Sleeping is Hard

Cal decided that sleeping was difficult. At night, he'd lie in bed, drift off, maybe fall asleep for a few minutes. Start halfway-dreaming. Then twitch awake. Then he'd drift off again. And dream. And twitch awake. Sleep. Dream. Twitch. Repeat.

As if flinching awake every few moments wasn't irritating enough, the half-dreams-or what fragments of fragments he remembered the next morning-left him with images he couldn't shake.

Like shadowed doorways and snatches of sunlight on barren concrete. Like friends long-buried.

And every time Cal flinched awake, he felt the fresh grief of leaving again.

Running: Revised

I went running today on a surprisingly scenic lap around an industrial park near my house. It seems as if the city planners put all their landscaping mojo into that little two-mile square plot of land, building gently sloping little hills lined with grass and trees up against some bland concrete buildings. They even threw in some now-defunct railroad tracks half-buried under the remains of autumn's leaves. How considerate. It's all very picturesque if you can ignore the main thoroughfare that was thankfully quite deserted on this Sunday afternoon.

It's not often that I feel so happy while out running. Lately, I've been dragging myself all over the hills of Westwood, mostly down cracked concrete beside angry L.A. traffic. Running, for me, has become a way to maintain my individuality because in all honesty, I'm a crap runner. I like to think that I'm one of those incredibly fit maniacs who live off of salad and brown rice, but I've got a one-pack of adipose and I regularly eat salad because I'm literally allergic to everything else in the dining hall downstairs.

I guess my reasons for running have changed.

I'm running now because I want to prove I'm not like everyone else. I'm not running to get in shape or stay in shape. Neither's going to happen any time soon. I'm not running because I want to be a healthy person. With all the exhaust I breathe in on my runs, I'm pretty sure I'm killing something in my lungs. I'm not running to look good. God knows it'll take a lot more than running for that to happen.

I'm running to clear my head. I'm running to focus. There's a reason I never go out running with headphones. Running is a time to think, and music distracts me because I get so caught up in the beat.

Plus I can't hear anything around me when I run, so I'd probably get hit by a car. Or hit a car while running. Or something equally uncoordinated.

I'm running so I can feel good about myself. What better way to enjoy this self-imposed isolation than by flaunting it? Hey. Yeah. I'm running. I'm running alone. All. By. Myself. Got a problem? No one's ever got a problem.

Running's the only time I'm not thinking about how many problem sets I have left to do. When I run, I think about how I'm feeling, both physically and emotionally. It's only when I'm running that I realize that both of these are important.

This is running.

Friends

Among my friends, I am known as a bit of a party animal. 

I'm a beast on the dance floor. I can carry a conversation without the use of pronouns. I stay out until the crack of dawn. I wear skirts and combat boots. Makeup is my friend. I drive my parents' BMW and top it off whenever I feel like it. Everyone likes me. 

I think guys are awesome because guys are always on my mind because all I can think about are guys and guys and guys and more hot guys. The world revolves around attracting the attention of the opposite gender. 

My world. 

Which is everyone else's world, of course.

Among my friends, I am known as a bit of a brat. 

I grind like there's no tomorrow. I speak incessantly about nothing at all. I sleep in class. I like advertising my skin. Pasting layers of crap on my face is fun. I don't understand the concept of making my own way in the world. Everyone puts up with me. 

Among my friends (if I really even have any friends), I feel like maybe there's something missing. 

To be honest, I don't think I have any friends.

If I were my friend, I wouldn't like me. 

Thank goodness I haven't got any.

Friends. 

Or me. 

Ghosts

The man in the trench coat ghosted through pools of light, shoulders hunched, satchel in hand. The orange glow that fell on him brought with it a sense of other-worldliness, as if this man did not quite belong.

He didn't.

On this unseasonably warm winter's night, he was a monster, his silhouette a lumpy creature of the darkness into which he melted with almost a sigh of relief.

This was a thing caught between imagination and reality, Cal decided, unzipping his jacket in a show of defiance. There was no man.

All the same, he turned, almost against his will, to look over his shoulder. Darkness. Just darkness.

Cal shivered.

Chance

Today's sermon was about baptism.

I frankly don't remember very much of it. I never really do. As the message began, I resigned myself to another round of let's-try-not-to-fall-asleep-this-time!

About halfway through the message, a young man walked up the center aisle. Purple T-shirt. Tight black jeans. He stood right in front of the stage and looked up at the pastor.

"My name's Collin," he said, "I want to get baptized."

There was a collective intake of breath across the auditorium.

"Uh... Can you wait until tomorrow?" the pastor said, mid-message.

"No," Collin said, "I want to get baptized today."

The pastor froze. I shifted uncomfortably, sleep forgotten.

"Why don't you take a seat over there?" the pastor said, "We'll work something out."

Collin turned, walking straight past the seats to the back of the auditorium. At the door, he bolted and ran.

I sat, thinking, how many more have we lost?

My Running Companion

I've started talking to myself on my runs.

I read somewhere that the ideal long run pace is one at which you can maintain a casual conversation. Even though I'm a lonely hermit with no one to run with, I've still managed to maintain casual conversation... with myself.

I'm pretty sure some people driving down Marquart the other day heard some really odd snatches of one-sided conversation involving crunchy leaves. Today, I spent about half my run screaming about kidneys. 

It's quite liberating, really. To go out running and screaming at the same time, knowing that (hopefully) no one will be able to make sense of what you're saying (or notice, perhaps, that you're talking to yourself). That's something you can't do on a treadmill.

This is War

My brother and I just had an all-out stuffed animal war.

He started it.

I only defended my dignity, which was badly damaged by an ambush in the bathroom whilst flouride-gargling.

I nailed him with a well-placed pink dinosaur. He retaliated with a rather large, overstuffed horse as I dove out of the bathroom, still dutifully gargling, into a pile of quite corporeal, fuzzy childhood memories.

It was all-out war for the next few minutes until I decided that I was in serious danger of ingesting my mouthwash and beat a hasty retreat back to the bathroom. My mouth minty-fresh, I turned to jump back into the fray, but was beaten back by a maelstrom of large, stuffed, Christmas-themed dogs.

Our great war spilled over into the long upstairs hallway as my brother barricaded himself in the master bedroom and I took shelter in the little nook just outside his room. There were several long moments of tension as we peeked at each other from around our respective corners, then all hell broke loose again as we ran at each other like five-year-olds pumped full of sugar, hurling little furry fish and teddy bears and seahorses at each other.

I backed him up to the stairs, and suddenly my stuffed pig could fly as it sailed downstairs.

From below, my mother screeched in protest.

We froze.

And decided on a truce.