I Miss You

I miss writing.

Every evening, drained by the sun of all my energy and soaking wet with sweat, I hop in the shower and try to wash away my lethargy. But it doesn’t work because my exhaustion is physical; my body needs to rest and repair itself. I put on my pajamas, prep coffee for the next morning, and gossip with my mid-western roommate over a soundtrack of classic rock and sixties folk music. Then I crawl into bed and doze off as I think about what I would write if I wasn't too tired to whittle down my vague thoughts to structured ideas. And so I fall asleep without committing any part of the day to paper.

Animal Attraction

My roommate Mandy, a small blond heavy equipment operator from the middle of Iowa, is engaged to the electrician on our Det. She’s recently decided that she’s going to end the relationship because he can’t manage to make her happy and because she’s starting to figure out that it’s his fault not hers. She plans her exit strategy every day and tells me stories illustrating his faults for hours. I subtly encourage her to leave him.

Last night at a barbeque infested with mosquitoes she came over to me in a mild fit:

You know for the last two years I’ve been putting on lotion and perfume thinking he would like it. And he never said anything. Sometimes I’d ask and he’d say, "Yea, you smell really good. I like that." But I always had to ask. But tonight, I put on tropical bug spray and he when he came up to me he told me how good I smelled. It’s bug spray! He wants me to smell like bug spray? He’s stupid!

I have to agree.