The last 6 months are unrecorded.

Hello. So tonight Ronald ran into me at Barnes and Noble. I haven’t mentioned him. He is 50 years old. He is a black man. He has no teeth, but I didn’t know for a month. He lives on the street, downtown here. I threw him a birthday party a month ago.

We drove to McDonalds tonight and we happened to drive down Bumby, which is the road I drove on every night to get home back when Amber was in my life. I got sad tonight. I remembered how I would leave and then she would call, and we’d talk all the way home. (She’d call or text while I was on Bumby.) Anyway, I allowed myself to think about it, to dwell in it.

I’ll be moving soon. I want to stay downtown. I’m not sure where I will move, or who I will move with.

Discipline is what Jesus is birthing in me right now. I have to follow. And, I haven’t, I’ve walked away for quite a few months. Yesterday, I felt him again like I used to. I went to dinner with my mom, and she immediately knew. I’m just a different person, at peace.

I’m a bit lethargic right now. I think Bumby did it to me. Or, I wanted Bumby to do it to me.

I’ve hardly read the bible in 6 months.

I no longer work at her father’s coffee shop (but not because of her).

I’m at film school right now. The disciplne is a need and I’m already seeing the destruction of not having it has caused.

I’m a different person when I don’t care. I’m better when I do.

Tonight, and I’ve known Ronald since July 3 (the night before I went to Africa), he showed me his latest sleeping spot. It was so quiet behind this building. Dark, and the sky above. He’s sleeping on the ground, in nature (with buildings taking over, but still the wind and the outside). He’s like the first humans, no roof. Yes, it’s partly by his choosing, even mostly, but it’s just so strange that he lives outside.

I was thinking about it. Has anyone ever made a film, not a documentary but a narrative film, with a homeless person on the street as the main character? I remember a Brendan Frasier movie from the mid-nineties that has Joe Pesci as a homeless guy, but that was more about Harvard or something.

“With Honors”. Monty is a student, and when his computer crashes, he’s left with only a single paper copy of his thesis. Frightened of losing it, he immediately rushes out to photocopy it, only to stumble and drop it down a grate. Searching the basement of the building, he discovers that it has been found by Simon, a squatter. Simon makes a deal with Monty: for every day’s accomodation and food that Monty gives him, he will give a page of the thesis in return.

Anyway, that’s not the kind of film I’d make. If Ronald’s still on the street in December (hopefully he’s not), I think I’ll live with him for a week.