Reactionary
(Written in a hotel room in Bloomington, Minnesota, on the 10th of August, 2009.)
I left my business casual in a puddle on the floor, opting instead for pajamas. The only mental response I really had was a quest for comfort ... Anything comfortable. Pajamas and Girl Scout cookies would have to do for the moment.
My friends are on the way and at least then things will pretend to improve. We'll have each other anyway.
I left Sauk Rapids yesterday and could only think, "What am I doing? I should be staying here!" But that sense of obligation was there -- the, "Ashley, you have work to do. If you had finished it last week you could just stay in town."
"But I had no idea."
By the time I was outside St. Cloud, I was making plans for the return trip that I had been certain I wouldn't make. It felt so wrong to be leaving.
I woke up this morning resolved. I was going to go back. And it's a good thing I had already made that decision or getting through the day would have been truly unbearable. I couldn't concentrate long enough to keep track of my car keys; I couldn't answer the normally innocuous Monday morning question -- "So how was your weekend?" -- without tearing up.
Finally I took to answering it point-blank. "Terrible. Absolutely terrible."
It's strange ... Yesterday I couldn't cry. I felt it -- it was there. But for whatever reason, lack of sleep or residual wedding stuff in my system, I just could not react. I felt inhuman, robotic, out of touch.
Until that point just outside St. Cloud when the tears started and didn't stop. Suddenly I just needed to talk to people and tell them about my friend ... I knew I had to come back.
Tomorrow ... Oy. I wish I were anywhere but here right now.
I left my business casual in a puddle on the floor, opting instead for pajamas. The only mental response I really had was a quest for comfort ... Anything comfortable. Pajamas and Girl Scout cookies would have to do for the moment.
My friends are on the way and at least then things will pretend to improve. We'll have each other anyway.
I left Sauk Rapids yesterday and could only think, "What am I doing? I should be staying here!" But that sense of obligation was there -- the, "Ashley, you have work to do. If you had finished it last week you could just stay in town."
"But I had no idea."
By the time I was outside St. Cloud, I was making plans for the return trip that I had been certain I wouldn't make. It felt so wrong to be leaving.
I woke up this morning resolved. I was going to go back. And it's a good thing I had already made that decision or getting through the day would have been truly unbearable. I couldn't concentrate long enough to keep track of my car keys; I couldn't answer the normally innocuous Monday morning question -- "So how was your weekend?" -- without tearing up.
Finally I took to answering it point-blank. "Terrible. Absolutely terrible."
It's strange ... Yesterday I couldn't cry. I felt it -- it was there. But for whatever reason, lack of sleep or residual wedding stuff in my system, I just could not react. I felt inhuman, robotic, out of touch.
Until that point just outside St. Cloud when the tears started and didn't stop. Suddenly I just needed to talk to people and tell them about my friend ... I knew I had to come back.
Tomorrow ... Oy. I wish I were anywhere but here right now.
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-B