the everyday
The man had been very tired for several days.
But not in the sense that he had been without sleep. Every night, after rummaging through his neighbors fridge for half frozen ice tea and discount whiskey, he would set down at the end of their dock for a time, quite alone. With the warm music of evening filling his ears. Eventually he would waddle home to fall into bed and blissfully dreamless dreams. Then awakening even more exhausted than the morning previous.
the same thought occurred to him then, that his days were only remembered, even experienced perhaps, in watered-down smears and nicotine-clouded shades. save for these piercing waking moments of drowsy apprehension, enflamed nasal cavities and an increasingly lacking sense of self.
"keep away from me" he thinks, protesting the sunrise. "I cannot face you yet." - it is at once a question and command.
he rolls to the cooler side. eyes closed again although regrettably conscious, and waits.
maybe it had been more than days. but it had been a long time since he'd debated it.
it is a slow rise with the afternoon. finally upright at the side of his bed, letting out a soft, cynical sigh. his lungs prickle and tighten from yesterdays cancerous inhalations. without looking he reaches for one of the many balled-up tissues littering the nightstand beside him and sniffles for a moment into the soft, wrinkled material.
the first moment of relief, he thinks, while staring at the pill bottles and nasal sprays he had piled together.
he waits for the effect. a few minutes pass and the weight is lifted slightly, moreso hidden.
altogether, temporary.
Then, moving to stand with ankles cracking. His body unwillingly leans and yawns into a base state of awareness. He sets the re-used tissue back onto the nightstand. Then begins shuffling through half opened drawers with their contents draped over the pale wooden corners. searching for something clean that could be donned without much trouble. this something, ironically, is found abandoned on the floor a few steps away. thin shafts of midday sunlight seemed to cage the articles down into the rug as he bent to retrieve them. his back cracked.
it was already past noon when he pulled open his bedroom door. or was it before he woke?
he was still too tired to be hungry, but the restless pit inside what he thought could be his stomach still bothered him despite. "Morning Sickness" he thought sarcastically. it would be better to wait until his body could decide what it really wanted. until then he would attempt to pull himself together. a cigarette maybe.
a morning ritual.
these shared waking events, he thinks, that are only subtly unique. But retain that same bitter aftertaste of the things you'd failed to prepare for yesterday.
so before every dawn and passing dream. we alight our consciousness. slowing the ripples of our material motions throughout the world to make them still in sleep. we rewind, then wake to reassemble for the living world.
some of us will better than others.
others will somehow get better,
many won't.
and so on.
he coughs and looks in the mirror.
it is already past noon.
But not in the sense that he had been without sleep. Every night, after rummaging through his neighbors fridge for half frozen ice tea and discount whiskey, he would set down at the end of their dock for a time, quite alone. With the warm music of evening filling his ears. Eventually he would waddle home to fall into bed and blissfully dreamless dreams. Then awakening even more exhausted than the morning previous.
the same thought occurred to him then, that his days were only remembered, even experienced perhaps, in watered-down smears and nicotine-clouded shades. save for these piercing waking moments of drowsy apprehension, enflamed nasal cavities and an increasingly lacking sense of self.
"keep away from me" he thinks, protesting the sunrise. "I cannot face you yet." - it is at once a question and command.
he rolls to the cooler side. eyes closed again although regrettably conscious, and waits.
maybe it had been more than days. but it had been a long time since he'd debated it.
it is a slow rise with the afternoon. finally upright at the side of his bed, letting out a soft, cynical sigh. his lungs prickle and tighten from yesterdays cancerous inhalations. without looking he reaches for one of the many balled-up tissues littering the nightstand beside him and sniffles for a moment into the soft, wrinkled material.
the first moment of relief, he thinks, while staring at the pill bottles and nasal sprays he had piled together.
he waits for the effect. a few minutes pass and the weight is lifted slightly, moreso hidden.
altogether, temporary.
Then, moving to stand with ankles cracking. His body unwillingly leans and yawns into a base state of awareness. He sets the re-used tissue back onto the nightstand. Then begins shuffling through half opened drawers with their contents draped over the pale wooden corners. searching for something clean that could be donned without much trouble. this something, ironically, is found abandoned on the floor a few steps away. thin shafts of midday sunlight seemed to cage the articles down into the rug as he bent to retrieve them. his back cracked.
it was already past noon when he pulled open his bedroom door. or was it before he woke?
he was still too tired to be hungry, but the restless pit inside what he thought could be his stomach still bothered him despite. "Morning Sickness" he thought sarcastically. it would be better to wait until his body could decide what it really wanted. until then he would attempt to pull himself together. a cigarette maybe.
a morning ritual.
these shared waking events, he thinks, that are only subtly unique. But retain that same bitter aftertaste of the things you'd failed to prepare for yesterday.
so before every dawn and passing dream. we alight our consciousness. slowing the ripples of our material motions throughout the world to make them still in sleep. we rewind, then wake to reassemble for the living world.
some of us will better than others.
others will somehow get better,
many won't.
and so on.
he coughs and looks in the mirror.
it is already past noon.