Transcending

Eastward on the 33rd Street i walked, savoring a half glimpse of the Empire State Building — to catch the second half of my Year-two, mid-summer commute. In about twenty minutes, the train would take me across the Hudson River to the other side, where this cooler, early Autumn air has been making my eight-block walk more relaxing and inviting than ever. Occasionally, on the sidewalk, the breezes would rustle through the tree leaves, and slowly brush me by. When it comes, you would want to keep walking, and walking.

It was this lulling softness in the air, perhaps among some other things, that had brought back to me the dream of reading. By reading i did not mean newspapers, magazines or tough articles, certainly not subway ads. Last night i had pulled out Sherwood Anderson's The Egg and Other Stories from the top of the shelf, slid it into my tote, so that earlier this morning on the downtown express train it would rescue me from the usual dullness accompanying my hour-long commutes. It did, his lightly plotted prose. Hardly any action there was, but the voices of the narrator leading me, with the same softness, into the same trance of that quiet, heavily tree-lined residential neighborhood.

i would not want this to end.

The condemnation

When i wake up tomorrow, i might find myself weighed down, very likely all the way at the bottom, by the regret for having a whole year (or a whole month, even just a whole week) and still...not making the August 1st deadline. But...who else am i trying to fool but myself?

The bitter truth is, whether this happens as a direct result of my procrastination or not, i am not a responsible adult. i am this ROV on an open sea, programmed to but somehow failed to self-propel. i am simply not capable. [Right...a loser statement it is.]

Perhaps the best penalty of all...is not being able to make it. The best lesson even, it almost seems.

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

Let bygones be bygones, i have to learn to. S is right, "it is not the end of the world", though it has to be the beginning of a new chapter.