All the fools in one place.

Thank you for letting me sleep, Neamhchiontach, he says as he comes into the kitchen this morning from the living room, blanket still over his shoulders. All eyes shift over to the doorway and he salutes the room lazily.

You seemed to need it.

The house is so quiet. I didn't expect that.

We soundproofed Ben's workshop, PJ says with his mouth full of toast.

What's that? Ben says from where he sits and ignores every last one of us. Lochlan smirks at Ben but says nothing.

Can we continue our conversation this evening? Caleb's still looking at me and ignoring the banter now spreading around the room.

Yes. A group of us are going to dinner and to a concert. We plan to get along. It's working. Somehow. Holy.

Twelve years. Twelve o'clock. Twelve tries to get it all wrong.

I watched Caleb sleep today. I watched him watch the fire until his eyes grew heavy and his chin touched his chest and then he lifted his head and his eyes opened again but only for a minute before repeating his shutdown. He's exhausted. Trying to stay alive in a world like this, trying to outrun his own heart so it doesn't trample him flat, trying to catch my heart so he can add it to his Bridget-collection where for now only my soul and my past wait. Trying to be a big player in a small field. Trying to be the hero when the world is all villains all the time. Trying to win back the trust he took from that little girl in the woods, who tried to lock him out of the camper but wasn't strong enough for him. Wasn't any match for him. And now sits and watches him. Wondering if she really needs him after all. Wondering if she should kill him in his sleep. Wondering if he'd be better off far away from this and wondering if he has room under his arm for her so maybe she can just curl up and sleep for a minute too.

On making do with cheddar bunnies. Sigh.

Here, Peanut. Eat a cookie and we'll call it a great experiment but you don't have to keep it up. 

Yes, I do. Until Easter. That's the deal. 

You're going to keep observing Lent?

Yes, I have to. 

Why? 

I've never finished it. Never kept a New Year's resolution, never followed through. 

You married me. That's following through. 

Naw, I was lucky enough that you married me. 

Bridget, you saved my life. 

After almost killing you. 

Let's not split hairs, Lochlan laughs and kisses the top of my head. The point is you don't need to prove a thing. 

I do to myself. 

Fair enough. He sits down on the step and eats my cookie right in front of me, the shit. God. This is delicious, he says with his mouth full. 

Wonderful. 

It is, isn't it? You see, Bridgie, there are benefits to being a heathen. 

On the road to Emmaus.

Today was full of good things. Like heavy soaking rains, a daughter who turns out has incredible hustling skills, a son who suddenly decided an old leather jacket was much cooler than the hoodie he lives in to wear to school (he's right), eggs Benedict and bottomless coffee. Like french fries in the oven just after five o'clock and one more episode of the Walking Dead before we're all caught up and eventual sunshine to dry things off just a little bit before the rain moves back in overnight.

I backed into Skateboard Jesus today in a storefront as I turned too quickly from a display of Wonder Pots (do I want one? Or at least four of them, for that's how many I would need to cook for this house. I'll wait until the crockpots break, I guess) and he put his hand on the small of my back and held it there for a moment so we both wouldn't fall.

Sorry! I turned too quickly.

I was too close. My fault. Hello, Bridget. I'm glad I ran into you, even if it is literal. It's been almost a year and the watch you gave me works a treat. He shoots an invisible french cuff out from where he's holding his backpack straps and I see Caleb's watch glint in the light from the burdened sun.

I'm glad to hear it. 

Every time I look at it I think of you. How goes the battle against the chocolate chip cookies? 

Thirty days without one now. I've set a lifetime record. I really want one, though. 

Don't worry. In a little over two weeks I'll be back and you can have one. It'll be a miracle if you still want one by then, I bet. 

Or it will just be a miracle. Right?

He smiles, puts his skateboard down, one foot on it and he's gone.

Staring at this yellow-haired girl.

Smiling in the bright lights
Coming through in stereo
When everybody loves you, you can never be lonely

Better today! I get down. It happens. I fall into a deep hole and then I reach up and try and pull as many people into it with me as I can, for company. I get lonely even though the house is full. I get scared behind the very army who's more than capable of protecting me and I get this weird combination of wanderlust and wanting to hunker down that makes me want to stay inside and just contemplate fleeing forever.

Of course it doesn't make sense. Time is flying. Things are happening. Life is changing even as I fight to keep us firmly wedged somewhere between 1983 and 2007. Formative years, you know. Not everything in between but those years are major players and I'll not accept it nor will I move on. I will mark them with reverence and respect for they shaped me profoundly. 

But at the same time, I'm not wallowing. John sang Counting Crows songs with me all morning while we tried and failed to make tortellini from scratch. It wasn't...good so we ordered pizza for dinner tonight. Actually five of them. The pizza was very good and more than made up for the metric ton of wasted ingredients from the pasta. 

But did you have fun?

I had so much fun. 

Good, then next time we'll add another person and we'll keep adding people until everyone is having fun. 

You're like the resident cheerleader. 

It's a dirty job, but somebody has to do it. Can you imagine if it was Ben? 

HEY. Ben picked that exact moment to come upstairs. Actually, later he admitted he came up and heard me laughing so he waited at the top of the stairs, enjoying the sound. I'll have you know I can cheer her up just fine. But it's an easier job if she's naked. That's all. 

Nice, Benny. 

Actually it's VERY nice. But not if this is the soundtrack. This has got to go.

Bumblebee (more than meets the eye).

The children (I need a better descriptor for them, they're bigger than me and driving and university-deciding and showing up at all hours now) went back to school today. It's Ruth's last term in high school altogether and Henry has a scant two years remaining. I have a weird feeling I'm going to cry all the time when they leave home, like Mrs. Witwicky in the Transformers sequel when Shia LaBeouf went away to college until they calmed her down with a pot brownie.

