Mind battles and distant travels.

You smell differently each time you return. Not of other women, but of other worlds.

I used to pretend you were my Odysseus of the open road. I told myself I was your Penelope and you were kept captive on a distant shore. It brought me a sense of purpose in the being left behind, that I was there to protect your home while you fought the gods to return. But this will be your 8th trip. Perhaps it is time to stop weaving this tapestry. I cannot bring myself to be angry, for it is your joy, and if it is yours than it is mine. But for so long I have been silent, and as the tears flow, so do my words.

You tried explaining it to me once over dishes. Your calloused hands dried each plate and you told me you could only compare it to the feeling of being chased, but by something good only what you did not know.

I know.
I know you need this. They say this is something every man needs. That it is the call. But can you hear mine?

You are good to me. You've shown me the maps. I've seen the coordinates and destinations and it's all wonderful. But I can never shake the feeling that you end up on a journey somewhere else. Somewhere beyond the logic of topography.


I read your journal before you left. Just a page. You stepped out to the garage and I came to bring you your tea. It lay there, open on the desk with it's oil stained pages. I feared confessions of a lost love. But instead there were only jotted names of towns, equations, and a quote in your scribbled penmanship "further up, further in". Further up and further in where I do not know. Only that it is where I am not. And there are no roads to get me there. Just as well I suppose. I have come to resent the Road as it is.

You hug her curves for months on end and mine are left untouched. Is this your gray eyed goddess? She is supposed to bring you back to me, not away! When she rises up to meet you in the morning does she shine more than these blue eyes? And are the tree lined paths that greet you with a thousand, welcoming limbs warmer than these two here? O that my words could take you places that she could not. Then I could go too, and we could be together-being chased by something good.

I wish you knew it was my heart at your heels. Because maybe then you'd fold up your shelter of nylon and sticks and make your destination our driveway...

You must forgive me. These accusations and lamentations are of no benefit to either one of us.These are the wave-tossed thoughts of a woman torn between jealousy and longing. I am sending them away with the wind, never to be uttered again. I beg you to forget these woes of mine and hear only this as you ride along the shore.

"We are waiting for you traveling man. Hurry home. For new adventure awaits you here. You are not Odysseus, and I am not Penelope, but there is a third character in our tale of love and leaving, and though I am terrified of one day being left times two, he needs to hear you whisper that the world is waiting. And I need you to hold my hand."






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Pulled together from:
biker brother and his supportive wife
Niel Peart
C.S. Lewis
drive home from MN
desire to explore all kinds of different stories and characters that have been left behind in one form or another