Category Archives: Emily

In spite of the fact that I run around the apartment like a loon holding the bird and strafe the guinea pig while making machine gun noises…

And in spite of the fact that I have a full blown anxiety attack everytime you eat something out of the fridge that’s been there for more than two days because I’m worried that you’ll get botulism poisoning and you’ll probably swell up and die…

And in spite of the fact that I will look you straight in the eyes and, with a completely straight face, I’ll tell you that there’s such a thing as turtle varnish and that’s how conservationists protect turtle shells from damage…

And in spite of the fact that I treat the whole apartment like it’s my personal bookcase and leave terrible boxing biographies everywhere….

And in spite of the fact that I have a tendency to try and eat your bird…

You’ve still managed to stick with me for over a year now and I think that’s pretty damn impressive.

Love you Emily.

Dylan

I’ve been thinking a lot about moments lately.

I’m rapidly, quickly, and oh so slowly approaching one such moment. It’s so clearly defined, so obvious a moment, a Point where my life will be affected in ways I can’t even begin to imagine.

I can count the big ones, those massive moments that stand tall in my life and marking those times where things have Changed.  Those moments that caused my life to shake, rattle and roll. But this particular moment is not coming upon me unawares. It came from a long chain that started way back in April.

No, wait, further back. Maybe around January.

No, even further back.

Let’s do this right and nail down the exact day it all started, at least from a point when I noticed it. Looking back through the records, it all started on December 4th, 2005 at 5:41am (my time).

Now, I didn’t remember that off the top of my head. It’s not a moment that came with any great explosion. I had to go and look it up. If things had followed a different path, if things had gone any number of other ways, that moment would have become lost in million other moments that have passed between here and now.

But because I did follow the path I did and because luck was on my side and because someone else followed the same path, that moment has taken on a special significance for me, where my heart quickens and I begin to grin just thinkin’ about it.

And looking back at it, I’m…terrified at how easily things could have been different. How small a thing that one little moment was. How close I came to living a different life. In all probability, I could have been just as happy. There might be a Dylan out there, in the infinite number of multiple universes, who followed the other path and he’s smiling too.  But I doubt it. I can’t see how things could be this good without that moment. I don’t see how my life could have turned out this well without that small, shining point in my life where I saw a multitude of paths and I took the one that brought me closer to her.

And I can still trace that path, that lead me further along. You have to look hard to see it, if you’re not me. It winds and disappears between trees and bushes and vines, but it’s easy to see if you know where to look. And then here and there moments, little sparks, bright signposts on a more definite road. Here, an invitation to talk (April 7th, 2006). Over there, those long conversations that took up entire nights.

It stops being a path and becomes a road. One that is well marked, clearly defined, highlighted by thousands of moments.

And leading up to that Point, the one that approaches so quickly and yet, at a snail’s pace.

And the thing is, the Point is not the exciting part. It’s not the part that gets my stomach to jump and my heart thumpin. The thing that makes me so happy is that I can see the road beyond that point. That I can see this continuing on so far and so long that I don’t see the end of it. That this point is just one more moment in the thousands more to come.

Dylan Charles

The time is rapidly approaching where I’m going to be doing something exciting. Terrifying too actually. It will be, in a lot of ways, a whole bunch of new crammed into a very brief amount of time. New challenges, new problems and just a whole change in how my life will be.

But no matter what the difficulties are, no matter how unbelievably raddled with anxiety I might be at the mere thought of how much work I have to do in the next couple of months, I can always get just a little bit calmer by realizing that I’m not going to be alone in any of this. Emily will be there along the way, going through the same things and already having gone through the same things that I’m about to go through.

Emily has been, for as long as I’ve known her and as long as I’ve been with her, someone who rights me, just by being there. It’s not just a matter of her calming me down when I get into one of my high-strung, manic, pacing wildly back-and-forth moods. It’s just about knowing she’s there and that makes it better.

And, even beyond that, she propels me forward and beyond what I thought I could do. This recent creative burst, this recent refocusing on my writing and trying to get my writing career started, is due, in no small way, to the constant encouragement she gives me: always reading what I’ve written, telling me what she thinks, prodding me for more. She is my best reader and she tells me what she thinks, which is the most important thing a writer can ever have.

And even further beyond that, she gets me out and about in the world: new foods, new places, new whatever. Her excitement becomes my excitement and where I was once reluctant to change, hated to change, I’ll now go out of my way to explore, to find new things to do and try, to broaden who I am.

She has, in every way that matters to me, started to make me a better person. Without pressuring me, without browbeating or berating; just because I want to be the person she deserves. And though I don’t think I’m there yet, I hope to be some day.

Dylan Charles