I awoke this morning. 5:27 AM. Let the alarm go back to sleep this morning. Don't worry about it little buddy. I'm up .
The last time that I was up that early, to start a first day of work so early, (with my legs goose-bumped and a wonderful chill coming in through the window whispering the first promises of autumn) was at least three, no four years ago. And try as I might sometimes, I cannot remember things. I will try. Good or bad, I just can't remember things. But others, it's like nothing could hold off the memories and scents and flashbacks if I tried.
This morning was the latter. I awake and it was... four years back.......
My ringtone was Yellow Ledbetter, my children were in diapers, Chupa was mine and mine alone to love, I worked in drafty wet and cold docks and warehouse temp jobs, ate off foodstamps, lived on a street named after only a letter in the alphabet, I sought shelter in the beautiful abode of my wonderful friends in Custer, and treated my Rhi Rhi and Ghi Ghi (my live-in friends/babysitters like shit without knowing I was doing it). I was a black pit. I gave a bit, I did. But I took far more. I did love them. All of them. The lot of them... true love.
I could smell formula this morning. I could smell evergreens. I could smell unwashed clothing. Salty hair. I could smell the logs burning in the Stabbin' Cabin down in Birch Bay and the Pacific Ocean even with the snow falling in December.
This morning, remembering these things, I felt ashamed and proud. I didn't want to be there, I don't want to go back, but I miss it. How that is possible I have no idea. But there it is.
Working early, monotonous labor, with that chill in the air, makes me feel alive. Reborn. Worth, something. Makes me feel complete when I return home.
What a long ways I have come, how small it seems some days.
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