I am here on the coast again. Well, inland, in a small town in Southern Oregon. I am only hours away from you. I have peeked into you life via Facebook. But, my love, that is as far as any of that goes.
Here in this little burg I have no connections to you. I am on my own. I weathered covid, a wild fire, the loss of a partner due to sheer economics. I have been on my own for a year and a half. I am at the cusp of our high holy season. It is not the 27th day of August but is closing in. Will I remember you that day? Will you think of me?
I have applied to two jobs up in the Puget Sound area. I did it to find my way back into the profession, but only as a lowly librarian, not manager or director or any such thing. I am not being nostalgic about the idea of a move, but more, in some ways, just being practical. I still have goods in storage up there. I won't have to bring them down to where I live if I just go up there to live, instead.
But more than anything, in my daily work routine at the winery, I think of you every time a baked brie rolls out of the kitchen. That dish will always remind me of birdbaths and overheated new lovers, of less than cold sparking wine and firewalls thrown up. I will always be your best girlfriend, even if that man who was alongside you that night was earnest and hot for you as hell.
Here's to foreign cheeses, to tee shirts with wee holes in them. Here is to two folks who once loved each other, now separated by time and space. And here is to the woman that I still am immensely fond of, even at a distance, even after sixteen years.
Here's to love, my old love, the kind that never fades, that never settles.
Your W
