~I once traveled over a thousand miles to watch the sun rise over the ocean,
only to realize that it wasn’t the sunrise I wanted to see, but you, seeing the sunrise.~

Five years ago last month, just a few days from completing my first year of teaching in the school district of my hometown, I had been offered the opportunity to attend a three day workshop at a school campus in Cypress/Fairbanks Independent School District (which would turn out to be a great experience for me) and while I was securing reservations at a hotel for the conference, I was offered what seemed to be a deal that I couldn’t pass up. It had not been an easy year (or couple of years), to say the least. But that’s another story, perhaps for another time. For now, let’s just say that a vacation was greatly needed.

The offer was for a four day, three night stay at a resort for $199, at one of several possible locations, in exchange for keeping an appointment where they would try to sell me a time-share vacation package. I hadn’t travelled much for several years, except to run from hurricanes, so I thought this might be a good opportunity, especially since I was told that the package was for up to four people. I had hopes of not going alone, but including friends. I had to pick the resort while on the phone, but could choose the dates a little later. I chose Myrtle Beach, SC, because I wanted to see the Atlantic Ocean (as the largest body of water I had ever seen was the Gulf of Mexico, which I had seen from Corpus Christi, TX, to Pensacola, FL).

However, I failed to set the dates for my trip in time to go during the summer months, so I reluctantly scheduled it during my Thanksgiving break. I am grateful that my school district gets an entire week off for Thanksgiving – though I wondered what the beach would be like that time of year. It turned out not to matter, as I would have to reschedule twice.

The conference was a great experience. And I spent most of the rest of the summer of 2017 driving for Uber to pay down some bills. At the end of the summer, just before I would have to begin a week of training and preparation for the next school year, I rewarded myself for my summer efforts with a set of luggage and an out of town trip. The luggage is still mostly unused, and the trip wound up with me staying in a hotel alone, and getting caught in a flash flood trying to get out to get a sandwich. I used the time alone to write to my blog before heading home.

Just after arriving back home, road-weary and disappointed, I reported for the week of training before the 2017-2018 school year would begin. However, there would be weeks between the end of training and the return of students, thanks to Hurricane Harvey. Hurricane Harvey struck Texas well to the south of us, but bounced back into the Gulf of Mexico to reload before coming back inland and causing massive flooding in Houston first, and then our entire region. My parents would call my apartment home for about the next two months, while we gutted their home of a lifetime of accumulated belongings to let it dry out before beginning the very long process of rebuilding. The house next to theirs was mine. Only I wasn’t living there at the time, as my son and I had moved into an apartment in Beaumont, and we had family living in the house. Both houses had five and a half feet of water in them for several days. They each had to be gutted of everything below the ceilings. Again, this is for context only. The rest of this story is for another time. For now, we’ll just say that I needed to reschedule my trip for a later time.

My house stood as a skeletal structure without even doors to close, until that school year ended, as we concentrated on making my parent’s home safe and livable. I didn’t even begin reconstruction on my house until June of 2018. I had no time for travel, as I spent my time that summer between rebuilding my house that I was going to have to move back into, and driving for Uber (and now Lyft as well) to pay off credit cards that I was using for materials. Though I got a good bit done that summer, I needed to use both my Thanksgiving and Christmas breaks that year to get my home to a level of completion that would make it safe to occupy by the new year. We moved back in on New Year’s weekend.

Once my son and I were back in the house, and we no longer had to pay rent as well as a house payment, I had hopes that things might get a little easier. We’ll just say for now that they did get a little easier then. Somewhere during the next few months, I was told that I needed to take my vacation or lose the money I had paid, and I set it for the last weekend in May. That was three years ago last month.

After school ended in May, I had quite a road trip planned. I drove form my home in Texas to somewhere in Georgia on the first day, and driving into South Carolina the second day. I was able to get a room at the resort facing the ocean for a small upgrade fee. It wasn’t a lot of money, but it made for a very different experience. I would spend the next three nights in a room where I could see the ocean from the bed. And I would sleep with the curtains open all the way. (The angle and height of my room made it impossible for anyone to see into my room, and I was only visible to others if I was standing on the balcony.)

