Austin reflections - An adoration of lights

2021

10 days in Austin, Texas

Texas is an adoration of lights.

Vignettes: Wake up laughing. Fall asleep laughing. Admire the Lady Bird River. San Antonio River Walk lights twinkling like from a fairytale, a dreamland we're cruise on a boat through. The water reflecting the multicolored lights, glittering. The trees, the air all glittering.

Lying in a car backseat. More laughter. A dog, a kid, that's what you are - a dork, a weirdo, crazy like me. Stealing glances, surprise hugs, my exaggerated exasperated interactions. 

Whispered conversations, the drama, the realizations, the 3 am lying awake together. "What did you dream of?" I ask every morning when you're awake. You tell me about the fantasies, the soon-to-be-realized escape to an island.

I hope nobody ever breaks your innocence. I hope nobody ever tarnishes that spirit of yours, the one I admire as innocently naive and optimistic. No matter how cruel the world may be, it all slides off you like water.

I'm often working at my laptop or listening to a textbook on the phone, and when I look up I see you laughing at Russel Peters videos or cute animal videos. I roll my eyes as you pull me down to join you - even right now, in the airplane back to the Bay Area, you sit next to me watching Abduction the movie, and I'm taking notes on a science book. And just pulled out my laptop to try to sum up all the tenderness I feel.