Let It Be So

Little sweetheart, today is the 4th of July. I'm mostly busy trying to get back to some of the projects that have been on hold for the last two months since the incident.

Two big music things - the side project I told you about with dear Sylvia (we call the band Native Tongue and the album title is Interiors) and the new Bipolar Explorer record (which, of course, you will be on), which we hope to release in time for Christmas. My arm is still very limited in range of motion but I've found that I can play guitar if seated and not flying from one end of the fretboard to the other. I'm trying to make up for lost time, get back on something closer to schedule.

But mostly what I'm thinking of today, unsurprisingly, most wonderfully, is you. We certainly had a memorable 4th of July a few years ago, didn't we little sweetheart?

It had only been a little over a month since my mom had passed away. I got the news in the middle of the night in an email, of all things. I was in London, alone, and it woke me up. You were the first person I got on the phone after I woke up Kris and Joy in Wales to find out how to dial internationally from their landline (I was staying at their flat while they were gone for the weekend). You took care of me, took care of everything. Got me on a plane. Flew yourself across the country to meet me, waiting in the airport all night to meet my plane. Stayed with me that whole week - coaxing the cats out of hiding, still traumatized from my mom's fall, helped plan the service and select the flowers, found mom's music to play, listened as I read you the eulogy moments after I typed it on her computer. You stayed and helped me, comforted me, stood me up and supported me in the crush of grief that whole week when I buried my mother.

Soon, you were here in NYC with me. And after that you brought me to you and with your family on a vacation that 4th of July weekend on the Oregon Coast.

Your dad rented a lovely house for the weekend that your brother nearly burnt down (a pretty wild exaggeration but it seemed like it at the time!) when the fireworks show went awry, we had a lovely boat ride down the River Rouge, visited a crazy "Prehistoric Village" where there old timey sculptures of dinosaurs (I have a picture of you kissing one) and famously went dune buggy riding.

You were excited to take the wheel, even as the proprietors warmed us "no matter what you, do not drive near the coast on the wet sand". So, naturally, as everyone else tackled the huge mountains of sand, you sped the two of us away right to the edge of the crashing waves and along the wet sand because it was fun! I have the most wonderful video of you on my phone, I'll try to post it on here.

We're speeding away, the engine roaring, a seagull or two taking startled flight off your path, as the waves roll in around us, the sky brilliant and you, helmeted and face wrapped in a scarf like some daredevil bandita. At one point you finally pull it a little ways away, revealing your beautiful, smiling, angelic face and wave to camera. I linger on you as you return your gaze to the path you're blazing ahead, before you turn to me with that loving look of yours acknowledging my utter devotion, my longing for you even as you are only an arm's length away and smiling as if to say "I know, but we're busy right now, I'll hold and kiss you in just a minute, when we're done and forever." 

Let that be so, my little sweetheart, my love. Let it be so and forever.