Consternation Nation

Covered in coffee, I dumped espresso onto my lap. Mediocre mud covers the northeastern quadrant of my laptop. The phone placed neatly next to the laptop took a splash and ate a deluge. The pouch I keep a notebook in took the brunt of the flood; the coffee seeps through the cracks in the table. I have half a mind to pack it up for the day, but I like Renoir Square. I call it that because it reminds me of his piece, Bal De La Galette. The collection of tables, chairs, benches, and streetlights all mimic the piece, but the unavoidable difference is the lack of human bodies draped in dresses and bonnets, top hats, and overcoats.

I think simple times are gone for good, and I’m not sure if they were even here to begin with. An era of arduous effort appropriate for the toiling soul starved and cut off. I leave, and I miss it, I stay, and I loathe it. Back in the cave, Jack! Back in the cave to stare at the wall and idolize shadows. The City was a shadow, what, with all the flickering lights of the subway station, face planting on the shit-smeared sidewalk with the lights at my back. Cigarettes on a Saturday afternoon flicked off the fire escape, falling to the street below with the intent to ignite a fire, burning it all to the ground. The impossible cost of living The City charges a price up front and then again on the backside. The journey continues, but the engines have stalled, and now I’m back in the valley. It’s an authoritarian tendency toward critical critique. There’s always something one can complain about, and to be content is a concept far off, somewhere off in the distance between everything I think I need and the overwhelming urge to blow it all to hell. Day four of my five-day fast, and while my hunger for solid food is increasing, I have a deeper appetite in the pit of my stomach, calling out both vociferous and grave, both vehement and dire. The strange man behind me plays the pan flute dressed in leather biker garb. Maybe I should appreciate him, but at this point, I hope he crashes on his way home.

Cover Art: Bal du moulin de la Galette - Pierre-Auguste Renoir