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I think I want what anyone wants, really. I want intimacy and lunch, I
want skin on my own skin, and the smooth acceleration that comes when I put
my foot down on the gas pedal in my car. I crave and idealize things
inaccessible to me, and I imagine children going swimming off the back of
the fantasy boat on which I've just gone sailing through the Med. I'd like
a good haircut, less crime, and a liberal democrat president who actually
seems to care about the long term effects of his or her actions. I'd like
replacements for the boxer briefs I lost in my luggage, someone interested
in calling me about the same amount that I'm interested in calling them,
and the psychic ability to see through walls, subterfuge, and women's
clothing. A canoe trip would be a lot of fun to do again, I've been
thinking, maybe up to the Boundary Waters. I'd like my cold to subside in
time for my band to play this weekend; occasionally, I'd like to be a woman
for a day. I'd like my fat cat, Lucy, to be thinner, and my thin cat,
Carlos, to be fatter. The mechanical differences between a dry clutch and
a wet clutch still elude me, and my posture while skiing isn't really ideal
and swoopy, both of which would be cool to correct. While I'm at it, I'd
love to be able to not work for about a year and chase astronomical
phenomena around the globe. I should really clean out my basement one of
these days, and I still can't seem to consistently make a beurre blanc
sauce without separating it. The poetry I recite in my head is never as
good when I write it down, and I don't write it down enough. I fear
regret, but that fear means that I hold onto the "pretty good" status quo
with white knuckles. I fear the corks in my wine going bad, but I still
sometimes forget to store the bottles sideways. At times, I feel myself
pulling my head back inside a tortoiseshell of cynicism and depression,
convinced that nothing I do will matter and that I will never find the
synchronies that I see people all around me settling into. Other times I
play great music on my car stereo while driving fast and wearing thin black
driving gloves, and I'm convinced that the rush of the highway past my face
is only the most recent exhilaration of life rushing through me, and that I
am surely a lucky being, a blessed child of the gentle clouds in a
wonderful time of progress and magic, and that I am incredibly fortunate to
never have had a speeding ticket in my life. The lines between "want,"
"need," "love," and "desparation" are uncomfortably murky, sometimes, and I
don't like that at all. I'd like a really good chocolate egg cream; most
of the ones I've had haven't been, of late. Too much seltzer, not enough
syrup.
Yeah, that's kinda what things boil down to, today. Too much seltzer, not enough syrup. |
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