A little warmth. 


I got all dolled up today, in my way - houndstooth pants cinched at the ankles, dark green tank top beneath a brown lace dress, killer pumps with corset details on the vamp. The pumps are high enough to induce acrophobia. My denim jacket barely keeps me warm, but that's not its fault. I'm sure it would be warm enough for normal people with functioning fat deposits. I have fat, but it doesn't seem to work. Even when I was bigger, I still borrowed jackets from people in the office to wear on top of the one I was already wearing.

So that is probably one reason I am not myself today - I can't keep myself warm, and my blood is moving slowly, sluggishly, like an old creaky donkey, like a drunkard waiting to die.

There is another reason, and I have been trying to come to grips with it since last night. I thought I had, but it seems I have yet to succeed; otherwise I would not have spent three hours coming up with just one headline. I am realizing, with resignation and a quietly-building horror, just how impossible it is for me to end up with someone who will be a partner, in love and in building a life. Of course I will eventually accept this situation, fully and without recrimination, because that's the way I'm built. If I'm really smart about it, it should take me only a couple of days before I run back into the warm arms of perpetual solitude, the ultimate consoler, the way contemplative nuns and ascetics on hunger strikes do.

I want to erase the hastiness of this body, the foolishness of its constituent chemicals. Failing that, I just want to be warm. 

Posted: Tuesday - May 18, 2004 at 01:03 PM