Well, after a day off and plenty of home-made chicken-rice porridge, I think I’ll be fine for now. At least I could do something today — got a bit of reading in. Hadn’t wanted to do anything for the previous day-and-a-half. I must say though, having slept so much was a wonderful experience that I hadn’t had in about 20 years. But the sleep was shallow. Shallow enough that I even remembered a few dreams. In one, I was a senator, and as I was walking through the Capital, I came across a woman with whom I went to high school. I stood there and she kept talking to a person I assumed was her brother. When she turned to look at me, she just stared. “I’m Bob,” I said, but that didn’t seem to be enough. “Fraleigh.” She knew me, and we talked — I can’t recall about what — but I do remember her eyes. The last I saw of her, she was just looking at me so incredibly deeply. Then she touched my mustache and said I should shave.
After I’d left her, I went to the Senate office building through a tunnel that was filled with bugs and cobwebs. It turns out the Senate office building is eleven floors with no elevator, and, being new, I was on the eleventh floor. It was an amazing adventure trying to get up the stairs, which were old like the stairs going up to the condemned gym of my old middle school, but worse. There were holes on landings that one could step through, and again, no people to speak of. On the seventh floor, there was a store that sold Hanboks (traditional Korean clothing), and it was about there that I found a list of office numbers written in pen and tacked to the wall. I had a hard time finding my name. I was in 115296.
A couple of floors up was a small restaurant. It was awful — dusty and deserted. The whole dream turned into that kind of “running-but-never-getting-anywhere” kind of deal. I still hadn’t made it to my office by the time I woke up.
I had another dream about a motorcycle that I tried to ride like a bicycle. It was kind of embarrassing because I started out by putting up the kickstand before trying to get on, which was a rookie move that caused me to lose my balance and drop the bike. I looked like an idiot. It was a Kawasaki, but it was yellow…which I thought was odd. Everyone knows Kawasakis are green.
As I said, I got to do some reading today. I’ve been off my game lately. I’m nearly a month along and still a couple of hundred pages from finishing Angle of Repose. It’s an excellent book, but it needs a running start — not something you can read in snippets. So today was enjoyable, as I knocked out about 75 pages while lounging around. I’ll probably get a few more in before I call it a day. I’ve found that reading — as is writing — is a discipline. You’ve got to resolve to do it sometimes, even if you’re not feeling entirely up to it. I guess you could say the same about my bike rides. I’ve commented before that it’s when I’m feeling my worst that I sometimes have the best rides.
But the reading has suffered lately; as has the writing. I blame social media. I picked up Twitter again once I saw everyone up in arms about Elon Musk buying it. I’ve been scrolling through Facebook a bit again. So this all reinforces my previous thoughts, but gives them a new spin. I was able to blog every day for over a year — and then only missing one day in over a year and a half. I’ve since dropped off, but from the start of that period, more for the thought that I couldn’t keep up with any semblance of quality. Maybe I would write less frequently, but take more time. Then I got back on Facebook to advertise my writing. Then Twitter. Then, here we are — I’m drifting back into the void. I thought I might get ideas from social media, but what it’s really done is drag me down into the swill again. That, and the amazing time-suck that it is.
And so you see: my reading is down. My writing is down. I think the quality of my happiness has even taken a turn. So yeah, maybe it’s time to drop out and buckle down again. But how on earth am I going to find out what happens to Aaron Rodgers?!?
But I think I know the answer to that question.
Spring is time to roll Cross fields and rivers, then back ‘til I’m home again
