Sweetest Goodbye
6:16 PM Edit This 1 Comment »
The way you say goodbye is in long exaggerated gestures. Always overly dramatic, but always from the heart. It's hard to leave a love behind. Especially when your lover is something intangible: the perfect summer, the contour of the land, the way everything always comes out perfect here in Haines.
Saying goodbye was more like saying see you later, see you soon, see you around, my friend. It was a sad affair. (How could it not be). The way certain places just click with all of who you are and if you waited long enough you know your life would unravel perfectly there. You know you could live a life worth living and sharing.
From the roof of the building, we sat in darkness listening. The few cars that haunt the streets at night. The screech of the motor cyclers who come in and out of town the way a dog does a house. And then that final exasperated breath. Whales. We couldn't see them from where we were, but we could hear them and their long drawn out sign was nature's way of saying "me too."
I remember the way everyone acted. Like we were unfolding on a stage or in a movie. It all seemed so scripted, but none of it was. Awkward hugs. Strange goodbyes that really just were see you laters. It's strange how you can live with someone for so long, share so many words, and then the only really way you know how to say goodbye is to touch.
But the days ahead are golden and are filled with more dreams than my head can hold. Before you know it the old crew will assemble in tattered pieces and like some mangled star fish missing a limb, we'll re-grow the missing pieces.
Everything always gets patched.
Everything always fixes itself.
The things that will stick are the times I was really nervous. Standing at the intersection at witching hour trying to figure out where the hell I was and so embarrassed about the fact that there are only so many intersections in Haines and well, how many times had I been here? It was strange because I knew he was coming before he did. Like some weird telepathic moment, just showed up and it all seemed so scripted.
Earlier, at the party I had no idea how I was getting home but I boarded the skiff and told myself, yes, I'd walk if I had to, so I did. Two and a half miles at three in the morning only to get confused when I was ten minutes from home. Ridiculous. My favorite was the way we kept creeping the fire upward away from the shore that was so desperately crawling up closer towards the music.
I have never been to a party on an island with a band where everything and everyone had to be brought in. One hell of a night.
Last night, when I was trying to say goodbye, I didn't know what to say to anyone. That age old question of "where are you going and why" had no real answer except "anywhere" and "because I can." The wind shifted. Currents changed.
And I know the stars are aligning in such a way that I'll be back here before I know it, but still.
Something's changed.
1 comments:
You'll be back, but in the mean time welcome home =)
Post a Comment