i so very much miss living at the oregon coast.

after living there 9 years it is in my blood. i am now back living in the beautiful valley of my youth, and i do love it here, and there are definitely more opportunities here in many ways...but i can't step outside and smell the crisp salt air of the ocean, or experience the indescribable awe-inspiring beauty every day.

alot of people i met at the coast who either grew up there or had been living there more than a year would say to me, "i hardly even go to the beach anymore, it's just kinda 'blah' now."  i always wondered what was wrong with them.

if i hadn't moved back and gotten a regular job for a while i would never have met the woman who will become my wife in a couple of months, so i don't regret moving away...but i am working toward building the sales of my glass art to the point that i can support both of us if need be, and we can move back to the coast. selling wholesale and over the internet can make that happen.

in the mean time, i am excited about working with other glass artist and friends in the area, which i also wouldn't be able to do had i not moved back. i am happy with the current situation, and am savoring it- even though i do hope in the future to be back on the shores my heart yearns for.

this is the first time in my life that i am dreaming of a future that is different than the present moment, while simultaneously being perfectly happy with where i am. i used to just be unhappy with my life and wish it would change- but did little to make that happen. now i seem to be happy with my life, while recognizing that life is change, and that i can help steer my future toward the vision of how i want it to be, since it will indeed change whether i want it to or not.

maybe this is that "personal growth" they talk about...sweet. 

     I finally started going though boxes in the garage that have been packed and moved around different storage situations for years. i found a little notepad from the hotel in Vegas that i found in the room, and apparently had been writing some of my random poems in.
    i was no doubt drunk, as i always was at that time in my life, and i'm not even sure i finished it, or if the abrupt ending made sense to me.

here are the scribbled lines:

11/15/05
It's not thru burning
are we spent,
but life thru learning
have we been lent
the truth of the sky
suffusing the night.

For Day is the intruder
trespassing the swollen lips

-----
maybe i meant to go on, but got lost in my Tullamore Dew...maybe i just forgot the period. 

it's strange that i'm still the person who wrote that, and yet my life has changed so much in the last 7 years- I have changed- so that it's like trying to decipher a note someone wrote me long ago...someone who liked to be unclear about what he was trying to convey. like he wants you to know, but a part of him wants you to have to figure it out. like giving too much away will make him lose himself...

i am still internally conflicted by a compelling drive to share myself with the world, and an inherent need to keep myself safe.
but hopefully my poetry gets better.