Four Days In August

To some they’re just that. Just four days.

To me they are something different. Four days of triumph. Yes. The Phillies swept the Mets in dramatic fashion but the mission is not complete yet. The chase has only heated up.

I Believe.

Raise Your Mugs...

….And Celebrate a New Semester! (Including Random Thoughts on Time)

So here I am. Summer is over and school has begun. It’s funny how time looks so short in hindsight. And so long when we view the expanse ahead. The experience is not unlike looking into a telescope backwards. We glance back and deplete our memories of the dull times, those events that matter least to our perspective of the past. Gone are the drives back from our friend’s house at midnight or later. Gone are the bland hours spent dosing through our hourly wage. Gone are the hours when we slept. When we ate lunch that hot and hazy Wednesday afternoon. When we cut the grass. When we killed minutes watching that rerun of fucking Seinfeld.

No. No. Go back. Go back to the day when we got back from school. When we got back from work. When we got back from anything for that matter. When the whole summer, the whole day lay before us. There’s a feeling that overwhelms our brain. That exquisite emotion of forever, where we have forever to do whatever we like.

Have you ever daydreamed when you were young? Perhaps when you were in 7th grade, and it was May, the harbinger of summer and you were deaf to Mr. Finley’s lesson on photosynthesis instead perceiving a time when you are fifty years old. How faraway it seemed, only a hair short of impossible. A hair, a gray hair. Mr. Finley’s gray hair glistens in the sunlight. And though he stands in front of you, as a physical presence, as an undeniable testament to middle age. The absolutely ancient, wrinkled idea he proves means nothing. Yes. Yes you convince yourself. I have forever until then. I have high school, college, friendships, relationships, marriages, kids, jobs all that shit before then….

And now you’re fifty. You have two kids, one planned entering college and one mistake just entering 7th grade. Holy fuck where’d the time go?

Are you sure you want the answer? Fine I’ll tell you. It went nowhere. In fact it never existed. Time is not some goal to be reached. Not some ticking time bomb to be defused. Not some second after second measurement to be perceived any differently in the past or the future. It’s a constant that’s so constant it doesn’t exist. It’s a constant that our simple minds could only name but never control.

And back to the issue at hand. So here I am, back at school mourning a summer long gone. In fact the previous minutes I took to write this are long gone. An interminably long semester expands before me. But you know what? When I’m fifty it’ll look short as hell.

Love Like Icicles

Today, I received a letter in the mail. And this was most unexpected because I never get mail, at least not anything other than bills. So with that rather pessimistic mindset I cast the uneven pile of bills and advertisements upon my kitchen table and rushed to get some hot water boiling for my tea. It was only after I sat down at the table and was sipping the harsh St. Paul winter out of me, when I noticed a stamp illustrated with the image of Abraham Lincoln. Like most I always had a soft spot for Abe, so I carefully unearthed the envelope from the pile.
In the center was my name, Katelyn Bell, and my apartment address, carefully written in a light but deliberate script. There was no return address. I ran my fingers through my hair, quite puzzled. Cause who could be writing me? The natural reaction would have been to rip open the envelope and find out, but an unexplainable desire to savor the mystery held me back. Oh yes, who could be writing me? It wasn’t family, or a friend, in fact who even wrote letters in this day and age of cell phones, email and the Internet. I must say the unusual datedness of the method added to the mystery. I stuck the letter to my refrigerator with a magnet and sat back down at the table to calculate the bills.
As I made my calculations, the silence in the room hovered with a thickness, only to be torn apart by an unusually loud squeak of my chair as I shifted positions. Eventually the very scribble of my pen in the checkbook and the clicking of the calculator’s buttons became terribly distinguished to my ears. I fancied that I could hear the air in the room rising and sinking by convection. Soon the heater came on, unbelievably loud, spewing warmth from the vent below the window. I looked up, to see the digital clock on the microwave read 8:42. I spoke aloud.
“Oh, enough work for tonight, time for dinner.” Without a listener other than myself the words dropped like lead to the tile floor below. At the very thought of dinner, I suddenly felt extremely hungry and out of leftovers I heated up a modest meal of chicken, a baked potato and asparagus.
While eating I watched TV. I flipped channels quickly, avoiding the news, seeking the friendly, if superficial welcome of a sitcom. I settled on a story about a young female college graduate trying to make her way in some nameless city as a fashion designer. The stock characters made stale jokes, each idiotically applauded by a laugh track as they pranced around an apartment much too large for a young female college graduate to afford. But despite the banality I found comfort in its carefree joviality. There was no worry except the manufactured crisis that was conveniently resolved at the close of each thirty-minute episode. There was a promise that no matter how imminent defeat appeared, one could rise unscathed, even reinforced with some moral platitude.
After an hour of TV, two and a half minutes of brushing my teeth and another minute for flossing, I buried myself under blankets and went to sleep.

