Lost Time

Blue Grass, of a sort. Bela and his weird banjo, his amour, singing strangely traditional tunes. The sense that music makes is the same side of the brain I use writing you. If I don't pay any attention I can be in touch with it, when I listen closely, I lose contact completely. Floating off into a Partita, doing a high-step around the island. I see it's 9 o'clock and don't know if it's morning or night, make breakfast, always a good bet. As the darkness deepens, I assume I was wrong. I can deal with that. I'm wrong more often than I might casually admit. Any idiot could see it's night, but I was holding out for overcast, as it is, it's either today or tomorrow. It could be yesterday, but I rule that out as a matter of course, pretty sure I already did yesterday, or the dream was vivid enough to make me believe. I remember driving or pulling nails, hitting my thumb, the damage is apparent. I'm sure it's a recent wound, it's still bleeding. I use that knowledge to establish a time-line: I must have been there then. Some things fall into place, but what about the tattoo, and where did that earring come from? Not sure things mean as much as they are. Walking the bounds, today, I was struck with how little I know. One place I stopped, over near the graveyard, I didn't recognize a single thing, like I had slipped into another universe and nothing was the same. I'm pretty good on trees and bushes but I couldn't identify a single thing. The grasses were the wrong color, the leaves were wrong, the growth patterns. I stood quite still and looked for my tracks in the soft ground: the way you entered is often an exit, if you haven't stirred things too much. When I gain sight of the house, I squeak, a muffled high-pitched sound, yes, home again. Simple pleasures. Roll a smoke, get a cup of coffee. My chair is uncomfortable as always. I must want it that way. Time unfolds. If I'm lucky I gain a paragraph, if I'm unlucky I lose one. There's a joke there but I don't feel funny. Comic, maybe. Tragic might be closer to the point. Consider the janitor thus, a trail of shit or vomit that leads to a pile, immediately you think logistics, how to get this from here to there. I use a lot of paper towels. Everywhere but my house I'm neat and tidy, my own space is a pig-sty, I clean it twice a year, more than that seems redundant. I'm not trying to impress anyone with my habits. I shave almost daily, wash often enough to not stink. The very model of a modern major general. Get the beat right, it's all jazz. Prison Bay is a Buffet song, right? No place you'd like to be. A corner of Cuba for really bad guys. But wait, I'm not so good myself. Not bad enough to be imprisoned but bad enough, cut me some slack, would you trust me with your daughters? Truth be known, I'd merely poke them, to make sure everything was in the correct place, roll over and go to sleep. I have a busy day tomorrow. Preparing for the reunion. Cut me some slack, I want to be there, in the moment, but I'm drawn elsewhere. How many pounds of potatoes per person? What cheese? Simple questions. but the answers are never that easy.