About Today

Today's tune is brought to you by my friends at Grey's Anatomy, which I was reunited with upon my return to Wireless Internet service -- a blessing and a curse. I do love that show, though, and I love that it helps provide me with emotional catharses right when I need them.

 Hearing this song on the episode opened something in me today:

Today you were far away
and I didn't ask you why
What could I say
I was far away
You just walked away
and I just watched you
What could I say

How close am I to losing you

Tonight you just close your eyes
and I just watch you
slip away

How close am I to losing you

Hey, are you awake
Yeah I'm right here
Well can I ask you about today

How close am I to losing you
How close am I to losing

Good question. In some ways I lost him while I still had him, in some ways I've lost him further since we broke up, and in other ways I can't imagine I ever will. And I probably won't. My first love is still in my life. But I reckon I'm going to have to lose more of my last love if I want to make space for someone new...

Drivin' On 9

The scene at the dock on our last evening

I took my niece, one of my nephews, and my kids up north to our family's cabin this past weekend. The weather was gorgeous, the kids got along great, and we survived the inevitable stressful moments that come with spending time with my parents.

Even the car rides were smooth. When we got home today, I had a mountain of laundry to do and a DVD that needed to go back to Netflix. The movie was called Anthem, and it was one of those that I don't even remember putting in my queue.

It was a documentary about two women who travel the country to talk to people about the American Dream and whether it is still alive. This song was part of the soundtrack -- and having just returned from a roadtrip, it seems an appropriate soundtrack for marking my day as well:

Drivin' on 9
You could be a shadow
Beneath the street light
Behind my home

Drivin' on 9
I sure miss you
Pass a motel
Looking at the pines

Drivin' on 9
Looking for one thirty
Maybe I passed it
Go another mile

Drivin' on 9
Drivin' on 9

Drivin' on 9
I'll sure look pretty
Carson City
Walking down the isle

Drivin' on 9
Does daddy have a shotgun
He said he'd never need one
Go another mile

Drivin' on 9

Drivin' on 9
Looking out my window sill
Wondering if I want you still
Wondering what's right

What's more, that last verse is quite descriptive of where I am and what I'm feeling now that I'm back home from time with my parents. Lots of things are hard about breakups. I miss the physical closeness a whole bunch. But more than that, I miss knowing that there's one person I want to call or talk to about my experience, and having him be either sitting next to me or on the other end of the phone.

I'm getting used to it. I am. But it's taking a long time. Once someone becomes your go-to person for sharing what's in your heart, wanting to go to them is hard habit to break...

Naked As We Came

This love song isn't nearly as upbeat or catchy as yesterday's post, but it's another one that stuck with me days after I heard it.

In this case, I'd never heard it before, but I think it's really lovely:

She says "wake up, it's no use pretending"
I'll keep stealing, breathing her.
Birds are leaving over autumn's ending
One of us will die inside these arms
Eyes wide open, naked as we came
One will spread our ashes 'round the yard

She says "If I leave before you, darling
Don't you waste me in the ground"
I lay smiling like our sleeping children
One of us will die inside these arms
Eyes wide open, naked as we came
One will spread our ashes round the yard

When I heard it, I thought: I know what that feels like. To love and be loved so much that the thought of dying in his arms is peaceful and comforting and not at all scary.

And that's so huge, that knowledge. Because it means I'm not going to settle for anything shy of it...

Ain't No Mountain High Enough

Another one of the Slacker so-called best love songs ever, this song has been playing on and off inside my head since I heard it on my run yesterday:

Listen, baby
Ain't no mountain high
Ain't no valley low
Ain't no river wide enough, baby

If you need me, call me
No matter where you are
No matter how far
Just call my name
I'll be there in a hurry
You don't have to worry

'Cause baby,
There ain't no mountain high enough
Ain't no valley low enough
Ain't no river wide enough
To keep me from getting to you

It's such a nice idea, the kind of love for which no mountain is too high to climb. I don't know for sure -- I'm still learning -- but I think it takes both the love and the willingness to keep climbing. Because love doesn't bridge the gap all by itself. It gives us the power to bridge the gap, if we are both willing and able to harness it.

At least, that's my belief:

Remember the day
I set you free
I told you
You could always count on me
From that day on I made a vow
I'll be there when you want me
Some way, some how

'Cause baby,
There ain't no mountain high enough
Ain't no valley low enough
Ain't no river wide enough
To keep me from getting to you

No wind, no rain

My love is alive
Way down in my heart
Although we are miles apart
If you ever need a helping hand
I'll be there on the double
As fast as I can

It sure is hard, having found the love and having the willingness myself, to give up on the climb. As hard as I have worked to get off the mountain, it keeps calling me back. It's true that I don't have a partner who is willing and able to bridge the gap at the moment. But that doesn't seem to require me to do anything yet. So I'm trying to just be where I am. In the space where I know what it takes and I know I have what it takes, but I don't know who will meet me there...

Your Body is a Wonderland

It was hot and humid today, but after briefly considering running inside and then going to a fitness class I decided to take my regular 7 miler outside. The hot weather is just part of the experience, I told myself. And it wasn't so bad. I decided to listen to another Slacker countdown -- the top 44 love songs of all time -- which for starters let me just say is a misnomer for many of the songs on this list.

