I listen to Real Estate, trying to imagine what it must be like to wake up next to you. Probably pretty nice; east coast humidity and immediate criticism of the waves past the boardwalk outside. This reminds me of that one Beach Boys song about being older and married and.. that’s alright.. but my god, marriage? While still sitting in bed? I usually save that for sappy night drives or at least after I’ve had a cup of coffee!

I’ve been waking up earlier lately, not to say that 10am is for those faint of heart, but it’s something. I’ve been working a lot lately. The way you’d be able to tell is that I complain my back hurting and the skin on my hands is tight and dry. I’m working on my calves! Bulkin’ em up so I can compete with yours. Just kidding. I’m being paranoid that I’m gaining muscle and that, obviously, is not alright. Anyway, I’m writing this so if you see it you will know that those Thom Yorke underwear reminded me of how you have a way of cheering me up like no other does. You’re not the only one waiting to find a home to belong to. I miss sitting on your front porch. 

I don’t want to be less scared of the world when you’re here, but it’s true, I am. You make it easier to exist. You don’t look straight through me. Your stare stops somewhere between my ribs and my spine, somewhere solid and chaotic, the part of me that even I cannot understand fully. I am separate and full-enough as a singular noun, though there are at least a dozen people I could be upon waking each morning. I exist as a separate entity, and yet I long to have a piece of you too. Not to own, but to pet. To press to myself in efforts to retain some of what makes you such an essential piece of my life. Like a sponge. You are old-fashioned and set in ways that change week to week. I have grown accustomed to your haunted ways. You have taught me to say no to myself. Ascetic pleasure of impleasure. You do not need me and I do not fear it. It is to be wanted and for mutual respect to be reciprocated, not misunderstood for love. What this is, is friendship in it’s shiny youth, or else the unsticking of an envelope ever-so-slowly with the tip of our fingernails. Inside is the most brilliantly written goodbye or hello. We’re not sure yet, although for the most part, we pretend not to think of the future. And that’s okay. The indecisiveness of it all is the best foreplay I have ever had. The most prolonged sensation of pleasure and pain I have yet experienced. The reason I am strong, if I really think about it, is because I allow myself to experience people and relations like this. They stretch me to great lengths and force me to make decisions that decide whether things will crumble a bit, build a new meaning, or just keep up maintenance. It takes a lot more to be impressed these days, but also a lot more to hurt me in the deepest part. I can feel more, the void increases and the emptiness dissolves a little. Does that make sense? Two nights ago, you asked me if I really even wanted you. I said, “Yes, of course I want you. Why do you ask me things like this?” You said it was your mother, that she never really made it obvious if she cared for you. You said that maybe that’s why you don’t believe that you can really care or be cared about. I told you, “I don’t let on that I care or how much I care about you, for your benefit. You seem afraid of it when I let it overwhelm me, so I stay quiet about it and show it in simple ways. I make your bed or ask you to make coffee.” Things like that. My intentions are good. We can pull a James Joyce sometime, I’d be alright with that. I’d just be alright with coming to your shows with you. The neon lights are not for us, but they are. Sometimes. Just focus on you and I’ll support you. My compassion hurts me. It is violent. I don’t know. I feel like a child. I love you so much. 

“WHERE DID YOU FIND HER? AMONG THE NEON LIGHTS. SHE SAID “THE NEON OF THE RIVER WILL LIGHT MY WAY.”