Hard stop. Reboot. System Check. Error.

My birthday balloon is still here. Floating above me, swaying in an artificial breeze. The Mylar is holding the helium in place and I've decided to leave it up as long as possible. No reason. Maybe because it makes me smile.

Stop. Reboot.

The sun is hitting the glass on the window and struggling to pierce the curtains that do nothing but look tacky on the door to the patio to which we're not allowed to venture.

System check.

I WANT TO GO HOME.

Sorry... didn't mean to shout. Just happened. Just popped out. I do want to go home though... well, maybe not home. More like somewhere. On a trip. I don't know. But being at work today feels torturous. And while there are many an important thing happening at my office today, they all feel small and finite. Total rubbish. It feels... this isn't how I want to spend the rest of my life.

Sitting at a desk doing somebody else's planning and thinking. Taking the little creative reserve I have left and pouring it into every work related project I have and thus leaving nothing but a withered husk where my creativity once flourished.

I feel dry.

Inside.

Cold. Like the Antarctic dessert. My latest script sits alone on some disk space, whimpering at me, asking why I don't talk to it anymore. Why I avoid its stares and change the subject when someone asks me about it.

I should have skipped work today. Yes, there's a huge work group thing today. Yes, we're all supposed to be there. Yes, it would've really bit me in the ass to call in 'sick'. But fuck it. Yes. Fuck it. There's a time for frakin' and a time for fuckin' and right now I feel like being a little more vulgar than my usual less vulgar self. And for that I cannot apologize. I should've called up my boss, told her I couldn't make it, and taken a friend up on his road trip offer. You can't live forever.

Here's the kick in the crotch. I actually like my job. How much more unbearable is this feeling for those who hate theirs? I sit here today and want to be anywhere else. I want to sit at a bar upstate and share a beer with my best friend. I want to go to a non-commercialized coffee shop where the people are artists, not pretenders, and write a scene of my script today. I want to have lunch with my mother. I want to stand at the edge of the world and sound my barbaric yawp.

Not the squeak of a crushed spirit. The pathetic whimpering of a man trudging through existence.

Error. Reboot.

More thoughts I do not wish to share in public forum. I don't like secrets. But I understand the need for them. And these aren't secrets so much as just my private musings... they are for me. Some might be fit for sharing down the road, but right now, they are mine.

I lie to my coworkers. They ask me how I am and I tell them that I'm well or that I can't complain. "Can't complain"? Seriously? Yes. Yes I can. Legitimately? Probably not. But in the grand scheme... I'm not fine at work. Good job, but it's eating my soul. I'm constantly creating here and that takes away what I might create at home. And yes, I work on my own stuff as much as I can. But lunches and breaks are ill substitute for the freedom of waking up, slinging the Blackbird over my shoulder, and heading out to write.

To see. To observe. To love. To live.

Here in the confines of these old walls, that does not happen. We all make our own personal Hell. My high school band director taught me that. It's unfortunate that I'm good at making things happen.

System check. Defragmentation.

I have a meeting in 4 minutes that I don't want to attend. I want to walk outside, get in my car, and drive to Lake Erie. Not even to jump in. Heck, I'll take a day at a local lake. I want to sit on the water in the crisp air today. I want to write something that isn't about selling the message or the brand.

I should be on my way upstate right now. I don't do things like that. And that's responsible. I know that. It's also killing me.

You'd think I would've learned something in college. Maybe just something. Like how sometimes it okay to fall down. It's okay to take the leap and not make it. It's not the end of the world to fail and to admit it. It's okay.

Sometimes crashing and burning creates the ashes from which a person rises anew. I haven't crashed yet. But I feel like I'm in the steep dive, hands pulling up on the stick as best I can. And everyday that I walk in here. Or do anything antithetical to me becoming a writer, I get a little closer to the impact crater.

Seventeen noises. Typing, air circulation, coworker chatter, construction nearby, birds chirping, my own breath, a podcast wafts through the air, phones ringing... and more and more and more in the wild cacophony that echoes about me here and follows me outside and everywhere I go. So many thoughts. So many things to do. E-mails I don't want to read. Phone calls I don't want to take. Nail me down an' whip me. The vegetables will rot. Shit needs cleaned. So much happening. So much going to happen. Still life moving. That's mine. Can't have it. Going to change. Going to be hard. Caffeine is my drug of choice. Off the Coke. Not withdrawal of commercialized addiction. Clarity. The black hole is not the portal. Ancient bricks doth crumble and statues topple. To sands stretch far. Out out brief candle. Talking nonsense. Never ceasing. Never changing. All the din.The lion roars. The girl cries. Wind blows across my face and I feel it calming me. Waves crash. Like thunder. The thunder cliffs. Goodbye Northman. Can't change it. No take-backs. Uh-uh, that wouldn't be fair, old sport. Interaction at its lowest point. A hollow fuck, a meaningful kiss. Confusion on the Orient Express. The rain comes down. Like grace. It's washed away. The boss is talking. I smile. Espresso punches me. A tic-tac. Not happening. Confusion. Derailment. Interruption of the flow. Can't stop the signal.

Hard stop.