tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1128469884487763839.comments2024-03-15T22:33:20.130-07:00 Unemployed Imagination.JD Maderhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13058074115809620653noreply@blogger.comBlogger26842125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1128469884487763839.post-38588414179443797152024-03-15T22:33:20.130-07:002024-03-15T22:33:20.130-07:00Can't argue with a word of it. Nothing to refu...Can't argue with a word of it. Nothing to refute the dystopian world WE created for ourselves.<br /><br />Please don't let your children be tainted by letting them read a word of this. Maybe they'll be brave enough, strong enough to banish the Hell we are leaving them.Anonymusthttps://www.blogger.com/profile/02789241739451534679noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1128469884487763839.post-4130250773814321772024-03-08T19:53:06.228-08:002024-03-08T19:53:06.228-08:00❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️Anonymusthttps://www.blogger.com/profile/02789241739451534679noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1128469884487763839.post-43147030140594103332024-03-08T12:05:53.119-08:002024-03-08T12:05:53.119-08:00Agreed. I made many of those same poor decisions, ...Agreed. I made many of those same poor decisions, and they almost cost me everything as well. - JDAnonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1128469884487763839.post-81630738726477154452024-03-01T19:22:12.645-08:002024-03-01T19:22:12.645-08:00While not exactly a challenge, the #2MinutesGo jdm...While not exactly a challenge, the #2MinutesGo jdmader tribute to Leland Dirks has inspired me take my own stab at death now that I'm not sobbing and cursing God every second of the day.<br /><br />I'm no stranger to death from an early age. The first close death occured when I was 22. My 15 year old brother died in an alcohol caused off roading accident proving "only the good die young." 43 years later the pain sometimes still feels like it happened yesterday when I let myself think of it.<br /><br />Funny, I always thought the death would be my own. I've lived a careless life, giving more credence to the saying "only the good die young." I've almost drugged or drank myself to death on several occasions. I chain smoke cigarettes like I don't know/care that they WILL be the death of me <br /><br />An addiction to a certain white powder popular in the 80's stopped my heart. The only thing that saved me was friends who dragged my lifeless body across the street to the hospital's ER, dumping me and yelling cocaine overdose as they ran out the door.<br /><br />An addiction to alcohol had me driving when I had no business behind the wheel risking not only my life but the lives of anyone driving around me. Like the death of my brother wasn't a serious lesson I should have learned from.<br /><br />In my 65 years I've lost grandparents, close and distant relatives—my father—friends, and countless animal companions to the black robed scythe bearer yet still I breathe. The animals are by far the most painful even though you know going in that they don't live as long as humans. Few of the deaths were unexpected, most caused by old age where you knew the end was coming.<br /><br />Leland was not expected. He kept silent about his killer. I surmise from a desire to not burden anyone with the knowledge his time was short. He brightened a lot of lives with his goodness and I'm grateful that one of them was mine.<br /><br />I only hope I do his friendship honor by spreading the goodness he brought into my life to the lives of others.Anonymusthttps://www.blogger.com/profile/02789241739451534679noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1128469884487763839.post-31807489775630325012024-02-19T05:43:45.894-08:002024-02-19T05:43:45.894-08:00(second half)
But it was never meant to be; they ...(second half)<br /><br />But it was never meant to be; they lived in two different worlds.<br /><br />“It’s fun, though,” Josh once said to him during one of those pillow talk conversations, “to fall in love with fictional humans. They can never break your heart.”<br /><br />“Yet they always do,” Charlie sighed. “Why are all the good ones married or straight or so goddamned fictional?”<br /><br />And Josh responded as he often did, by showing him the advantages of being a nonfictional man.<br /><br />After a time Charlie got up. Josh pointed to Charlie’s glass and Charlie shook his head. He went for the bookshelves and prowled until he found the book he’d been thinking about. The first of the author’s he’d read, about a young man’s search to find the lost cowboy who’d stolen his heart. He pulled it out and flipped it over, gazing at the photo of the author with his dog, the noble Border Collie Angelo. “Thank you,” Charlie whispered, and he could swear he heard the voice of the author saying, “One lives to serve.” <br /><br />When he caught Josh watching him, Charlie shook his head at his own foolishness and went over to kiss the chef properly. Later, during dinner, after they’d caught each other up, Charlie said, “How would you feel about going to Colorado with me this summer? Maybe getting married out there?”