During the time Erika and I were coasting down Highway 1 along the blue, blue Pacific-- ducking cows and plucking starfish-- I would stay up late, late at night writing postcards. One for Michael. One for Jay. And always one extra. One that would contain a magical message. One that was stamped and self-addressed. One that I would always hide somewhere in our room-- the secret drawer in a desk, on the top shelf of an armoire-- just before we departed for a new destination.

I used to dream about one of these cards finding its way into someone else's hands. Someone who would spin it between the tips of his or her index fingers, reading so carefully, laboring over every word. Someone who would tap it on a hard, shiny table while he or she imagined me. Someone who would never part with it in the post, but connect in some other way-- a letter in my box, a knock on my door.

It never happened. I remained at that address for over three years and I never got a word in return. I sometimes think of those cards out there and wonder if someone will ever look up the right name in an Oregon telephone book or reach far enough under the mattress in a bed and breakfast along California's lost coast to rescue one of them. I often hope. I often imagine.

My friend Karl used to wear a t-shirt with a picture of a man walking in dreamy daze over the edge of a steep, steep cliff where hungry, crocodile-like monsters were waiting at the bottom to devour him. Underneath the cartoon it said, "The romantic enters the world." How true that feels sometimes. Many times I've felt devoured by my romantic illusions. I've chained steamer trunks of hope to a dream sequence that only exists in the dim, hazy morning between sleep and consciousness. And sometimes I get lost inside of myself for days at a time. And sometimes it gets me no where. And yet-- without explanation, without rationalization-- I dream. Still.

Tonight-- walking home from Fresh Fields with Amélie's Montmartre settings and Merlot-red wallpapers running amuck inside my brain-- I decided that it's time to actively resume the romance of the daily routine. It's time to search out those tiny, sometimes imperceptible, gems that make life so divine. It's time to collect tokens, walk slower, watch more closely, sit for long periods of time with my eyes closed, talk to complete strangers, take risks, imagine a life outside my own, inspect the mundane, unearth the revelations all around.

Today I happened upon an empty mailbox and left it in tears. Tomorrow-- instead-- I'll fill it all on my own.

It's been nearly a year since I last pulled out the Q cards. I remember laying them atop my Paris bedspread in the dimness of a late late birthday night, after a ride atop La Grande Roue and a cafe and cognac with British companions. Three distinct forecasts: day, year, decade. Endless, interesting possibilities stacked inside of their bright colors and whimsical pictures.

And then I met B-- so quietly at first-- and I wanted to keep my secret hidden, from my friends-- and from my fate. And as we grew, something in me wanted to stop seeing what was just ahead, just around the bend. Something inside wanted to take comfort in the overwhelming surprises, instead of the sureness of a charted course. And with that-- with us-- the Q cards, abandoned and lonely, settled into a corner of one of the art bins along the back of my closet.

Even thinking of them from time to time over the past year has made me worry that I was tempting fate. Coaxing a jinx. Encouraging a bad omen. I realize the silliness. I know it's just a game. I know the difference between choices and destiny. Between creating a future and trusting a worn-out, ten-dollar deck of cards.

And yet they made me just a little nervous all the same.

But sometimes I miss their sweetness. I miss their playfulness. Once, before a show at the Improv Asylum, Todd used them to tell Jeanne about her future-- much to our wild amusement-- wrought with difficult decisions between Caffe Vittoria's tiramisu and cannoli. And there was the Fourth of July that Laine spent in the "pet bed" of Bev's Suburu Outback, forecasting our futures with every wind in the road to Acadia National Park. And a scatter of the future on a late Saturday night atop a large, round table in the basement of the Curious Liquids Cafe with Carl, Landon, Jill, and Jared. But most of all, I miss their ability to convey a thought, a sentiment, a feeling with so few words, so few brush strokes. Such simplicity and inspiration with so little effort.

I've got quite a week in store for me. Complicated and big and lonely and happy. It's hard to wrap my mind around it all, hard to put a finger on exactly how I should be feeling. And I find myself wanting to look in that closet for a little help. A little sweetness.

A little magic.