Cheating

It's one AM and I haven't slept, hence have no dreams to blog about.  I've just finished reading the best book I've read in a long-ass time: Zoe Whittall's "Holding Still For As Long As Possible".  I love when a book is so good that I have to read it straight through.  That hasn't happened in a while.

So here I am, gorged on lit, with ambitions of waking at 630 in order to make it to the 1. gym, 2. emissions test, 3. work to start four separate experiments and 4. all before lab meeting at noon.

I think my permanent sense of failure stems from chronically unrealistic expectations.

What I'm wishing is that life was more like art.  The thing about really good books that is also true about great paintings, photographs and sculptures, is that they are True.  They are life cubed.  Reality on steroids.  Zoe's take on the queer texting generation is seductive and irresistable because it gathers all these specific, accurate details and makes them seem romantic, vivid and interesting.  Art is Life Concentrate, Extra Pulp, with Added Calcium (TM).

The truth is that life only feels that way when you're in love, starting a new job, a religious zealot, or enlightened (and I'm not interested in getting into an argument about whether those last two are the same things; but FTR, I don't believe they are).  It's not impossible to live every day with a sense of romance and adventure or even just more run-of-the-mill peaceful joy - but it's hard.  I know only a handful of people who can pull it off on an even semi-regular basis.  I love them dearly.  I'm not one of them.

Bedtime.  Possibly you'll hear from me on the flipside.

PS Gratitude, I am convinced, is the antidote to boredom and cynicism.  Today I'm f-ing grateful that I found my phone.  It had fallen under the bed.  I'm 39 but half my friends are 20-something which means I've become an honorary member of the generation that doesn't understand why you would hand-write letters.  I love you, battery-hogging Samsung flip phone with your sim card full of social contacts' phone numbers.  I promise not to drop you in a toilet bowl when drunk, nor leave you on a bench at the next salsa dance.  I will plug you into my car charger religiously on my commute to work, and carry you more often in that dorky leather protective carry case rather than jammed into the same pocket as my housekeys and nail clippers.  Amen.