The Wind Says Soon

Hurricane Fay is just kissing Long Beach, Mississippi today, and I am here. The breeze is blowing every which way, and the rain is so light that the drops swirl into mists like Starry Night. There is no sun, but no angry clouds either. The temperature is just right for a windbreaker, although if I had my druthers I would select a violently patterned, swirling caftan. It's a day for drama; the gulfcoast equivalent of a Cornish moor. It makes me contemplative, and a little sad.

I have opened the all the doors and the windows and the blinds, and I am inviting the weather right in for a chat. It's been whispering secrets all day and night, and I can't help but think that if I were a better listener, a dearer friend, I might learn a powerful secret. It will be a night for spells, I can already tell.

Without a car I must scheme and deal for a ride to the beach. I long to be there today, walking in the sand, my caftan blowing about, the scritchy grains dusting my toes and between. I'll stop to pick up rocks, shells, and other detritus, all while getting the pedicure I can't afford. It's there, at that time, I'll sit and stare and The Story might begin, might take me over. It's become not only a dream of mine to write, but also my salvation, the swift boat rescue after years adrift at sea. When will it come? I must admit, probably not during my fanciful imaginings.

The wind frees the strands of my hair from its queue one at a time, and they blow against my face in time with the breeze, and ghostly fingers skim my cheek. Comfort and hope bloom while patience grows. "Soon", Fay says. "Soon."

Post Theme: Clarity (acoustic) by John Mayer

Come the Storm

Hurricane Fay, come blow your horn!
the boards on the window, the cows in the barn
where are brave citizens on coastal streets?
"under their blue tarps starting to weep."
Will you help them? "No not I;
I'll wash all away, with none left dry."


What is the nature of a storm? Is there an evil sentience, or only the focused energy of a thoughtless minion of higher principalities, of deities? Is it sent, or allowed? Believing either is your choice, and the only thing you can control.

Bring it on.

Sisyphus Speaks

It's been awhile, but I've been busy at my task you see. I have become my namesake, Sisyphus, cursed to a backbreaking, soul-stripping, ubiquitous task... survival. I don't even ask why anymore. Or when this will end. It feels like they've got me right where they want me, impervious to well-meaning exhortation, to pie-in-the-sky notions like "someday your prince will come". It's funny, I've never been defeatist, but I don't know what else to call this.

I'm not unaware that my problems and situation are laughable, and that makes me laughable. It's been great for my self-image. I mean, what am I really complaining about? Joblessness? Quarter-life crisis? Even knowing the meaning or spelling of the words marks my place as pampered and middle class. I'd love to pull myself up, but I sold my boots, and so I have no bootstraps.

Nowhere to turn, nowhere to run, no rescue plot afoot. There exists only this continual uphill battle. What kind of mountains are these, with no peaks, no valleys, no sheltering caves, just inclines?

Tonight I feel...

Tonight I feel like the last person standing after a war. The only sane one in the room. And after writing that I can't help but think: how emo! That was the equivalent to a childish whine, "no one understands me!" Crisis averted by my inner wit.

Tonight I feel like there are a lot of stupid people out there, and all of the smart ones are incommunicado, or maybe can only be reached by ham radio, which I don't know how to operate.

Tonight I feel cabin fever crawling up my legs, my back, and through my scalp, like the flesh-eating red ants in the latest Indiana Jones flick.

Tonight I feel frustrated that everyone that I want to talk to, to take comfort in, all the people that I call to get a lift from a funky mood, or a fresh perspective on my dreary circumstances seems to be living a more interesting and fulfilling life and is unable to be reached at this time. I hang up before I can leave a message. I don't want to say something that I will regret, or be unwilling to clarify or discuss tomorrow.

Tonight I feel angry and ashamed of my unwavering penchant for comparing myself to others and envying their accomplishments. However short I may have fallen, or short-sighted I may be to do it, it's like I can't stop. I am certain this isn't why Facebook was created!

Tonight I feel like I am on a giant wheel of fortune, and I keep landing on bankrupt and losing my effing turn. This game is rigged!


Tonight I feel like human nature is a dark thing, and no one does the right thing anymore. An example: I think that HRC is "suspending her campaign" instead of conceding because she plans to wait in the wings in case "something happens" to Barack Obama. It's not too far a stretch for me tonight, especially in light of her bizarre and malevolent statements about Bobby Kennedy's assassination a few short weeks ago. All the evil conspiracies seems totally plausible tonight.

Tonight I wish it were the future. The place where this is a fuzzy memory, chucked into the bucket of melodrama, of bored self-indulgence. The time where my life is so full that there is no room to remember these times as anything other than the desert journey toward an oasis destination. And it would also be cool if Barack Obama were president at that time....

Tonight, I see, will be tomorrow in a matter of minutes. Although not far enough in the future to forget tonight, it is better than nothing.

Post Theme: Sometimes by Bilal