March 21, 2021 (originally written on March 14, 2021) – This is another one of those stories that I wrote earlier, last Sunday to be precise, but I couldn’t post then because something went wrong with the log-in screen. Never one to let a story go to waste, or perhaps it’s me feeling lazy, I’m going with this one, with commentary in italics, like I did the last time this happened.
On March 14, the morning after the change to Daylight Saving Time, I wrote, I have this theory that the feeling of a hangover, you know that feeling you get the next morning when you’ve stayed out too late the night before, isn’t limited to people who drink. I’m not one to drink, but I do know that feeling, and I still get it, even without drinking a drop. I have it today, not because I stayed up too late, but because morning came too late. It’s 10:44 a.m., and I haven’t eaten breakfast. Okay that was true on March 14, but today while it is also about 10:44, oddly, I have managed to have breakfast. And forget this mountain of work things I was going to do today. Yep, still feeling that way. Okay, I did one thing, but that was easy. Yep, same. I’m sensing a pattern. What I call it, this feeling I have today, this advanced sleepiness, might as well be a hangover. Yep, still have it.
Honestly though, I don’t know if it’s Daylight Saving Time making me feel this way, or if it is the effect of a hard week – people with demands that don’t even make sense. Or perhaps I’m just rebelling.
Yesterday, make that Saturday one week ago, I took a drive to the desert. While the trip was task-based — to get cheaper medicine for Jasper, I also went to an antiques warehouse and to Tractor Supply to get supplies for the beginnings of my mushroom farm. Mind you, my farm is starting solely in fabric pots, but it is a start. Yep, planted, yesterday. Plus, Tractor Supply itself is an event. I know a woman there, the cashier who’s always there, and I asked her about horse places around the area. I passed a couple asking about the baby ducks for sale; the store was all out. It’s such a different world there. People just start talking in Tractor Supply. It’s like the country places in Texas. Perhaps every place in the country is like that. And it’s less than 100 miles outside of this frenzied city. Every time I go there though, to the desert in general, I get such a state of calm that I sleep through the night. I would have last night, make that Saturday one week ago, except at the “new’ 3:15 a.m., “new” in quotes because it would actually have been 2:15 a.m. but for Daylight Savings Time, Jasper was outside barking at something. She wasn’t very loud, but my maternal instinct wakes me up when I hear her bark. Really seriously, a blind dog should not be out in the middle of the night barking, not when things like coyotes are awake. I got up, got her inside, and went back to sleep until 8:22 a.m.! That’s the desert’s effect on me. Not today, so I guess I’m getting used to the new time; it took a week, but I’m almost there.
I don’t really have a subject today, other than some days I just need to escape, not necessarily to the desert, but just to do-what-I-want escape.
Last Sunday’s video suggestions included another skating video. In this one, the skater is taken to a mountain-top lake in British Columbia. I really like the ones in the Canadian mountains. She says she doesn’t know why she was picked because she hasn’t skated in four years. She’s talking from a room that is built with concrete board imprints. I don’t talk about that much, if at all, but my dream of building houses includes using concrete as a building material, and imprinting it with those boards. She talks about the place she is skating in. She says she’s skating in Heaven. Truly, I truly agree with her.
Whatever this video was intended to be about, I’m taking it as a hint to enjoy things … just a bit more. The stress of last week was ridiculously intense in my life. It was too much, like dream about these situations all night-every night too-much. So I think I’ll embrace my Daylight Saving Time hangover one-week-running now, and do things for me. Indeed, perhaps that’s the point of stress – to force one to not get complacent, and to actually do things, to change things to make things better. Just like this week’s skating video, this skater (that means me, who hasn’t skated in way more than four years), will get back to it. This skater will get that place of hers (that means me) in the desert going, growing something, in some way. This skater will build those houses she wants to build. Because that’s my version of Heaven, and one might as well go find it.
And speaking of Heaven, here’s some inspiration. Hopefully, more on this band, The Pretty Reckless, soon. I really do need to feature their new album. Well, except that Lana Del Rey released a new album on Friday, and I’m listening to that non-stop. More to come on both, I suppose. How about one, old song, from each … about Heaven. Except that one from Lana is an unreleased song, one of many, many unreleased Lana songs on YouTube. In a way, that unreleased Lana song is a prelude of things to come, because I think her newest record sounds a lot like the unreleased and early songs done under other names she used. Perhaps, if you play it, it will serve as a bit of background for when I get around to writing about her new record. I will get to both!