A writer of romance novels told me to stop writing in the first person.  “Why do you do this?”  She was puzzled by my narrative.  “This style isn’t very commercial,” she said through a crackling telephone line that sparked and fused with my anger at her intended helpful comments.  And I thought to myself, “Perhaps he should write romance novels?”

            But what did he know?  His last taste of romance left a fine sheen of burnt gunpowder and cordite on his lips and tongue; hands, heart and soul blackened and maimed by the blast.  Waiting in line at the grocery check-out, the old housewife behind him found him presentable, but smelling of war.  She would comment to her sister later that evening, “He was handsome Myrtle, but something wasn’t right.  You could tell he was alone, he bought just enough for one, and he smelt like burnt wires.  His smile was more of a wince.  I tell ya, for a second I thought he would just poof, turn into ashes and dust if the wind blew through the line.”  Her sister would respond back, “Sounds like a man in need of a hug.”  And Myrtle said back in a hushed and knowing tone, “That poor boy needed more than a hug, he needed love.  I found myself afraid for him.”

            He is burnt wires and spent gunpowder.  He is rubble and wreckage.  He is.  And that is at least something, isn’t it?

            He has endured a nuclear winter of love a gone bad.  He has suffered and when that wasn’t enough, he has taken, created, more suffering just so he could feel something.  He is no martyr for love, he is loves great champion.  He understands that to feel good, one must feel as bad as possible at times, most times, according to his ethos.  “It makes the good that much better,” he will tell a friend that is hurting in a similar fashion.  As he says this, he smirks and lifts an eyebrow, in a way that brings a smile and joy to even the darkest of moments in this human condition.  He is.  But he is also love.  He is the hope of love and all that it can and should be.  This is why old women at the grocery check-out want to hug him.  “I tell ya Mrytle, I just wanted to take him home and, scrub him nicely, make him a good dinner, and take him to bed.  I haven’t felt like that in years.”  Mrytle’s sister will just sigh heavily and make a point of going to the grocery store more often.

            And he will be there.  He has and always will be.  He is love.

            And he knows love.  It is just far away, a bit out of his reach.  

            And this is why he burns.  It is a new fire.

            No one knows that the seething and smoldering that he exudes is a want, a love so deep that ignites his nerves and melts diamonds.  He keeps this love private.  It is his touchstone and talisman.  It is his and his alone.  He gives of himself feely to others, but reserves a place inside himself that only one other soul can share and see.  He is in love.  This is why he burns with the heat of a blast furnace on Sparrows Point.  What is mistaken by some as loneliness is just a want for a touch from the soul he has given his heart to.  It is her soft hand that will temper his fire, control it, and put its heat to good purpose. 

            He and his love are separated by an ocean, which may as well be a simple pane of glass as far as the universe and its time are concerned.  Miles and time mean nothing in the calculations of love.  Silly mankind studies the heavens and waits patiently for two stars to collide after a century.  What takes forever down here is just a blink in the ether.

            So our hero is in love.  His star has collided with another of brighter and greater magnitude, and their collision will be witnessed and noted.

            An old man sits on the warm hood of a pick-up truck at the end of dirt road.  He drives out to where the dirt and gravel ends by a fecund pond that is alight with fireflies and the sounds of night birds in the thick green trees.  He climbs atop the warm hood and just sits, listens and waits.  He has been coming here for centuries it seems.  He is drawn to this spot by some strange pull from across the universe.  Something tells him that if he is patient, he will be rewarded. 

            And he is.  On a cool springs night our old star-gazer is witness to the power of the infinite and its exquisite beauty.  He watches as the day fades into night and the stars rise over the green that envelopes him.  And just when he has had enough of all this beauty, he sees something extraordinary…Two stars, brighter than all the rest, race across the night’s sky leaving purrfect trails of light and heat behind them.  Their paths are predetermined by a math that hasn’t yet been unlocked and deciphered.  Far away in dimly lit observatories, astronomers await the impact, but have no idea why the courses of these two stars should meet.  And an old man on the warm hood of a tired old pick-up truck doesn’t think of this or care.  He just waits, and remembers what it was like to be young again and filled with wonder.

            And these two stars find each other in the deep blue and purple of the night made new again.  Amongst an infinite array of stars, light trails behind them betray their path; but their initial impact is for them and them alone.  There is a pause.  And then a quick small flash from very far away.  Another pause.  And then a small purrfect circle of light where the impact of these stars had been.  Another pause.  And then another larger purrfect circle.  Pause again, and then a third and even larger purrfect circle marks for a moment this spot in the heavens where paths collide and life begins. 

            An old man on the warm hood of a pick-up truck, at the end of a dirt road, next to a fecund pond surrounded by the green of a cool spring and fire-flies, lifts one hand to his heart and the other to his lips.  He breathes in deep and remembers what love felt like once.  He will stay like this for a few moments, a blink in the ether; and wish for the long slow passing of time by the universe’s clock. 

            Our hero tonight, lies on the floor sleeping.  His love from afar, across the universe, watches over him from the tiny eye of human creation that glows with soft blue electric light.  As he sleeps, an uneasy sleep, he dreams of stars in the heavens that are destined to meet.  He dreams of purrfect white light circles in the ether.  He dreams of touch and contact.  He dreams of love made real.

