Patterns

Today and the lingering feeling of off-ness is probably nothing more than a minor separation anxiety – not to be compared to the way things were, back when weekends were pretty much all we had, and they always ended with a long drive back to reality, alone in the car in the dark, back to the downtown street and an apartment full of scents and memories of where you used to be. I don’t think there’s any other cause, except the weekend was both relaxing and intensified – running errands, helping each other, teamwork, collapsing on the couch in front of Movies and Buffy and feeling the curl of your fingers around mine in the cool breeze…and now it’s back to every day life of work. There is, however, something to be said about the fact that I know you’ll be home when I get back, after a long day of meetings and work. When I asked you if you’d be there (as this marks two weeks, officially of the life-smash at work) you asked simply “can i?” Unequivocally yes. Please. In spades.

We have made certain patterns for ourselves that we fall into with no great fanfare or abandon, but simple living. On the weekends, you leave the room before I’m fully awake to move to the couch in the living room, trading one laying space for another so as not to wake me. But I sleep lighter when I don’t feel the weight of your presence as I have become accustomed to, and it’s not long before I follow you out. You make breakfast, or we have cereal over reality tv, the guide channel playing in the background as we discuss dreams and plans for the day. We do what we have to do – mutual errands or helpful looking. This weekend it was the Bridal Shower Invitation marathon. I’ll never forget it, really. Then it’s home – crashing in front of the tv. You were feeling “clingy” as you put it this weekend…I love the feel of your hands continually on me, in one form or another. I’d much rather take this than any other form of being. My problem is it is addictive, like the feel of my lips on your skin, and so when it is not as present as it is now, it will be a withdrawl to the ordinary. I’ll take that as it comes. I don’t fear that moment, when your independence will strike a resonant chord, but will shine in the glow that is the strength you have, the strength I envy silently, that I dream of…and will reach someday. In the evening, it’s tv – and joint dinner making or helping…it’s gnome blaming and laughter and conversations that shape my whole world. Then, after slipping into a half state of sleep while I’m outside for my final goodbye to the night, I collect you off the couch and take you to bed, where you curl up contentedly, sighing. I drift off to sleep with the contentedness of the feel of you around me, smiling.

During the week it’s different. I leave first, putting on my shoes bedside, while your arms snakes around my waist like a tangled vine, determined to hold on. You want me to stay, and I don’t want to leave, but I always seem to anyway. It’s quick kisses, your eyes still half closed, a smile still teasing the corner of your lips in the dawn creeping through the blinds as the fan stirs them, and us, to life. I text you, always, when I get to work, at your previous request…we talk at lunch for varying degrees of brevity, depending on the day. I get home earlier than you, and contemplate dinner while indulging in my dorkinesss and catching up on the electronic world at large that has taken place in my absence. Play with the cats. Read. You come home at different times, dependant on the day – the gym trip, etc. And you greet me immediately with a smile and a kiss, and more often than not a story of your day, or an exasperated sigh. Dinner. Then we curl up on the couch again, and I watch tv while your eyes fade to dreams. I wake you only when it’s time to move, and we walk across the house together. You usually rally, ironically as soon as we hit the other room, and are awake for another hour or so of bible study and staring. More laughter.

My time is marked with laughter these days, only broken up into different chunks by intensity and promise. I love the way that life is. So aside from a feeling askew from the norm, but easily explained when I take the time to consider it…things are blooming and beautiful. I’ve got a handle on the kite of a shooting star, and it’s flying me to places I’ve only dreamed of going. And as always, the view is worth the price of daring to dream, to hope – to have the faith it takes to even begin the journey.