<br /><br />Josh, who’d started reading all the stories in a kind of self-defense but also ended up loving them, smiled and said, “I thought you’d never ask.”Laurie Borishttps://www.blogger.com/profile/08361627047571650547noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1128469884487763839.post-47535084486269013442024-02-18T13:37:43.117-08:002024-02-18T13:37:43.117-08:00This comment has been removed by the author.Laurie Borishttps://www.blogger.com/profile/08361627047571650547noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1128469884487763839.post-101425366653679352024-02-18T13:37:00.828-08:002024-02-18T13:37:00.828-08:00(This was a running joke between me and Leland. He...(This was a running joke between me and Leland. He fell madly in love with one of my characters. I thought it only fitting that the character respond. I hope he would have approved. I'll continue the story in a separate comment)<br /><br />The weather fit Charlie’s mood. Dark, cold, a nasty rain spitting down. He turned up the collar of his trench coat and soldiered on, dodging pedestrians, puddles, and his own morbid thoughts. After nearly twenty years in television, he thought he’d seen it all. But this news fell especially heavy on his heart—when he let himself admit he had one. The day had been long enough, fraught enough, calling on him to referee fights between divas, between divas and producers, between producers and crew, without getting the one text message that froze him where he stood. The rest of the afternoon had moved mechanically after that. And now, thank whatever was above the clouds, he could retreat and power down. The always cheerful bodega he frequented for their marvelous coffee loomed up ahead, a sign that he was almost to his block, almost to his building, almost free. Almost home. His steps were already feeling lighter, the fog in his brain thinning, and by the time the tiny electronic doorman buzzed him in, he could have trotted up the stairs to his fourth-floor apartment, but wisely chose not to. Why, after all, tempt fate?<br /><br />Coltrane flowed from outside his door, which meant Josh was home early from his latest assignment, and Charlie’s entire soul smiled. All he wanted was to feel that man’s arms around him, then collapse into the sofa with several fingers of scotch until he was ready to talk about it.<br /><br />Josh was in the kitchen, dishcloth over one of his broad shoulders, focused intently on slicing up a large bulb of fennel. But he glanced up when Charlie came in. The concentration that adorably crinkled his deep brown eyes melted away, as if he already knew. He put down the knife and closed the space between them, pulling him into a hug that Charlie never wanted to leave. Josh smelled like licorice from the fennel and his usual intoxicating aroma, and the tears Charlie had been holding back since he’d heard the news threatened to spill.<br /><br />“Leland’s gone,” Charlie managed to say against Josh’s shoulder, the words barely above a whisper.<br /><br />Josh, bless him, merely pulled back, touched Charlie’s left cheek, looked softly into his eyes then released him. “Sit,” he said, pointing toward the sofa, and moments later a tumbler of scotch appeared on the table next to him. Charlie picked it up, stared into its depths before taking a long, bracing gulp. The sounds of kitchen prep and Coltrane faded into the background of his thoughts as the scotch fired through him, releasing so many memories. All the nights he’d spent alone on this very piece of furniture, sipping scotch and reading those goddamned beautiful stories of love and loss, entering the world of Colorado’s San Luis Valley, walking alongside Leland Dirks as if they were physically together, hearing the wind rustle the sagebrush and the call of the coyote. Sometimes he wished he could magick the author of those stories into this very room, into his life. Through his words Charlie felt their connection; as silly as he thought it was when he thought about it for too long, he felt they would have been perfect together. They’d like the same literature and music; the same secret lust for cowboys; the same admiration for noble dogs.