Stranded.2-The Weekend OF Solitude!
Jan. 31st, 2005 12:39 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
jack_babalonSaturday:
The storm didn't just dump a few inches of freezing rain and then pass up the Mason-Dixon line spreading a little seasonal chaos. It left in it's wake a different world, a small pocket of a different reality. I'm marching to get some smokes. Marching is the right word, because the snow crunching under my boots makes it sound like i'm two stepping with an invisible regiment, there must be a dozen of us according to the echo. The sun is going down but you can't really tell. There was no daytime today. There's only Night and not-Night. I'm between the two. Down the lenght of the road you can see the trees hang low with the weight of the cold. Crystalized pine needles each wrapped in their own private icicle. I snatch one off as I duck under the branches. I suckle on it to satisfy the oral fixation the cigs have given me. Mmmmm it tastes like Christmas Trees. There are patches of ice that just pop up on you- long streches of frictionless road and each step is gentle, very small, a bull sneaking out of a China shop. The wind roars and sends down a cascade of sleet on me. I just stand there and force myself not to give in to instinct, to dodge or sidestep. Some of it goes down my bomber and I yelp like a little girl. The wind howls back a laugh.
I resume taking baby steps but to the side rather than forward so I look like i'm crab scuttling or line dancing. I make it to the swail right by the road. The grass sticks up straight and is frozen solid. Walking across leaves a different kind of crunching- I'm Godzilla walking across Tokyo, in my wake the crushed skyline of the frozen blades of grass. I get a burst of sleet coming down. It lasts a few minutes. Shake it off and keep going, keep marching and I can see the Shell Station sign up on top of the hill. I cross the street and dodge a car that either had no brakes or was NOT going to brake for me. The adrenalin is pumping in me now and I take the rest of the slope at a light run. I get in and the clerks behind the counter just look at me confused- like a Orangatang just walked in and asked for the Sunday paper. Much to my suprise theres a Mexican couple in front of the slot machines in the back. Oblivious to me or the elements. I pick up a cup of shitty 12 hour gas station coffee for the warmth more than anything else, I grab some candy bars as well along with the Camels I needed. On the way out I pause at the door. A car screeches and almost spins 360 at the light into a pick up truck. Another burst of sleet comes down hitting the glass of the door in front of me like pellets from a BB gun.
"You don't want to go out there" one of the clerks says.
"I know" I say like a little kid who got caught doing something wrong and had to own up to it. I close my eyes and breathe deep. I push the door open and force one boot in front of the other, back and forth, and back and forth
This is the only truth a man can know sometimes. That he must go forward no matter what lies ahead.
The storm didn't just dump a few inches of freezing rain and then pass up the Mason-Dixon line spreading a little seasonal chaos. It left in it's wake a different world, a small pocket of a different reality. I'm marching to get some smokes. Marching is the right word, because the snow crunching under my boots makes it sound like i'm two stepping with an invisible regiment, there must be a dozen of us according to the echo. The sun is going down but you can't really tell. There was no daytime today. There's only Night and not-Night. I'm between the two. Down the lenght of the road you can see the trees hang low with the weight of the cold. Crystalized pine needles each wrapped in their own private icicle. I snatch one off as I duck under the branches. I suckle on it to satisfy the oral fixation the cigs have given me. Mmmmm it tastes like Christmas Trees. There are patches of ice that just pop up on you- long streches of frictionless road and each step is gentle, very small, a bull sneaking out of a China shop. The wind roars and sends down a cascade of sleet on me. I just stand there and force myself not to give in to instinct, to dodge or sidestep. Some of it goes down my bomber and I yelp like a little girl. The wind howls back a laugh.
I resume taking baby steps but to the side rather than forward so I look like i'm crab scuttling or line dancing. I make it to the swail right by the road. The grass sticks up straight and is frozen solid. Walking across leaves a different kind of crunching- I'm Godzilla walking across Tokyo, in my wake the crushed skyline of the frozen blades of grass. I get a burst of sleet coming down. It lasts a few minutes. Shake it off and keep going, keep marching and I can see the Shell Station sign up on top of the hill. I cross the street and dodge a car that either had no brakes or was NOT going to brake for me. The adrenalin is pumping in me now and I take the rest of the slope at a light run. I get in and the clerks behind the counter just look at me confused- like a Orangatang just walked in and asked for the Sunday paper. Much to my suprise theres a Mexican couple in front of the slot machines in the back. Oblivious to me or the elements. I pick up a cup of shitty 12 hour gas station coffee for the warmth more than anything else, I grab some candy bars as well along with the Camels I needed. On the way out I pause at the door. A car screeches and almost spins 360 at the light into a pick up truck. Another burst of sleet comes down hitting the glass of the door in front of me like pellets from a BB gun.
"You don't want to go out there" one of the clerks says.
"I know" I say like a little kid who got caught doing something wrong and had to own up to it. I close my eyes and breathe deep. I push the door open and force one boot in front of the other, back and forth, and back and forth
This is the only truth a man can know sometimes. That he must go forward no matter what lies ahead.