ohmy god i’mso tired i hit snooze once and went back to reading theunderside of my asleep thougghts, all about-- all about-- incredibly,i already forgot. my fingertips have the winter pain my heart has the winnte fear alwyas feellike a tardy squirrel about this time of year. oh shit, we were supposed to be gathering nuts this whole time, weren’t we? like i hav a fluffy tail and can dash and dart like you wouldn’t believe and you should see me race up a tree trunk like there’s notomrrow, but there may not be--because around this time of year, i always start to get that creeping feeling, in my quietermoments, that the car that wipes me and my family off the face of the worldisjust around the corner as we[‘re crossing the street. always just a twitch of indecision away from sudden suffering and helpless death.\ so how about you? How you been? ok, ok, and we’re going to south dakota. i can’t even picture mysefl driving that far, across unfamiliar territory, someof which has very few and far between services of any kind. how the fuck am i supposed to drive overnight? why are we doing this? is it worth it? Are my dad & ruth that close to death? Do i sense something i can’t say? Or am i just impulsive and restless? yes it will be novel and probably in some way rewarding to see my bro & fam, even though i’m still a little salty that i’ll be down by one girl, but still. this isfucking insane. maybe i need to be more insane every now and then. but is this how? i think about those people you read about who do and have done so much. and then in his spare time he invented a new type of vacuum cleaner that solves the problem of hunger for a west african village. and then while he’s sitting on the toilet he writes 16 books that redefine the nature of reality and hope for a generation. and after work, he learns how to parasail and speak greek and gives presentations to the royal society of i don’t know how people do all that shit that they do. shit it’s all i can do to grade a few papers before i totally lose my focus and runout of energy and sit and eat fritos scoops and read the back of the internet instead. oh, let’s employ a herculean effort today and read a book instead. there! Now that’s an accomplishment! I *read a few chapters of a novel.* Wow, I’msomekind of fucking genius after all, ain’t I. someone texted me. the phonewas kind enough to not make a noise in this dark morning hour, but its face pulsed with an insistent light, so it may as well have played the trumpet in my ear. i could blame my lack of motivation and focus on technology, i guess, that could be fun. i don’t know dude. i don’t know what to say. everything seems a little hopeless and scary right now. maybe it will be better when i’m finally and complete out of on the other hand, at least i don’t oh shit, i also have the presentations for avid coming up tomorrow, and nobody knows what to do or how to do those. i don’t even know if amanda’s thought it through. we have three different grade leves and one hour to do them in. how are we going to coordinate that. i’ll have to ask her that, THE FUCKING DAY BEFORE WE”RE SUPPOSED TO DO IT, GOD I HATE DOING THAT KIND OF SHIT AND SO I ALWAYS PROCRASTINATE IT AND IT MAKES ME LOOK LIKE A GODDAMNED IDIOT. i want to cry and say i hate being a teacher so that if it doesn’t go well i can blame it on existential reasons and personlaity and temerpament and how our educatino system is so fucked up, andything except just admit that i did a shitty job because because why? because i’m afraid of people and making decisions? well, i guess we’ll just talk to amanda and talk to the kids and give it a shot and see what happens. does anyone want to run through it? has anyone tried running through it? Are you going to record and play back and then be avalilable for questiosn, or are you going to present live (my preference)? i don’t knwo, i’m so tired and groggy and there’s just still this gnawing sense of unease at the back of my inesxplicably stiff neck. every tie i twist with any tiny aount of verve or oomph i get a twinge in my back. i can’t get the sleeping situation down and my fear of having sleep apnea is probably almost as bad as actualy having it. i feel old as fuck and it’s prbably just because i haven’t been getting any exercse. i feel like a fat tube of sausage, glistening and slick and white as a neutered porpoise, and this just weeks after i felt all full of purpose about eating better and bringing that blookd pressure down even though nobody told me to, and the people who measured it didn’t even bother to mention that it was at the high end of normal. i had to look that up myself because nobody gives a shit about your health in this country. we have a shit ton of blinking fancy equipment and we can count the freckles on the back of a mouse’s genes, but we can’t seem to get a syste where we just look out for each other and mention a few things that might help. hey, i noticed that your... hey, you might want to consider.... is it ust me? do i just lack community because i don’t go to church and don’t have any friends? got, what is the point of this fucknig whine session> When do i get to the part where i accidentally start writing something good? it’s just not happening today. this is all one big recaptualtion of a 20-something’s dismal journal entry, with a 48-year-old’s existential and physiological insecurities thrown in to make it even more flaccid and pathetic. fun. yeah, i’m really glad i stopped sleeping for the last few quiet moments before millie comes down, to do *this.* Wow, i feel like a real writer now, i just wrote about myself and my stupid fears for however manyminutes it’s been and i’m no closer to telling an interesting story than i was last night, wel whatever.. try again next time. how do you stop writing journal entries and start weriting something interesting and useful. fuck here comes millie and the lights and the rest of this godforsaken skeleton bone pile of a so called day. lord help me