Want

(In response to the question I posed at the close of the previous entry):

I want my sister Lorraine to stand up and go to Ireland with me and the rest of my sisters — the trip long-planned and then abandoned last May in the wake of my disintegrated marriage. I want the  tumor-fractured discs in her back to fuse so we can wrestle for the front seat of the rental car, and then collapse into laughter. I want to walk the beach at Keem on a blustery sunny Irish afternoon. I want to share a pint at the Minaun Heights pub, where the jar on the counter for political contributions is never quite filled enough. I want her competing with me to scale Croagh Patrick, the summit of which I've never reached. I want every shop owner to look at the five of us and ask, "sisters?"

Roy's Hauling can't deliver this.

I want my friend Connie back at work. I want her stomach back, where it belongs. I want a bite of her scone, or posole, or whatever homemade marvel she brings for lunch. (Just one bite.) I want to hear about her travels to the Czech Republic when it was Czechoslovakia. I want to hear about her Whidbey Island property, about her daughter's Brooklyn apartment. I want to hear about all three of her cats.

Again: no Roy's Hauling.

I want my friend Carol back, right now, so I can share this Piesporter Michelsberg wine with her and tell her about all these things I want but seem so completely impossible. I want her advice on so many things....

I want someone to talk to — every night — when I get home from work.

Oh Roy, you are a wonder, but there are things that, no matter how much I ask the universe, there is no chance that I'll encounter any of them on the sidewalk in front of your house.