Promptly at six in the morning my alarm clock began blaring. I shut off its piercing ring and lay, with the multiple blankets up to my eyes staring at the gray ceiling. What day is it? My, its only Wednesday, I have dance class today. If only the week would go by faster.
It was dark outside and I deftly made my way to the kitchen without stumbling. In the kitchen I turned on the lamp and tightened my eyes shut until they adjusted to the light. I put on a pot of coffee and went to the fridge for some creamer. It was only after I was returning the creamer when I noticed the letter stuck on the door in the same place I had left it the day before. On impulse I wanted to tear it open. Viciously revealing its contents, but I refrained and my hand only hovered over it in temptation.
Sitting down at the kitchen table I poured milk into a bowl of cereal and began to eat. In between bites I cupped my hands around the hot mug of coffee. The warmth enlivened my cold fingers. I finished my breakfast silently at the kitchen table and made my way to the bathroom.
Following a quick, hot shower I immediately wrapped myself in a towel and huddled on the floor, attempting to retain as much warmth as possible. Drops of water dripped from my hair making wet splotches on the floor rug. Through folds in the towel the cold air crept towards me. Eventually I decided to brave the cold and I stood up quickly allowing the frigid air to rush around me. An uncontrollable spasm of shivering shook through me and I forced my body rigid till I regained composure.
With my palm I wiped a gash through the fog on the mirror and stared at my reflection. My hair, usually a light brown was dark with wetness and flattened to my skull. Water made streaks like tear drops down the side of my nose, curling at my lip and continuing onward down my chin. I smiled at the mirror and my freckles sparkled. I felt lovely. I turned this way and that inspecting my profile. Oh the vanity! But just as the feeling was realized did it start to decay. Was I too pale? Was I too plain? The insecurities emerged silently but in force. No, no, I am pretty. I am still young. Isn’t the only mirror that matters the one in my head?
When I was sufficiently dry I went to my room and changed into my work clothes.
A mere twenty minutes later I was out in the snow-covered cityscape, wearing a thick wool jacket with the hood up and a scarf tightly wound around my neck. The sharp wintry air blew into my eyes and I could distinctly see my breath dissipate around me. The sidewalks were icy but I walked briskly, partially because I didn’t want to be late for work and partially to get out of the bitter cold. I worked as a secretary at Doctor Morgan’s Medicinal Practice, which was promptly opened at eight every morning. The practice was located about three blocks from my apartment and easily traversed, even in weather such as this.
Being a secretary was mostly dull work. Or more specifically, it wasn’t what I thought I’d be doing with my life, but I really couldn’t complain. Dr. Morgan was a nice, gentle man. He was middle aged, with a thick woodsman like beard, which at the roots was only beginning to gray. He was very fatherly, very patient with me when I first started out. He and the nurses were always careful to assist me through my first couple months of rookie mistakes.
But despite his kindness, he inversely unsettled me. I was unsettled by his confidence and security. The only reason I could surmise was that he was in a position that he enjoyed, a position he had worked to achieve, and I was in a position of unfulfilled aspirations. Unfulfilled promises. But every sprawling past analysis as to where this diffidence first emerged accumulated to nothing. For I suppose there wasn’t any one clear moment. My anxiety was the product of numerous emotional and social failures. Aimlessness coupled with doubt, the ever-lingering fear of uncertainty plaguing me, creating a trap of paradoxical proportions...
At the end of the sidewalk I stopped and a lone car, spewing white exhaust from behind turned in front of me and drove onwards down the street. I continued across the intersection, the office being half way down the next block. Snow and ice cracked under my feet. Suddenly, my careful steps made an error in judgment and my boots slipped out from under me. I yelped in awkward surprise and reached out for a railing, anything to steady myself with, but there was nothing and in slow motion I fell backwards to the ground. A sickening sensation of inevitable pain and humiliation bellowed in my stomach. The pavement came fast. But thankfully my head landed in a mound of snow, cushioning the impact. I felt very foolish but physically I was fine besides a little soreness here and there. Carefully I picked myself up, brushing snow from the folds in my coat. Glancing up and down the block, I saw that there were few people about to witness my moment of clumsy humiliation. It was still early. I trudged carefully onwards to the office.

