National Blog Posting Month (NaBloPoMo) has risen from its grave for another year of anxiety-causing fun for bloggers everywhere. As per last year, I will start off strongly; then post the half-thought-out musings that live in my drafts folder; then meme-mine; then collapse, exhausted — but not before a couple days of self-congratulation! Choo choo!

This start to this Month of Lies couldn’t be less grand and firework-free. I’ve been in a somewhat iffy state of health the past few days, which, this morning, necessitated loading up the car-pod with Radiohead and feeling all delicate and swoony as I rode the misty, swirling highway up coast. Perhaps wearing the vampire makeup all day yesterday blocked some key, life-enhancing pores, since I managed to feel both ethereal and leaden.

My place of work (as usual) was about 15 degrees cooler than the weather report promised me, and damp. Gloppy is the way my mother described a day like this. She herself reminded me of that word as her gray, ghostly spectre materialized as I made my way past the Engineering building. One would think one’s mother would have slightly more profound things to say when making an appearance from the afterlife. I miss baklava! she hissed, as she vanished.

I realized that the external atmosphere matched my internal landscape perfectly; not only did the gloppiness exist within and without me, but it reminded me of the east coast and how deeply dark and inpenetrable it often is this time of year. Which caused some bittersweet to flow in my veins. This phenomenon didn’t cheer me up (that would have ruined the effect), but it lent a certain saturated fullness to the now, to the here.

Up from my cabin,
My sea-gown scarf’d about me, in the dark
Grop’d I to find out them: had my desire;
Finger’d their packet
— Hamlet: Act 5, Scene 2

I can’t recall what exact packet Hamlet was fingering, but that second line really speaks to my soul, and to this foggy day. Good gracious, if I’m to be this melodramatic about things, I might have to demand a fainting couch to be installed next to the copier. Fetch me my sea-gown; there’s a dear.

Frau Hambox, originally uploaded by twomets. Even the undead need to earn their mad money!

nablopomo 07 day 1