Nothing Like Being Scolded By A Hippie.

Sometimes It Seems Safer To Hold It All In, Where The Only Person Who Can Judge Is Yourself.

There Was No Short Answer To This; Like So Much Else, It Was A Long Story. But What Really Makes Any Story Real Is Knowing Someone Will Hear It. And Understand.

Times Like This It Did Seem Real I Was Leaving, And Even More That My Family, And This Life, Would Go On Without Me. And Again I Felt That Emptiness Rise Up, But Pushed It Away. Still, I Lingered There, In The Doorway, Memorizing The Noise. The Moment. Tucking It Away Out Of Sight, To Be Remembered When I Needed It Most.

Closed My Eyes And Listened. It Was Like Music I'd Heard All My Life, Even More Than "this Lullaby." All Those Keystrokes, All Those Letters, So Many Words. I Brushed My Fingers Over The Beads And Watched As Her Image Rippled, Like It Was On Water, Breaking Apart Gently And Shimmering Before Becoming Whole Again.

The Thing Is, You Can’t Always Have The Best Of Everything. Because For A Life To Be Real, You Need It All: Good And Bad, Beach And Concrete, The Familiar And The Unknown, Big Talkers And Small Towns.