#99

So what I do is I work five days and get a weekend, but my Monday is Wednesday and my Friday is Sunday. At least, that has been the way things have been able to shake out for a few weeks running, maybe even more than a month (I have a great memory but it is not chrononormative or performative, so I forget what day it is and how much time has passed around events and it is panoramic as opposed to photographic), which is impressive given the way turnover and call-offs go. 

Someone, however, did indeed call off on Tuesday, and I covered the close and opened Wednesday like usual, figured it wouldn't kill me to throw in a clopen at the beginning of my week and take a little overtime. Now the new schedule has come down the line and I do not get a day off till Wednesday, due to various requests for time off, so that's eight days in a row. 

Frankly, I'm glad. I hated Monday, a day on which I accomplished little outside of recuperation, and wished I were at work. Now I have an unbroken stretch in front of me. I have asked, and now I shall receive. It is a blessing to have work for the hands, and paths to tread, so I am grateful.

*

Never before have I wondered if I could get away with simply coming in on my day off, punching the clock, and getting to work. 

Kind of hoping for another call-off I can cover, either to throw a double in there or a ninth day, since I'm already approved for overtime. 

*

I don't need a lot of money to live my life, but I am a gamer, and so when the numbers go up, I feel viscerally rewarded. Paychecks can be a sort of high score. That's why people ask each other "so, what's your game?"

People in my industry are pretty badly underpaid, so my effort-to-number ratio is pretty good. Like, a Wall Street shithead my age pulling in more than three hundred and fifty thousand points after taxes is playing Tetris on easy and getting his dick sucked for it and free cocaine into the bargain. I'm in the corner playing a pinball game that cuts or burns my hands or arms if I fuck up; if I lose, somebody gets sick, and if I play a perfect game, I might get fired with no notice because the pinball machine is fifty grand in the hole. The points don't exactly rack up, but I'm proud to punch my initials next to the score.

--JL

#88

I'll be back after the New Year! I should have mentioned that. I don't feel like making any more blog posts this year. I'll write the first post of the year of our Lord two thousand and nineteen on New Year's Day. Hopefully I'll generate something marginally worth the effort required to read it.

I have had my fill of 2018! This was a really difficult year to survive, but I think I learned a huge amount. Wretched and incredible. So it goes! Upward and onward! If you look back, you die! If you give in to fear, you grow old! Step forward, forward, ever forward!

Enjoy your holidays.


--JL

#24

I missed another day yesterday! No excuse. The day just passed it by. Practiced four musical instruments, walked and fed the dog, went to the market with my mom, read a bunch. Had ample time, but it didn't happen, but I accept this, personally. The blank spaces in some days simply aren't meant to be filled.

Standing on a low hill yesterday, feeling the wind, I existed completely and totally, with no thoughts in my head at all. Only the vast silent rush of the holy wind. Personally I would not replace that moment with my own digital chattering, no matter how apt or amusing or pointless. However, if you happen derive some sustenance from my humble noises, I do apologize that I was not where I was supposed to be.

I can offer you most days! Most. But no truth-seeking person makes promises. Only one man ever made a true promise, and as we are, we can but reach up to that height, straining and failing.

This is all by way of saying that damn play is probably not going to be ready by October first. A lot of things changed since I made that plan, which is how the world works. I still mean to try. This blog is all I've had the juice for since I started, and work demands as work is wont, but things are settling down.


--JL