At the office, the hours passed slowly. Patients entered and exited, stating and restating comments about the cold weather. I typed names and dates into the computer. I politely laughed at tired old jokes. But mostly I daydreamed. I remembered when I was a little girl, and piggyback rides with my dad. I remembered long aisles in department stores and the beach my family would vacation to every summer. My thoughts were like leaves stirred by a strong gust of wind: flowing, elevating, and collapsing. Sometimes the connections were delicate and smooth, others were jarring and disfigured. But all together they formed a portrait, not a traditional portrait, but a Picasso inspired collage, of free bleeding colors and stern faced division lines.
But no matter how distant my thoughts became I was faintly aware that the gust of wind that rustled them in the first place was the letter hanging by a magnet on my refrigerator. My thoughts became less absorbed in their own delightful confusion and headed directly to that very source. I made wild speculations about who the sender could be, feeding upon the mystery and perpetuating it. I thought about who I’d want to receive a letter from the most. I wonder if it’s a secret admirer. I wonder, no I hope it’s that cute boy in my dance class. Taylor is his name. So handsome he is with that grin, that wavy hair and that gentlemanly air. Oh but there was no chance of that happening even in a fantasy. I mean, I wasn’t even completely sure if he had a girlfriend or not. But even if he didn’t I could never find the nerves to actually introduce myself to him.
So why am I dwelling on the letter? Why was it inspiring this giddy introspection and innocuous daydreaming? It had to be the mystery. But no, mystery was merely a single flame in the fire, and the fire had to begin with a spark. The letter was an unexpected variable that entered my common everyday life of controls. And its surprise entrance was sending convulsions through my concrete perception of daily existence.
While daydreaming the hours passed quicker, and soon enough it was 4:00 and I left Dr. Morgan’s for my dance class, which started at 5:30. A journey I made every Monday, Wednesday and Friday. The class took place in a converted warehouse across town, so I made my way to the bus stop a block away. The sun was lowering quickly in the sky, taking the temperature down with it. I tightened my hood around my face and bundled my gloved hands in my pockets.
Following the bus ride, I walked to the warehouse. The sun was nearly completely hidden and one by one the streetlights were flickering on. Eventually I made it to the building and was quite thankful to escape the interminable cold. In the coatroom I hung my jacket on a hook and stuffed the thick wool gloves in the pockets. I was early and went upstairs to the empty changing room. The room was long and narrow. On one side were a series of small lockers. Mine was adjacent to the floor near the corner of the room; I opened it and removed my sweats. There was no one else in the room and I changed in silence. Opposite the lockers were a row of mirrors, each adorned at the edges with big gaudy light bulbs.
While looking in one I carefully fixed my hair. When I finished, I continued to stare at my reflection. I smiled. My freckles sparkled. I felt lovely. I felt different than when I had seen my reflection earlier that morning. Could it be the letter? Could it be the mystery? No, the mystery is nothing more than a precursor. All that matters is the content inside the letter. Mystery alone is a useless exercise, a disintegration of certainty, and an act of avoidance. Why was I delaying reality? Why had I settled on glorifying the simple? I gazed into the mirror. I knew what I had to do.
Two chatty girls entered the changing room and broke my trance, but my conviction remained intact. I left the room determined and went into the main practice room. A square, high ceiling-ed expanse of glossy wooden flooring, reflecting the overhead lights. More people were arriving and a bustle off crisscrossing conversations was reflecting off the walls. In the far corner Taylor was stretching, preparing for the class. I walked towards him, across the room, resenting the weakness in my legs. It was like walking blindfolded down a sidewalk. Reaching the curb and leaving your foot to hover above the incline wondering if the next step will land on solid ground or collapse upon an abyss of empty space.
He looked up, aware that someone was near. I smiled and met his glance as unwaveringly as I could. 

“Hi.” I managed to say.
“Hi.” He responded.
I took a deep breath.

When I got home I bolted the apartment door behind me and switched on the light. I lay a pile of advertisements and bills upon the kitchen table and quickly began to heat some water for my tea. Then I saw it, or more accurately, I remembered it. For the wonders of the night had left me in a glow. A glow of hope and optimism, removed from mystery. But there hanging by a lone magnet was the letter. I removed it from its perch and held it in my hands. In the center was my name and address written clearly and carefully. I hesitated. In a way I knew that I was in debt to the letter, that only through its unexpected arrival did I dispel my fear. Yet it was also a reminder of that fear, a symbol of mystery and a part of my recent past.
Behind me on the stove the pot for my tea was beginning to whistle. A whimper at first, but as the steam strengthened it became more distinct and piercing. Still in my hands I clasped the thin white envelope. Though subconsciously I already knew what action I would make, for my trashcan was right in front of me. After one final glance at Abe’s wise profile on the stamp and even a single heartfelt speculation into the letter’s writer I let the envelope fall to the trash below and closed the lid.

