One
It’s been a long time since we spoke, and there’s so much I want to tell you. I was walking down 5th street the other day, and I couldn't help but notice the way the afternoon light strikes the bricks. It's a vibrant red that outlines the leaves hanging over the bike lanes. One step, I'm next to a vintage house in an architectural style that I can't name, with moss swarming over the walls, and the next, there's a Taco Bell. It's a mosaic of feelings, walking down these streets - a clash of tradition and modernity. At least, that's what I've felt, while exploring this new town, leaving behind my little restaurants and coffee shops, in order to find new familiar haunts. According to my smartwatch, I've taken thirteen thousand steps today. No matter how far I go, however, it's been impossible to leave you behind. I don't know if I even want to.
I'm taking a rest on a park bench, peering at the mountain through the buildings. It's nice out here, with the evening breeze carrying the smell of trees crossed with the afternoon sun on pavement. It's a good smell, I promise - or maybe it only smells good to someone who's forgotten what it's like to bathe in a sunrise deep in the Northwest rainforest.
There's a black bird - a crow, I think - that's been dancing elegantly around a tray of fries that someone dropped before I arrived. I'm sure you'd be watching him as intently as I am, wondering what it's like to be a bird, but hitting the wall of your own consciousness. After all, I can only imagine what it's like for me, a human, to be a bird, not birdhood itself. He's picked up a fry and stepped back, letting another crow grab one. Is he sharing? Did he just get distracted? Is it fair to apply our concepts to someone so different, yet the same? Maybe that's all we can do, desperately translate, hoping that something can be recovered from the noise.
I must confess, though, I wouldn't be watching this crow if you were here with me; I'd be listening to you.[1] Maybe that's alright, to be struck by someone, in the existential sense. At the very least, it's deeply human. It's those moments of recognition, when you see someone as utterly themself, that shake your very soul. I can't help but wonder if it's like the call of the sea, so beautiful, yet dangerous at the same time.
I don't know if I'll keep writing these, or if I'll ever send them to you. Maybe they'll be collecting digital dust on some forgotten memory card. But really this is more for me; it's a way to stay grounded. I've already felt myself slipping into the pattern, getting up, going to work, exercise, sleep, repeat. It's too easy to blink and miss a week, month, or year. Life's too short for that, isn't it?
Anyways, I hope you're doing well out there, wherever you are.
~ Alonso
Editor's note: Alonso has deleted and re-added this line several times across versions. ↩︎