Echo

We stayed in a beach villa over the water in Bora Bora. Every morning, I would go out to the deck and jump into the bluest ocean.

I had a couple of dreams.

In one, I was at a movie theater and it turned out Jennifer Aniston and Justin Theroux were in the same row. Jennifer was both making a big deal of not wanting to be noticed, but she was drawing a lot of attention that it made me wonder why she worked at cross-purposes. Justin was wearing a rubber diaper like it was a big joke, and I felt a connection to him when I asked to take a picture with him and I shook his hand. He was a cool guy, I totally wanted to get to know him, but they were going out of their way to draw a lot of attention to themselves while claiming they didn’t want attention.

In another quieter dream, Jerry and I were talking quietly about something while sitting in a stairwell, and at one point, there was a pause, where I could tell he knew how I felt, and there was almost an acknowledging moment, where it was right there between us. For the first time in a dream, it almost happened, where it was so clear he was open to me. I was frozen and I knew it could go either way, but the moment passed. Later, I was with my mom who’d seen the moment. She said, almost sadly, “Jerry really likes you.”

I had a dream about Dave on the plane. I don’t know what it is about him that irritates me so much. He was emailing with me again, being intellectually flirty, and somehow he came to hang out. Except I hung out at some wasteland rest stop like in Bagdad Cafe that was dusty on the outside and a hookah lounge on the inside. We ate some chicken-not chicken and watched foreign soap operas on a shitty little TV. I could feel how intently he wanted me to be into him, such a needy fucker. Some guy I knew came in wanting to snort marjoram, and I was being big-sisterly by telling him this shit wasn’t good for him, while cutting it up finer for him knowing he was determined to snort it. Dave left and at some point I was banging on some dirty piece of metal that came from the sewer or something, trying to fix it and waiting for contact from him. As I woke up, I said to myself, see…that’s what happens when you wait around for a guy like him…you get your hands dirty.  I woke up irritated. I don’t even want that guy close to me in a dream.

I didn’t have time to get into the details of that night of the full moon. Sir Gawain.

In the Arthurian story, Sir Gawain must answer the riddle of what women want most. And the answer is…free will.

And for whatever reason, this story set the precedence of my interaction with a beautiful, deep-voiced man I met by chance one night on a sidewalk. The night we met, we were two subtle, winged creatures, drawn to the same light. When he said he believed darkness had a stigma, that so much light comes out of darkness, I knew he could understand me.

I don’t give out my number. But he asked kindly, so I did. I asked for his email to send the story of Sir Gawain and the Hag, because he’d brought up his love for King Arthur stories, and I told him that was my favorite.

Then that night, when the improbably happened, when by a full moon, this beautiful stranger showed up at my doorstep, I had gone to bed wearing this:

That night was the first and only time I’ve worn this shirt, having bought it from a local artist because I liked the design, but it didn’t fit. Yet going to bed that night, I put it on and it fit. I never planned on anyone seeing it because it is a private shirt, about private feelings.

That night I was already in bed when I got his message that he wanted to find me.

And under that full moon, he found me.

He had the key. We had so little context at that point that everything between us was the key. But he missed the lock and I let him go.

How can a woman so warm be so cold.

Because I care.

i want to be reminded that i came to the bay area to find a husband in los angeles.

whether or not i have to bring him there, i’m not certain.

the thing about traveling, is that immersion into one world, when your roots have been in another, and that return. like waking up from a night of broken dreams, you don’t know what you’re coming back into, or if you’re the same person returning. somewhere in a million tiny places, there have been fractures.

starting at sunset yesterday, i took a boat ride, a propeller plane ride, a jumbo jet flight through the night, then a commuter flight and long drive to reach home.

home?

i realized landing in los angeles, after spending the week in tahiti, that this was home. walking out into the air, the feel of it, the smell of it, it made me relax into me. this is where i find myself. my home in la is me.

i only spent a few seconds on that curb, but even after flying back to the bay, back where my obligations lay, i still feel it inside me.

the bay area is where i come from.

la is my home.