Including this one, which the countdown hosts said was written by John Mayer at age 14 about his girlfriend at the time. 14? Are you kidding me? I have a 14 year old. I can't imagine that someone wrote a song like this when he was that young. I was in my 20s when I first heard the expression room for two:

We got the afternoon
You got this room for two
One thing I've left to do
Discover me
Discovering you

One mile to every inch of
Your skin like porcelain
One pair of candy lips and
Your bubblegum tongue

And if you want love
We'll make it
Swim in a deep sea
Of blankets
Take all your big plans
And break 'em
This is bound to be a while

Your body is a wonderland
Your body is a wonder (I'll use my hands)
Your body is a wonderland

I like to think I have a little more time before the body being a wonderland becomes part of my children's world -- but maybe I have less time than I think!

All the World (I Tell Myself)

This afternoon I met a friend at a coffee shop at her request. Things have been up and down with her boyfriend for a while, but the story she had for me was so much worse than anything resembling a typical up or down. Basically, her boyfriend was still sleeping with and texting his "ex" the entire time they were together. Which was three years! She was with a man living a lie for three years. Earth-shattering.

As I said to her, these are the times in life when we understand the Buddhist teaching that the only certainty is death. Other human beings are just not something about which we can ever truly be certain, and there's probably no harder realization to come to in this crazy world. Of course, you can learn, as I know my friend will and I hope I am, to stack the deck in your favor next time rather than trying to play a hand that something inside you knows isn't a winner, but there are still no guarantees.

This song was from the episode of Grey's Anatomy that I watched tonight, and it seems to be about the search for meaning that can sometimes be so obvious and other times so obscured:

Say that I'm changed, say I'm different
Maybe I'll finally understand
Say I'll let go, say it's obvious
Oh, I tell myself over, over and over again

I'm ready, I'm ready
I'm ready to believe

So tell me I'm strong, tell me I'm weak
Tell me I'll never, ever bend
Then tell me I'm fire, tell me I'm cold
Cold oh, I tell myself over, over and over again

I'm ready, I'm ready
I'm ready to believe

And all the world can watch the choices you make
All the world can watch each tiny mistake
Let the world watch to let the world wait for you

So tell me I'm wrong, or tell me I'm cruel
Tell me I'd fight, yeah tell me I fought for the wrong things

But I'm ready, I'm ready
I'm ready to believe
I'm ready, I'm ready
I'm ready to believe

Hit Me Baby One More Time

Sweet baby Hazel

This song is another in the list of 66 songs that changed everything that I listened to the other day, and so it kinda makes sense that it was on repeat today when I was hanging out with my friend's baby:

Oh, baby, baby
Oh, baby, baby

Oh, baby, baby, how was I supposed to know
That something wasn't right here
Oh, baby, baby, I shouldn't have let you go
And now you're out of sight, yeah

Of course, this song is about the other kind of baby, but methinks they're related:

Show me how you want it to be
Tell me, baby, 'cause I need to know now
Oh, because

My loneliness is killin' me
(And I)
I must confess I still believe
(Still believe)
When I'm not with you I lose my mind
Give me a sign
Hit me, baby, one more time

Because it was the same loneliness I felt when I lost my man that strengthened my desire to have another baby. I wanted that closeness. That feeling of belonging. Of Oneness.

I'm happy to report that I've come to find out I can have that feeling without a man or a baby, because both the man and the baby are just means of accessing something that is actually within me: my being, my light.

I'm reading a book right now called Perfect Love: Imperfect Relationships, and the author does a brilliant job of laying out all the ways we try to get the love we are looking from other people -- what he calls horizontally -- when what we really need is to get it vertically -- by connecting with our own true nature. For me it's a real relief, and it couldn't have come at a better time.

My now two-week old commitment to the Ashtanga path of 6-day per week practice is already having a profound impact on my life. I've got a ways to go, but I'm doing so much better at focusing on myself and my own healing. And it feels like it's working. And I'm lucky, because I do get to hang out with a super cute baby every once in a while and have her nap on my chest as she did today, which is one of my very favorite feelings in the world.

But I no longer feel like I need to have another one of my own. I feel like I don't know what direction my life is going to go in -- I don't know what's next for me on my career path, I don't know who my new man will be, and I don't know if I'll ever have more kids -- either my own bio, adopted, or step. I don't know.

But I know the what the path I'm on looks like. I know that it involves going to an Alanon meeting on Father's Day when my father ignores what I've written to him in his Father's Day card. I know it involves a commitment to being as present and as loving as I can be for my kids. I know it means practicing Ashtanga six days per week, including tomorrow, even though I'm pretty sore after all the yoga I did this weekend. I know it involves daily meditation, even if it's only for five minutes some days. And I know it means staying really fit, biking most places I go, and being able to head out the door for a run that lasts an hour or more without being sore afterward. I know it means caring for my beautiful home for which I am profoundly grateful. And I know it means using both music and writing to make sense of my life.

So even if there are a lot of pretty big unknowns, there's a lot I do know, and it's everything I need to know right now...