restless and surly
Last night i went out with Dreadlock to the Alberta St. Pub. It was boring. Then we walked fifteen blocks down to The Know and that was more than just boring, it was also loud and smoky and I started realizing that my days in that shitty-bar scene are numbered. Ending. Over, maybe. I left early, while Dreadlock was flirting with a coworker. I walked home, checked my email, went bed.
I woke up this morning hungover. Three pints of Pabst. That's all. I can't drink like I used to. That's probably for the best. I came to work. No emails from SK today. I notice that I'm spoiled to her messages and when I don't get any, I feel bratty. It's early there, she's probably still sleeping. Whatever.
I'm feeling restless and surly. I want a cigarette. I'm not a smoker, but I bought a pack of Camel lights the other day for complicated reasons and I've been smoking since then. Not a lot. Just enough. I have to write this paper, this really long, really important paper, and I use the cigarettes as a mind trick. I tell myself that smoking a cigarette is a treat I can have if I get some of my paper done. I tell myself that I'm laboring away over this paper and it will be easier if I adopt a pensive, bitter, smoker persona. I stand out on my front steps, which lead up from my basement to the street. I lean against the cold concrete and look across the flower bed (full of blooming bulb plants, pushing up through a layer of dead, decaying leaves), the ground is eye-level. I blow smoke towards the clouds, purse my lips, squint, feeling hard and tired. Then I go back in, dizzy, sit down, try to write, can't write, get up and wash the smell off my hands, etc.
It's kind of ridiculous.
I'm interested in my paper topic, yet I can't seem to muster any enthusiasm for the writing. I'm writing about early gender normalizing surgeries performed on children born with disorders of sex development (DSDs -- such individuals are also called "intersexed" and they used to be called "hermaphrodites" -- but that's outdated.) I'm writing about how fucked up it is to perform these surgeries on infants and theorizing about the possible avenues for litigation. So far, only in Columbia (the country, not the district of) has a court found doctors liable for medical malpractice for performing these surgeries. Not that anything a Columbian court did will make any difference here b/c we're such separatist xenophobes, but it helps to consider the basis for the decision when crafting arguments to US courts -- the same things might be persuasive.
Anyway, I have strong feelings about the topic, but feel bratty about doing the work and writing a forty page paper. My first draft is due tomorrow night. I've done 10 pages. I guess I'm twenty five percent done. That doesn't feel very moving.
Meanwhile, I have to go to CB's tonight to pick up a box of my stuff. After that awful conversation, she called back and apologized for hanging up on me. Then she called and apologized again -- all on my voicemail, I wasn't picking up. She sounds so sad. It's heartbreaking, really. I have no idea if she'll be home when I get there, I just know she left the box inside and I have to go in and get it. It will be sad to see her. My heart still hurts but there's nothing I can do.
I can't even smoke on the way over there -- I accidentally left my cigarettes at home. Oh well.
I woke up this morning hungover. Three pints of Pabst. That's all. I can't drink like I used to. That's probably for the best. I came to work. No emails from SK today. I notice that I'm spoiled to her messages and when I don't get any, I feel bratty. It's early there, she's probably still sleeping. Whatever.
I'm feeling restless and surly. I want a cigarette. I'm not a smoker, but I bought a pack of Camel lights the other day for complicated reasons and I've been smoking since then. Not a lot. Just enough. I have to write this paper, this really long, really important paper, and I use the cigarettes as a mind trick. I tell myself that smoking a cigarette is a treat I can have if I get some of my paper done. I tell myself that I'm laboring away over this paper and it will be easier if I adopt a pensive, bitter, smoker persona. I stand out on my front steps, which lead up from my basement to the street. I lean against the cold concrete and look across the flower bed (full of blooming bulb plants, pushing up through a layer of dead, decaying leaves), the ground is eye-level. I blow smoke towards the clouds, purse my lips, squint, feeling hard and tired. Then I go back in, dizzy, sit down, try to write, can't write, get up and wash the smell off my hands, etc.
It's kind of ridiculous.
I'm interested in my paper topic, yet I can't seem to muster any enthusiasm for the writing. I'm writing about early gender normalizing surgeries performed on children born with disorders of sex development (DSDs -- such individuals are also called "intersexed" and they used to be called "hermaphrodites" -- but that's outdated.) I'm writing about how fucked up it is to perform these surgeries on infants and theorizing about the possible avenues for litigation. So far, only in Columbia (the country, not the district of) has a court found doctors liable for medical malpractice for performing these surgeries. Not that anything a Columbian court did will make any difference here b/c we're such separatist xenophobes, but it helps to consider the basis for the decision when crafting arguments to US courts -- the same things might be persuasive.
Anyway, I have strong feelings about the topic, but feel bratty about doing the work and writing a forty page paper. My first draft is due tomorrow night. I've done 10 pages. I guess I'm twenty five percent done. That doesn't feel very moving.
Meanwhile, I have to go to CB's tonight to pick up a box of my stuff. After that awful conversation, she called back and apologized for hanging up on me. Then she called and apologized again -- all on my voicemail, I wasn't picking up. She sounds so sad. It's heartbreaking, really. I have no idea if she'll be home when I get there, I just know she left the box inside and I have to go in and get it. It will be sad to see her. My heart still hurts but there's nothing I can do.
I can't even smoke on the way over there -- I accidentally left my cigarettes at home. Oh well.
posted by reasonably prudent poet at 3:13 PM
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home