Hobobooked and Processed...

(as it appears in some random floating sketch pad you may find for sale somewhere)

It feels like years since I've picked up a pen. I won't say that is true, it just feels it. The joints respond to the first pushed with a mixture of caution and familiarity, a consequence of age. Age is a highly ironic thing--like a roller coaster: you wait, you wait, you board, you wait, then terror, then calm, the highs, the lows, self-doubt and euphoria, and in the end, you haven't really gone anywhere.

Bleak. At least, that's one way to look at it. Truth is, the world accelerates, time follows, the body slows and the mind...wanders.

I remember a time when a pen grew from my fist like a second thumb. All my summer days and winter nights were devoted to the notion that any word or phrase left unwritten or recorded could one day become a regret. Even as a young man, I was concerned about accruing regrets. So I wrote, for hours or even days at a time, taking short breaks for naps and frozen meat pockets. There were no drugs or alcohol, just electric youth. I had a companion some of the time to bounce ideas off of, swap stories with, compose schizophrenic poetry with. Other times, I was alone, burning the midnight filament in my shadowy roomcave. These are processes that I have loved and somehow lost over the years.

This particular morning is chilly and gray. The few leaves remaining on their branches are being slowly bullied down by errant raindrops. My street is quiet, almost secretive. It is lined with dozens of mildly distinct town homes, conjoined in sets of 3's and 4's. Many are vacant, as is the one to my left. It is like a twin that has passed but whose weight cannot be cleaved. Two black cats live with my wife and I. They spend most of their time staring through windows and storm doors at a small stretch of yellow, blue, green and endless gray. They were rescued together, blind and starving from this merciless, vast colorpot at 1 week of age. I've always been curious if they look out with simple curiosity or with familiarity and disdain. Perhaps somehow, somewhere we will be allowed to discuss it someday.

The coffee I drink is mildly flavorful, just this side of burnt. It's effect, though slowly realized, is a bit exaggerated. It has been 3 weeks and nearly as many surgeries since my last cup. Despite being underweight and organless, I am determined to resurrect myself one comfort at a time. I suppose one can use that to determine when death is finally approaching: the winter doesn't yield to balmy threats of thaw, the body doesn't twitch in rebellion of idleness and the great comforts that define us never regain appeal. My wife has made comments that she is beginning 'to get her husband back', and I would have to agree. It seems that I am destined yet to mend.

For myself, I had always figured writing to by my chief comfort, perhaps my definition, a part of it. If that is so, why have so many years of seasons passed and all I seem to do is chip away at the tundra? No answers. Just a hope, or as my companion would call it, a thawt: the sun can surprise you...