I meet Jill at a bar. She's encouraged me to go outside to see the other humans on the sidewalks and in the parking lots, after dark even, even after bedtime. But when we lean toward one another across the booth to say some things, to check in, the acoustics are horrible, bad sound system bouncing my ear drums. All I want to do is eat fries and commiserate. When Jill spots a table outside, she sits up straight, then locks eyes. "Should we? Ok, quick!" and she's at the door, plate in hand while I'm still back at the booth goofily trying to pick up a coaster with two spare fingers. Sometimes you can be too careful. Other times, you can grab what you need in your own two hands and make your move while you can. Later at home, I want to text her about how much I really admire her for all she's done-- I mean, besides spotting the table. The life of her. But I'm too tired to figure out what to say.
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All these full-souled women searching around for the next thing to do, here in the latter days of whatever the hell this is-- I see you. How brave we've been. How nervous. I'll set a catalpa flower on an altar. A prayer card showing a mother holding her child. Rock from some quarry somewhere. I'm tapping out signals on the network. Is it clear across town? How's the sunrise in Joshua Tree? How goes the scything and God? How soon until you can stand by the water again in northern Michigan?
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