8:05pm June 19, 2014

"In the dead of the night, in the still and the quiet, I slip away, like a bird in flight, back to those hills, the place that I call home." -Kathy Mattea

This is something I do most nights. I go back to the redwoods, and I linger there. I don’t mean I’m ~astral projecting~ or some shit. I just have connections to places, and I am able to ride those connections back to the places. I can lie in bed, curled up against the Mother Tree, and be in both places at once, comfortably. This gives me a great amount of strength to carry on in the ordinary world.

Anyway, I’m not only able to do this with places. I’m also able to do it with people, if I have a sufficient emotional connection to them. It has to be the right kind of connection. Some connections are all static and no substance. The best connections are all substance and no static, all center and no surface.

I can connect to Anne this way, and I do. She’s able to feel it when I reach out to her.

And right now, there’s something I want to tell my father:

I am there with you no matter what.

Even though I am unlikely to be able to fly out there. I am with you right now. I will be with you throughout all of this. I will be there every moment of every day until you die, and I will be with you afterwards.

Our family has deep roots. Those roots connect us. By following these roots, I can follow the line from myself to my father, and I can, in a sense, be where he is. Anne and I are two branches of the same thing. Ron and I are connected by different roots in different ways, but are no less connected.

Ron: I am there, holding your hand, right now.

I will be there, holding your hand, as long as you need me to be.

Love will make this possible.

Love will make this real.

Love is connection, love is caring about each other, and love is being able to hold your hand from thousands of miles away.

I’m here. I’ll always be here. And you can reach out to me any time you want, and I will be here, loving you with all my heart.

And even at times when my ego gets in the way and I’m doing the stupid stuff we all do when we’re grieving and angry and afraid and numb and everything all at once, love is still there, love is still at the center of things, and love will cut through all the crap.

I love you. I love you. I love you.

I will be here for you till the end and past it. No matter what. No matter where you are, or I am, physically. You will never be alone. You will never die alone.

I love you.

Love – in everything,

Mel