This day to myself

I started running again and now it calls to me everyday. I'm a much happier person in this state, though there've been times when i ran out of sadness, ran for exhaustion and a subsequent weariness nearly incapable of thought. But even then it was the antidote and i knew it; i used the negativity as fuel.

The sun has been unobstructed for days. I'm over it. My shoulders and neck are pink and hold my fingerprints where i touch for a few seconds, the pink slowly filling the white. I've drank so much water today i'm afraid i'll overhydrate or some such thing. Cathleen was telling me she'd been to the hospital one time for drinking too much of Eve's ale. Seems i'm always recovering from some water-stealing episode afoot~ running the trail along the lake, the tennis courts, or more recently pacing about the house with a bottle of chardonnay to myself. This a.m. i questioned whether last night's drunk was worth this morning's bright welcome. Good god! The sun was so bright! And did i drink and dial? I did...

I climbed out to a quiet house, Cathleen gone for the weekend to play with 50 thousand Burning Man carousers testing the melanin content of their skin. I can see the leather-hided new-agers of Los Angeles drawing mandala in the sand, or Berkeley beats discussing their latest trip over maté. Just the thought makes me wanna go hug my pillow.

I walked around with two cups of water, one for me and one for the plants. Spent some quality time with the herbs building up a chopstick and twisty-tie support system for the basil, which has dumbly outgrown its stem capabilities and flopped over like a dejected sunflower.

It was a tough day for decisions but i managed a call to a potential employer and surprised myself by declining the job, despite desperately needing the income. Hanging up i had a great sense of relief and had to pat myself on the back, and i did quite literally. It's a thing i started doing a few years ago, usually when ending a long hike or run, a personal yet stupid self-congratulation.

I decided to go spend a few dollars to celebrate the fact that no paychecks would be coming for a while longer still. Walking into the bookstore i realized it would be one of those shy days where making eye contact with people plays on the nerves. A pretty common affair for a hangover day. I fidgeted at the counter as the lady ran about the shop finding my book. I grabbed the new Josh Ritter and fumbled for payment acting like an underage kid at a liquor store. Remember when Michael J. Fox got that keg of beer in Teen Wolf? His canine eyes burning red, he leaned over the counter to say,"Give me, a keg of beer!" He was my hero after that...