Skip to main content

Glad to see you go, go, go, go, goodbye

Dear September,

I'm not quite sure how to put this, so I'm going to come right out and say it: You've outstayed your welcome.

Look, I was excited as you were about you coming to town for a month. I mean, what's a year without a visit from old September, right? but, dude, you've really been a downer this year and I just can't take any more of your crap. Now September, I don't want you to get upset. I love you. I really do. What, with the change of colors in the leaves and the cooling weather (usually), you're one of my favorite months. And how can you go wrong with that three day weekend you gave me at the beginning of the month. Dude, that was great. Oh, and the weekend when it rained. Killer, my friend.

But like I said, you've become too much. You've given me hellacious writer's block, you've caused turmoil in my family life, and you made me put on some weight. I didn't want to eat those Oreos, but I had no choice. You drove me to it.

I will always appreciate getting a sneak at the new Springsteen album. I will always treasure the final month of the 2007 baseball season when Sophie and I bonded while she kept track of the Indians wins and losses. For those things, I am forever grateful, September. But the writing has been on the wall for two weeks now and I insist that you leave.

Tomorrow morning when I get up, I expect you to have your things packed up and out of the house.

This isn't goodbye forever, September. But I need some time. Maybe... maybe in a year I'll be ready to see you again.

Take care of yourself, September.

One last thing. I want my "Bad English" LP back. I never said you could borrow it.

Aloha

Comments

spankydav said…
I have used this song recently for my own reflection towards saying goodbye.
Thought you might be able to use it to say Goodbye to September.
It isn't the whole song, but enough to get what you need from it.

Here Comes the Flood
Peter Gabriel

When the flood calls
You have no home, you have no walls
In the thunder crash
You're a thousand minds, within a flash
Don't be afraid to cry at what you see
The actors gone, there's only you and me
And if we break before the dawn, they'll
use up what we used to be.

Lord, here comes the flood
We'll say goodbye to flesh and blood
If again the seas are silent
in any still alive
It'll be those who gave their island to survive
Drink up, dreamers, you're running dry
Homelight said…
September

But, September will always be with you
no amount of Round-up
will stop you from extinguishing
her from your memory. No amount
of running away will let you forget.
She’s the month
with the first harvest moon;
the moon that pulls you back
from your fairy dancing frenzy
on that warm Midsummer’s Night;
that moon who lingers closest to the equinox
half way between warm and cold.
Her vivid question:
Did you forgot I was coming
while you were idle
sipping ice tea on the porch
spitting watermelon seeds to New York
jet skiing in the creek.
Mother Earth was moving
once again - repositioning you.
Can you feel the balance
between actively gathering, freezing and
craving for winter’s long nights of reflection?
Oh! September never leaves you
she’s brings you the fruits to what
you’ve sown under
April’s flowering moon
that now seems eons ago.
She asks: “did you plant enough
to share or are your fields barren
and full of over grown weeds?
Did you change your gardening techniques
or hold on to old ways
that never will bring peace?”
Yes, September
with her royal announcement
promises that at autumn’s equinox
cyclically, next year
you will return again to this spot
hopefully a little different
hopefully more loving.
ready to plant garlic and
spring’s daffodil bulbs.

Popular posts from this blog

MARATHON FOOTNOTES (for those who didn't think I would really footnote a stream of consciousness thought): Footnote #1 Academy Award Winning Best Picture Films from 1969 to the Present: Midnight Cowboy, Patton, The French Connection, The Godfather, The Sting, The Godfather II, One Flew Over The Cuckoo’s Nest, Rocky, Annie Hall, The Deer Hunter, Kramer Vs. Kramer, Ordinary People, Chariots of Fire, Gandhi, Terms of Endearment, Amadeus, Out of Africa, Platoon, The Last Emperor, Rain Man, Driving Miss Daisy, Dances With Wolves, The Silence of the Lambs, Unforgiven, Schindler’s List, Forrest Gump, Braveheart, The English Patient, Titanic, Shakespeare in Love, American Beauty, Gladiator, A Beautiful Mind, Chicago, Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King. Footnote #2 Members of the band YES, from 1969 to the present: In 1969, Yes is formed with Jon Anderson on vocals Peter Banks on guitar, Bill Bruford on drums, Tony Kaye on keyboards and Chris Squire playing bass. This group records

The Beginning of an Explanation

When I dropped off of the Internet, it wasn't meant to be a years long sabbatical. I thought I just needed a break; that I was getting burned out from writing Basement Songs and movie reviews for Popdose.com. Something cracked, though, and I couldn't consider writing even in a journal for a very long time. Things changed in the winter of 2017. While driving to pick up Jacob at theater rehearsal, I experienced my first panic attack. It started immediately after he got in the car at the theater and it slowly took over my body for the fifteen minute drive home. My skin became clammy and I felt myself removed from my body. My brain was empty and I wanted to curl up in a ball and cry. I gutted it out until we walked through the front door. Without saying a word, I went upstairs, crawled into bed and got in the fetal position. I just wanted to close my eyes and shut out the world. The next morning I awoke exhausted, as if I'd exercised the previous day. That was the first time

The End of the Explanation

I don't want to drag this out for a series of extended posts; there's no need to go into the minute details. So I'll wrap up my ongoing mental health journey with this post. After I basically quit writing, I began the work on myself. From 2017 to the middle of 2019, the only things I wrote were 10 minute dramas for our church, and let me tell you, even those were a challenge. But when God gives you a deadline, you don't mess around. There was a real depression that came with the relief of not writing or worrying about writing scripts. Again, if I wasn't writing, what was I doing? I really struggled with this question because we had moved from Ohio to Los Angeles so I could pursue a career in film. Even though I'd written and directed a movie, and sold a script, in my mind that wasn't good enough. I couldn't appreciate all of the great things in my life, and the solid career that I had forged in animation over 18 years. It took some real work: a lot o