Affection

A vignette if you will. (I Always wanted to use "vignette" in a sentence...)



Learn to enjoy the fleeting moments of rare pleasure. The moments of cool euphoria that settle secretly and silently upon your heart like comforting snow. That makes you ache for time to melt into oblivion, so that the feeling may remain within you eternally.

The car rode in darkness as the headlights cast blank shafts of light upon the pavement ahead. The barely discernible whisper of the radio haunted the otherwise silent car. I sat in the back seat pretending to watch the scenery pass by the window. In actuality my eyes stared into space, for my mind lay anchored to one thought, one hope, one tormenting desire. May be obsession was the wrong word but I desired her, and her affection. She sat opposite me, the middle seat between us a vast ocean of opposition, a brick wall of torture. Though an unyielding storm raged in my heart and the mutiny of a thousand pirates careened in my head she sat clueless of my hell, clueless of my desire and at peace with herself.
From in the reflection of the window I could see her.
May by it was a false obsession but regardless I knew what fueled it. Contrary to your first impression it was not lust, but nor was it love. It was a lack of affection, the lack of a comforting embrace. I wanted our fingers to intertwine, her head upon my shoulder, the wisps of her hair soft upon my cheek.
Unfortunately all of my previous attempts during such opportune times had met with failure. So each subsequent moment that ticked slowly by in the car was soaked in pessimistic desperation. The great unknown, the last hope continued to sting like the fresh prick of a lovelorn rose. Only the sting grew exponentially in the car’s dull hum, tormenting me, mocking me, deceiving me. Till the walls of desire collapsed upon me, crushing me, grinding my skull to fine dust. So I leapt from my house of cards into the unnerving abyss of chance. Softy my fingers settled upon hers and I held my breath for a sign.

The Horror (unfinished idea)

The snow beat against me as I ran. It fell heavily, the large white flakes sticking to my face and jacket. I was surrounded by trees, tall, thick trunk-ed oaks, with branches hidden by the night’s blackness high above. By contrast a blanket of untainted snow spread out before me, snow of the purest white complexion that sparkled under the light of my flashlight. But despite the beauty of the setting I continued to run. Or more accurately, I plodded quickly, with my heavy boots collapsing with a crunch into each labored step.
I wondered if I lost it, the thing that was chasing me. A “thing” because I really don’t know what it was. It had wings; yes wings cause it swooped down upon us but after that all I know was screaming, terrible screaming and then running. And now I’m here. The screaming stopped long ago. In its place was an eerie silence that was interrupted only by the sound of my disordered steps. I slowed my toiled progress and leaned against a tree. Its ridged bark scratching my back as I slid down its length to sit. I could see my breath envelope around me, while I gasped for air. Cold drops of sweat streamed down my forehead and a frigid chill enclosed my frame. I folded my arms tightly around myself to retain what little body heat I had.
I sat there for a long time, bewildered and out of breath. I wondered how far I had run; in fact I didn’t even know how much time had elapsed since the chase began. It was all so sudden and I had no time to realize where I was even going.
What happened to the others? Did they escape? My God. I wouldn’t even know where they were even if they did. Suddenly a new fear grabbed hold of me. I am alone. I shivered, partly from fright, partly from the cold. Fingering the lens of the flashlight, I lowered its beam on to my still fresh footprints. Another horror descended upon me. My footprints led straight to me. There was no escaping the beast if it was so determined to find me. Where could I go? Wandering farther into the forest was pointless. I had no bearing of my whereabouts and who knew what other terrible beings lurked in this cursed woods.
My only apparent option was to follow my footsteps back to where we were ambushed. From there I will know the way out of the forest. From there the path was familiar to me. I got up slowly, steadying myself with the tree trunk behind me. The snow were falling less fervently as before, instead lone flakes were floating towards the ground languidly. The cold air was still and all was silent. I began to retrace my steps, the snow crunching under my feet. I lowered the beam of my flashlight and made my way as quietly as I could.
For about twenty minutes I continued on my way until I reached what appeared to be the sight of the ambush. The snow that had fallen during the interim since the attack had somewhat disguised the commotion that had occurred. It was a small clearing among the trees. Slowly, I walked to the center inspecting the nearest trees with my flashlight.
Suddenly a sound!
It was a guttural sound. It was close by. My body was shaking and I swung around haphazardly for whomever or whatever had emitted the sound. With my flashlight I detected movement low to the ground just outside the clearing. My breath came in shortened, almost neglected gulps.
I heard the sound again, this time it was softer and hollower. It was most definitely coming from the spot just outside clearing.