<br /><br />Laurie Borishttps://www.blogger.com/profile/08361627047571650547noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1128469884487763839.post-15413828441471039382024-02-17T11:19:09.899-08:002024-02-17T11:19:09.899-08:00That's gorgeous. What a great mental journey, ...That's gorgeous. What a great mental journey, loved the images. "He wanted to put on the soft clothes that he kept hidden."Laurie Borishttps://www.blogger.com/profile/08361627047571650547noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1128469884487763839.post-56083191532827372982024-02-17T08:38:29.599-08:002024-02-17T08:38:29.599-08:00A quiet brilliance :)A quiet brilliance :)vickiejohnstonehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/15947507866512596346noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1128469884487763839.post-38794356131941934232024-02-17T07:45:31.240-08:002024-02-17T07:45:31.240-08:00Maggie stops, sniffs the air, looks over her shoul...Maggie stops, sniffs the air, looks over her shoulder, sees the reassuring paw prints in the new-fallen snow. How odd that they come from a different direction now. How odd not to see his as well, the complicated pattern of the soles of his boots, the way he’d look at the sky and the snow and the mountains and the trees through his little box. There are new prints now beside her own. With the same complications but smaller. <br /><br />She catches a whiff of coyote, sees his pointed ears above the sagebrush. She’d heard him howling, that night. Before the other humans came. Before everything changed.<br /><br />“Were you scared?” Coyote asks. “When they took you away?”<br /><br />“More sad than scared,” Maggie replies. “The human explained what would happen. I knew something was wrong. The way I knew about Angelo. It’s a particular scent, but I’m sure you know that.”<br /><br />Coyote nods. For Coyote had seen much death in his day.<br /><br />“He said a time would come soon that might be very frightening and confusing for me, and that I might not like it very much. But I should be brave and patient, and our friend would free me, and that I would be part of her pack then.”<br /><br />“How strange it must have been for you, to join a new pack. Was it difficult?”<br /><br />“They’ve been nothing but kind to me. They knew him.”<br /><br />“I have seen them. They are a little noisy for my taste, but respectful. I keep my distance, especially from the young ones.”<br /><br />Maggie then spots Brother Raven swoop across the wide swath of freshly scrubbed blue sky and land at the top of a nearby cottonwood. A quiet caw acknowledges the loss. She had seen Brother Raven from the window, flying slow circles over the house while she was watching over him, protecting him, anticipating the promised confusion which did eventually come. She’d tried to do what the human had asked. But she’d barked once, instinctually, before remembering.<br /><br />“You will be telling the stories now,” Coyote says, and Brother Raven nods in agreement.<br /><br />“Our friend said she would take good care of the stories and we will write new ones together,” Maggie says. “I sense her sadness, but she is very kind. She gives me extra scritches and cookies, but I feel like that’s to make her feel better, too.”<br /><br />“It is good to have a pack,” Coyote says, staring off into the horizon, where Maggie knows the others are.<br /><br />“Yes it is,” Maggie says. And she imagines that Angelo was on the other side of the rainbow bridge the human often wrote about, waiting for him, and that the pack would once again take care of each other.<br />She hears footfalls. Lighter than she ones she’d been accustomed to, and a voice that was growing more familiar, calling her name.<br /><br />Brother Raven gives a subtle uptip of his beak, and flies off. Maggie and Coyote watch him go before Coyote, too, disappears back into the brush.<br /><br />There is no need for words. She knows she will see them again. She turns and trots off toward home.<br /><br />She pauses at the fork in the path, thinking she could still see his old footprints on the left, underneath the new snow.<br /><br />“Maggie? This way, honey. This way.”<br /><br />She sighs, and heads toward the voice.Laurie Borishttps://www.blogger.com/profile/08361627047571650547noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1128469884487763839.post-28472865685280866622024-02-17T07:03:27.365-08:002024-02-17T07:03:27.365-08:00Love the 'hermetic' and the confering rave...Love the 'hermetic' and the confering ravens, and the silent feel of it.vickiejohnstonehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/15947507866512596346noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1128469884487763839.post-67471588590920010962024-02-16T23:20:08.747-08:002024-02-16T23:20:08.747-08:00Too sad to write today. Maybe tomorrow.Too sad to write today. Maybe tomorrow.Anonymusthttps://www.blogger.com/profile/02789241739451534679noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1128469884487763839.post-41567017561472083132024-02-16T22:22:34.743-08:002024-02-16T22:22:34.743-08:00This blue dome is a vault, an airy segment of free...This blue dome is a vault, an airy segment of freedom cut from cerulean cloth. Distant peaks glitter with purity, touched by the cold breath of angels. A coyote hidden in sagebrush yips to his family, probing, hoping. A man is coming. A man and his dog. Ravens drop and confer. This is the world entire, each element meant and hermetic. The dog world and the god world, all present, all meant. Wait for me, my friend; this is a quiet moment poised on a fulcrum. We’ll be back here soon. We will return. I fucking promise. David Antrobushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/08486219404600185419noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1128469884487763839.post-41448515707593355012024-02-16T16:38:32.496-08:002024-02-16T16:38:32.496-08:00For Leland
