One Step Away

The patterns are taking shape. Sleeping when the sun is up, avoiding work, saying no to things you like to do, finding fault with perfection, laying mortar to the blocks of your isolation. Yep. Soon you'll be talking to yourself as you shuffle your way along the sidewalk, coffee steaming in your paper cup, head down, on your way to the river. It's the clutter that got to you. That and the unfinished business. It would have been your father's 89th birthday today if he had made it this far. But that is just a coincidence, isn't it? You pull it together and get your ass in the car and make your way to your first day teaching of this new year and new semester, the ropes and cables that hold you here light as air until you remember.