To my sweetheart...

Little sweetheart, pretty little girl – I miss you so.

The record is almost ready to go. Finally! The smaller insert posters will finally be here tomorrow and everything will be ready to go out on Tuesday. The large ones will arrive and the digital version will be online by the end of the week. Friday after next, we play our first gig without you. We’ll play all these songs, the whole double-record for you. In sequence. Twice! It’s our night. We don’t have to do the shorter club set.

Eva is our new bassist. You’d be friends, little sweetie. She’s a NoCal girl, too. Serious and fun and nice and really good. She’s also, like Sean, a whiz with graphics. She’s helping us with that now, too. And I had a meeting with her tonight. She’s such a trouper. The weather is changing now and everybody is getting sick. Eva got felled by whatever the hell this thing is (and we had to cancel a mini-show here on Saturday. Our sorta “warm-up”), we’ll be fine. She could totally use a prescription from your Dad but she’s stubborn (sound familiar?) and wants to sweat it out on over-the-counter stuff (I grabbed an order for her at CVS) and tea. I did say she’s from Cali, right?

Anyway, we did good work tonight. She walked me through a buncha stuff so I can do an e-blast and we worked up some actual physical postcards for printing that we’ll have to announce the release of Of Love & Loss day after tomorrow and the NYC release party at Zirzamin on October 26. I wanna tell you all about that, too – the guy who booked us, Jack Martin, is fantastic. Such a good man and a terrific guitarist and lost his love, Pandora, just like I lost you, a buncha years ago and so he knows. He’s been moved to play the (instrumental) songs he wrote for her (they were also bandmates & lovers)  for the first time in a decade in support. It’s to honour you, little sweetie. I so wish you were here. More on all that and this beautiful room that you would love to sing in.

But what I wanted to say tonight is that while I was at Eva’s and she was uploading files, I showed her a couple of videos of you. The record and our practice space (my apartment, the holy place I shared with you) are filled with pictures. Your voice is predominant on the record. But she had never seen you in “motion”, as it were. I showed her the video of you playing “Blue Blurry Eyes” and the one of you driving the dune buggy on July 4 on the Oregon Coast. I loved watching it, of course, but kept working. About 20 minutes later and looking at all our graphics, maybe because we’re days away, maybe because it’s always with me, I burst into, not just tears, but horrible sobs. You would be so glad that Eva was so kind and held me, tried to comfort me. She’s such a good person. You would be pals. And so good together in the band. After I kinda collected myself, however selfish, it seemed like a good time to read the speech I wrote for your memorial. I carry it with me everywhere and always. It’s still impossible and somehow perfect that it was held on my birthday. On a day that more than any other I should have been able to hold you. Oh my, girl…

I’m trying the best that I can, little sweetie. I miss you so much. I can almost touch our life, it’s still so familiar. I only wanna wake up and be with you. Oh, sweetheart!

I packed up my stuff and walked back west. Listened to the Giants rally but lose. Texted your Dad. Worked online.

All my life, whatever remains, is for you, trying to return to you, preparing myself. Help me, if you can, okay? Remember when we were together and you would shift your hips, headed for the kitchen or just anywhere only for an instant? Remember that I would always say “don’t go too far away?” Remember that, my little sweetheart? My True Love. My Best Friend. Please, sweetheart – don’t go too far away!

My “epiphany” in therapy last week was a religious one – I need to invite you to be with me always. I say it at your grave whenever I visit. I know you are everywhere. That you only alight there when I arrive to meet me. It’s always so hard to leave. I can only do it begging you to come with me. I know you do. I just have to be mindful, always make sure you come along, invite you. Be with me, Summer. Always. And soon I will cross over. Until that day. Until that day…