It's sort of like that.

Don't you think?

Beth.

Remember, those old rooms, the windows.  Chips and Salsa sent all the way from New Mexico.

Your favorite kind.

Beth.

What a few perfect moments, days weeks, a little over a month in my memory.  Lets see, Summer of '95 it was hot in Chicago.  Hangin' by the lake in Evanston.  Breathing the humidity.  Hitting no doze, and running, running, running, every day. Passing out while reading court records, wait, opinions in cases.  How did we end up here, again, together?

You were just pretending to sleep right?  You heard the whole thing, the whole phone conversation with all my confidences poured through the line.  You knew, and didn't say.

Beth.

Sometimes you would just rub my back.  Talk kindly.  Treat me to a picnic with your visiting family.  Let me play "American Girl" over and over and over.

Then.

Beth,

Remember when we saw each other at the Berkeley Tournament? Hailey and I were so proud to be there.  But, I had cut my hair short, and it surprised you.  We clung to each other.  (Did we know we would never see each other again? Saving for the dream of course.)

Dinner, chinese, you were up against a team from Idaho in a round.  I wouldn't give you any pointers except vague references (Siting regional protection).  I didn't think I needed to because you were superb, taught me the meaning of the words "antithetical, antithesis, anethema".

You won.

Then a good-bye I don't recall.  Night time? Rain?

Then, the message, long into my machine.  I never called back, was riding my own crazy disillusionment.  My peering into mortality.

And I went on that backpacking trip.  Into the Cascades.  And you visited in the dream.  You said "Good-Bye."

I heard the world cry, all the way up there in the Pacific Northwest Cascades--I heard all of everything cry at the loss of you.

And when I came out I met the news.  A long sobbing message.  That I returned.

All that passed, and

I still feel you.  Yes to the light, vibration, but also a brush of your hand still in the connectedness. Each day.

Thank you Beth Brown.