A Wednesday, Technically

It started because someone used the phrase 'just come for an hour' and I have never once in my life successfully treated that as a binding agreement. By eleven I was picking songs on a jukebox I'd never seen before in a bar I'd only half-noticed from the street, and I was having a genuinely good time, which felt both deserved and slightly irresponsible given that it was a Wednesday in May and I had nowhere to be the next morning except wherever I decided to be.

The thing about having a departure date, even a loose one, even one that still has some packing math attached to it, is that it does something strange to a Wednesday night. Every ordinary thing gets this faint double exposure, like you're living it and already looking back at it at the same time. I picked a song on the jukebox and thought: I wonder if I'll remember this specific jukebox. Which is a ridiculous thing to think. I'm aware.

extremely serious jukebox decisions happening rn

I ended up outside just past one, doing the math on how long the walk home would take versus how much I wanted to stand there a little longer in the warm air. May nights have been genuinely nice lately, that specific spring quality where it's cool enough to feel alive but warm enough that you don't want to go inside. I stood there longer. Obviously.

1:07am. wednesday. no further questions.

I added something to the list when I got home. Not a feelings one this time, a practical one. I wrote down 'figure out what happens to my plants' and immediately felt the specific absurdity of that being the thing that made it feel real. Not the ticket. Not the packing. The plants. Anyway. The jukebox was good. I regret approximately nothing.