it’s all wet. things are dripping in august. this is a blessing.

there’s almost always a little fear anymore… what if and where, and what if is slowly turning into when. it takes work to let it go, though i usually do it.

i guess the bonus is that when i don’t do it, i’m aware of the detriment now, too. that’s motivating when i need it to be. working with myself is an ongoing thing, a journey to be present, and still a thing i have to remain conscious of. not yet evolved, sorry. cool with it though.

so, in the present, it is gray and rainy outside at the end of august in a place where normally a plague-worthy legion of grasshoppers parts the sea of dead grass as i walk through the yard. everywhere, indicators of the land’s needs show themselves to me and ask me to feed it and i pray that it’s enough. i accept the pace, i read the ground and the things that make their homes here to see what they will tell me and the process, it’s slow, it’s oh so slow. i only have time if i’m conscious of it.

i welcome storms, especially the gentle beginning and inhalation of petrichor, yeah, that shit always winds up in a poem somewhere, for sure… not mine, but somewhere. it’s a great word but it’s one of those words that shows up unsurprisingly, like ‘liminal’ (maybe time to just live on the edge and let that one go).

it smells so good though, in the way that a musty attic full of secrets to unpack also smells good, and also not like that at all. the attic is the smell of time over a span, and petrichor is a smell of the present. their own similarity may be, in the end, that i happen to like both kinds of time.

we once welcomed thunder and lightning when we knew more about it. skygasms of light and electrical discharge, visual shock felt also through the follicles and then the ears, driving the body to spasm. boom. big bang indeed.

now, we cower as the lightning strikes, afraid of a power bigger than we are. it could burn down everything we know and love, this power, even if accompanied by rain. it is never enough now. we are dry to parched, soaking it up as fast as it falls, praying it stays on the land so we can welcome thunder and lightning back into our lives as something to behold without so much terror. it’s no longer a matter of if, but when, yet we stay. such a human thing to do.

What i wouldn’t give for something to lean on right now. I’ve given up my bed to guests and I’m sleeping on an air mattress in my office, a cavernous room at the back of the house with a creaky floor that sounds its alarm whenever I move. I think a lot in here though. This is where the serious work really gets done. When I’m not sleeping in it, which is usually, it serves as my office and is also where I do stretch and meditate. The wall-to-wall closet at the end of the room has sliding, mirrored doors, useful for confidence-building or alignment but creepy otherwise. i lived in another house like this here too, a large box with mirrored closet doors throughout the house and a spiral staircase. it was like you could never escape yourself. i mean, i get it, but still…

So here I am on an air mattress in the middle of this larger room. I feel adrift on it.

There is nothing to lean on, so I’m driven to complete this thought ride by the desire to lie down. There’s a point in my cycle that’s pretty rational, and I’m in it. Without something to lean on, this is too hard to do.

I’m more interested in dreaming right now.