::Townpainting.

Time flickers past like a training montage in an 80’s ninja-action flick: 

the hero stumbles, squinting and limping, through winter wind.  A fair-haired toddler howling.  The glare of a computer monitor and the sound of simulated sci-fi gunfire.  Cats wrestling.  The hero gets to the top of the mountain and puts on new glasses; they make his head look funny, he thinks.  But he can SEE!  See his bad hair day.  A smirk into the mirror.  A movie sex scene that is clever in disguising its mediocrity — panting and fumbling are carefully edited out.  A house crumbling under hurricane wind, fences collapsing and gutters splaying out like broken bones.  The love interest saying, "I’ve been so dizzy.  I wonder if I’m pregnant?"  The hero clamping new orthotics in his ass-kicking boots.  A brief flash of ass, being kicked.  A car hurtling down a freeway ramp.  A sword being pulled down from the wall and belted on.  A stadium soaked in blue, roaring approval. 

* * * 

The place is empty, but I’ve left a note on the counter:  there is stew in the pot and you know where the whisky is at.  I took the missus out on a date tonight.  Fancy, indulgent Italian and some light shopping.  We bought a Christmas tree — my first since I was a young child — and I’m irrationally excited.  Even though I don’t bank on the religious aspect of the holiday, and I figured out the truth about Santa Claus.  I’m still looking forward to fending the cat and the toddler out of flashing lights and shimmering ornaments.  Silliness.  

Afterward we were going to land the spaceship for a spot of tea/coffee/conversation, only to find that every Starbucks on our side of town had decided to close at 8:30pm.  Double-you-tee-eff?  When we were but boyfriend and girlfriend, we used to perch in coffeehouses until well after 10.  Who decided that the carpets were to be rolled up so early?

Disappointing, says I.  But still a good evening.  So nice to be liberated from the grabby-needy short person in our lives.  Who is wonderful, but Oh So Needy.  So nice to go out with only half a plan and a full tank of gas, and do Whatever We Want.  Sooooooooo refreshing. 

* * * 

That’s all really.  No whining.  It’s been a decent week.  Although for the weirdest reason, I’ve been waking up in the mornings with my shoulder or elbow or wrist screaming in pain.  Like I’d been in a wrestling match with Grendel and fell afoul of a hammerlock or armbar or something.  What HAS my body been doing without me of a midnight dreary?

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