Four in the morning and I'm listening to music that makes strange parts of me want to sing, and singing aloud in my horrific voice, and celebrating everything...
My life is a celebration, and oh how often I forget, but today I am celebrating.
Everquest for the first time this month and I have no more xp than I started with but oh what glorious fun it was and I got a quest item and made a few friends and now I'm camped in Cazic Thule to spend some quality time with my favourite monk, Akkasha.
Breakfast this morning with the boys, the hugs and kisses and tears over painstakingly selected gifts - the BIG PURPLE BONG and the Ninja Scroll DVD and the Opera tickets and on and on...
And trying out the bong at Marc's place afterwards, months of affection to catch up on since I haven't had time to see them, despairing that we were growing apart but curled up on the couch between Cfoo and Mark, with Lucky running his fingers through my hair...
Eric stoned in the chair and laughing so hard that we had to laugh...
...until my abs hurt.
An oft-repeating pattern it would seem, with my boys, and I love it more than anything.
And Eric and I had dinner the Christmas-Story sort of way, entirely alone in the nearest chinese restaurant (he had a craving to use chopsticks) that the storm would let us get to, laughing and crying and swapping sex-we-shouldn't-be-having stories...
And when I announced that I was the Ice Queen, Eric's fervent rejection of the concept
"But you have such a big heart... I always tell them, my students, my coworkers - she's a shirt-off-your-back-kinda-guy"
and then we picked out the irony in what he'd said and laughed some more but
"a big heart"
suddenly made it a very, very, warm heart.
And my dad is screwing me for $400, don't ask, but really it's the cycle coming round, the only thing he gave us as kids was money, and the only thing he wants now is the same...
...so I guess dealing with him is suddenly simple, write a check and waltz out the door.
And I'm broke, but thrilled, stoned, tired, and oh so wonderfully happy.
Happy everything, I'm wishing you everything that I possibly can.
Everything. The strength to face your fears, the warmth that lends you a bit of that strength, and the unfathomable fortune that has led me here.
And the perspective that once in a while shows you just how staggeringly beautiful it all is.
The sky is white behind the naked trees and blanketed rooftops beyond a window that has shared so many moments alone with me...
But I know right now just how not alone, not at all alone, we are.