first draft
october 30, 2024
written after reading the olds poem below
and before taking the kids to a pumpkin patch
I remember being eighteen
in McKee Hall
It was December
The fall semester was nearing its end
and it was Christmastime
or was it the beginning of the spring semester?
It hadn’t snowed since the previous winter
My first girlfriend and I had spent the whole night doing whatever we wanted
I had exactly zero responsibilities at that time
not just that night, but throughout my life
For the first time, I didn’t even care about passing my classes
Had no bills or debts
How many people ever have that level of freedom?
I have known it and I WILL get it back
If my memory serves me correctly,
we had spent the whole night up together, having fun in and around McKee
and then fallen asleep for about an hour (or less) on a couch in the basement,
in a lounge room with high basement windows
that faced S, or SSE, or SE
The winter light slowly began to show
and it was white
When the ground is covered in snow,
the light on a cloudy day is a grayish white
I want to go back to Ohio and live that quiet life
around calm, humble, down-to-earth people Ohioans
like Everett and Justice
I do not want to go back to being a teenager in an awkward relationship on Western Campus
but I would like to be living at Annex again
going over to Everett and Justice’s apartment to drink and just be together
going out at any and every hour of the night to run and skate
living in a quiet but alive town
with the large field and forest out my back window
I am almost going to cry
from thinking about this all
None of it is there any more.
(Except for the nature.)
That feeling is within me now.
I want to find other people who are the kinds of people I enjoy being around.
Where are those people in Las Vegas?
I have a great deal of trouble trying to find them here.
It is very difficult for one to go through life
with that rural/small town Ohio feel
while in a place like this
It is a very bad place.
I want to live in Oxford with my wife and children
for one year
One quiet year
So they know what that is
So they can experience Dad in that way
and know what a father can be in the right place
There is a peace when I think about Oxford
and the people who meant the most to me
Everett, Justice, Alec
When I remember living there with them
I feel at peace
I find it is much easier for me to accept the way everything is
I do not feel that here
I am not at ease here
In Ohio, I could die
Here, I am terrified of death
Here, everything feels wrong
I need to leave as soon as possible
In Ohio, I feel:
I could die
and
When the people I love die,
I will want to die too
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