Alabama

During the time I spent in Opelika, Alabama, there is no easy way to describe the ease I felt. Moist and warm, the time there was like returning to a womb; a safe and a calm. I remember everything so vividly, it scares me because I don't remember anything so clear as I do that time. Melanie and I became kindred spirits. We practiced yoga, baked whole-wheat pitas, took trips to the gulf of Mexico together. We talked and talked and talked more, and took her kids to the library where I rummaged through the shelves, the music and movie selections. We rented Dark Crystal at least seventeen times over. I took runs in the rain, and learned to crochet. It was there that I first heard Radiohead's album "Amnesiac", one dark, still night on a couch. I was unable to sleep. It was thrilling and I couldn't close my eyes to the haunting sound in my ears or the blanketing darkness around me. It was also there where I first read the George Orwell masterpiece, 1984, and a condensed book of Shakespeare, which Daisha had given me years before, that I grew to adore . I remember writing poetry and reading poetic anthologies, tanning in the backyard amoung cedars and near a pasture, getting horribly bitten by the array of various insects that infest the south. I remember so many things from then that made me terribly happy, and make me terrible melancholy to think of now. I listened to Steely Dan, Diana Krall and Chris Issac. It was a time of peace and for peace; of mind, body, spirit. I can't think of more a release than when I let go in Alabama. I grew up in Alabama. I think of the time there as a century of thought, of brilliance, beauty, growth, humility, learning, love, and peace. I think of the weather there and I am happy. I think of the green and I am happy. I think of the stretching highways below brilliant thunderstormy sky, and I am happy.
I grew up there, and in that I am content.