I Dared Her

I dared her to kiss me.

Told her I knew she wouldn’t because if she did she would be lost, but not in the negative sense of the word, because this would be the very best kind of lost.

The one where you realize you and another are stuck in a world only the two of you can see, feel and or experience.

A time where the moments last forever in a place you can’t get find on your own and may never discover.

Lightning struck more than once for us, but the last time I took the brunt upon my brow and the  explosion left us both blind, deaf and dumb.

We forgot who we were together and went our separate ways.

Eventually I remembered and I spent years searching for her determined to do what some call a course correction and reset things.

But she didn’t remember and when I dared her to kiss me and prove me wrong she called me names and told me to get lost.

I smiled and told her it was too late, I already was and left.

It wasn’t until months had passed that I learned she had watched me walk away the entire time, hypothetically hoping I would turn around and try again.

But I didn’t, cuz this time I listened.

That must have shocked and disappointed her, or at least it would have in the old days because she used to tell me I never did listen.

Working On A Story

That is part of a story I am playing with, a silly tale that I may make something out of or might not.

Pieces of it are based upon experiences I have had and some others are just things I have heard about from others or seen in dreams I have never had.

But a big part is from the song I quoted over here, ya know that Don McLean piece I cited there ‘cuz that one section got me thinking about how life throws monkey wrenches at us.

What can this be, can you tell me?
Would you like to discover why we’re not free
To be lovers
I’ve been wanting to ask you
Where has all the love gone
And what have we become

If you go for a literal interpretation you could say it is about people who want to be together but can’t for reasons that aren’t explained within the song.

That fits with how I like to write and or tell stories in that I try to provide a framework for my characters and then let the reader’s imagination fill in the blanks.

When I do a proper job of it the impact is significant because I can’t provide the same details and 3D reality that your imagination can.

I can give life to characters, but I can’t make them breathe, run and walk with the sort of force that comes with that little piece you find inside your head.

Confession: I’m not sure why I haven’t taken the 100,000 words I have written down and turned it into something that I could submit to publishers or why I haven’t at least gone the self publishing route.

It is kind of funny to me to think about it because I really have done things that have scared the hell out of me.

Not because of the search for an adrenaline rush but sometimes I have responded to a little voice inside my head that tells me if I don’t I will miss out on something special.

Sooner or later I am going to actually move from talk to action and see what happens. Sooner or later we’ll find out if I can take fiction and entertain people with it.

Sometimes you have to find out if heroes fail and whether they can get back up again. Sometimes you have to enter the secret world to find closure or answers and sometimes you have to just walk.

Almost 17

My parents are back in Texas for an extended visit.

They are here to see the grand kids and to celebrate the 17th birthday 0f my oldest. But I suppose they just might be happy to see me too, especially since they both told me they can’t believe they are going to be the parents of a 50-year-old kid.

I keep reminding them I have a year to go, it is not like I am one of those old people from the class of ’68.

We did the Jewish Christmas thing and went out for Chinese food with an idea that we’d look into catching a movie afterwards.

They were too tired for the movie so we took them back to the hotel and helped my dad get the room set up.

That is a soft way of saying he had to arrange things so that his dialysis equipment was set up. It is also a good reminder for why I keep exercising, even I don’t feel like it.

I may not be in the kind of shape I want to be in but I am not sedentary either.

*****

We needed two cars to go to dinner so the Wilner men set off together and for a moment I thought about how surreal it felt.

I was supposed to be in my son’s seat, the teenager who would keep an eye on grandpa and make sure he didn’t fall in the parking lot, not the middle position of dad and son.

But time never stops moving so I found myself in the old sandwich position and stared at my son and father and thought about how they have changed.

That kid of mine is a monster now, so very big. I hugged him from behind and he walked a solid 20 feet with me holding on to him.

I wasn’t trying to stop him, but was still impressed that he didn’t care he had 200 some pounds hanging on him.

And dad, well it is funny to see him walk and catch flashes of my grandfather moving.

He is still my father, but damn if I don’t see a lot of grandpa coming out. It is a natural thing and I am sure I’ll go through it, but it is strange.

Final Words

I remember when that teenage boy was a wee lad and had no siblings.

Back in the days when I wondered how many children I would have and wondered if I might be living in Calabasas, Texas or even Israel.

Some things are very different from what I imagined and wanted. Don’t ask me if they are good or bad because most aren’t the sort you can apply labels to without more information.

But some of them, well some are things that I think I probably could point at. Some are the sort that I could label if I dared or maybe if others did.

Maybe those thoughts will show up in a book or maybe they’ll remain unspoken and the answers will be whatever imagination decides to throw out as possibilities.

Maybe.