Both of me, opposite sides of the wall

I woke up with Miss World by Hole in my mind. I am pretty certain this will be the last outing with the camper this year. This will mean that it was out for three extended periods this year which will account for 18 days and all, I guess I can’t complain about that too much. The summer mind vs winter mind perspective is in the stratosphere, hovering over my little world, like invading forces occasionally firing barrages of common sense thought, followed by complete ignorance. March 4, 1985. The great Dodge Space-time Disaster was one of those pivotal moments in which I could feel myself standing at the edge of forever, but not being able to see but a couple of feet in front of me.

Here now, I think I have wisdom. But, really, do I? If I did, then I could look at this late August day with the eyes of January. If I could do that, then this August day would be full of all of the richness it is entitled to. I know, I am still not ready though, because this only gets written in August and January. For me, there is no other way. Sigh.

 It is now 7:15 PM Indian Giver by Joan Jett is playing in my head. It’s a warm day and humid but damp.

  The uncertainty of what is ahead for all of us. Strange dreams of snowy roads and propane tanks just showing up out of nowhere. No rhyme or reason for the icy snowy roads and the fact that dragging a 100-pound propane tank through it makes any sense. The coffee is perking away, promising a good start to today. I find myself hoping it was just a little cooler today. 

There it is, that seasonal forgetfulness that blindfolds us. A strange misty dream of this moment, flashing forward to when I truly am dragging propane tanks in the snow. Living the dream, aren’t you?

Why am I so blank? (I know now, here in January. It is because I could only see some of the words in August, and they could never be complete until January 11. This is my problem. This is my reality. Not only did I need the time, but the pain that in August, I had not arrived at. The loss that comes in the weeks ahead…the weeks behind, depending on which writer you ask.)  My Anthony Bourdain book is sitting in the mailbox at home, it would be so nice to have. Then I did. I know him now. Our journey lasted from August till October, and what a long strange, and incredible trip it was.

7:20 PM on a Tuesday, August 31 down in the valley of Winhall Brook. The night air that one could wear like a garment descends upon us like a damp blanket. At the same time, 7:44 AM, January 11, knowing that valley sits in sub-zero deep freeze, desolate and what I knew it would be at that moment when I thought forward from August, these words prove that time travel is somehow possible and yet, there is a level of wisdom that allows us to be here now, that just cannot cross the terminator from one time to the other.