Some light streams in through the cracks between the blinds that cover my sliding balcony door.  The Winco is a 24-hour store, and the soft yellow lights of the parking lot mesmerize me at times.  I like the way the puddles catch the reflections, and send them off at odd angles on their way back up.  I’ve lost a couple hours watching this more than once…with a beer, sitting out on the balcony.  Every once in a while an occassional tire, shopping cart or shoe passes through those puddles and adds even more variables to the equation as I look on from my 2nd story vantage point, roughly 12 feet up and 10 yards out.

It’s 3:25 AM on a random weekday morning as I type this ‘intro’…and I find myself wide awake as usual at this time.  I’ve got work in a few hours, but if I can’t sleep anyway I might as well do something productive with the time.  I enjoy the night…the silence, and the lights off…I even see better this way.

This apartment is too clean, too sterile.  Like it hasn’t been lived in enough, or at all for that matter…

De reir a cheile a thogtar na caisleain.

It takes time to build castles.

There are definitely some signs of life here, though…and in one case, remnants of a life.  I saved the orange “funeral” placard that was on my front window during the procession that brought my best friend from the wake to his final resting place, a little fenced-in Catholic cemetary in Union County, New Jersey.  Lots of trees, lots of green.  Lots of places to sit and think.  It’s best at night…the stars make no noise.  A respite from the nastiness of the world.

I spent most of my last day in New Jersey there. I sat there, and I thought about…

… Do not stand at my grave and cry-

I am not there… I did not die…

Okay, so we’ll leave there then, man.  We’ll go back to my place again, okay?

Let’s dig much deeper…