We enter the silence of never forgetti...For Leland<br /><br />We enter the silence of never forgetting,<br />listen to the murmurations of a lost few<br />spiralling high in this languid, shivering air,<br />the cirrus strewn like white cotton sheets.<br /><br />Here, we contemplate the misty curve of morn <br />rousing life out of night, our shadows lengthening,<br />teasing us that they know the way. But only we know.<br />This is where nature absorbs us, draws us in.<br /><br />I watch you scatter, track nature’s scents from miles off,<br />a skill I can only dream of. An emerald lizard darts. <br />You ferret deep into the spiky undergrowth,<br />digging down this dry desert, coming up twigs.<br /><br />These trails we spirit down take me back some days,<br />hiking past our guards, these purple-blue mountains,<br />jagged peaks fogged out, streams of misted white light,<br />and without a care we pass by the ghosts of yesterday.<br /><br />Low hums catch on the drafts, silk petals turn sunward.<br />Our paths never cross with any other human being.<br />This is a kind of freedom, this sweet eclipsing <br />of the glass-brick-grey city with its petrol choke,<br /><br />And in this yellow, green, sienna-dusted viesta<br />we walk as one, legs bumping legs bumping legs,<br />our breath blowing clouds to mix in the air,<br />as if we are a doodled, made-up faery creature.<br /><br />As high as we are, the opening skies seem lower,<br />as if seeking to reach down to bathe our heads.<br />Absent, we traipse this stone-worn curl of path, <br />knowing by heart its myriad twisted ways.<br /><br />In the end, you inevitably take the onward lead, <br />as though you are the parent and I am the child,<br />protecting me. You wag your tail and turn your head,<br />beckon me to follow as far as we can see. <br /><br />February 16/17, 2024<br />vickiejohnstonehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/15947507866512596346noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1128469884487763839.post-32483245739104116042024-02-16T16:38:17.688-08:002024-02-16T16:38:17.688-08:00This is lovely. It's okay to be different. It&...This is lovely. It's okay to be different. It's beautiful.vickiejohnstonehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/15947507866512596346noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1128469884487763839.post-43765505135672977372024-02-16T08:51:56.643-08:002024-02-16T08:51:56.643-08:00This is SO rich and visual. If I could paint, I...This is SO rich and visual. If I could paint, I'd try to paint it. You're aces at this quick world-building. It's very hard to pull off, and you crush it every time. - JDAnonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1128469884487763839.post-53556382940243766402024-02-11T14:32:20.177-08:002024-02-11T14:32:20.177-08:00Thomas followed half a dozen steps behind, his att...Thomas followed half a dozen steps behind, his attention directed toward another world. We were covering our options equally, neither of us wanting to be surprised.<br /><br />It helped to have eyes everywhere. The unwary were easy targets for the predators from the twinned realms, thousands taken before they realised, snuffed out without a trace. And then there would be an increase in the imbalance in the statistics, slippages attributing for more lost individuals than most people thought.<br /><br />The people that were aware of it just closed their eyes. It paid to be blind sometimes – vision being one of the anchors fixing us in place. <br /><br />Perception can be a curse and conviction a handicap.<br /><br />I maintained a continual dialogue, towing Thomas along in my wake. He did the same with me, letting me know where he was, his words tethering us.<br /><br />“We’re approaching a divergence in the path,” I said, “the way to the right spiralling steeply around a knoll. We will be following the easier route to the left, staggered steps dropping to a plateau where things should be calmer.”<br /><br />Up on the hill, there was a small derelict castle, a handrail guiding its visitors to the top. A man would sell each of them a ticket, taking their money before pressing the button to release the turnstile that barred their way. I led Thomas away and down - the bustle of the city would provide us with cover but would also give the endarkened places where they could hide.<br /><br />Thomas was seeing but not aware, his eyes looking inward. His head was in two places, his attention split, hearing me but deafened in the other realm, stumbling over the unseen obstacles here that I had to guide him around.