It's All in Those Moments

On the train home today, I was reading Writing Begins with a Breath; a book that I bought after having a good old sulk about my disconnection from my writing relationship. We've been involved for seventeen years now and I still don't think I've put in enough TLC and time to make this relationship work.

I needed to take a pause to think whenever the author metaphored this relationship with love nuances and how we should move into these moments as opposed to running away from them or missing them completely.

Awareness. It's fundamental.

And then in one of these pauses I looked out at the blurry greens of Middlesex suburbia and I thought about how much of this awareness I had tapped into recently and what these different degrees and moments meant to me. When the train stopped and I was snapped back into my immediate surroundings, a man with the most beautiful long hair sat down next to me. Sure, I was a little amused by his surfer shorts and gave a quick thought to how it wasn't warm enough to wear them. But I was captivated by his Anthony Keidis (circa "Under the Bridge") hair. I fell in love for fifteen minutes.

Then I realised that I have been living through this movie of mine by clinging to mere moments of falling in love. Whether for fifteen minutes, two hours or six weeks; I have moved into these moments to catch my breath, feel it rise and fall in synch with my heart.

I've not written here for over a month. April - just gone. She wasn't here because she was with me; I was too busy falling in love with all the moments she gave me.

From Colliers Wood to Stockwell, it was the man with the Rubix Cube. He looked like a character from a John Hughes movie and I loved him for the twenty-five minute ride as he sat there seducing the cube with his dedicated hands. He'd chosen this instead of an Ipad or Ipod or an I-something. He won my heart for this alone.

I fell in love for 10 seconds with the air in the middle of Baker Street station because it held the scent of familiar skin.

I fell in love with a vintage typewriter for 3 minutes because it took me back to my seventeen year old stories - the ping at the end got re-acquainted with my heart.

I fell in love with a tattoo for six weeks because of the way it felt when I traced it with my fingers and how it accented the ribcage.

And yet, I still surprise myself when I think of how much love I have to give to these moments - can I give it to my writing? Fully commit for life and not just for twenty-five minutes or six weeks?

I've finally moved myself into May now. I'm accepting her company and letting my curiosity drive me like the reader who follows so closely alongside the protagonist. What moments does she have for me? Because she has big shoes to fill. April:

When I bathed in the sun on my living room floor and painted on a canvas using my five-year old hands. When I felt the history of a 2000 year old tree and was in the audience of the perfect gig. When I heard four sincere words that were just perfect in the moment that I heard them.

A hug that lasted for a time I couldn't record because I was lost in it's warmth and the many words that it spoke.

I couldn't keep them or the hug.

Just like all those other moments I had to let it go. But after these waves of love that occured in these brief encounters all I can say to them is this:

"Thank you. I shall remember you always. And I sure as hell am going to miss you."