next. I've decided that my next move will only happen when I'm ready to sell all my possessions and live the gypsy life.

I haven't been back to the doctors office because of the move, but it's something I know that I need to do soon. I've been making excuses about monetary and time constraints, but the real reason I haven't been back is because I didn't want any bad news until I'd at least settled the move. Not that I have any particular reason to believe the news will be bad on the follow up, but, you know; one thing at a time.

I've been back on a Nina Simone kick the last few days. She's the soundtrack of autumn in my mind. At some point in my life she became the music that accompanies the transition of summer into fall and as we've gotten our first cold front she's been creeping into the corners of my mind. Last night was the first chilly evening and today I turned off the air conditioning, opened the windows and played "Black is the color of my true loves hair".

thank you for the lovely dream

I’m moving soon, but I’m not going far. It’s time for a new apartment, one that’s a little quieter (I live above a bar), has different walls to shoot against, will inspire something new. I’ve been rushing to finish all the editing that needs to be done before I start unplugging things, packing them away.

Thoughts of moving have seeped into my dreams. Last night I dreamt that the only thing left in my apartment was my bed, which is massive and has been described as a ‘trap’, because of its opulence. In my dream, I opened the door to my bedroom and the hazy light of early morning creeped into the room. The absence of objects that have their usual place made the room seem even larger than it does when filled with all the familiar things that I possess.

In this dream; amidst the impossible number of pillows, tangled in the sheets, you smiled at me over your shoulder. You slid one bare leg across the other slowly, bringing your foot to rest at the back of the knee you’d uncovered in your movement. You were otherwise nearly perfectly still and there was a calmness about you that I wanted to appreciate nearly as much as I wanted to disturb it. I could see the well defined line of your back and I wanted to place my lips there, softly…

"If I could write out my own dream, for the next time that I sleep.."

Summer is coming to an end; I can finally feel it. Fall is around the corner and I'm waiting for it as patiently as I can. Fall is, after all, my favorite season.

I've committed to stay here in New Orleans for another year and that, coupled with the change of season, makes me a little restless to travel. The fall in particular always finds me wanting to go back to where I came from. I want to see the leaves explode in brilliant colors, watch them rain from the trees and walk over them, feel them crunch beneath my feet.

I want to go back to the Paint Creek Cider Mill and look at the cigar-store Indian like statue of chief Pontiac as I eat fresh, warm donuts and drink cider. I want to watch the wheel of the mill turn with fall of the water.

I want to see the family that I've been removed from for too long and make up for lost time. I want to see the friends that I've grown apart from in both lifestyle and geography. I want to drive past the places where we all used to live and look at them, appreciate them, in a way that is entirely different after all the things that I've seen, all the things I've done.

I'll never live in Michigan again, this I know. I don't visit it often enough, I'm sure of that too. I do however miss it from time to time, but even more so, I miss the people that I've left behind there.

The summer comes to an end here in the south and I know that fall has already begun in the north. I'll always be a wanderer, leaving little pieces of my heart in every place I've ever called home, giving big pieces of it to the people that I've loved along the way.