Essay #3
Nothing of note
The mom of a girl I had a crush on in 5th grade sent me a friend request on Facebook last week. I saw it on my way to The Facebook Marketplace, pretended like I didn’t notice and continued to browse the same hatchbacks I had seen 45 minutes ago, but then last night this new awareness of a person miles away digitally thinking about me forcefully entered my dream and made the first day of the week which they require me to be in the office that much more disillusioning.
BUT let me continue laying out the foundations of my current state. A week ago I vaped a lot. It felt so good, and for the first few days as I reentered my Alan Carr-dictated sobriety, I could not believe the sentiment that nicotine would be anything but a relief for my lungs. It’s been a week now and my body remembered that oxygen is what I was looking for. I have been wandering around the house taking deep breaths like galaxy gas, realizing that my previously prescribed breathwork activities weren’t working because the breaths weren’t reaching more than 10% of the way to my lungs.
Put on a nasty outfit this morning. Took a picture of it and decided it was too embarrassing to send to a friend because I would be admitting I thought the outfit was “cool,” discounting all swag immediately. “You’re My Angel” came on thanks to DJ X and I shouted, “Everyone’s got a little Zyzz in them,” as I rallied 35 mph for my suburban commute downtown.
Can I outwardly experience whimsy? Is that allowed? My intuition is no, and my intuition has enslaved me to the point of probably imprisoning my actual intuition. I’m trying to say I have two intuitions, non-schizophrenically, and the one perceived as intuitive is the imposter. My impostor intuition also believes that mysterious silence is fun and interesting for those around me who are attempting to communicate, when not communicating is making my existence in their life extremely confusing and horrific. Bad day to think that, though, because I am wearing mega swag head to toe. One fitted sport coat away from the 2027 NBA draft.
I take one or two dribbles and lose the ball but make it look purposeful as it rolls away. I play the role of pretending I was done even though I just walked onto the court and that was my ball, so they don’t know whether to pass it to me or if that would ruin the screenplay.
Interlude: I am the AI. He asked me to stand here for a second while he figured out what came next. I don’t know either.
Ignore that I am trying new things as the creative process becomes a fugue state. It doesn’t help that I looked up to find the time for this next section, where I explain that I am two hours into the brutal soul suck of office fluorescence, and was greeted with the pleasing but timely haunting nature of 11:11 AM.
Shocked so deeply I never made a wish, and it took me long enough to write that last sentence that it is now 11:12 AM and God said too late try again later.
What would I even wish for? Should you prepare your wishes ahead of time, or is there a deeper magic in coming up with the wish on the spot? I wish I knew what I was aiming for with this essay.
On the subject of time, as I continue writing to achieve a higher word count and not substance, I was sitting on the bench outside the Woodrow Washeteria drifting away when some beauty got in his Altima and, windows up, I heard clear as day:
AND IF THE DAM BREAKS OPEN MANY YEARS TOO SOON
AND IF THERE IS NO ROOM UPON THE HILL
AND IF YOUR HEAD EXPLODES WITH DARK FOREBODINGS TOO
The laundromat is the only place you can still feel the warmth of your God.
Today, someone asked me how my weekend was and, as usual, I hesitated. Not withholding information, but forgetting I was supposed to remember. I remembered something, said good, hesitated some more as I weighed the pros and cons of sharing this weekend highlight—
Coworker just walked past. I wonder what the activity of this essay looks like.
—then remembered you can just pass the ball off and asked them about theirs. I proceeded to be way too into what they did this weekend, at which point they sat down and started working and I stood behind them for a few more minutes breathing deeply.
Well, I have reached the present. I think I feel much worse than when I chose to write this. I should probably go for a walk, but in the name of science I’m glad I showed up here in my work computer’s Notes app.
Bob Zimmerman