You start with a wisp of memory, or some detail that won’t let you be. You write, you cross out. You write again, revise, feel like giving up. What pulls you through? Curiosity.
~ Abigail Thomas, What Comes Next and How to Like It: A Memoir
It’s an all-night dance at The Alibi.
The strobes, the churning, my personal whitewater at the base of a long spillway of a hydroelectric dam.
I pull the left shoulder back and tug it hard to roll away from a throbbing right, and then settle heavily on the left. A desperate search for comfort.
A handless re-positioning of the knee pillow, a defensive moat shielding bone on bone impact, a life-to-date action now into the tens of thousands. And counting.
Voices drift into the dreamless oblivion. The unreal is more powerful than the real…Stone crumbles. Wood rots…But things as fragile as a thought, a dream, a legend, they can go on and on.¹
A chill, a pulling up of the covers, and the play repeats.
Left shoulder pull
Right shoulder roll
Right knee tuck
Left knee slide
Voices
Covers
They can go on and on…
Notes:
- Image: Anna Vihastaya (Listening to Silence) via les-yeux-avides
- ¹ Quote by Chuck Palahniuk. Thank you Whiskey River.
Like-like-like.
Thanks Catherine
Your writing lets the reader truly envision tangible and abstract visions at the same time. It’s beautiful and inspiring. Thank you.
Thank you for the kind words. Much appreciated.
I can’t tell where someone else’s writing ends and yours begins. The desperate search for comfort.
Thank you Sandy.
Fantastic…I can feel the pull (no pun intended)
Thank you Mimi
Oh, I am sorry to hear of your shoulder pain & interrupted sleep I am always asking my dear hubby for help with the covers because they are too heavy and hurt my shoulders. My covers have to lay just right… I have found relief from pain by consulting these interactive charts one for the hands and one for the feet.working the corresponding areas helps so much at least for me… I know the shoulder & neck area on the hand chart, intimately. http://www.reflexologycharts.org/ “It’s an all-night dance at The Alibi.” love the name ‘Alibi’ on my travels I’ve driven past two restaurant/bars named ‘Alibi’, ha. May your pain ease up so you can be more comfortable…
Thank you Christie. Smiling about The Alibi. In college at Northern Michigan University, The Alibi was our bar/dance club… 🙂
Tangled discomfort fueled by the whitewater mind…. I feel it too!
🙂 I’m sorry to share the burden!
Who said a burden shared is a burden halved?
Genius!
With the sharing let it dissipate and sleep a little better tonight 🙂
Magical as always, pal. And two words for you: Ashiatsu massage. 😊
Smiling. Thank you Lori
the dance of the world – weary.