Yeah, that’s me.
Minute by minute, day by day, week by week, month by month, year by year.
It gets weak sometimes, folks.
The train between Boston and Worcester seems to take on an almost elastic quality these days.
I want to be home.
Maybe I just need a vacation.
See all of you next week.

Pax . . .

M

*In’ as busy as a . . . ‘
Get that mind out of the gutter.
Won’t be on the net for most of the weekend.
The blog and Facebook will have to wait until next week.
(I know, you’re crest-fallen *grinning*)
An 18 hour day tomorrow and work on Sunday will leave me with
little to no cyber- playtime.
Mikey is like sad poo-poo.
Catch you guys on the flipside . . .

~m

reds, crimsons and bloods
there’s a rose in the meadow
snow-covered in love . . .

for a very special flower
and for Deb

The tree is up and dressed with soft, white lights, ornaments and icicles.
The cats are already stripping them off and methodically leaving them on the floor where my unsuspecting feet find them at 3:02am.
The other morning I found a ceramic reindeer the sole of my left foot was violently impaled
with the antlers of an unsympathetic and ceramic reindeer.
*%&^$&(#)@!!!!
Bastards.
Yeah, it’s Christmastime.
Although I’ve yet to hear much in the way of holiday music,
I’ve no doubt that within two weeks time I’ll be deep in the complicated state of Yuletide Dismay
wanting to slit my wrists at the mere sound of the introduction to ‘Carol of the Bells’.
It is at this festive time of the year that I unleash my innermost Mister Nasty, the stygian beast within, the curmudgeon of melancholy, my dark saint.
Part of me still harbours (more like imprisons) that little boy that used to love the snow
and the Christmas lights and yes, even the ’Carol of the Bells’.
These days Mister Nasty can’t come out and play.
Actually, I don’t want to come outside.
I play the dark saint of sorts and find my own personal way to somehow make it to December 26th
(Sarah’s birthday for those of you who will find out anyway on her Twitter).
I think that some of my snowy disdain is rooted in the overabundance of past holiday social fatalities.
Dealing with Alzheimer’s Disease ironically (and sadly) made me forget my ‘Santa’ mentality replacing it with this almost diabolical Grinch-like quality – an issue currently Under Construction.
Humor me for the next month or so as I deal with the bleak canvas of winter as my thoughts turn deeply inwards.
This holiday season has quite a different feel to it though and I think I know why.
Unfortunately, I can’t tell you the reason.
So indulge me, won’t you?
And who knows?
Maybe this Grinch will once and for all find his Christmas heart . . .

Enjoying a bit of badly needed time off.
I will be reading and checking in but won’t be posting until next week sometime.
Have some personal things that need some attention.
Thanks for stopping in.
Now back to my fine Montecristo No. 2 . . .
(and no, that’s not me sitting in the comfy chair.
I am in a dark cellar with a rocking chair and three cats. But somehow that’s okay)

Pamela-

I’ve always dreamed of singing this song for you.
In my heart, I know that I have, maybe someday I actually will.
It’s everything I’ve always wanted to say to the only person in the world that I could ever say it to.
Our love is a slow, sweet dance . . .
Happy Anniversary, my Pamela
(put on the headphones I’ve left for you. Loggins is simply amazing LIVE.)

Forever

Now, while we’re here alone and all is said and done
Now I can let you know because of all you’ve shown
I’m grown enough to tell ya
You’ll always be inside of me.

How many roads have gone by
So many words left unspoken
I needed to be be your side
If only to hold you.

Forever in my heart
Forever we will be
Even when I’m gone
You’ll be here in me
Forever

Once, I dreamed that you were gone
I cried, I tried to find ya
I begged the dream would fade away and please awaken me
The night took a hold of my heart
And left me with no one to follow
The love that I grasped in the dark,
I’ll always remember

Forever in my heart
Forever we will be
Even when I’m gone
You’ll be here in me
Forever

Forever in my heart
Forever here you’ll be
Even when I’m gone
You’ll be near to me

Forever in my life
Always thought I’d be
I’d be yours

Forever . . .

It’s not only the way it feels,
it’s the way it makes me feel . . .
a conditional freak of
my own mind,
my own doing,
my own flesh and
candy-apple red blood,
and a host that lives inside of me . . .

It grows asymmetrical outside my body,
the unwanted lichens of all that I can’t bear
It’s only when I look in the mirror;
I am sadly reminded that it’s still there . . .

Someday perhaps it will leave me,
that time just isn’t right now
but
I still ask when, Dear God in heaven, when?
And I shall curse forever the very day it found me,
this visible demon of my flesh
I gladly let the steam cover the bathroom mirror
and for the moment,
I can put the thing to rest
Perhaps

I figured out that I spend approximately one month a year riding the train back and forth to Boston.

One month.

30 days.

720 hours.

43,200 minutes.

2,592,000 seconds.

I write, read, sleep, text message, eat, drink
and look out the slightly opaque windows and think.
I’ve been doing this for over 4 years and if it weren’t for my writing stuff and my
Ipod Nano (thank you M), I think I would have thrown in the towel years ago.

I will say that it endlessly fascinates me when I look back and read some of the things
I’ve written on the train; the original thought process with my cross outs and all.
It’s the true ‘me’ that not too many people see.
Pamela and the girls have seen much of it and one other special friend
but my journals tend to get sequestered soon after they’re filled.

The journal I’m currently writing in has
‘Beginnings, mishaps & didgeridoos’, ‘Akubra’, ‘Communion’ and ‘Serenissima’.
The corrections and edits are actually quite funny in a way; silly things,
inconsequential explosions of neurons misfiring and my internal editor trying to patch it up.
It’s a literary ER of sorts going on in my mind 24/7.
Though I’m very proud of much of my work, there’s so very much more to do.
Tough pill to swallow when I look at the stacks of yellow legal pads & journals filled with my thoughts, blues and dreams.
I currently have 7-8 stories waiting to see the light of day.
It makes me sad because I just don’t have the time to devote to editing them and finishing them in the fashion they deserve.
When they’re ready, the will let me know.
I honestly think that what I’m trying to do here is keep myself sane as I think about those 2,592,000 seconds.
You know what my commute needs?
A 20 minute neck massage times 2; into the city and out.
Maybe a rub or three on the soles of the  feet on the way home.
Hey, a writer can dream, can’t he?

Dear Mom,

I stopped by your grave tonight just as the sun was setting.
The town seemed eerily quiet but the burnt orange sky to the west held promise of another day.
Maybe it was remembering you, that’s the Utopian side of my brain at work.
I had little to offer you save for my tears that splashed on your gravestone and
a sotto voce ‘Hail Mary’, slowly spoken for you and all the sleeping souls that surrounded me.
I miss you dearly and still see you in the many places and faces in my life.
Maybe it’s because a part of me still looks for any insignificant trace of you, any sign
Dad is still here and I can’t understand why when I know you’re just waiting patiently for your Wally.
He misses you too.
I just know it.
I guess it’s all in time . . . all in His time.
For now, I pray you are at peace, cradled in the loving hands of God.

always,
Mick

I close my eyes
trying to dream of something better than this
anything true, a slightly bruised honesty would do
Maybe it’s because nothing feels safe anymore

So I close my eyes
and dream of distant Norwegian lilies
of beautiful and colourful things, the slumbering truths of my past
Although nights of black rain are making it so hard to sleep

But I close my eyes
And dream of opening them to the tragedy of a bleeding truth;
that life is never quite what it appears to be
to these sad and sleepy eyes of mine
And that innocence can only be found caught between the teeth of angels . . .