heart hotel

Yesterday I was thinking a lot about my heart, in some ways I feel like its the only thing I really know... in other ways it is a complete mystery to me. I began to imagine it as a sort of hotel. I don't know how big this hotel is, how many rooms it has, its constantly surprising to me... but there are some things that are for certain. Some of the rooms are filled with folks traveling through, short and long term stays welcome, but these folks will make their presence known for a night or for a few hundred and then pass on leaving room for the next guest. Other rooms seem permanent, my family for instance seems to have some really random rooms scattered throughout the hotel and they seem to have the right to do as they please within the confines of the hotel. Sometimes they knock down walls, shrink and enlarge their domain. Sometimes they get locked into their rooms for long periods of time without anyone noticing, but they are still there.  Sometimes they cause a commotion and the whole building gets shaken up...  there are more rooms, that seem to have a time and place.  For instance that girl that one night at Pete's house who told me about her religion. I don't understand why she is still around, I can barely find that room, but sometimes I stumble upon it and I go oh yeah she existed...I only met her once, but she has a room somewhere. Same with a few others, its not that I see them anymore but they still have a spot and it seems like it only fades slightly with time... childhood friends, for instance may have a spot but it seems like it has been under construction for a long time... so maybe eventually it will reopened for someone new.  Then there are the permanent rooms, the rooms for the people that I loved, and love, and though I sometimes have to make adjustments to the size of these rooms, they are here to stay... I know those rooms. I make a habit of walking down their halls on the regular, check to see if the lights on, to see if the room is warm etc.  These rooms are comfortable, I do whatever it takes to keep them comfortable, always ready for their return.  There are rooms I have had to open up because someone came in out of the rain and needed a place to stay, and also rooms where someone popped in and made my little hotel a more charming place.  There are the rooms that had catastrophes in them, and the rooms where miracles occurred. There are the rooms I don't go to because I am embarrassed -but they are still there because they are part of who I am... and there are rooms that I know are there but I still don't know who they belong to.  These are the people I am looking for, the ones with keys that will one day swoop in and unlock some piece of my hotel that holds some secret I don't know about... and I am waiting. Trying to keep the place looking nice, warm, comfortable... keeping the lights on to guide them in.