I stayed.

At this point, all the heartache that led to those two words seems unreal. Like it never happened. I feel a little numb because the distance between here and there is so great that reality on that other side only really seems like a dream. Still there is emptiness, aching, loneliness, and that stabbing feeling that I have work to do.

Every little thing that was stable two months ago is now uncertain. It is unbearable, this disconnection, spinning freely.

I'm sorry I had to drag another person under with me.

But here I am still. Borrowed another geriatric vehicle from the friend who helped me so much when that other car died three weeks ago. (What? Didn't I spill? Tom's car died on June 30. Fuel pump. Two days and $400 later it was running fine again. The kicker is that the last time I borrowed his car a radiator hose self-destructed, stranding me in Centralia for hours on a Sunday afternoon. That car and I have bad karma together.) That day - the 30th - Paige carted me around, saying initially the best words any friend can say to another in crisis: "What do you need me to do for you?" Later she said I shouldn't borrow cars from people who live 3 hours away. True. She said too that I could borrow from her because her husband is a Subaru mechanic - they own a Subaru shop - and they have extra ones....

So this time, in a frenzy trying to organize myself in the wake of a hasty and catastrophic decision, I called her and asked for a car. An '84 Subaru GL 10. Was a beauty deluxe in its day with digital display everything and power everything. Torn upholstery, burning oil, stains galore on the carpeting are its most salient features now. I asked all kinds of questions; was reassured at every turn. Will it make it to Seabeck? 'Cause that's where I'm headed. Yes, it will make it (but just barely).

Found myself chugging along I-5 South yesterday afternoon. Looked up into the blue at 2:50 to see if a shiny plane carrying Sweetie was flying overhead. It was not, that I could see. How could I be here, on the road with the AC going, the CD plugged in while he was strapped in for a ride to hell? I felt evil.

Car overheating. Liquid dripping from the engine. I pushed on to my cousin's house at Seabeck where I opened the hood to find the alternator/water pump belt totally shredded. Oh god. Not now. Turns out that it wasn't such a big deal. My cousin knows cars. We bought a belt and he installed it himself. $10. Now it runs perfectly and I have named it the Millenium Falcon because I feel like Han Solo in it.

But I don't want to talk about cars. And I don't want to really talk about the violence I witnessed yesterday even though it's right up there with the subway anthropologist stuff and I just want to share the oddity. Suburban anthropologist maybe: At the AMPM getting gas with my cousin Kaaren. I don't know: I guess she ran into someone she knew from work at the pump and they had a lot of mutual work stuff to share so they started chatting away. I could hear them loudly, clearly, continuously throughout what I witnessed next: Aquamarine domestic mini-van monstrosity turning right into the AMPM lurches in mid-turn. Weird motion catches my attention. See through the window the woman passenger hitting the driver. That's weird. Van pulls in and parks in a place that is not a spot next to the air hoses and pay phones. Through the tinted glass I see the driver totally beating up on the passenger. A few seconds later the passenger's head hits the window and then it slides down out of sight. Driver gets out. It's a woman wearing a half-shirt with a bad, platinum-blonde bleach job. Blood is smeared across her forehead and running down into her eyes. Into the AMPM she goes, the clerks eyeing her curiously as she strides by. Meanwhile, the passenger resurrects and switches seats. She honks the horn. A few moments later she's out, with scratches on her arms and blood on her shirt, looking around the premises for her nemesis. Then she asks the clerks something and I can only imagine: "Uhh, have you all seen a woman with a gaping head wound pass through here?" They nodded. The woman returns to the car, locks up, then leaves heading up the hill to suburban residential paradise. Soon after, the blonde woman emerges from the store all cleaned up and seems surprised to find the other woman gone. She, too, searches the premises before finally spotting and yelling to the woman beating feet up the hill. Turning around in her stride, the fleeing woman proudly displays a double bird then drives the point home with a "Fuck You!!" so loud and blood curdling it turned all the heads in the near vicinity except for the two co-workers sharing grievances on the other side of the van in which I was sitting. Blonde woman returns to the clerks, presumably to tell them she's going to leave her car parked illegally, and then she runs up the hill after the other woman. End of story. Kaaren back in the van, apologizing for leaving me bored while she chatted away. "Not a problem. I had my own entertainment." As we pulled out, the blonde woman was gaining fast on the other one. I told Kaaren about it and she said, "They must be sisters."

What I'm swimming in now is some kind of murk. Mire. I don't even know. It's apparent that at this moment I'm not really ready to go there. The fact of the matter is that when I started writing this I was here alone. Now my cousins are home and I've been in and out of this room which has interrupted my train of thought, lessened the chances I'll get connected with the part of me I'm trying hard to ignore right now.

Had to make some tough phone calls today. Hard to call and explain; or rather, call and explain carefully only what I want people to know. "Oh yeah, I'm still here. I didn't go back...." Trying to secure a roof over my head, wheels under my feet. Switching gears from vacation-mode to a survival one.

Decided the best thing to do is hire someone to workout my mind. I'm calling it summer camp (for adults in transition). Summer camp isn't always fun, is it?