Dearest Leo

Leonardo

It's hard to comprehend how young we once were, but sometimes we are given a clue. I was idly scrolling through some books on a shelf upstairs when the above slip of paper dropped to the floor, and the feeling of being thirteen came rushing back to me. It is all that remains of a little diary I kept in 1964, a diary I called Leonardo.Underneath that taped construction paper heart I had written the name of the boy I truly loved.  Now all these years later I poked my old fingers into it only to find it empty.

But here's what it says on the other side:In case it isn't obvious, the word that got cut off there is "heart"...always in my heart, that's where dearest Leo dwells, and he's still in there somewhere, of that you can be sure. Life hasn't entirely beaten from me a certain dreaminess and hopefulness, an approach that won't entirely conform to good sense, a trove of hearts and stars and wishes still sparkling underneath the dust.

Apparently I found it necessary to destroy all but this last page of my "silent loving friend" lest unworthy mortals uncover the secrets I had shared with him. Not that I was given to melodrama.

And it strikes me as hilariously ironic that I now share quite abundantly on this right-out-there website, easily viewed by mortals far and wide who may or may not do, not that there are great numbers of them reading this.But it certainly is a different world. So much intimacy and accessibility, and yet so little.It has been said that the internet is still in its adolescence, and I suppose that's true. Who knows what it will turn into? But for now I'm quite happy with my odd little blog, my old-ish woman modern day version of Leo, because I feel that I am adding a whisper to the river, and I know it sometimes finds its way to a receptive heart.

Good-bye. Until next time.