My time at the resort included meals at the resort restaurant, where I sat in an open-air area looking over the pool and the ocean, and a trip into North Carolina just to add another state to my been to list (I was so close anyway.) However, everything I experienced on that trip – the drive, the meals, the sights, the sounds – EVERYTHING, seemed as though I was just observing myself on vacation, rather than vacationing. I didn’t feel fully present. I had surface-level conversations with resort personnel, and at least a few guests, but I didn’t really connect with anyone. I found myself thinking, with every experience, about who might enjoy seeing, feeling, tasting, whatever it was that I was seeing, feeling, or tasting. I’d never taken a vacation by myself, and have a hard time thinking that I could again. I remember having an Uber passenger sometime later, who had been all over the world by himself. I’m not cut out like that. I need to share it to enjoy it.

On the first night in the resort, I went to sleep with the curtains to the balcony opened all the way. I was awakened about 4:30 in the morning when the sky began to brighten a while before the sun would start to break the horizon of the ocean. I got out of bed and grabbed my phone off the charger, and took my place at the balcony. I launched Facebook Live, hoping that someone would share my first sunrise over the Atlantic.

I once traveled over a thousand miles to watch the sun rise over the ocean,
only to realize that it wasn’t the sunrise I wanted to see, but you, seeing the sunrise.

I walked the beach in the early morning, looking to see what the tides had stranded on the sand, as young lovers were enjoying the peaceful quiet of the nearly empty beach, and I was thinking that it wasn’t the sensation of the sand between my toes that I sought, but of your fingers entwined with mine as we searched for nature’s bounty.

I listened intently to the sounds of the winds coming off the water, the roar of the waves approaching the beach, the cawing of the seagulls, the laughter of children at play. I longed to hear your voice, as you pulled me closer to whisper, “This is beautiful. Thank you for sharing it with me. “

I sat at the table overlooking the ocean, eating shrimp tacos and drinking a Hurricane, wondering if you would enjoy this, and knowing that even having a drink by myself seemed empty, as I sat and watched people laughing and talking and enjoying their company, knowing I would be walking alone back to my room, after struggling to annuciate my words to ask the concierge for some more coffee cups and stirrers for my room.

It’s not the absence of people that make me feel isolated and alone. It’s the absence of connection. I cannot enjoy anything unless I share it with someone who enjoys it. In fact, it’s your enjoyment that brings me joy.

So, my house is still not finished. I hope it will be soon. It’s just harder to finish building a home that I can’t fully enjoy because I have no one to appreciate and enjoy it with me.

I wish you were here.

I may never be able to give you the world, but I can offer you mine.

I may never be able to show you any of the seven wonders. But I can take you out to the country beyond the streetlights, and throw a blanket on the ground where we can lay on our backs and wonder at the greatness of creation, and our part in it all.

I may never be able to buy you diamonds. But I can remind you that the contours of your face and limbs were chiseled by one who makes any master diamond cutter look like a novice in comparison; and that you are of far more value to me than any jewel, no matter how rare or exquisite.

I may not be able to take you to as many concerts as I’d like, but I’ll sing you karaoke love songs with abandon, as you blush.

I may not be able to buy the biggest house on the lake, but I’ll fill each room that I can afford with love and presence.

I may not be able to take you to dance in a grand ballroom where others can fawn over your beauty and grace on the dance floor. But I can dance with you in the kitchen at 3 AM, and tell you how grateful I am to be able to hold you so close.

We may not be able to visit an exclusive spa, where you can be pampered as you so richly deserve. But I can put on some soft music, pour you a glass of wine, and rub your feet while you relax and let go of the day’s worries.

I’m not likely to ever take you to a Nascar race, but I’ll race go carts with you. Then I’ll take you for a celebration/consolation dinner for the winner and runner-up.

I may not take you to a casino, but I’ll stay home and play cards or board games with you, and fix you snacks.

If we don’t get to see all the latest movies that come to the theater, or ever get to go to a Broadway musical, I’ll share a blanket with you as we stream a movie on the TV, or as I read to you from a book that you would enjoy.

The decisions I make do not usually lead me down a path to worldly riches, but they make my life rich in relationships – because that’s where I choose to put most of my investments.

I may never be able to give you the world, but I’ve already made you mine.

There’s a room in my heart with a perpetual reservation in your name.

An open invitation. Always.

