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[TRANSCRIPT]

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One week ago I was on top of the Blue Ridge Mountains and now here I am looking out over the Atlantic Ocean. 

It’s…big. 

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That’s a stupid thing to say, of course it’s big, it’s the ocean. And it’s tiny compared to the Pacific. But it’s still, you know…yawning. Is that the right word?

I thought the ocean—which always feels big—would just…fit right in with the rest off the huge emptiness. But it’s somehow even bigger in context. 

I wonder what’s going on over there—out, across the ocean, in other countries. Is it the same as here? Is everyone gone? Is anyone also trying to reach out? Fruitlessly?

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There’s a lot of old shit in Virginia. Did you know they made a whole colonial town nearby? Williamsburg. The entire place is trapped in seventeen-whatever. “A Living History Museum” is what they called it on some brochures I found. They had…actors, I guess, dressing up as the founding fathers or whatever, going around and pretending like it was the olden days. 

What an absolute trip. All these old buildings, horse posts, the whole nine—and lemme tell you, it’s even creepier without any people around. Like I’ve been the last person on Earth for two hundred years. 

Which I’m not. No matter what I see—or don’t see—out here, I know I’m not the very last. I’m not the only. 

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Harry would probably love it. All the antique crap, the costumes…It’s…theatrical. Like she is. Like Francis was. 

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A widow’s walk. I remembered this morning—that’s what the little thing on top of Francis’ house was called. A widow’s walk. Like a crow’s nest on a ship—a place to look out over the ocean from. They’re all over Cape Cod. 

And I guess they’re called that because the people who’d be looking out from them were the wives of sailors. Men who were more devoted to the sea than the women they confined to their homes. Women who had nothing to do but stand on a perch and pace and worry when their husbands were coming back. 

But they’re not called ‘wives walk’s. They’re called ‘widow’s walk’s. The men rarely came back. And the women were still there, looking out over the endless water, waiting to see a boat that would never come. Is that…

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(quietly) Is that what I’ve done to Harry? I told her I was never coming back but now I—

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Never mind. It’s not important anymore. There aren’t any more widows to walk and I’d bet most of those houses are standing empty, ready to fall into the ocean, with no one any the wiser. 

I wonder if they’ve got widow’s walks out on the West coast.

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