a conversation with the ceiling

Dear K-

You know I cannot. You know that isn't the way I work, though perhaps some days I wish that I could be that blissfully simple. But rarely do I have that desire, the desire to be the dead-eyed goldfish mindlessly blowing his own reflection kisses as he swaggers aimlessly about his bowl. Day after day, blissful and dull. I do not think I could handle such a life.

The ennui has evaporated, sucked from my flesh to leave me with nothing but frustration and the tingling sensation of impending deadlines. It feels rather strange to be back in the student setting, and more so it feels strange to be a professional student. Sounds pretentious as fuck, doesn't it? I'm actually having to study for classes every day, which is a new and terrible realization, and still I am not sure if I will maintain the pace which is required by these professors. Of course, I'm not the only one being overwhelmed, but sometimes it gets lonely.

I spent six hours in a cafe one night, huddled over a histology text and scribbling notes to myself on a pad of legal paper. By the end, you could hardly see the table top with it's ringed and crescent moon stains for all the tattered canary yellow sheets. Patrons came and went, but still I sat there guzzling bitter black coffee and writing away. It was almost like high school, although instead of being bored and angst-y I am now trying to focus and be productive.

Someday I will have to be addressed as Doctor. But that seems so far away, and for the moment all I feel like doing is disappearing into a foreign country, melting into the morning market on a crowded street in Brno. Or perhaps it does sound appealing, to sit out on a balcony in the dying hours of the day and sip at a glass of wine. Perhaps that is what I want to do.

But I also want to be called Doctor whenever I step into the room.

Doctor Who? Exactly. And this is my assistant, Rose.

And then I'll bow and exit with a quick grin and then I'll slip out into the afternoon and beat my way to the nearest cafe.

This life is lonely, yes. I haven't found anyone that I could say I truly mesh with well. Of course, it isn't like I have a great amount of time to socialize...but I find myself now, more than ever before, really missing the friends and socialization opportunities I held in university. Now it's like I'm starting again from square one. It took me four long years to build up the friends I made in undergraduate, and then I just had to wave them all away and start anew. What's the point? In four more years I'm just going to be moving again and saying goodbye yet another time. This is why I don't get emotional over departures. People are always departing. I am always departing.

Tell me about your day.

At least I can hear the metros growling in the distance from my new apartment,
-K

Oh Please! Oh, please. oh. Please. Oh! please. Oh? Please. ohhhhh, please. Oh please oh please oh please.

Dear K,

Oh! Ennui. Stifling steaming ennui! It is rolling through your letters and syllables like a thunderstorm. The sound dopplers past me and I hear its speed, spreading seeds of disdain and distaste and hatred of hate and then finally there comes cool waves of detachment. What a sweet summer rain of apathy my dear. Oh I sincerely revel in it. I have found again my love of humans and I am in love with our species and we are very happy. The human race and I are thinking about settling down on a nice little planet, the rent isn't too high and we can afford to sit outside and drink wine on the patio as the sun dips down in the evening.

Laughter and birdsong, these are the things I prescribe.

But really, in the worst possible way I want to warm your untouchable heart and make you laugh and sing silly little songs about toast with me.

We could be uncontrollable and hilarious and skip down cobbled streets with old shoes tied around our necks and bare feet barely touching the ground. Wouldn't that be nice? Wouldn't it be nice of us to be such great beings?

Or maybe it is better to relax and slowly droop our eyelids at the whole joke of it all. Entropy is rushing madly in and even the rules of time break as we sip our rapidly cooling tea. Maybe one day the universe will be so old that it will be young again and then I could convince you finally of the things that set me free.

I wish I could be everything for a moment, but for this moment I'll be fine if I could just have a glass of wine and sit, and sit and stare and laugh and smoke cheap cigarettes and not care about the cancer that comes later in the night of my life to steal me early into sleep.

Wouldn't that be lovely?

Oh please my lovely say that it would be lovely.

caution: contents hot

Dear K-

I have been busy. I apologize. For the record, I didn't automatically banish your call to my voice mail. I was up in international waters when you called and I didn't have service. I actually didn't receive the message until several days later, as it was.

It's the time of year for my insomnia to return. Hot, stale nights of laying on top of the sheets, wondering why I can't relax. It's fantastic. I mean that in the most sarcastic of ways.

Perhaps my lack of sleep is evident by the dryness of this letter. Who knows. Of course, as I sit in this crowded little cafe, drinking an unreasonable hot cappuccino that makes me feel like I'm sweating on the inside as well as the outside, I can't help but think that at least my insomnia has come about at a time when I can stand to sleepwalk through the days. I don't work at the moment, unless you call pecking away at a childishly-written detective novel work. Because that's what I've been up to lately. I've been trying to write again.

And it's all going in the drawer. I don't give a fuck. I did let a coworker read two of my previously written detective stories. That cheap, miserable drivel I pump out when I have nothing better to do. She adored the first, but then commented that in the second story the lead character started sharing too many of my own personal insecurities.

In high school, my AP English teacher told me to write what I know. I guess I know my insecurities. I didn't know what else to do.

I hope you are well. I hope you are enjoying your fluster of activity and preoccupation.

Undulating,
-K