Colorado Past

I arrived in Colorado on September 14th of this year, and how could I have foreseen what current reality is now dripping thick like sweat on a bear woken mid-hibernation for the hunt?

A woman–a precious thing from my long and distant past, whom I met when she was only a girl, I was an art student and my son wasn’t even a thought in my head yet–appeared on my scene like Andy Warhol at a Velvet Underground show, and despite my lack of intentions or desire to change up what whole world I’d built up until that September day, I couldn’t avoid an attempt at being with such a creation that felt so right for me in every way. I pursued, though I was given no indication that I might be successful in my attempts, indeed given much the opposite. I changed my life, bought a bus from a town conveniently nearby her own, and did what I could to win her over to me.

Three months, a bus ride to California and back, a plane to Florida, much uncertainty and more than a few weeks of freezing cold Colorado nights to bear, and by the time this post is up and at ’em on the ol’ Internet my son, myself, our bus and that lady will be somewhere in the slowly warming two lane highway descent into some Southwestern desert where we may, fate willing, spend a winter’s worth of not too cold, perhaps find some small town there or elsewhere to settle it all down for awhile, and continue what chapters we’ve begun.

Colorado has been good to me, it has been harsh. There were more than a few moments where I thought that no amount of whiskey might be enough to warm my toes through some broken down bus nights stuck in parking lots with nothing to do but watch the Target sign go out for the night. I would be lying dearly if I said I thought that what I was after seemed attainable. In fact, there were likely twice as many nights where I wondered why I would chase after such a deer which seemed all too swift and able to handle its leave so much more aptly than I could give hunt or deal with the fact of that leaving. But in the end I leave here with a bus to live in and a woman I thought would only be a shadow of a memory of what I would never have for the rest of my life. I’m choke full of thanks and eager for every morning.