Hayley Ain't No Comet...

So...I'm coming to the end of my second trip home in less than three weeks...and though I am tired...I am leaving home without the exhaustion I felt upon my arrival...and a large part of that I attribute to my pal Hayley. I warned her that I was going to write a blog about her...but I do not think she truly feared...well...let the terror begin. Perhaps if she had come home for dinner tonight instead of "exercising" her right to vote this tragedy could have been averted. I mean...voting...who does that?

Hayley is one of the members of the Scooby Gang...North High graduate...and recent returnee from Denver where she had been in hiding for the last three or four years (something about smuggling knock off Cingular cell phones across the Canadian border in her bra). I didn't know the H-Monster very well in high school...we kinda circled one another...she with a knowing glint in her wicked eyes...and me the sweet young closeted homosexual pure and innocenet...before Hayley unleashed her corruptive influence upon me. Really.

It wasn't until our first Team Superflick/Scooby Gang Camping Adventure that Hayley and I first bonded...it was late at night...around the campfire...copious amounts of hard cider had been imbibed...and I had just made it known, through a clever round of I've Never, that Dawn and David had done everything short of the verticle mambo...which caused Ricky to break down some mid-sized trees as he roared off into the forest (incidentally...the papers were full of Big Foot sightings the next morning...coincidence....perhaps). It was then that I looked across the camp fire and saw Hayley's eyes glowing hellishly...her smile promising infernal delights...and I knew then...that my soul had been esnared in her net of wicked malidictions. Or perhaps it was only the impish light from my own eyes that I saw reflected in hers....but in that moment...I knew...that I'd found a true friend. One as tricksy as I.

When Hayley moved away to Denver...I largely lost touch with her. She would sweep back into town from time to time...dazzle me with her adventures in love (largely confined to one man...yet still adventuresome). And I silently wished for another night of skullduggery around the campfire. 

Earlier this year, when I spent my spring vacation as a guest of Fairview Riverside Psych Unit...I was summoned to take a phone call...it was Hayley. I was pretty much astounded. She did not have the same relationship with me as she had with the rest of the gang...but she cared enough to call, check-in, and let me know that she loved me and that if I needed to talk the phone line was always open. I didn't really take her up on that...but I also don't think she knows how much that meant to me. Just a few months later a family medical emergency prompted Hayley to move back to Minnesota...and while I would rather have not had her move home under those circumstances...I am glad that she is here.

This weekend, Hayley opened her home to me. We had spoken briefly earlier in the week when I was dealing with some of my feelings around my step-father. What I find the most refreshing about Hayley is that she is compassionate while also been no nonsense.  She doesn't take  crap from anyone...and even when she is calling me out on some of my not so positive habits (like my tendency to put myself down as a way of being "humble")....I always know it is about love.

This blog is my little way of saying thanks to her....your presence in my life is valued...and I hope that I am able to be there for you as you have been for me...so often...in these last few months.