Time to Take Time

I look out the wide window of the bus to see the grey clouded sky highlighted with a strip of yellow that stretches from one end of my periphery to the other. It looks like something from a movie. There are the first stars making an early appearance.

There are times when I want to close my eyes so that I can't see all the suffering that goes on. I want to cover my ears so that I can't hear all the criticisms and demands of society. I want to fold my hands so that I don't have to reach for the next offer before someone else takes it. Sometimes I wish I could stop watching the clock to make sure I say all of my key messages in 30 seconds or less. Right now, I can wish for other things and other people, hoping simply that they are the best of themselves.

Traveling from one place to another, never stopping, but in some cases going back to where I started gives me a sense of warranted laziness. My legs are weary. My boots are too tight. It is cold outside. My toes are sore. Here I can stretch out and slouch if I want to. No one is paying attention to see whether or not I'm paying attention to anything at all.

This is the lull in the stream of events. Time to spare. Time to close my eyes, even though I don't feel like sleeping. I should set up my drum kit or rewrite my resume. I should make up a set of goals that I want to achieve for 2006, but not at this moment. I am a visiter in everyday life. The questions people ask I've heard before. There are snippets of conversations going on around me, people talking about how they've grown out of one scene or another, how they are meeting up with their families for the first time since X, though they are always conscious of being branded as something new each time, which means they have to come up with a whole new set of explanations. A woman quietly knits a scarf for her son.

Coming home to a warm meal and tons of books waiting to be finished. The computer offers itself as my cozy spot; another window peering into the interconnected world sucked up and packaged in a vaccuum. The words I find by chance seem more accessible then the bound papers piled on my shelf. I have the privelege of checking in on various people at various times all at once, checking emails or responding to instant replies. There is no direct interaction but we make up a 'network'. I track people at my own leisure.

With this sense of comfort and freedom, I can afford to write about nothing in particular.

With exams done and a roof over my head, my basic Maslow's needs are covered. Everything seems so sufficient.

With all this time, and few plans to fulfill, the air hangs like slabs of fat over a smoking fire. For a little while, I will relish in it, but soon enough, it will melt away.