<br /><br />“Not a good move, Dude,” Thom said, his head swivelling about as he surveyed the way laid out before him. “There are dangers here in the broken lands. The night is full of fear; the Spear is in the ascendant.” He slowed and crouched within himself, ducking as though to avoid something overhanging his path. I didn’t know what he was seeing; he was in a far different place from the one I was experiencing.<br /><br />Thomas’ world was very much like the one I saw but displaced in time and detail. The city was younger and more vibrant, filled with wonders no one here had experienced. There was magic instead of science, its parameters defined by its own limitations. He was a powerful mage in his own realm, strong enough to straddle the divide.<br /><br />“Let me show you – you’ll understand then,” he murmured, wide-eyed but seeming vacant. “You might make a different decision. It’s becoming difficult here.”<br /><br />The moon fell, and the night closed in. I stumbled, missing my footing. The path was running with slime, and dragons were strafing the buildings. It reminded me of a second world war blitz, our enemies rising relentlessly.<br /><br />Except that Hitler was a warlock and looked likely to win.Mark A Morrishttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14463807197393582228noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1128469884487763839.post-58554472583853568932024-02-10T11:11:49.301-08:002024-02-10T11:11:49.301-08:00Creeping dread permeates the story.Creeping dread permeates the story.Anonymusthttps://www.blogger.com/profile/02789241739451534679noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1128469884487763839.post-65922580518078209752024-02-09T08:54:03.816-08:002024-02-09T08:54:03.816-08:00Man, I feel this one in my bones. I'm not quit...Man, I feel this one in my bones. I'm not quite there yet (still working on the spare tires), but this is real and weighty. I've been thinking a lot about aging lately. There are parts of it I dread, but I am really looking forward to some stuff, too. _JDAnonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1128469884487763839.post-13746328013353112712024-02-09T08:52:11.943-08:002024-02-09T08:52:11.943-08:00This is super strong writing, and so visual. I thi...This is super strong writing, and so visual. I think the whole thing is dope, but the images especially. They landed so well, and it really gives body to the narrative. - JDAnonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1128469884487763839.post-8838283095196028692024-02-07T13:56:03.987-08:002024-02-07T13:56:03.987-08:00I’m smaller than I used to be. I weigh less and my...I’m smaller than I used to be. I weigh less and my clothes are beginning to hang loosely, the number of unused holes on my belt fewer than before. I'm running out of adjustments – I’m disappearing by degrees.<br /><br />I’m slimmer and leaner now. The spare tyres I used to carry are no longer a full set. I’ve only the one left now, a space-saver I keep in my trunk, its benefits no longer obvious to anyone.<br /><br />Life is different now. I’m calm and I’m more meditative than I used to be. Less stressed. I can see the effects of that. I sleep well, but not excessively. I’m lucid and aware. I can see the future opening before me, impassive and without any sense of enthusiasm.<br /><br />It’s just that I can do little to change it right now.<br /><br />I live in hope. I’m persistent. I can wait.<br /><br />Back in the seventies, when I was in my teens, the world and its options seemed infinite. Money was tight, but I had time; too much for me to be worried. I had youth and I had optimism, a need to do well. I had ambition, a keen mind and a sense of equality and fair play. There was nothing I couldn’t do if I applied myself and focused my attention.<br /><br />Fifty years later, the whole of the world has changed.<br />Mark A Morrishttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14463807197393582228noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1128469884487763839.post-25412354605699672102024-02-03T13:09:07.893-08:002024-02-03T13:09:07.893-08:00At first you chalk it up to the time-whiplash of b...At first you chalk it up to the time-whiplash of being back in a once-familiar place that has become unfamiliar. A meal, a good night’s sleep should take care of that, you think. But then you wake. And it doesn’t. It’s as if the world has been magicked out of one of its dimensions. All looks flatter, stiffer, the colors not as bright as you remember. You feel like an animated figure walking through a sketch of a background. It takes a moment to recognize the people in the photographs, the knickknacks on the shelves, those standing in front of you with hopeful, too-wide smiles. You want to grab them by the shoulders and give them a shake. Don’t you understand, you want to scream. Don’t you understand what happened?