A Halloween List

I'm taking my sister trick-or-treating tonight. About a week ago, she showed up at my bedroom door, and, with a very hopeful expression, asked me, "Dana, will you take me trick-or-treating on Halloween? I want to go with Gordon and Alex, or maybe Madeline and Peter, I don't know, but could you please, please come?"
Of course I said yes.

I wasn't going to wear a costume, but my best friend reminded me not to slip too early into adulthood. A trip to Walmart yesterday produced a $7.50 t-shirt and a 93¢ tube of lipstick. I'm going to be Batman.
My mum said, "....Isn't Batman...a man?" Yes. And no, I am not. But I will look just as sharp while defending Gotham City.

When I was little, my mum always used to make me sit down and eat dinner before we went out on Halloween night. It was the hardest thing, because I was never hungry, and too excited to eat even if I had been. I never much enjoyed talking to strangers, but I liked getting candy, and seeing my friends, and dressing up. I liked the post-pillage inventory, when we'd dump all the candy out on the living room floor and sort it into piles. I used to be able to make it last until Valentine's day.

This Halloween should be good. I'm in the right mood. My siblings have promised to share their candy.  We carved pumpkins last night. My costume is tops. You should come over. We can trade mini Twix and watch old Scooby-Doo episodes. Stay up late and wait for the Great Pumpkin. It will be fun.
Happy Halloween:)

{Costume inspiration}

[This is terribly written. I had a killer test today, and not enough sleep last night. But I'm sorry. Thanks for understanding:]

the obligatory mention of how much I love October

Somehow I've gone twenty-seven days without writing an ode to October. That might be unprecedented! But tonight the sky is pale pink, and I'm sitting on my deck, on a bench covered with leaves. The light in my neighbor's window just came on. The air is cool, but not cold yet. It's peaceful. I think I'm happy.

I was lonely this time last year. I was thinking about that today, remembering the ghosts that used to walk at my shoulder and ride shotgun in my car. But a year is a long time. I'm not a different person now, but I know a little more. 

And this autumn has been treating me well! Sure, there's been a few scares, a lot of stress, a little sadness. But there's also been a lot of honesty. A lot of late-night phone calls, of the best kind. There's been more writing. Less struggling.

I don't have a closing thought. All that I'm trying to say is that it's October. Good things happen sometimes when you aren't expecting them. And I'm glad to be alive.

{This is my view.}

rainbow shoelaces

My sister is on the floor in front of the TV, singing along to the claymated theme song. I come up behind her, and softly I tug on her ponytail and kiss the top of her head.

I sit down on the couch with a blanket and my laptop on my knees. In a few minutes, she climbs up and makes me share. She lays her head on my shoulder. I watch her serious eyes and the way her whole face lights up when something funny happens. 'Hotshots' soccer jersey, white turtleneck, miniature Newbalance sneakers, her perfect freckled nose. She notices me watching her, and gives me an eskimo kiss. She grabs my hands so I can't type, and laughs, and tells me a story about kindergarten. 

She's five years old, and the most beautiful thing in the world. 

                 /.lkogirituutyde8figojd8eyw6teujffijduetr5e5s66eyhwiskisu66tar5rshiiu

(That was her.)

among the stars

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Click for big, links below.

blue silk

Last night, I was on the phone too late.
I talked outside, under a deep, starry sky. The Milky Way was a dusty stripe in the blue silk. I lay on the hood of my car.
On the other end, I heard him laugh, dry and quiet, and I reached up and trapped a star between my thumb and forefinger. For a second, I thought that maybe I could catch it, pull it down and stow it in my pocket. It seemed so close. He seemed close, too.
I got up and walked barefoot down the center of the street. As I neared the corner, I saw the moon coming up. It was huge and orange and half-full. It sailed slowly upward over the black tree line on the horizon, and I was the only one awake to watch it.

Last night, I was on the phone too late. I should have hung up an hour earlier. But my soft velvet weariness beautifully matched the blue silk sky, and my solitude matched perfectly the sound of his laughter.

on seeking

"I think God is always there, and He's always perfectly there. The issue then becomes, "Why can't we receive what is already there? Why can't we look at our mother and really truly understand how much our mother loves us even if she's unable to show it?" . . . Why do we need indications of love? Why do we need lesser symbols of love to reassure us of what we already know is there? That's what the core of the spiritual journey is. It's knowing—yet without the proof you need for your heart, you need to just wander around and figure it out . . . . If one could agree with the construct that we're here per God's grace to have an experience and learn something to come into the sublime world we live on, then there's something beautiful about the idea there's a trust from God to let us wander, stumble, fall, and pick ourselves back up."

 ~ Billy Corgan of the Smashing Pumpkins

    

The rest of the interview, with Stephen Christian of Anberlin, is deep and excellent and well worth a read.