The Man 5 Houses Down

       I cannot tell you his name.  He may have a wife he treat(s/ed) like royalty, a son in his spittin' image, a granddaughter whom looks forward to nothing more than a trip to his house, but I would not know.  I cannot tell you his age, though a completely grey head gives way to assumptions that he has lived a fair share of sunrises and sunsets...not a fair enough share.  I know him as the encouraging man five houses down.  Whenever I run and feel as though I cannot go on(whether in my workout or in life in general) I go by his house and he takes a pause from washing his truck to give me a smile, thumbs up, and on occasion, an encouraging word.  For seven days now, one week, I have run by that house with no such experience.  The truck is gone.  Yesterday, two American flags and two military flags were in his yard.  It is Memorial Day weekend.  Perhaps that is why they were placed there? So where is he? I suppose he must have served our country? I suppose he has saved me in multiple ways.  And I cannot tell you his name.  Did he have a good life?  Was he prepared to leave? Is he gone? Permanently? Although the phrase YOLO rides on the wrong side of my nerves, our shortage of time has been on my mind more than usual as of late- almost to a bothered state.  Death is natural.  It is not negative.  It is not the enemy.  Death is not truly what we fear.  Death marks the moment we have no more moments to do all we need to, all we want to, all we were meant to.  We are afraid of the lack of life we may or may not have accomplished when our time to meet Jesus comes.  Do not live in fear.  Let that fear be the fuel to chase your dreams, no matter how trivial they may seem.  And pray that I can take my own advice.

Masterpiece of Tangled Beauty and Beast

     We are all breaking, if not broken.  The said words are less important than the unspoken.  If I thought it'd do any good, I'd share a token, the most valuable thing I own, but poor in money, I'm rich in the unseen. But you don't care much for that; it doesn't produce a pretty penny.  As the dagger hits your heart, I see your swollen eyes soften. The three most deceiving, most healing words, said too often, but not meant enough: "I love you." But does anyone? Have we allowed sacrifice, being selfishly selfless, show us what to truly love truly means?  And so, what have we to show, to be, without passion the actual root of anything. And so, it is all about the money, the fame, the items, the name.  If only we were so driven for mankind, the kind of man would be entirely changed.  First, the soul, then the face. Coping is sin, for not in the natural, but how we choose. What's your addiction, and perhaps I will share a glimpse of mine? Oh, no! Our mutual assistant would never allow that, goes by the title pride.  Have you ever seen anything so tragic? Encountered anything so beautiful? So messy the human heart?  The epic, age-old battle between spite and love, below and above, so evident yet so convoluted.  "It's complicated." We say everything lies in the grey area, yet we are the ones who twist it.    It is simple, right and wrong. Good and bad.  To love, not to love.  We add conditions, circumstances, track records, and suddenly the picture is an abstract piece of art.  A masterpiece of tangled beauty and beast. I have no answer, no potion, no wise word, or solution.  All I know at the end of a day full of dreams and their fitting procrastination: We are a purposed creation.