Seven Words and a Very Long Walk to My Car

I have been thinking about something completely unimportant for approximately four hours and I am tired. Not bad-tired. Just the specific tired that happens when your brain gets hold of a small, dumb thing and decides, actually, we're going to run this on loop until further notice.

There is a guy at the running club. I have mentioned the running club before, Sophie, the quiet regulars, the weird solidarity of people who choose to be outside before seven a.m. for reasons none of us fully understand. I have not mentioned the guy because there is nothing to mention. He showed up maybe three weeks ago. He runs fast, leaves fast, doesn't really talk to anyone. This morning we ended up walking to the parking lot at the same time because we both finished within thirty seconds of each other and that is just geography, not fate. He said 'good pace today.' I said 'thanks.' He said 'see you Thursday.' I said 'yeah.' That is seven words. Those are the seven words. I have thought about them for four hours.

I put my phone face-down in the pottery bowl on my dresser, which I do when I need to stop doing something I'm doing too much of, and what I was doing too much of was absolutely nothing, I was just staring at it, and made myself sit here and write instead. That's the deal I made with myself in April when this whole blog thing started: if you're going to feel something, at least put it somewhere.

the pottery bowl watching me spiral. as always.

So here it is. I felt something small and slightly embarrassing for four hours on a Friday. I'm eighteen and it's September and I said 'thanks' to a boy in a parking lot and apparently that's enough to run the engine all the way to nine-thirty p.m.

phone goes here when the brain needs to stop. it's a system.

Thursday is in six days. I am going to act completely normal. I am going to continue to act completely normal even as I type that sentence and watch it be obviously untrue. Goodnight.