Chess With Dru...

Dear Juliet

I don't exactly know how you're feeling today, although I think you read a wide range of blogs last night.

Well, my number/email hasn't changed, I'll get a few more photos of London for you 18th-20th this month, and Point Lobos is still there:

Dru's probably having a Pina Colada on the porch in Avalon (must give you the address sometime), and I am relatively content writing to you.

You do still make me happy. I like thinking about you.

But perhaps the thing to say today is that Dru still loves you. She is of course actually very old, and now she's got her head together, very wise and very understanding. It's a depth of comprehension no human can match, because she's been around since 1840 and she's seen it all...

So, just for once, I'll step fully back into the Drusillaverse (!) and explain something I once referred to vaguely in more depth...

"In the articles I sent back to the NAS, I sometimes talked of Drusilla as if she were there with me. She was not, but just now and then I would catch the tiniest glimpse of her, always serene and supportive, telling me it would be all right if only I could go on a little longer..."

(Dear Miss Landau, p. 158)

It's like I really got a glimpse of her once, while I was half-asleep on a Greyhound bus somewhere out in the Great Plains. She was sitting beside me, looking at me clearly (that's where I saw the depth of wisdom no human could match) and the message itself was equally clear.

Keep going.

All she ever wanted was for her story to be told.

She's content enough in her fictional version of Avalon, but it's like all the pieces on the chessboard have not been put completely in their proper places, and so she waits.

"Edward Hopper would love this, Xander thought.  A one-eyed man and a vampire, sharing coffee late at night in a diner. The only thing necessary to complete the picture would be Elvis sweeping up behind the counter.

Dru looked at him briefly while Xander wondered what the hell to do next.

'So what brings you to this neck of the woods, Dru?' he said.

'Not necks. Not prey. Not time. Not place. Silver rain and golden light brought me here. I am standing on the chessboard with my white knight and I don’t know my next move.' "

(Drusilla's Roses)

I dropped the chessboard analogies in here and there, latterly with a touch of The Seventh Seal, but didn't wind myself into knots interpreting them.

Maybe it's time.

What do you think?

Love,

James