life is about more than what you love

I'm in a daze these days. I stumble around, lost and searching, but it's like I don't even know what I'm looking for.

Christie came up this weekend--it was like breathing again, being with her, remembering the hospital and processing how we have adjusted since leaving our city (has it really been a month??). It's getting harder to remember patients' names, stories of people I used to think of everyday. Christie and I held hands and talked, and then just looked at each other for a long time.

Tonight I came across a little rectangle of paper. "Al Smith" it read. "5D, Room 1, Bed 2." All in very straight, practiced writing, nonetheless with little tiny variations in each line, as if written by a trembling hand. On the next lines are written his phone number (with area code), address, and landlord's number, I believe. Another square of paper holds his email address. Child's writing. Al Smith needed me, bid me farewell with all of his information--even the address to his low-income seniors' hotel.

Next to these papers lay my lanyard badge for working at SF General, my photo ID and nametag. I went through three levels of bureaucracy (and waited 6 weeks!) to get this badge, and I won't be throwing it out anytime soon, I think to myself (as if my subconscious has vague plans of volunteering at General sometime in the distant future).

Who am I, anyway? Who am I anymore? "I'm Cari, the chaplain intern here at General. Do you mind if I come in? How are you feeling today?"

"there's a symphony in my head,
& i created it...
there are pages upon pages in my head--
but i can't recollect any of it"

p.d.

From our first class together, and all those Los Angeles plays attended in your beautiful navy Volvo,
from our dinners with dreadlocked Jesse and Shannon, laughing and joking,
High-fiving that the Democrats won the Senate and the House in one go.
You must know how dear you have become, you are becoming.

Tonight, I saw you for the first time in many months (having been in San Francisco)
We hugged, greeting, enjoying the poetry event side by side
After, you pulled out your tiny planner--not more than 3 inches long,
wanting to share more of your time with me.
Parting, we shook hands.

You, who hesitate with your sentences, teaching me patience and thoughtfulness
and I am learning pensive speech doesn't have to be awkward
I am seeing just how wide and deep the ribbons of your brain are
You, gentle man in beret
you, upcoming 40th anniversary celebrated with a hiking trip to Sequoia & Yosemite.

You, a boy from Kentucky
a 16 year-old with a high school diploma,
a 22 year-old with a doctorate
an 18 year-old with a wife.

You, a 7 week daughter in tow as you embarked on your first British semester
you, a taste for humor, for irony, for good literature (obviously), for politics
you, an ear for listening

& with all this talk of writing, of following our hearts, of family--
I must confess I sometimes want to cry around you
and I understand you as a professor, an advisor--
but as a father?

[a short list of films greatly appreciated by the author since January]

The Darjeeling Limited (how I love Wes Anderson).
I'm Not There (the Bob Dylan biopic--Cate Blanchett is incredible; plus good screenwriting, camera shots, acting, and soundtrack, of course).
Transamerica (a compassionate, endearing, and hilarious look at life as a transgendered person, in the form of a cross-continental roadtrip; Felicity Huffman won an Oscar for this one).
Becoming Jane (the slightly exaggerated story of Jane Austen, and with a sort of painful and true ending; and yes, I realize I love Anne Hathaway far more than I probably should).
Everything is Illuminated (Elijah Wood plays a young Jewish man in a very funny and poignant search for pre-Holocaust lost roots in Ukraine).
The Painted Veil (an on-location beautifully filmed and rending love story between a young British bacteriologist fighting a cholera outbreak in rural 1920s China and his less than affable, unfaithful bride (Naomi Watts). Edward Norton at his best).
Girl with a Pearl Earring (a treat for the senses).

(And by now, hopefully all readers have seen Juno, Into the Wild, and Once.)