[witty title]

Found: on the ice and snow outside the Roxbury Crossing Orange Line train station in Roxbury (duh); last night, after night school, around 9:25 PM. Loosely scattered rose petals, mostly the traditional blood-red, but a few cream edged with a blush of...uh...my childhood crayon memories are telling me carnation pink? (Though, considering how often carnations are dyed, I'm not sure how reliable that is...)

I picked up as many as I could without wasting too much time--I always try to catch the 9:25 train to Oak Grove so I can get home by ten--and proceeded into the station; it was a cold, crisp, clear night, the moon just shy of full, and there were just enough clouds in the sky that every now and then one drifted past and filtered the light so that the moon was surrounded by a watery greenish halo of blurred shine, encircled by a deep, rich, burnished bronze-copper ring. The petals were frozen stiff, some stuck to each other, and a few beads of ice frozen from where drops of water had once been. They defrosted a bit on the way to Downtown Crossing; the wind took one of the cream petals on Winter Street walking home. The silly romantic side of me imagined that perhaps someone's heart was broken that night, and the drops were her tears or something cheesy like that; it was probably from a shipment or decorative arrangement, but hey, what's imagination for if not making shit up?

Last night was beautiful. Tonight was probably even more so (I didn't take the opportunity to go out and see it), being a full moon and all. But last night, walking home, it was just me and the wind and the moon and the frozen rose petals, and although it was quite chilly I didn't feel the cold at all, and it was just so beautiful.

I have this weird sort of...spirituality? that flows through my default bipolar mix of embedded childhood Anglicanism/Catholicism and instinctual scientific cynicism/atheism, and guides a lot of my motivation. Sort of a Wicca/nature thing, like everything has meaning and significance and purpose, that if something means something to someone then it's important, that things happen for a reason; not that some omnipotent masculine godlike figure guides all of existence and has a Plan, but like nature and luck and fate (and Murphy's Law). The smallest pebble by the curb, the fluffy seed pod floating by, the lost glove on the street, the sky and the moon and the earth and the ocean and other such hippie crap. Old things. Growing things. Lost things. Stories. Everything has a story, and it deserves to be told. Because the meaning of life is different for everybody, life is what you make of it, and we are constantly surrounded by little surprises, details that most people miss while rushing past in their busy, frenetic day-to-day lives. Like the world has a soul, and a million things to show and tell you if you just take a second to watch, and listen. (And I know that sounds really rich coming from someone with the attention span of a two-year-old on speed, but.)

If I could spend my life just communing or meditating or zoning or whatever with the world around me, things would be so much easier; our society and constructed ways for how we must get from point A to point B are so insanely complicated, but the wind always feels like an old friend caressing my skin, and the full moon is mesmerizing, and I'm constantly finding small joys everywhere in what people and nature have left behind, which usually results in me picking weird shit up off the ground, the sidewalk or the floor or the street, and taking it home. I'm quite accustomed to people looking at me funny: everyone has their own distinct "WTF" face, and in the past I've had far too much fun provoking them.

Found: about halfway through J.D. Robb's Seduction in Death, one 13-cm-by-10-cm Hallmark greeting card.  Opens vertically.  Front: blue border along top edge, sepia tone bordered photograph featuring two little girls in dresses walking hand-in-hand along a white picket fence.  Inscription in black cursive font reads 

"With a sister like you,
 I know I'll always
 have a friend..." 

finished inside 

"...and so will you."  

Back: the blue border fades to the white background color, overlaid by white letters in childish font reading "Out of the Blue".  The Hallmark logo is directly beneath, and in tiny letters near the bottom edge, just above the bar code, reads: 

"99BLF 103-5 
(c) HALLMARK CARDS, INC. 
KANSAS CITY, MO 64141 
TORONTO, CANADA M2J 1P6 
MADE IN U.S.A. 
www.hallmark.com"

(The bar code then reads "0 - 70000 09504 - 7 - 01035")

Inside the front cover of the card in neat blue-ballpoint-pen handwriting reads,

"Meg,
Just wanted to send you a note
to tell you how much I love
you and value you - you are
my best friend and I know
I can tell you anything
and you will never judge
me and it is the same with
you telling me anything.  We
have such a bond.  I hope
all is well and your foot and
everything is good.  I love you
so much and miss you a
ton - let me know if you need
anything or want to visit.
Take care you, love you.
Love,
Whit"

Inside the back cover of the card reads

"November 4, 2001
Megan,"

and then underneath the inscription

"Love you so much.

LOVE,
XXXXXXXX
OOOOOOOO
Whitney"

(The edges and crease of the card are slightly yellowed with age.  Creepy how something from 2001 can be old.  Also, considering the date, I'm compelled to wonder whether the writing of this card was spurred by the events surrounding 9/11.  Also, I wasn't aware that there are people capable of longer run-on comma-deprived sentences than me.)