Quarter of noon.
The decade of ideology is over with. It’s really weird to remember when I had a job and to try to piece together what beliefs I espoused. But by the time I quit working, the delusions were ridiculously bad, and I blamed them on the crazy workplace.
One o’clock. It feels like everything is falling apart, body and mind alike.
Two forty. I knew I needed something for my pain, so I just walked to Bi Mart under the blazing sun and bought a bottle of ibuprofen. It must be 85 degrees out. Construction on the new high school has moved along since I last saw the site. There’s part of a building up now, the first story of probably two, and you can see the girders at the corners. When I finally got to Bi Mart, the store was nice and cool inside. Masks were not required except to do business with the pharmacy. I wasn’t concerned because ibuprofen is over the counter; I also bought a tube of toothpaste. At checkout, the cashier looked young enough to be my granddaughter— and then back into the brutal sun. A neighbor on Grove Avenue has a sign up that complains about threats to his Second Amendment rights, and my response to him is kiss mine. I could have sworn that I saw Jan from church pass by me in her silver car as I was trudging up the same street. And I saw Jeff and his wife in the Bi Mart parking lot just getting in their orange Boss Mustang. I guess I was feeling rather crabby because after all I was in pain and in a hurry to fix it. All along the way there and back I appreciated the shade of the few trees I encountered, most of them on Grove Avenue. Home again, my face in the mirror was red and exhausted, but I lost no time in taking the pain reliever. At last it was good to sit down and feel the cool of the air conditioner.
robgradens 