I'm putting off reading a ton of theory for class. I'm trying to care about Erich Auerbach, and let's face it, the guy is (was) way smarter than I'll ever be. But I'll be damned, where's the story?

There's a lot up in the air right now. A possibility that I'll work on a farm starting in June and ending in October of 2011. And...

I might go back to Brasil? This time for several months. The idea sounds like the last thing I would ever do. But a part of me is not entirely opposed to it. I remember when I was there, reading Rick Bragg's All Over But the Shoutin', and how comforting his voice was to me. A voice from the south, my home, speaking to me when I was so far away from the everyday, from my home. I remember how sweet it was to climb into that top bunk, freshly showered, pull the covers up to my waist, and read Rick Bragg. To get to experience home through language, rather than being smack dab in the middle of it. There's a sweetness to doing that that is unlike anything else I've ever done. But that does not mean I will not cry my eyes out when I have to leave Mom, Dad, Annalee, Leon, Minda, and the South altogether, depending wholly on my God.

I am not sure that life is at all well-lived if there is not a deliberate attempt into heartbreak. I am not telling anyone to intentionally mess up their lives. What I am saying is that you have to look, you have to do. You have to pay attention, and do the thing that hurts if you want to feel things, to live, have your imagination stirred and be that "searching dog in the rubble" (God bless Barry Hannah's soul).

I am twenty-five years old.

I'm still in the first half of life (with a lower-case l).

Lord, stretch them bones of mine.