Where are you, Chynna?

There is a place in my mind where everything makes sense. I look 30, at most. I'm thin and perpetually tan. I wear a white sundress with tiny pink flowers all over it and the little straps sometimes fall off one shoulder or the other. I'm barefooted and my toenails are painted Estee' Lauder's Rosa Rosa. My house is never the same in this little place in my mind. Sometimes it is in the country, sometimes in the city. There could be water nearby, or maybe a forest. There are things that are always constants, though. Everything is always perfectly in place. Floors are scrubbed clean. Beds are made with hospital corners and ironed sheets, dried on the line while hanging over lavender. The scent of roses and patchouli wafts lazily through the air. In my mind it is always a warm day, but a gentle breeze blows the hair away from our faces, never inward. Every metal and glass surface that exists in this house in the little place in my mind is achingly bright with the glare of complete and total cleanliness. It just could not be more perfect.

Where is this place? Will I ever get there? Was I there once with you and just did not realize it? More importantly, why can't I just stop searching for this place...for you? As crazy as it sounds, my perfect little place that I can never seem to reach has some advantages, some things that are not so terribly out of focus for me. There is always a peaceful feeling of love. We are both contented and patient and everyone can read this in the looks on our faces and the way we carry ourselves. We always have just finished a complete and total full-body laughing spell, probably over something you said or I did. Life is the way it was meant to be. You're wearing that adorable dress you bought yourself for Easter this year. You've either grown your hair out, like in your Sophomore Highstepper picture, or I've let you cut it shorter and die it jet black like you wanted so badly to do. We've just returned from a trip - maybe to New York. I was planning on taking you as your graduation present next summer. Maybe we went back to Disneyworld again. You've just finished doing something incredibly important, like discovering a cure for cancer (in light of everything, don't I wish!) or winning the Nobel Peace Prize. In this little place in my mind, you're my saving grace. You alone keep me sane and safe from all the things that threaten to destroy me but go unnoticed by a grown woman who still thinks like a child at times. You are still my hero and my dream come true.

Thank you for continuing to exist in this perfect little place in my mind. Finding you there is the highlight of my crazy world right now. I know if I never give up I'll really get there one day, for it's so real I can almost touch it! I can almost touch you. Almost smell the top of your head. Almost see your bottomless dimple. Almost hear your voice. You are the best part of me, Chynna. Stay there in that perfect little place in my mind, baby girl...and save a glass of lemonade for me.