Winter Solstice marks the official end of the year for me. I made it one more full circle around the sun. The boxes in the garage mark both the end and the beginning of both this year and a decade that began when I left beloved Tower Records with my soon to be ex-wife to care for my dad during his last years.

So many boxes a decade ago, not nearly so many today. There is a scene and speech by Al Pacino from an almost forgotten movie, Any Given Sunday, which describes loss, age and the toll it exacts while imploring the cast of football players the camera pans to find the resolve to fight for redemption inches at a time. The team gets the message in the movie. I thank Bill Simmons for providing the clip in his humor filled blog on his Grantland website this past week while doing his NFL picks, which apparently this year have hit bottom just like my marriage.

I'm one in a long line of examples living the message of what getting older means in this world. A lot of what has been gained has been lost, but the quest for understanding this dot in the galaxy, and my place in it, remains worth getting up everyday for, even if awareness comes inches at a time

I see the stars and watch the jets from Miramar, or maybe Edwards, leave vapor trails in the blue-black sky with a palm tree a few doors down silhouetted on the night canvas. Orion's belt hangs above the diffused eastern horizon light with its three main stars beginning the turn from vertical in these late hours of the day to a horizontal view I will catch at 5AM. Sleep seems to come to me in periodic patches during the course of most days, certainly not in the long stretches of time I was comfortable with in the world a moment in time ago. But sleep does come still, and the long dark hours in our 24 of winter help ease me into dreams and numbness.

She sleeps, and I hear her breath in our former shared bedroom. I napped earlier this evening with my old cat on our couch. I'll grab some shuteye again tonight in the guest room with Darby Dog and Bo Kitty squeezing me inside their slumber stretch on the bed. What are they thinking these days? The old man makes a nice breach and warm divide between our adversarial relationship you dipshit dog/cat you?

My dreams now turn from yesterdays mutated brain vision combinations of was and fantasy to possibilities of unknown rooms colored from advertising photos of property offers and old friendships to reawaken. A lot less baggage in the mind today. Hope for a future unexplored. Travel. New beds and breakfasts with familiar voices and faces for a day or two and then down the road for another reunion of hope and inspiration. The high way.

Thanks for stopping by. Peace.