CONVERSATIONS..........

CONVERSATIONS

6:30 am, for me, usually arrives in an obnoxious manner. Most mornings I catch myself being awakened to some commercially overplayed radio tune. For the record - the snooze button doesn't have any of my fingerprints on it.  So if faced with actually proving in court that I own my alarm clock, I'm pretty sure I'll need the best lawyer around - hands down, the Lincoln Lawyer.



Most mornings I stand next to my antique green gas stove and tiredly yank my coffee beans down from the second shelf of my cupboards. I usually have to throw back up the salt and garlic powder that managed to escape yet again, for their usual morning descent onto the counter. I scuffle around for a filter, an unbleached one, and reluctantly decide that, yes indeed, I should be awake...I am awake - officially a morning person.

Then it happens seconds later, without fail, my roosters awake. Yes, even I beat the roosters (my 5 and 3 year old sons) awake most days - barely.

Realizing that the morning is actually a really raw kind of experience that can be used to connect with my husband, it wasn't long into my marriage that we decided to get up earlier than the kids. With his full work load and school jumbled into a web of too few minutes and its own headaches, I actually started looking forward to mornings. I started to look forward to our conversations and discoveries.

I have always thought, (and still do think), of my husband to be hilarious; addicting. He actually makes me crave his presence. Most mornings, I excitedly pour a homemade hot coffee brew into two coffee cups. I fill his higher than mine because coffee and me are still on a drip by drip plan. From there we start.

We start ideas. We start potential cartoon drawings. (I start wearing fragrant smelling lotions). We start deep conversations about Jesus. We start inventing bizarre thingamajigs.  He starts winking. We start craving gourmet food. We start getting to know each other more. We start fighting. (I start wearing prettier sweaters). We start writing songs. (He starts having a harder time looking at me without getting distracted). We start sorting through the pressures of a busy entrepreneur lifestyle. We start flirting. We start growing. We start laughing. We start being honest and in tune. We start inside jokes and discover new hobbies. We start pouring more coffee, except this time we add cream.

And as the days start, we start. We start our own warmth for the day, our own tone. We start our own color of Monday; our own style of Tuesday; our own personal Wednesday; our own complex Thursday; our own version of weekends. And we keep starting - even at noon, even at dinner, even at closing time.

I have always loved the concept and the reality of seven days a week. I mean seven different, unique, new days, with a constant rhythm - one by one arriving our way. Mondays and Tuesdays, Wednesdays and Thursdays’ and weekends too - it really is dreamy.


Monday,Tuesday,Wednesday,Thursday,Friday,Saturday,Sunday
-Caryl

Check out my Come Get me! for Starting Date Ideas at the bottom of blog

(A dramatic sad short story)

A day and a half-

She lived in a house, in an HOA neighborhood, for seven years. This might sound intriguing, but it was actually filled with sadness. People on this street had the most melancholy, bizarre ways of thinking. The old lady down the street was constantly walking around with empty holes in her heart, ratting out any neighbor that had garbage cans in sight, trailers in driveways, anything and everything that she could find a flaw in - she was all over it. The house several houses down from hers was a constant parking lot of nagging, raging housewives, disloyal lovers, lie architects, drunks, misguided doleful political thinkers - an endless broken down, manipulative pile of extremely lost and bitter people.

They hated seeing people happy. They hated smiles, they hated heartbeats, they hated within, and they hated her. They even passed out hate for trick-or-treat, and her Marilyn Monroe costume was spot on. They all worked the same job for years, sucking time and energy out of them consistently. They were paranoid, lonely, downright mean and unwilling to break free. They drove the same predictable way to town, at precisely the same time without fail. And when they drove by they threw everything but sticks and stones, yet none of it hit her.

Their cotton unfitting shirts and well-worn sandals never hid a lie. Several neighbors hung out at this parking lot of loneliness every weekend without fail. Living 23 miles from Austin, she was somewhat confident they have never actually been to Austin - not once.

During the weekdays several different lost woman on the street would sit on their faded outdoor chairs and hold phones to their ears, never smiling but chatting. Chatting, chatting, and chatting. Crushed Marlboro cigarette butts formed lonesome trails, in threadbare patterns from yard to yard. The men arrived home from work drained and programmed. They all had nice houses, a thriving Texas native flowerbed, and two car payments.

The irony and sadness of it all was that they only lived a day and a half every week. A day and a half of drunkenness, partying and decayed laughter. They met in their parking lot of emptiness every weekend for a day and a half. It was truly chaotic to see. It was like jobs were walking around with people on leashes. All the minds were numb, wearing grim goggles and getting mental tans.

And so, when no one was looking, she took the Mondays and smuggled the Tuesdays and picked up the bruised and broken down Wednesdays and Thursdays too. She found a way with them, a place with them. She lived a life with them.