<br /><br />They back away. Their smiles grow more timid, their approaches more tentative, the way they interacted with that messed-up cat they used to have. The cat understood. You know that now. You wish you could apologize to the cat, long dead. But you heap it onto the growing pile of things you can’t change.<br /><br />You stay in bed until you hear the last of them close the front door and drive away. Then you troll through what remains, trying to make sense of it all, but it’s too hard, and television is boring, and you know far too well the slippery slope of that first drink.<br /><br />You are lucid enough to know you need to make a change. But not enough to know what that change ought to be. All you feel is…nothing. You fall onto the couch, let your gaze melt into the change of patterns through the windows as the sun tiptoes across the sky. The moving squares of light. The metaphor hits you like a big stupid hit on the head from a cartoon mallet: time marches on, but you, my friend, it has left you behind.<br /><br />Two telephone numbers do battle in your head. Always, the way things battle: the one you want and the one you should. The digits swirl and dance and taunt. Your chest tightens with the ramifications of both. Finally you choose. You get a recording. Your message after the beep stumbles, preambles, then finds a scintilla of adulthood. “So what I’m saying is yes. I’ll sign the divorce papers. At least that way one of us will be free.” You end the call, drop the phone onto the carpet a few inches from one of the moving sunlit squares, watch time engulf it with light.Laurie Borishttps://www.blogger.com/profile/08361627047571650547noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1128469884487763839.post-50395352978074870802024-02-03T13:08:45.959-08:002024-02-03T13:08:45.959-08:00Agreed. Felt this tightening my chest as I imagine...Agreed. Felt this tightening my chest as I imagined the triggers.Laurie Borishttps://www.blogger.com/profile/08361627047571650547noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1128469884487763839.post-36437897411316430312024-02-02T22:17:17.595-08:002024-02-02T22:17:17.595-08:00"...American dream. One part paranoia, two pa..."...American dream. One part paranoia, two parts unwarranted pride. One part individualism. One part propaganda..."<br /><br />Maybe we all need to get the duck away from un-Social Media.Anonymusthttps://www.blogger.com/profile/02789241739451534679noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1128469884487763839.post-83022867917005066322024-01-26T09:47:28.490-08:002024-01-26T09:47:28.490-08:00
At first you chalk it up to the time-whiplash of ...<br />At first you chalk it up to the time-whiplash of being back in a once-familiar place that has become unfamiliar. A meal, a good night’s sleep should take care of that, you think. But then you wake. And it doesn’t. It’s as if the world has been magicked out of one of its dimensions. All looks flatter, stiffer, the colors not as bright as you remember. You feel like an animated figure walking through a sketch of a background. It takes a moment to recognize the people in the photographs, the knickknacks on the shelves, those standing in front of you with hopeful, too-wide smiles. You want to grab them by the shoulders and give them a shake. Don’t you understand, you want to scream. Don’t you understand what happened?<br /><br />They back away. Their smiles grow more timid, their approaches more tentative, the way they interacted with that messed-up cat they used to have. The cat understood. You know that now. You wish you could apologize to the cat, long dead. But you heap it onto the growing pile of things you can’t change.<br /><br />You stay in bed until you hear the last of them close the front door and drive away. Then you troll through what remains, trying to make sense of it all, but it’s too hard, and television is boring, and you know far too well the slippery slope of that first drink.<br /><br />You are lucid enough to know you need to make a change. But not enough to know what that change ought to be. All you feel is…nothing. You fall onto the couch, let your gaze melt into the change of patterns through the windows as the sun tiptoes across the sky. The moving squares of light. The metaphor hits you like a big stupid hit on the head from a cartoon mallet: time marches on, but you, my friend, it has left you behind.<br /><br />Two telephone numbers do battle in your head. Always, the way things battle: the one you want and the one you should. The digits swirl and dance and taunt. Your chest tightens with the ramifications of both. Finally you choose. You get a recording. Your message after the beep stumbles, preambles, then finds a scintilla of adulthood. “So what I’m saying is yes. I’ll sign the divorce papers. At least that way one of us will be free.” You end the call, drop the phone onto the carpet a few inches from one of the moving sunlit squares, watch time engulf it with light.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.com