Today is the first day I’ve slept more than four hours in a row. (I slept for five.) I’ve had maybe nine hours stretched between the past week so pardon me if this doesn’t make a lot of sense. Or it’s jumpy. I can’t believe over a year has gone by. Yesterday Rue, Tyler and I packed up his desk and mattresses and took them to his parents because he’s leaving in a two days to go down to a major university for school. If any of you see him, please smile at him for me, because I will miss him dearly. I thought I could handle the move, but I was exhausted and became a little emotional. We all did. But I couldn’t help it: it hit upon seeing his room so empty. I’ll see him again tomorrow, right before he leaves, but it’s still hard. I’ll go from seeing him every day to not at all and that’s quite a change. I’ve just been so busy because the summer ends in a few days for so many people and it will going back to rare visits and long distances. It’s strange, but I find myself a constant. No matter where my friends go for the fall, during spring they come back to me. Birds migrating for the winter. They go, and I’m still here, but they always come home.

And I’m still here.