"you know my theory about that store."

"no."

"i think the designers were drunk, in their grandma's attic, with a glue gun. "

"true."

"but i still love it."

"true."

We are also singing.

I must not be turning the pages fast enough. I do like to overly savor a book's language; she must be reading for plot, only.

Utterly Wretched

I am freezing yet covered in sweat. Sweat has soaked through my pajamas, my sweatshirt, and dampened my sheets. Which, in my finicky mind, Must Be Washed before I fall asleep. My aching joints are not sure if it is necessary. In agreement, my lungs shudder in a series of cough spasms that bring tears to my eyes as well as fluid from my nose and ears. My stomach feels a little left out, so it heaves a bit. And I run to the bathroom. Not to lose my cracker and soup lunch, but to spit out the piece of my lung that is choking me.

I pass out in my bathroom and wonder when this misery will end.

The front passenger side door of my car has OCD. Specifically, the lock will only work after an elaborate and ritualistic turning of the key. Left, Left, Right, Left. A process repeated every cold morning, in every abandoned parking lot, on every dark evening.

I am not sure if this is a mechanical problem or a character trait reserved just for me. No car psychologist has been called. My father - the car nurse - has his own diagnosis. He has yet to examine the lock but he knows: it is not the car that is crazy, but the driver. The driver, he informs me, may need mechanical as well as emotional support. He has anecdotal evidence of the symptoms: driver calling crying because lost coming home from sister's; driver calling crying because of a flat tire; driver calling crying because she was hungry. He went on, but driver stopped listening. She was crying.

Crying because her car has OCD and there is no car Zoloft available in the states.

Busted

"Watching your hair in the mirror is not exercise."

"I am stretching! It is very important to have correct form when you are stretching. The mirror helps with that."

"Right."

Now my library is complete.

Because I am not alone.

Contentment

A nap of 20 minutes lasted 120. I woke up squinty eyed, confused, and with my skirt on backwards. Drool matted my hair to my face. I was a set of wrinkles: face wrinkles, shirt wrinkles, and worry wrinkles. I had articles to read! Literary letters to write! Bathrooms to clean! However, I don't move from my encasement of sheet, blanket, and down comforter. I turn over and watch the fading light from my window.

I could be there now,
snuggled with content,
if not for the smell of bacon. *


*so aware of the extra syllable. it is killing me.