The Song of Neptune

There are steps on the shores of Croatia where the ocean waves play music through pipes of marble.

I listen to the videos and feel a very different sort of alive. I am moved.

It is beautiful. Like something from a book of fantastic make-believe. Like from a Gabriel Garcia Marquez story where death turns into yellow butterflies and magic lays in wait around every dark corner and in every shadow.

And in secret, I tell myself, I'll go there one day. I'll walk along those steps, hand in hand with my future, with my past.

I've been meaning to tell you, that the Pacific roars through my veins. That I'm a California girl, a coastal girl, a free and wild and salted hair kind of girl.

Because today is the first day of the rest of my life. I will live and love. I will grow and be successful. I will graduate and generate. I'll be grateful for the wonderful friends in my life and the family I've always had. I'll do things that I could never do with you...

Be happy.