I am in Lexington, Virginia for my cousin’s wedding, which is tomorrow. Tonight there was a sort of outdoor gathering in a beautiful park here, surrounded by mountains and later lit by many stars. When I was younger I didn’t think my home state was cool, but now I know that Virginia is one of the best ones. Sorry everyone, but it’s true.

I’ll write more tomorrow after I bear witness to it all. For now I will sleep soundly within the dark and beautiful confines of my A/C-frozen room at the Motel 6 off the highway . . .

Fairly certain I have said this verbatim to someone . . . also: rest in peace to my brother Robert Redford. Now he is with Paul again.

my nephew tower mccune, the last hope for mankind, to whom i am both uncle and eternal protector, as well as godfather to as far as the catholic church is concerned

what can i say . . . i have a real soft spot for wizard art

I’ve been walking around at sunset every single day since I got back . . . I retread The Old Remembered Path (TORP) I took hundreds and hundreds of times when I was trapped here during the first pandemic year. It feels good. I always miss that walk when I am away from it . . .

The sky is always on fire when I reach this parking lot. I have taken a picture there each time I stop to see it. And when I walk two blocks up to the little old town area with all the brick buildings and warmly lit streets, I get a Cold Delicious Beverage (CDB) from 7-11 and sit down somewhere to drink it and text my friends. Afterwards I zigzag through quiet suburban neighborhoods in the direction of home, petting cats and listening to music until the sun has absolutely set on the town where I was born and grew up.

I’ll tell you what: on these walks I feel a yearning. I do! I have not felt this sort of thing in this sort of way in a long time. I won’t explain what I mean because I’ll sound too precious about it. But it’s both exciting and terrifying. I love it . . .

I went walking again this evening . . . it was warm out and I had nothing better to do with my life, so I figured walking was the best way to keep myself out of trouble. And anyway, summer is almost over . . . the equinox (which is inferior to the solstice) is only a week away. And so saying, I have to SOAK IT IN while I still can.

Tonight I met two cats. The first was a kitten with a little black mustache who was running around in the front yard of a house I passed. I stopped and took this picture. When I turned around, I saw several more kittens watching me from beneath a car. A woman in front of the house was watering plants. I asked her if the kitten was hers and she said it was the neighbor’s . . . she said there were five in all, and the neighbor had taken them in. She asked if I was interested in adopting one and I said I just wanted to make sure they were safe. I said good-bye and kept walking.

Later, back at the Starsailor East Coast satellite office, a little grey cat wearing a lightning bolt collar with a bell on it started following me around. I had seen her earlier in the day on the balcony when I went outside to hang my jeans up to dry. She was a little hesitant, but when I crouched down and talked to her, she came over and rubbed her head on my hand. I had seen this cat once before on the day I left for New York at the end of August. In fact, I had managed to take a picture:

My befriending her earlier today was evidently enough to make her want to follow me around tonight. She was coy about it at first . . . any time I looked back at her trailing me, she’d stop and clean herself or else wander around a little. But as soon as I turned around and kept walking, I heard the little bell on her collar start jingling. Eventually I climbed the short flight of concrete stairs leading to the front door of the office and she followed. I sat down on a stair and she hopped past me and lay down on the uppermost slab.

I sat there with her for at least an hour, deciding I would not move until she did first. It was nice out and I could sense that we were both lonely in some way. She rolled around and cleaned herself and looked up at the sky and watched the moths encircling the outdoor light. Any time we made eye contact, we would slow-blink at one another. Whenever I attempted to speak her language, she would respond. She felt so comfortable there that at one point she straight up fell asleep:

If she had stayed there all night, I would have stayed there with her. But eventually a passing car woke her up. She yawned and stretched and galloped down the stairs to continue her patrol of the neighborhood. I stood up and went back inside to make coffee and take a bath.

“star catcher” by remedios varo

Today Nora and I drove from New York to Washington, DC where I caught a train from Union Station to my hometown. My cousin’s wedding is this weekend so I’m going to hide out here and read and write letters and walk around at night . . . and after the wedding on Saturday I will drive to Tennessee to see my dad and then begin my long excursion through the south and the desert beyond it to get to California.

I took this picture on the walk home from the train station. This is just outside the hospital where I assumed human form 37 years ago. Having come from the stars, the hospital was essentially a portal from The Other World to this, my mortal life. One day when my task is complete here, I will once again sail the stars, as is my wont. But for now I will gaze upon this small reservoir beneath a setting sun and wonder how it all went wrong (lol)~

☆彡