Brains!

The tub needs to be cleaned, but I slip into the water anyway. I am akin to the walrus. I turn pink in the heat. Blotchy even. My blubber rolling back and forth as I lower myself for the resting. Sometimes I sit the entire time upright, staring at my naval. Now I lay back, the better part of my legs sticking out like monoliths.

First I am reminded of all the tubs I’ve bathed in. Humboldt under the redwoods in the Finnish barrel, with the rain and wind making the nearly boiling water bearable. Is it normal to be homesick for a place that’s not your home?

Tonight though, I am thinking of barren expanse. Strapped sideways in a belt, propped against pillows, ‘revelry’ floating through my ears, I watched as it glided by through the window. I put my hand on the glass behind me, feeling the hot pane. Outside, ancient ocean mudflats, abandoned gold tunnels, and dusty dark cinder cone peaks. I imagined how quiet it was near those places. I pushed against the ceiling, knowing that beyond it the hot sun, the only thing in a vast bleak sky waited, the slave driver of the desert.

Pushing my hands flat behind my head, I feel the porcelain of the tub cold against my palms. Wild thoughts enter my mind. Memories, secrets, wish, mostly about things I don’t have the gumption to actually do. A word I’ve thought about before, but recently have been replaced with things like adulthood, economy, responsibility, loyalty….it’s escapism.