Four thirty in the morning.
The night is so long it’s ridiculous. I think I’ve done all the sleeping I could. I awoke to the tune of “Cult of Personality” by Living Color, perhaps the best Black heavy metal band ever. I don’t remember what other dreams I had during the night. The service for All Saints’ Day felt pretty weird to me; kind of like “The Altar of the Dead.” Photographs of dead people, candles, and photographs of the photographs, while the assembly prayed to keep them alive in heaven. A sort of magic spell to make us feel better about death. “Parting is all we know of heaven / And all we need of hell.” Dickinson’s agnosticism makes more sense to me than self deluding tricks. It is also more honest. But at the same time, it took me ten years to get over losing my mother. I guess I was kind of sleepwalking yesterday at the service; there was no one I was grieving for. Now I have to wait two more hours until daylight, but the store opens at six o’clock on weekdays. Suddenly I feel tired again. Either wake up with a Snapple tea or go back to bed and rest for a while. The night has been incredibly long… and this brings to my mind “Matte Kudesai” by King Crimson, such an exquisite little piece of music, owing mostly to Robert Fripp’s rhythm guitar line.
Seven thirty. I took so long picking out the chicken strips for Aesop that I totally forgot to buy his canned food, so now I have to run back to the store again. The sky is clear now, with the sun just peeking over the housetops to the east. I regret being absentminded in church yesterday morning; I hadn’t had my caffeine yet, wasn’t very alert. It was actually a fascinating ritual to watch, and it made me ponder about how people deal with death. I probably avoided it by drinking a lot of alcohol for fifteen years. The one question I remember having regarding my mother was why I still remained here after she had gone. It made no sense to me.
robgradens 