Yesterday and today were cooler than we've had in the past few days, and it scared me, because it was cold, and that's a reminder that winter is coming, and misery will return, and I don't know if I can handle it, feeling worthless all the time again, regardless of how many sit-ups I did in August or how many miles I ran in July or how many words I wrote in June.
So, I went out to the lake, like I always do, and I tried to find the spot where the water was bubbling up from the ground that I recorded a few seconds of three weeks ago, thinking it was cool enough I could upload ten minutes of it and, I dunno, buy my own home with the proceeds. But it had all dried up, even the water coming up from the ground (there was still a very small stream--say, one foot wide) coming from the mountains and feeding into the lake, but it will be dried up by the next time I go out there), and in the time that I was looking for the spring, the sun was getting awfully low, so I finally had to run back to where I had parked my car across the lake to get my tripod and lyric sheet.
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| The rapidly-diminishing lake |
Because it was cold, I had grabbed my jacket from the car, but in running all that way, I started getting hot and sweaty, so I took off the jacket and put it on the only landmark I could see in the dried lake bed: a big rock sticking up out of the ground. Then I made it back to the car--wheezing, since yes, this is over five thousand feet up, elevation-wise--grabbed my tripod, and ran as best I could back to the dried lake, to see if I could find my jacket.
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| All this was under water in July |
Because the sun was now 50% down, and I had mere seconds, I just set up the tripod next to the rock, put my phone on it, and looked over the lyrics one more time to see if I couldn't--
And then my phone fell off the tripod, and guess what it landed, screen-down on? Yep, the one big rock within five hundred feet. I didn't even want to get a big phone with a big screen, and now, well, it's got a crack in it from the first time I brought it to the cabin, and and a second crack right in the middle of the screen from this trip to the cabin. Fun.
There was a guy in a rowboat out in what's left of the lake, and I guess he was fishing, but he just seemed so lonely out there, watching the sun set, that my heart went out to him. My heart goes out to people, and even six years in the big city didn't stomp it out of me.
So, I was wandering around in what had, just a month ago, been the middle of the lake, and suddenly, I start getting all these alerts on my phone (eBay, Facebook, gmail, Mercari, I think a text from Big), and I was kind of amazed. I stopped and texted Big and it went right through--I had a 4G signal. So, I called him up. And two weeks ago, when I was angry about having to help my uncle move out of his house but nobody would tell me when, it wouldn't let me dial--it said "Emergency Calls Only." But this call went through and Big answered on the second ring.
Now granted, he could hardly hear me, but I was standing in what would normally be the middle of the lake, and there was a signal strong enough to talk with the guy. That should mean that I could take a boat out sometime next summer and check Facebook and such in the center of the lake. I could even check the lyrics of a song instead of cursing myself for forgetting how it goes (like I did today). I don't know why that excites me, but something has to.
I was listening to Marshal Latham's podcast, and he was talking about his kids going places with him, and that there are times when he just wants to be alone, but he can't be. And here I am the opposite, though I recognize that part of what's so special about this cabin is that I can come here by myself and think and write and exercise and sing and sleep or stay up, and it's all up to me. Of course, I'd trade my life for somebody else's in a New York minute, but I also recognize that I am very, very lucky.
Sit-ups Today: 150
Sit-ups In September: 250
Push-ups Today: 26
Push-ups In September: 51
Words Today: 1102
Words In September: 2215
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