Yep. That will be me, except for the grace that they won't be living in residence because they'll go to local universities. They freaking love Vancouver. I would have too, had I lived here since the age of eight or ten, because it's a cool place and you never have to wear a coat, technically. Plus things like noodles and bubble tea and pretty much whatever your heart desires, framed by beaches and mountains everywhere.

Plus, as I found out this afternoon, King of Donair is finally opening a shop here. Or at least I hope they are.

Dies. Life complete.

I'm about to get fat.

Really really fucking fat.

And I don't care because the boys will be even fatter. And we're all okay with it. We'll run it off some other time.

But where was I?

Oh yes. The children. I really missed them today when they went back to school. I filled my morning up with grocery shopping and new-windshield wiper hunting, and laundry and dishes and baseboard-scrubbing and I started spring decluttering a bit and yet it was all done with that tiny thread of unease that reminded me constantly that they weren't home. That this is an all-day every-day life and that I really need to work on my abandonment issues because I'm here digging my own grave while everyone happily comes and goes.

You're the anchor, they tell me.

I'm drowning here, wedged on the bottom and yet I'm the only one who will be able to save me, because that's how life works and I can't seem to figure it out. Now I'm getting passed by my own kids and I'm so damn happy they're successful I don't even care about me much anymore.

That's not a good thing, everyone says.

Yes, I know it isn't. But I'm honest at least. My one and only sterling trait.

I got a big huge round beach blanket this weekend. It's a green mandala with a pom-pom fringe. I love it to bits. It has not been beach-tested as of yet because the rain showed up early and thwarted my plans and it hasn't let up since.

I can wait.

The early bird gets shut down.

Good morning. I've crossed over from mildly sleep-deprived into fully narco-haptic now, and am being watched like a late-stage dementia patient for doing things like trying to put the honey in my purse instead of in the cupboard and trying and failing to remember Ben's name when he greeted me today with the sun.

They don't take any of it personally and so Sam asked me to name three things I am grateful for this morning. I start it all off the same way, every time, by naming names and he stops me seven names in, because I can't count today either and maybe my tiny little twisted buns are too tight. Maybe my leggings are too tight. I think my skin is too tight. Fuck it. I get to the end of my list and glare at him. He says Name other things besides us, because his name was in there too.

I'm craving Pho. I think that might be a good birthday lunch this year. 

That isn't gratitude, but I'll indulge you. What would you have for dinner then? 

Ramen. 

(Because noodles. Bowls and bowls of noodles.)

Breakfast? 

Coffee and cold pizza leftover from birthday-eve. 

I like the way you snuck another request in there. 

Gotta compound these things, Sam. 

What do you want for your birthday? 

Someone to come and Feng Shui the house. 

You're serious. 

Incredibly. We need it. 

Okay. I'll uh...what do I do? This is not in my....uh...sphere of influence. 

Easy, silly. You pray for a Feng Shui master to appear. 

Like magic, then.

No, like faith. 

What's the difference? 

HA! EXACTLY. 

I think you need a nap. 

I just got up!

I think you're sleep-talking. 

That would actually be cool. 

Not from my point of view. 

Your 'sphere', you mean. 

Go back to bed, Bridget.

A little reminder because it's getting harder to read your emails again.

Pallbearer's Heartless came out this morning, in the wee hours and is a fucking MASTERPIECE. Best listened to on a windy rainy cliff with good headphones or in a car with a good sound system, driving down the highway in the darkness.

It's one of those kinds of albums and it's perfect unlike your dear Bridget, who may have broken the mold. I'm sorry. I didn't mean to, it just happened when I woke up and couldn't move, so I cracked some pieces, not realizing that it was too soon. I wasn't finished. Wasn't ready. Wasn't complete or whole or as perfect as the rest of you, the rest of them.

From down here your horses are too high, your derision cuts too deeply, your words hurt when they should bounce off, and that's how I know. My skin should be thicker, my brain should have abilities it doesn't even understand, like pronunciations, map-reading and navigating mean people. I should be able to function as more than a comfort object, more than comfort, period. I should be independent and free. I should be smarter. I should be capable. I should be better. 

I should have waited a little longer, but I was curious, like I'm always so fucking curious about every little thing and so I went exploring and I keep getting burned, cut and flayed alive on things that would be a scratch and then on the other hand I can accept very hard, very difficult and very bad things with a grace few people possess. So I've heard. So I know now in a way I didn't before.

So I'll take my gifts (and massive, unforgiveable flaws) and you take yours and don't read anymore if all you're going to do is try and pass judgement on a life you actually know very little about. This is my world and I'm happy here. Go find your own.

A classic.

Outside in the sun today. The bike was loaded onto a truck. Screw rail freight, it will ship singular, covered in a larger truck all the way to New Jake. It's insured up the wazoo and GPS-chipped as well which is new to me but Batman assured me no expense will be spared. 

Bye Sunbeam. Bye the biggest personification of New Jake that ever was. I'll miss the bike but I'll miss the man more. 

Stop wingeing. 

Stop telling people what to feel! I glare at Loch and walk past him into the house. 

He's mad because I was at Caleb's yesterday and he will forever be mad because he's Lochlan and that's how he works. 

That's fine. I'm too tired to deal with things today. Only I recognize what the crushing exhaustion means. I see it coming from a mile away. So I blow a kiss at the shiny pale green bike and exact another promise that it's going to be just fine and that's how that story ends, with a flatbed disappearing through the gates and a scowling redhead on the patio steps.