While napping on the couch this morning I wrote a poem. I woke as I finished it, feeling the lines slide from one into the next. A moment of joy and then it is incoherent and fades away. But - it was beautiful.
And the pegs are slipping, or the strings are stretching
We are in tune with ourselves and out of tune with each other. I wake up at 5:30, 6, 6:30 - delighted by the sun, the clean morning blue of the sky, slowly turning into the white of morning haze over the lake. Ethan rolls over as I slip out of bed, out to the computer, my book, some breakfast, Greek reading. Some mornings I still feel tired - then it's just a couple of chapters to restore that perk. Or a cup of tea. Or something. The only thing that stays constant is me waking up and tiptoeing around for a couple of hours until Ethan feels ready to embrace the morning. If we had better soundproofing, I'd watch Buffy every day (FX at 6!) to just keep that nostalgia going. I am young, on my own, I can plan my life for myself. Ethan gets up, we have breakfast (again) together and set about the day. Work. Lunch. Library. Dinner. Work or play in the evening. But I am getting tired by 9, unless I've had a nap. And Ethan is wide awake and ready. We compromise without ever saying anything. He gets himself up a little earlier than he otherwise might, goes to bed with me earlier too, although sometimes he slips out again to read when he can't fall asleep. I try to be quiet, get some work done early on so later, before I fade, there is time for levity. But there is a sense the whole time that we have both set our schedules. It is a hard thing, to be apart and together so permanently, for so long. You adapt, find your balance, remember how to be alone - otherwise you sink into a puddle of incoherence and nothing would ever get done - no dishes, no bills, no laundry, no work. I have days like that. Sick days, I suppose, where I end up eating mandarin oranges out of a can for dinner because nothing appeals and I don't have the energy to change that. And then you're back together and it's delightful - no need to schedule conversation, someone to go shopping with. Together, we just are. And I suppose after a few more weeks I'll value this time - already I start to. I have the train, instead of my planes and I listen instead of look. When we spend all day together, these moments of quiet and calm are soothing. And in the morning I have that quiet and calm, it seems, from the whole world. No shouting from the pepperland, no noise from the hall, no horns or gunned engines at the stop sign. The trains are fewer and then more and then fewer again as morning rush comes and goes. The freight trains are early, to keep out of the way. And I suppose I can finally see the 6am amtrak from champaign, if I look out my window at just the right time.