It has been stocked with all the amenities to make your stay comfortable no matter how long.

There you’ll find an assortment of music to listen to, and movies and T.V. shows to watch – all of which were picked for your liking. There are books to read – both for pleasure and for growth. I add to them as I find others I think you would like, or find challenging. Or there’s even a deck with a clear view of the moon in the late night. Come by any time. Kick off your shoes. Adjust the thermostat. Poor yourself a glass. And make yourself at home.

I check in every day. In fact, I check in often throughout the day every day, making sure everything is just right, and looking for signs that you may have stopped by. Most often it is just as I last left it just moments before. But sometimes…sometimes I feel your energy…I smell your fragrant scent lingering as if I’d just missed seeing you. I look quickly to see if anything is out of place, proof that you were here. I touch everything you might have touched, to absorb any residual traces of your aura. Then I sit back in a familiar comfortable chair, close my eyes, and breathe you in.

In my mind I see you clearly. I can look into those deep eyes, and see the dimple in your smile. I tell you how I feel, and that I’ve missed you. I ask questions, and you answer. I reach out and touch you. I hold your hand. I ask you about your day – what has frustrated you, and what has made you smile. I hear your passion and your laughter. I invite you to dance with me, and you take my hand and rise to your feet. I hold you closely and smell your hair as we gently sway to the strains of our own soundtrack. I feel the warmth of your body as you relax into mine.

I am lost in an embrace that as far as I know only I am able to feel.

Then I wonder…do you ever hear my voice when I speak to you? Do you feel my prayers going up for you? Do you feel my love radiate across the expanse between us? Do you feel the strength and comfort that I send to you?

I spend so much of my time in this room that others may think me a recluse. But this is my favorite place in all the world – even though the vast majority of the time spent here I spend alone. It is after all, the only place I see you.

I spend my time trying to make this room more appealing to you so that you might want to spend more time here as well. I clean and dust. I add music to the playlist, and movies to the queue. I even hang a new picture from time to time. I pay attention to what I know you like, as well as what I suspect you do. In the process of making the atmosphere better for you, I make it better for me too. Which is good, because I spend so much of my time here.

I often don’t realize how much time has passed. But I am always eventually jarred from my thoughts by some pressing responsibility. My phone rings. An alarm goes off. As I open my eyes to attend to the present, I realize that my eyes burn and my face is wet. I collect my thoughts – savoring those from which I was awakened. I rub my eyes with the palms of my hands and dry them on my jeans. Then I rise, put on the smile that makes others more comfortable, and leave this warm abode to take care of whatever requires my presence.

But I’ll check in again very soon. As always, I HOPE to see you then.

There are events that change the course of our lives forever. Once experienced, there is no going back. A new course must be assumed, and all future decisions are necessarily affected. Those events become marking posts that identify new beginnings, as well as burial plots containing the decayed remains of beliefs once thought immutable, traditions no longer meaningful, and relationships found to hold us back rather than hold us up.

Today is the third anniversary of my first blog post, “Why Disturb the Cat?“. And, though I’ve let the cat get a little comfortable as of late, I’d be remiss not to mark this important date in my life. I am grateful that my words get your attention at all. If you are reading these words, I thank you. And know that I am not finished. There is more to come.

With warm coffee keeping company, and morning sun hidden,

A single lamp chases shadows of desolation,

Momentarily holding darkness at bay.

Sounds of wind-driven rain fill an otherwise silent morning,

Displacing discordant drivel with white noise.

Unending thoughts reduced to whispers, not to disrupt the notes of melodious harmony.

Loneliness becomes respite, and alienation, a time of solitude.

I attended a workshop for my writers’ group this past Saturday. Our first exercise was to write a poem. We had just about 15 minutes to come up with something and write. One of the things the author taught us was to follow the rules of the type of poem we were writing. I had two problems: I don’t know the rules; and I don’t always follow the rules that I do know – especially in writing. I thought I would share what I wrote. Critiques are welcome.

12.3 miles,

57 steps,

4 digit code,

8 by 8 cubicle,

10 oz styrofoam cup,

contents at 180 degrees.

Routine

He sits and stares past a pile of papers on his desk, to a yellowing map of the U.S. Interstate system. Points of interest marked with Post-It Notes.