Ink Stains & a Whole in the Sun

Not writing much on this blog started out because I thought I'd run out of things to say. Then Life turned tragic and I didn't have the heart to write. Now, I think I am going to ease back into amusing, confusing, and sometimes infuriating my few readers. There is a wealth of things to bitch about--I suspect such will be the case so long as we have a Bush in the Oval Office--but I'm not going to bitch as much as I have in the past.

I'll definitely still point out the sorry shit that goes on in the life politic; however, I realize I border on the whiney petulant pisant rather than the writer full of incredulous indignation. I don't know, maybe I've needed to whine. Offputting as it is to so many others, sometimes pissing and moaning is therapeutic to the Whiner, even if it is like so many Freddy Krueger claws on the blackboard to the Whinees.

Don't worry, my little sheoples, I'm still angry and bitter at the world in general and most especially with the idiots who run it. From this point forward, however, I will endeavor to find more creative ways of exploring my rantings so that they are more intellectually palatable.

Now that I have dispensed with the "returning to duty" pleasantries, on to begin fulfilling my promise of last post to "write until my hands fall from my arms and scamper away."

I was driving into work this morning after another hair-pulling episode of Cats Who Have a Death Wish, and realized for the first time that the days have already gotten noticeably shorter because the sun wasn't up yet. It was the same time I usually left, but I guess since I had managed to sleep-in quite late for the past three or four days, the morning had lost another three or four minutes of sunlight without my noticing; i.e., the sun was rising three or four minutes later than the last time I drove to work.

It was pre-dawn. The sky was lightening, but it wasn't quite there yet, wasn't quite daylight. Have you ever noticed how early morning air, unmolested by traffic and heat and people, has a distinct and refreshing smell about it? It is cool and crisp, it is distinctly morning air. While driving down LBJ, I saw the sun break the horizon. RED. That was the first thing I noticed about it, it was glowing blood red as it lifted lazily over the horizon, yawning in the morning air. The world suddenly seemed to come alive as the red light spilled over the highway, reflected off cars and bumpers and chromed skyscrapers, and filtered harmlessly through my sunglasses as it played shadows of light and awe on my mind.

I was struck by its majestic simplicity and mundanity. I know it happens every morning--has since its fusion reaction began and the earth form into a solid mass, but this morning it was my sun, my dawn. So many things have come to an end over the past few weeks, things that saying I would much rather had not ended would be the biggest cliched understatement of my entire life, that I felt like this dawn was just for me. This dawn, my dawn was a signal from the Fates that it was time to start afresh, that yesterday was officially gone and a new time approached--that life was going to get better starting today.

For the past two weeks, and last week in particular, I have been at a breaking point emotionally. Sleep deprivation, overwhelming stress at work and with family issues and responsibilities had left me a time bomb wrapped in a fragile sparrow's eggshell. I was lashing out in rages at people and animals closest to me over the smallest of insignificant slights. Had I had to work yesterday, the holiday which extended by a day the weekend of my first real break from things in weeks (a break I so desperately needed) in a non-air-conditioned office doing a job I have really come to loathe over the past nine months, I would probably be unemployed and institutionalized this morning, enjoying that magnificent sunrise through wired pane-glass. However, that didn't happen because of a last-second reprieve from my boss via a phone call Sunday evening.

Yes, I did my happy dance when I hung up the phone.

For the first time in days I felt like I could breathe, that life had finally quit kicking me in the gut, even if for just a moment. Joy flooded me for the first time in weeks and I didn't care that I had laundry to do the next day. Such a small thing not having to work on Labor Day is, yet it had such a deep affect on me for the better. I could breathe and relax. I had a fresh start. Suffice to say, it was the best damn laundry day I can remember. Except maybe the first laundry day that we actually owned our own washer and dryer and didn't have to lug a week's worth of clothing 30 miles to one of our parents' houses to wash it all--but that's another story. Best of all, I got to spend the whole weekend with Tim. We washed our cars and cleaned the apartment together on Saturday, relaxed and shopped all day together Sunday, then relaxed and did laundry together all day Monday, with shopping of the grocery variety that night. It was a mostly utilitarian weekend, but it was revitalizing work, adn with Tim by my side the whole time, I realized how lucky I am to have him and our life together.

Don't worry, I'm not going to launch into some sanctimonious crap comparing my life to the tragedies of the world--all that goes without saying and I never lost sight of how much better I have it than so many other people, because, somehow and by my own admission, selfishly so, that knowledge was never any comfort.

Then the dawn this morning. I feel refreshed. I feel like me (albeit still a bit moodier than usual).

But most of all, I feel like writing again.


Cheers-Thanksalot.