Friday,
January 18, 2002
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evidence of things needing clean up in the backyard
"One's mind has a way of making
itself up in the background, and it suddenly becomes clear what
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the details I dreamt a lot in the night. I was sitting on a high diving board while someone cut my hair. I later paid ten dollars, twice (having forgotten the first time) for the privilege. I considered jumping off the diving board but I didn't. I can't really dive, I said. (I can't.) I have jumped off such boards. Then we were on an excursion. On a boat. Someone pointed out that there was a rental place on the top deck. I thought car rentals for shore excursions. But it was boat rentals and you had to have a captain's license. Was there a cruise to get such a license I ask. The captain demonstrated his prowess with a hairpin turn in the water while saying there was. I was asked if I'd brought beer. No, I hadn't. I wasn't buying any, I said. Then we were in a van. I didn't really have enough money for the trip. I'd had the two tens and a $59 check from my dad in my wallet. I gave the $20 to the hairdresser. At least the $59 check made sense. Dad gave Forrest a $59 check last March. He found it in his jacket and put it in the bank. But Dad had closed the account. I asked Dad about it and he rewrote the check. As I wrote this and remembered dreaming of the check, I kicked myself because FFP had just that minute left to go to the bank. And the check was still in my wallet.
I'm obsessed with details lately. I think it's because of emerging from the fog of illness, because I've gotten back into a routine where just getting from place to place isn't consuming me. Travel does that, you just try to make the connections you have to, often overlooking smaller things. But every arrangement of trivial things, every detail of people and what they say and what they are wearing is registering with me. Or seems to be.
Sometimes people say to me, "Are you losing weight?" or "Have you lost weight?" When they say this, I never have. I'll be right at 180 or a few pounds above or below. (I don't think I've ever gotten over 183.) Anyway, I've lost five or six pounds since being sick and then, subsequently, eating and drinking less and trying to move around a little more. (Walking in NYC in the cold didn't hurt, I'm sure.) I don't gain or lose fast although the territory between 172 and 182 is pretty slipperly, I can go up and down there, just water weight, little changes. Busting out below that (or above, thankfully) would take some serious thing. Anyway, I notice my jeans are looser. But no one has said anything about it. I don't care, of course. In fact, I'm happy that no one has noticed, but it is interesting.
I took SuRu from the Honda place this morning to work. We went via Allandale, a way I don't usually go. I'm trying to do things differently. Shake things up. At lunch we met one of the Nancys at Koreana. With one of the Ds. We had to wait for a table but it was good. I had hot and sour soup and Bi Bin Bam (or anyway, three nonsense B syllables...nonsense in English anyway). It had fried egg, seaweed, meat, vegies, rice and a hot chili sauce. I ate a lot of it. It was good and so interesting I'm afraid I might get stuck on ordering it there in the future.
Work is going well. My presentation isn't done but I'm enjoying the research. I'm enjoying all my tasks even though some seem, as usual, mightly futile or impossible tasks. It just depends on where your head is.
Austin Lyric Opera is doing André Previn's Streetcar Named Desire. And we are there for opening night. I'm in a detail kind of mood. I'm focused. Usually at a performance, I drift in and out. Not tonight. Yeah, right. Actually, I was pretty focused. The music is wonderful, there was lots of good acting, interesting staging. There's nothing quite like a story of madness, is there?
And it's Friday. And everything will be accomplished on the weekend. Just believe it.
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173
JUST
TYPING