#214

This year, the first of September, summer died all at once. Autumn was present immediately, with a finality and a completeness that startled, but with such correctness, such inarguable factuality, that the calmest sense of the harvest season blankets the spirit. 

Some grieve the end of summer, but autumn is far and away my favorite time of year, and it was a privilege indeed to be out and touched by its very first breeze of the year, complete with the first sparse and gentle fall of little yellow leaves.

Spent at least a couple hours outside almost every single day this summer like I do, also. Feel like I got a real good strong pull of the season's bottle all the way through, which helps very much with transitions. Transitions can be rough.

*

Yesterday on my usual Sunday double I sustained some real hardcore burns. That was the fun part. The main thing was I had to clean putrefied human feces and shit-impregnated compost from an upright plastic bin, the wheeled kind with a hinged lid. This was quite a process, during which I heated, carried, and poured about forty gallons of soapy water in stockpots. I also used pine floor cleaner. Why not bleach, or any disinfectant, Joseph? That is probably what you are asking.

Because of the kind of workplace I choose for myself (bleach is poison with no excusable human use in those circles, much like canola oil), there is no bleach on the premises. Probably for the best; should I have had some handy, I cannot guarantee I would not have poured undiluted it over my legs and feet when I lost control of the bin and released a tidal wave of rotten shitwater into the back alley, dousing everything below mid-shin. Then again, I would have felt considerably more confident I wasn't going to develop a staph infection in the time it took to finish the job, drive home, wash off, change pants, and drive back to close out the shift, which I did by shattering a  huge panel of safety glass on our salad bar--if there had been any bleach around. But there wasn't. 

Also a dude called off a three-person crew, so it was all suitably overwhelming. 

*

It's a fucking gorgeous autumn day. I'm having a rough time, but because of how bad yesterday was, today feels exultant and unquenchable, and would even if the light weren't golden, the breeze cool, the trees blushing beautifully, the sky that lightest evening blue, extra distant, extra keen.

Sometimes it's be thankful or die. I mean to stay thankful.

*

Picked up more Stephen King books on Saturday, as I read The Shining again and have never read Doctor Sleep, which was among the ones I had not yet grabbed. I saw the trailer for the upcoming movie when I went to see It: Chapter Two and it reminded me it'd been years since I reread The Shining, which used to be a favorite and which reliably made me mongo-freaked the living shitfuck out. That book is still a hellacious creepshow. It creeps. Thank heavens.

Loving Doctor Sleep so far. I had no faith that I would when it was released, but I was wrong, which is kind of always the consequence of lacking faith. Faith bears disappointment better than certainty, which is vanity in the first place. But it is amazing how consistently faith bears out; miraculous.

I need this book right now, in fact. With that magic pertaining to wonderful books, it waited till I needed it most. The feeling of needing a drink might be on me very strong right now, were it not for these two books. 

One year sober, folks. No one to give me a chip to carry on my keychain, no cake or candles, but I guess I can share that here. Actually it was a year back in August, but it don't matter.

'Course, I been sober for a year before. Haha! Staying thankful.

*

Anyway, the books:

Saturday

Doctor Sleep

Mr. Mercedes

End of Watch

Dolores Claiborne

The Institute

Sleeping Beauties

Today

Blockade Billy

And, other books not by Stephen King that I also obtained:

Saturday

At the Fights: American Writers on Boxing edited by George Kimball and John Schulan

Frankenstein by Mary Shelley (recovery, given to my younger brother)

A Confederacy of Dunces by John Kennedy Toole

The Haunting of Hill House by Shirley Jackson

Today

Neuromancer, by William Gibson (recovery, given to my youngest brother)

The Amazing Maurice and His Educated Rodents by Terry Pratchett

What is the What by Dave Eggers

The Kitchen God's Wife by Amy Tan

The Song of Roland translated by Frederick Bliss Luquiens, introduced by Nathan A. Smyth

The Waste Land and Other Poems by T.S. Eliot

Jangle the Threads by Scott Beal, Aracelis Girmay, and Rachel McKibbens

Empire Falls by Richard Russo

I Am the Messenger by Marcus Zusak (recovery, given to a friend a long long time ago feels like. I guess twelve maybe thirteen years is a long time but when I use the numbers it feels like less time. so weird)

Dragon of the Lost Sea, Dragon Steel, and Dragon War by Laurence Yep (I checked this series out from the library like a dozen times as a kid, I fucking love the shit out of them. Now I am heedlessly driven to obtain Dragon Cauldron, maybe the best of them and definitely the creepiest. I read that one the most as a kid, and was able to get my hands of Dragon Steel fewer times. The first and last of the series were around about the same frequency. I don't know why things just play out like this sometimes but there is always this kind of reverse play in life with stability mixed in. Wild)

Airborn by Kenneth Oppel

The Mostly True Adventures of Homer P. Figg, by Rodman Philbrick

After Dark, by Murakami Haruki
The Ruby in the Smoke, The Shadow in the North, and The Tiger in the Well, by Philip Pullman
Animorphs #51: The Absolute by K.A. Applegate

*

Been driving around a lot. I drive again, I guess. All part of the endless healing. Gonna go do that now.

Peace, you golden clits

--JL