i feel like a bachelor

My new schedule leaves SK and I apart Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday, all day long. She works day shift and I work swing shift on those days. I sleep at her house Sunday night and see her for a moment Monday morning as she's leaving for work. The next three nights, I get off work at midnight and ride the bus home where I sleep alone. I spend my days alone and it's easy to forget I have a girlfriend now, easy to fall into a bachelor's sort of grumbly quiet.

Today I came home at 8 am and boiled some eggs. I ate them with crackers and read about twenty pages of Saul Bellow's "The Victim," a book I don't love, but a book I'm committed to finishing. Then I got on the computer. Then I read some short stories and decided to eat again. By then it was after twelve. I looked through my fridge which I'd recently filled with food, but such a random selection of things, I couldn't at first figure out what to put together. I grabbed out the red cabbage which is going to go bad soon if I don't use it, and I grabbed also some carrots and an onion. Ten minutes later, all this was diced up and in my new cast iron skillet when I realized I was out of Bragg's. I love Bragg's. I needed Bragg's for this weird little stir fry, so I turned off the stove and gathered things for a walk to the store.

The walk was lovely. Yesterday's storm was loud and the rain fell hard and the evidence of it all was in the streets today, leaves and debris everywhere. The green trees and bushes were lush and heavy with water and as I walked the heavy clouds parted and some sun came through. I dropped off a book at the library and picked up a novel I'd had on hold. I also picked up "A Tree Grows in Brooklyn" which I happened to see, one of those classics I never read. Then I quickly grabbed a few groceries from Wild Oats and walked back to my house. I cooked. I ate. I read some more short stories and I worked on a story of my own for awhile and now, suddenly, it's time to get ready to leave for work. So here I go.