There's something in the walls of the house. 

One morning, when I turned 13, I noticed I had two shadows. 

I'm being stalked by a flock of unusually large ravens, and they all have human-looking teeth. They click them at me and smile when I look at them.

I've gotten what your voice sounds like, but I can still see your face. Frozen in the ice; the last time I saw you. 

A tiny pocket universe, where everyone is bored out of their minds. They're not evil, exactly, but so lacking in stimulation that you can pluck them out and promise they can stay in this universe if they'll just do a few terrible things to your enemies, I mean, to some bad guys that deserve it. 

Plastics can be directly bonded to the cells of your skin. You'll lose almost all sensation, but your skin will look perfect, and feel soft to the touch, and also be much tougher. It's very hard to cut, but if it does, it won't heal on its own and will require an operation to seal it. 

Embrace the darkness like a relative you have to put up with at annual holiday gatherings 

I meant to go to bed earlier, but I did not. That ever happen to you? After running around all day, leaping and twirling from task to task, suddenly night falls and the house becomes quiet and the waters recede, and the shores of consciousness spread out to the horizon. 

Man I do need sleep. 

It should be interesting. I'm sleeping on the treadmill. It sounds like a joke, but it isn't. The mattress fits on it, and if I sleep okay tonight then I can arrange this room to have more space for... I don't know I guess I can put my big comfy brooding armchair in here. 

I may be taking this minimalism thing too far. That's likely because I don't really know what minimalism is. There's probably more to the concept than just combining everything into one multifunctional thing, like a Swiss army knife of furniture. 

It must be windy outside. I hear, or think I hear, a dull distant roaring. Like a tsunami, or an uncertain future. 

Last night, it was whale sounds. Tonight, it's ocean sounds. I expect tomorrow will be kookaburra calls in ambient rainforest.

If that is what you wish, then that is what I wish too. 

Goodnight. 

When I fall asleep, I dream of the labyrinth. A labyrinth and a maze are two different things. The labyrinth has one path, to the center, and does have twists and turns and loops back very near to places you've already been. You can't get lost, but certainly you can stop, or give up and go backwards. 

Every night I walk this labyrinth. I am weary, and slightly injured, but I want to see what's next. 

One thing that puzzles me more than the occasional monsters and ancient treasure chests: why all the whale sounds? I can hear very faint whale songs. Am I underwater also? That seems a bit much, even for a mystical dream labyry.  

I'm trying real hard to be here every day. Even if it's just me prattling on about handpans or the correct plural form of octopus. (Both are fine, octopuses or octopi (turns out they don't even call themselves that so they don't really care what we call them.))

I wonder if there is any scientist out there experimenting to see if they can get octopus to live longer. They're so smart and if their lifespans weren't so short, I bet they would come up with some very interesting ideas. 

The delicate, ethereal notes of a handpan float through the air and simultaneously lull my restless spirit and invigorate my body. This is also very confusing because it's 2 am and this is a truck stop diner.

A handpan consists of two metal half-shells glued together and is played by hitting it with your hands. It's kind of like a steel drum, but it looks like a tiny flying saucer or a giant robot clam. 

It sounds like more laid-back version of a steel drum. Where steel drums tend to sound bubbly, buoyant, and festive, the handpan leans into exotic meditative tones. 

Knowing this, I still don't know why I'm hearing it now. I've finished my eggs and toast, the coffee is cold and black like the icy roads I've got to drive on for the next hundred miles, and I'm enjoying the warmth of the diner for a few more minutes before I have to brace myself for the winter chill as I go back to my truck. 

Is no one else hearing this?

Open and start typing. If you can begin, you can persist. I'm not sure that's exactly true, but I like the way it sounds. It feels right when you say it. We don't need to worry about how our minds are recursive, not yet. It's a green plastic watering can, with a few holes at the bottom, so when we walk to and from the flowers, we water the path a little, too. Surprising things might grow. 

It's either a great time to be reflective or a terrible time. I haven't decided yet. I think it's great, just more difficult. Our brains have a way of picking out and holding on to the information we like, that supports that we believe to be true, and then discarding the data that we don't like. 

I don't think I'm immune to this either. Knowing it's a thing isn't enough to stop it. I know I do tend to seem argumentative because when I hear something proclaimed as True, I want to test it, probe it, find the boundaries, extend the logic as far as it goes, like forging a silver thread, to see if it holds, or if it breaks. 

I'm real fun at parties. 

If you can begin, you can persist. 

If you're a watering can, you can exist. 

Well that doesn't sound right at all. 

There may be a moment, or many moments, a big old bunch of blobs of moments all stuck together like old boba tea, when it feels like...a mess. 

You can love the mess. It's allowed. 

Rowyn's Spire

Halfway up Mount Cullerman, (the locals call Rowyn's Spire) within just a few hour's hike from the summer cabin, are the ruins of an ancient stone fortress. They lie just at the edge of the treeline, which is strange because the treeline everywhere else in the area is about 2 thousand feet higher. Out of all the mountains in this stretch of the range, the trees just don't seem to want to grow any higher up on this one. 

Maybe that's why whoever built the fortress chose that spot. It wouldn't be hidden from their enemies, but nor could the enemies sneak right up to the walls. 

They'd have to cross about fifty yards of scree with no cover, and the clattering of the loose rock would alert the guards, even in darkness, and be met with a shower of arrows. 

I can see the tactical advantages, but what was the fortress guarding? Why spend the time and effort to put up stone walls and ramparts to defend a bare, resourceless mountaintop?

I made a campfire in the center of the ruins, and was sitting on the crumbling stones all mottled grey and green with lichen, with the sun having just set, when I heard the gritty, scraping, sounds of something, or many somethings, from somewhere above. 

It hadn't occurred to me that the guardians of this fortress may have been trying to keep something from getting down.