"I think you have melodies in your head all the time when walking around. you listen to sounds in nature quite a lot, the wind, birds... What else do you do. You listen to all kinds of music.

"And anyone who can sit in a room and listen objectively to a song with someone else and really, really appreciate the song for what it is..... thats a big one. Not just a song that makes noise, but one that conveys a message or creates an emotion that can be identified with. You do that alllllllll the time. "

"But there's something I don't like about you.

"I dont like it how you can make me crumble....inside...... no amount of xmen power can stop it. It's like my kryptonite. Not in a super "mushy" way, just breaks through icey stuff that I have."

The words stayed with me even after I slept last night. Just feeling known. Feeling understood. Appreciated.

This afternoon, I've sat and listened to music. People think I'm dedicated to my homework because I've been at the computer all day.

But the truth is, I have music this way. And I have my journals. And even a secret blog [gasp] that no one knows about! Imagine....

And my response:
"It's Linus and Lucy (Brubeck's). It's Vivaldi. It's acoustic guitar plus electrorhythming. It's the walk, the click-clip-shuffle-shuffle of our shoes. The crunch of leaves of twigs of lonely chirp of a bird not yet flying south. A bird content to feed on the view, the mountain air. The crisp Mount Blanc. The hand in the stream, nailbeds blue-ing.

"The gray cold of the cement floor, cleaner than slush but just barely. Then the music, how you play is green and blue. It's red and smooth. A blanket. Because it's not the melody as much as the sound, the tickle of music, of the vibration of the string of the melody that I hear and my fingers reach for my invisible flute.

"Or in the lounge, the forbidden drumset. Your hands and the drumsticks, positive and negative magnets. No amount of signs and exclamation points would keep you away.

"I miss our friendship. I miss how easy it was. How casual. How it was not "on purpose." It just was. And that's all it had to be."