The Winter of My Discontent

The weather is unseasonably cold today. I am wearing a long sleeved shirt and a wool sweater, which should never, never happen in August. It is raining. It smells of fall. Just as a detail, the sweater was one I gave to the Ex Who Says He Will Never Love Again. It keeps me warm, even if he no longer does.

There's a general malaise settling in around me. This indescribably dense cloud of ennui that usually appears when things have been too still in my life for too long. "Too long" is usually a few days, which is an infinitessimal amount of time to normal, thoughtful people, but an eternity to me. I am a human blender. I am chaos theory. I am scattered, in every sense of the word.

The feeling builds, this discontented restlessness, until I do something rash and stupid. Last time, it was a tattoo of a dragon on my foot, which I had to cover with Band-Aids last weekend when my parents visited. The time before that, it was taking this job in Chicago. Or maybe I should count Harold as the last rash and stupid thing, shouldn't I? The point is, the rash things stir up my life so that I can predictably have something to do for a period ranging from a couple of days to a few years. And, because my life is in this constant upheaval, I can keep smoking. "I'll wait 'til things calm down to quit." You see, I've designed my life so that things are NEVER calm. Clever, clever little smoker!

I am wondering what this next rash thing will be. I am meeting SB Thursday for a beer and then I am forcing myself to go home at 9 pm on the dot. If, at any point during this evening, I feel like saying "Hey, let's go set fire to something!" or "You want to get married?", I will shut the Christing hell up.