(Photo of us by Chip Warren)
11.11.11 – the day we intended to be our wedding day. For reasons beyond our control, we decided that it would be wisest to postpone the celebration, and hopefully be more ready to do it justice a year from today. It’s just numbers, just another day out of the year, I know – but still, I want to take the time to honor it for what it is to me, to us. A magical occurrence – my favorite number. I always wished on 11:11, always managed to catch it both morning and night, and was taught from an early age to make a wish when it happened. It wasn’t until years later, when I got a copy of my birth certificate that I realized that I had been born at exactly 11:11am. On the 10th day of the 1st month – another eleven. I’ve never been much of a numbers person – I’m not mathematically inclined, but I have always ascribed some magical and even emotional significance to them. I have always believed in the power of wishing – call it praying, positive thinking, or just creating your own reality, but it’s always worked for me. Not always in the ways I had expected, but my wishes do tend to come true in one way or another. So, with the full moon high above our little bed, far, far away from everything familiar, in the desert of West Texas, I make these wishes – for us, for him and for me. I wish with hope and love. I wish.

This one.
Owl-eyes that contract and expand when they alight upon me, making shivers run up my spine even after these six years in each other’s company. My tall drink of clear water, my true arrow. Colin, sweet and strong, the blacksmith who courted me and won my heart all in the space of one afternoon, one moment where I woke from rainbow goblin dreams to find him kneeling at the foot of my bed, my hands suddenly running through the thick bear pelt of his hair, and us locked in a kiss, a lover’s knot from which we’ve never come unbound. It was never a question, from that moment on – our lives were twined like ivy.
He is stubborn as steel, the steel he commands with his hammer and forge. He is that bull, sweet in the field, horns garlanded with wildflowers. He has taught me so much about kindness, about honesty, about generosity. He inspires me to be better, to be stronger, more fearless, more fierce. He is both mighty and gentle. Sometimes I think that he is not of this earth – that he is a tree-spirit come to life, a bird-king, long-taloned and downy-chested. He is the deep water – the purest subterranean river – elusive, mysterious, unknowable. After all these years, at times I get that sense that I’ve only glimpsed the barest tip of the iceberg of who he is. His mind is a cavern of giant crystals, constantly creating, cogitating, ruminating. When he’s thinking, his eyes go distant and I can almost hear the sound of enormous wings beating.When I lay my head on his chest, and listen to his heart, I hear an ancient song. It is in that place, our skins dissolving into one another, that I feel most at peace. His heart is the cave I want to make my home in, forever.
He proposed to me on my birthday, in our kitchen, surrounded by our dearest friends. The happiness I felt in that moment was as if all the birthday candles I’ve ever wished on were simultaneously ablaze inside my chest. I want to find that joy again, here, in the middle of nowhere with my love. This is the year that the lesson of completely letting go of my attachments to the outcome, or to “the plan” has come up and smacked me in the face again and again. I’ve had the rug well and truly pulled out from under me so many times, that you’d think I’d have absorbed the lesson by now, but it takes time – and a lot of work – to really live in the moment as much as possible. That’s my only goal for the moment – just to do that thing, to BE HERE NOW. To sit across from this man I’ve built a life with and not worry about the past, or the future, but just to enjoy being present with him, to enjoy each other’s company. This is the letting go, and it hasn’t been easy – no, in fact, I’ve fought it nearly every step of the way. Letting go for me, is the hardest thing. I’m learning, though. I’m trying. We came out here, to the wilds of West Texas by train in the dead of night, leaving behind all our friends and family, our animals, our home, our plans. We took a different track instead, and will find ourselves, as dawn breaks over the mountains and the moon sets, embarking on a wholly different journey than the one we had put so much thought into planning. I hope that path still waits for us. That beautiful cave, that majestic valley. I hope that we can stand strong in a circle of all our loved ones one day, with no fear in our hearts. The terrain we cover now is unknown – it is rocky, and full of dangerous crags and pitfalls. At times this landscape looks bleak, but I know I just have to wait for the sun to rise and bathe those unforgiving edges in peachy light to remember how beautiful it can be.
I know that this is the right thing, the right work.
I put myself into it with my whole heart, my whole soul:
loving unconditionally, loving without expectation, without judgement.
That’s the true love.

McDonald Observatory by Michael Cummings
I am excited to explore this new territory, to wish on stars, on the moon.


The Marfa Lights by Jeremy Zilar
The Marfa Mystery Lights are unexplained lights (known as “ghost lights”)
usually seen near U.S. Route 67 on Mitchell Flat east of Marfa, Texas.
If I see the Marfa lights, then I’ll wish on those too.

Given over to lesser men by Trey Hill from Everything’s Bigger in Texas – Pictory
“There’s a vastness here and I believe that the people who are born here breathe that vastness into their soul.
They dream big dreams and think big thoughts, because there is nothing to hem them in.” Sitting on top of Enchanted
Rock at sunrise, these words by Conrad Hilton (about the state my family has called home for nine generations)
ring incredibly true. They give a voice to the pride I have long had difficulty putting into words.”
– Trey Hill is a commercial photographer and a story teller living in Dallas.

Sunset over Davis Range by Michael Cummings
There’s a rough beauty here in these hills that I treasure.
I know I breathed that vastness into my soul when I was born.
No matter where I go, I’ll always be from Texas.

Prada Marfa by Noel Kerns

Early morning railroad by lomokev
Let this be a new dawn. Here is my wish on this most magical day:
that we celebrate each other, revel in each other,
that our paths will always run parallel,
for our tracks to join and intersect,
and carry us onward into the wild blue yonder and beyond.
Happy 11.11.11 and many bright blessings to us, and to you and yours.