So.
Home. And everything changes. It is usual for the world to hold exactly still while I leave. Waco sits and stays, and then I return and everything is exactly where and how I left it. This didn't happen this time around. Three weeks away, three great, full, slow, fun weeks; Five days spent driving across the deep western half of our country; seeking, finding, reveling, and I am home. Home in my big house with my dear, precious roommates, with their loud laughter and avid life giving. Home with my best friends, one of whom I missed enough to make a boyfriend upon my return. Home.

We have sheep now. Four timid, ridiculous sheep, all named for characters from Harry Potter.

And I am in school now. At MCC where there is no one even remotely similar to me in attendance. I'm going to be fine. I am going to splendid their socks off.

And I watch the baby boy now. Tuesday and Thursdays from 7:45 to 5:30 you can find us playing mad games of peek-a-boo.

Right now I am at the end of 21 hours of work (with a brief four hour sleep break in the middle) and am about to embark on 7 hours of school. I'm pretty good at filling a life. But its a good life. A good, full life.

I miss my far away friends. I need you in my life.

I carry your heart with me

One of the many strange things about genetics is this aspect of love. I keep thinking about what e. e. cummings said about . . .

(carrying) your heart with me(i carry it in
my heart)i am never without it(anywhere
i go you go,my dear; and whatever is done
by only me is your doing,my darling)

Almost literally I carry these people's hearts with me in my heart.

We are about to leave, having been here for seventeen days. My cousin, Joey, would have been 26 today. If he hadn't died 23 years ago. I carry his heart with me. Too. I carry it in my heart.