            And when he has had enough of dreaming, he opens his eyes and there she is.  She is hope.  She is light.  She is love.  And only an ocean, a thin pane of the universes glass lies between them.  Our hero will rub his eyes like a child, to make sure she is real, and then whisper through the ether, “Hello Sunshine.”

            Make no doubt, our hero burns and seethes and smolders.  But it is a new and better fire that burns inside him.  It’s just easily misunderstood by old women in the grocery store check-out line that have forgotten the heat and smell of love.

            It doesn’t always have to hurt.        

    A reader of this body of work recently asked me, "Where have you been?"  They were wondering why my posts were becoming more and more infrequent?  They asked, "Are you losing interest?"

I have not lost interest.
I still stand by this body of work.
But something has changed.

I have changed.

    The initial purpose of the Hit and Miss Engine Papers was to take a walk down shitty memory lane.  It was my intention to expose every raw nerve, and exposed vein, that was the result of the dissolution of my twelve year relationship.  I used my own teeth to chew my skull open, and then freely and wantonly dug my hands deep into the viscera of my silly brain.  I wasn't searching for anything really.  I was just getting all the shit out.  It's akin to personal therapy; only there is no couch, no smug doctor, and no bill at the end of every session.  My little experiment may not work for everyone, but I must report that it worked quite nicely for me. 
    By getting all the shit out, committing it to this metaphorical paper, I was able to find some peace.  I would examine why I was hurting, write it all down no matter how verbose or trite it may have seemed; and I was able to go to bed and sleep.  I was able to get up in the morning and go to work.  I was able to exist.  I may not have been living most days, but I was getting through each day, and that counts for something, doesn't it?  And as the days turned into weeks, and the weeks turned into months, and the months finally became a year, I found that I was starting to live...again.
    And so, I have learned to live all over again.  I am still learning.  I will never be the man I was before all this, and I am glad.  I am a better man now. 
    There are people, places, and things that I will miss, but they can all be replaced.  Just as I have been replaced in her life.  Four days after my 45th birthday in October, she placed the home that I built for her, on the market.  The greatest expression of my love and talents is now for sale.  When I was told of this development, I didn't get angry or cry.  It is just a house, and I will build another.  I actually smiled when I looked up the listing.  It's a good house and I am proud of my work.  I know it will make the new owners very happy.
    And then in November I was informed that she is now engaged.  I actually laughed when this news was passed along to me.  I had a smidgen of hurt, but truthfully, the news wasn't the blow you might have expected it to be.  The only thing that bothered me was the understanding that she had been cheating on me during our last year together.  In one of our last conversations together, I asked her if there was someone else.  "There isn't anyone.  I just want to find myself.  I think I'm going to be alone for quite awhile."  And she lied to me as easy as a child when caught with their hand in the cookie jar.  And I knew she was lying.  I even wrote a story for her, describing her new lover almost perfectly.  I changed one small detail, in fairness to her.  I didn't want to tell her that I knew everything.  She read the story and cried deeply.  But she was committed to her actions and her promise of a new and better life.  And to this I say, "Good luck."  And I am not being smug or condescending or snarky when I say these words.  I wish her nothing but luck in her new life.  Everyone, no matter how shitty and messed up they may be, deserves at least this much.
    Here are the last words I ever spoke to her, just before I climbed into my truck and drove off,  "I don't understand any of this, but I do.  I hope you find whatever it is that I couldn't give you." 

She reached out to hug me,
heavy tears were starting to fall.

I stepped back.
I left her with her arms open,
awaiting a last embrace.

    And now here we are.  One year later, and so much has happened and changed.  I have happened and changed.  It's funny to think that so much can be so different in such a short time.  The Universe is a silly thing.
   
    Chapter One, of the Hit and Miss Engine Papers is now done.  I hope it has touched you, (both good and bad) and forced you to think.  I hope that these words have given you pause, and inspired some of you to take a closer look at your lives and relationships.  I hope that we can all find our smiles; even when confronted with the heavy task, of learning to live all over again.

    Chapter Two of the Hit and Miss Papers has already begun.  It is about finding love again, across an ocean, just through the sharing of words.  It is a truly romantic story, one that is developing as you are reading this, and one I think you will enjoy.  So, readers and friends, thank you for sticking by me this past year.  Thank you for reading my thoughts and musings, and not passing judgement and just riding along.  Thank you.
    And to my muse, my siren, my oracle and love across the black water, "Hello, Beautiful.  It was a good day."
                                             -Murdoc.

 
       

One Fucking Year.

One year.

I cannot fathom,

this ridiculously quick,

passage of time.

When I was a child,

a year was an eternity.

And now a year,

seems like the blink,

of a jaundiced eye.

What was yesterday,

is so far away;

and still I  can feel it all,

everything.

I want to go home.

I want to go back.

I ache so deep

that trees shudder as I pass

and concrete cracks and heaves under foot.

The weight of my broken soul,

could crush stars into dust

and melt diamonds.

I have spent a year,

pretending and hiding.

I have spent a year,

trying to bury my broken heart.

I have spent a year,

digging a hole

in the water out back.

I have spent a year,

one full year,

precariously perched

out here on the edge

of being,

and not being.

I have lived a year,

a complete full year,

in exile.

And yesterday,

I signed the lease

for one more;

another year.

I have so much to say,

so much to express,

so much to share.

And here I am,

at a loss;

on the edge between love and life.

One year.