this strange darkness in life…
The truth is there isn’t any more darkness in my life: it is buoyant, light, strong.
I have a wife, I have a child, I have what seems to be career more so than a job. Outside of purchasing a home, it cannot really get better than this. But buying a home brings up a certain fears about job security and financial comfort, i.e. if I lost my job, could we keep the house afloat on Mari’s salary and if so, more than likely so, then for how long? The idea of unemployment, still sore in my memory from 2001, is too scary, too visceral and feels far too likely.
Still however I am afraid of growing up and it’s happening faster: first child has already arrived and then the next and who knows maybe another, and at some point I will have to begin to look older at the very least, my youth has to start to abandon me. All I see right now is a new crop of grays, but still slight. My friend Mike has lost his hair and shaves his head now, as does Pete the Foot and even Watersport Pete show signs of wear around his skull. Still thick head full of hair, no deep lines embedding themselves, no hardening or leathering of the skin. The weight sure but that’s more of a sign of excess than age.
I haven’t been remembering my dreams of late: with a job like this I wrestle myself into and out of sleep, there is little to remember in the exhaustion. And I’ve started hitting the gym again, although with a different purpose in mind. More set on losing pounds than pressing weight. Running now for the last two weeks six days a week, 2 plus miles at a time. I work with free weights three times a week, Monday, Wednesday, Fridays while running around the nearby park the other days. The progress I’m making surprises me and encourages me. I’m trying, trying to build the health I’ve taken away through over eating and smoking.
And the writing, save for a few ghost sentences here and there, the segment of an idea, the piece of something not broken exactly, but definitely not a piece of something larger, is entirely gone. I don’t know if it’s a question of discipline but I can’t seem to break through or go on in any sort of prolonged manner. There’s a spark or two, but then that’s it, nothing sustaining or maybe sustainable? Not a good idea in any of them. Or like I wrote somewhere else, “I get bored” and lose interest.
But what if the problem is not the idea, or finding a fresh idea, but rather, the impatience in taking the time to build something better than a gimmick?