Third page VII

 

Saturday morning. A piece of bread and a mug of coffee, here in the balcony,  yes. I better enjoy the moment. It’s sunny. It’s a good time for giggles and wiggles. I’m just drawing a little smile for my face and a bit of patience for my mood. I think I left something undone and unspoken, but it’s next day and I am a little more into what this next day is going to offer. I worked.  I’m going to work tomorrow too… in the other job; the delivery one. A beer before bedtime: when it's bedtime, anyway? Poor people, yes. I’m thinking about them. I am poor, that’s why this will go public, if it ever does, by myself through a blog  I hold. I’m not sure if any editorial might ever get interested in this as something worth to pay. It doesn’t mean I’m going to refrain from doing it. What the hell! These are my words: my inner war. My dealing with poverty… that’s the thing! Poverty.  Why do we have this need to hide our Poverty? Why? Poor people have projects, dreams, ideas. It’s just that work comes first because bills must be prioritized for living. Everybody must pay to be in this world. And on top of that, we must pay interest – high ones, by the way – for any sort of expectation. Expect is expensive in many ways. I like to believe, from time to time, that we are the fuel of the world, kind of like Matrix, and that there is actually energy for it in every effort we make. It would be great to be compensated for that energy we provide. There would be more healthy people around. More sex, considering the energy there. More laughing,  more reading… if only!  But the poor have to stick with a full time shift, tell the same jokes over and over, and try to find some relief on a glass of liquor, or on the screen of the phone. Others try stronger, but stronger eventually turn unaffordable, because even a bad habit is also hard on (and for) the poor. Sunday: Sunday bloody Sunday. I found a bit of satisfaction on the delivery this morning. Funny, I know. To realize what you're  lacking is a terrible skill. Most of the poor don’t know what’s missing and that is a bless. It's a bless because they can take it on whatever, whoever, and whenever suits them. I’m sad; surely because of the news, or because I couldn’t buy that I saw on Instagram… What about those who think they deserve better? Deserve; again, what a word! I deserve a glass of wine. I worked today. I went out twice on a Sunday while many are just enjoying their balconies. By the way, I should take a look, maybe the sun is setting and the evening might bring some air to promise, to promise oneself better mood for the upcoming challenges,  to promise better being for those who I share my home with, to promise more smiles, to promise never giving up, not even under these circumstances. I have a son to look after while he’s looking at me. Tomorrow is labor day here. In my country we celebrate it on May the first. It’s a big day back there because we have this tradition where the president, orders (yes, orders) all employers to raise the minimal wage over a percentage he decides. This, of course,  is announced on national broadcasting followed by a speech full power for the people, and the eternal big fight they (we, I suppose) are always winning against the imperial forces (meaning United States)

 

It makes me laugh too, I know.

 

I was thinking about those cover letters. I wrote mine. So far, nothing to point out. I’m still trying to figure out  if there’s any other reason why I haven’t got an opportunity, other than being Hispanic. Don’t get me wrong, please. I don’t want to go into politics. It’s a comfort zone people use as an excuse to avoid trying harder. I’m bringing it up because I would like to share what I think I might have said on a cover letter. I believe  it started out as a personal description of myself. Who is that? Am I the one who is placing these words in a sequence for a message? Or the character of this story? You see, I’m not always the guy waiting for the balcony, or the one who complains about his poverty.  I am a multiplicity of events, followed by ephemeral purposes that becomes a narrative, ⁸once mixed all among each other. That narrative is who I’ve been so far. Those events are my thoughts attached to my memories. That multiplicity is my desire burst into breaths  unable to catch, and smiles forbidden to explain. I am more silence than loudness. I am more what I choose not to say. I am what I think, when I realize you are not paying attention to my thoughts. I am what I think of you, when I see your face sunk inside social media. I am each and every  resentment from other times. I am a father above all. Anyway, I am, like we’ve learned in our language; substance and presence. Since English provides us with just one verb for both, then I am for both,  and for everything.  Another morning.  Weather reminds everyone it’s still summer and it won’t be for too long. Black coffee with no sugar: the charm of the bitterness. No good for teeth, to be honest, but teeth and mood won’t ever agree on that,  neither on wine . It’s like when poor people have a great time, there’s then this  feeling of guilt that comes as a remorse: a remorse for feeling good. Again: deserve is quite a word! I read once that brands and gambling targeted poor people to get their money out of status.  Most of advertisements are orientated that way. One is by offering the illusion of easy money just for being lucky, The other creates an archetype and sells it as an example of what great means in life. There is a sense of pleasure already guested in our perception, its purpose is making oneself happy for a little while when buying something we don’t really need. What have we established as needs, anyway? I mean, have we ever done it? How do we know that the will of buying something unnecessary is made up? I haven’t figured it out. I’m just wondering because it bothers me. But, and yes, there is a but. It bothers me when someone else does it. Not when I do it myself. It’s how I found out that when anybody does something we get irritated for, it might be something we carry within as well, it’s just that our ego won’t let us see it, so we look for it on others, and there it is when we start projecting, thinking that we hold any sort of capability for judgements,  when most of the times what we do is a confession. So let’s confess: I can’t stand unproductivity. I hate laziness out of nothing worth to be tired. Another morning. Another morning I wrote nothing. This another morning is not the one before. Busy day, I guess. Eviction letter. Interesting. In this country, you sign a contract for a period, and monthly payments must be done during the first five days. Failing to pay then, you’ll be charged a late fee for the whole month,  and an eviction notice, giving the fact that the month you are late is not over yet. In Spanish, the language we use, for such case is, in a way; let’s say: softer. I guess we see words more carefully, or perhaps we’ve been raised this way that, because we think we always deserve better, we feel offended by pragmatism. We have this sense of being someone that pops up on curious circumstances. If you need a volunteer for a challenging project, fewer, but a lot fewer people, would step forward, but when we feel in some way undermined, or underestimated,  we step up right away, claiming we deserve better because of the many things others should consider when it comes to consider us. How different was back then. We’ve been understanding a few important things through immigration.  The biggest one, from my perspective, is that there are a lot of things that are just different once you arrive. One of them is that your traditions are no quite so in the new country. 

Third page VI

A new week has come. This is my most important week of the year: it will be my son’s birthday.  Everything makes sense and whatever effort has not been hard enough when it comes to him. I just hope to improve it in time. Actually I expect it so. Let’s see what comes along with it next week. For now, let’s just think and enjoy. I want chocolate.  There’s a candy bar machine across the room but I don’t really feel like having anything from there. I’m just waiting for this break to end while these words find themselves a place for this paragraph. I’m at home now. Again, holding a glass of wine, indoors. Hearing the complaints of the house, hearing them like they were said in some foreign language I don’t know.  I just consent with my head pretending I’m paying any sort of attention.  From time to time, I make a little smile. I open up my eyes in an attempt of surprise. Anything that works for looking like I’m following it. Balcony minutes. Not enough. Never enough. I’ve lost space over the smoke. It kind of makes me sad but I can forget it a little bit with every taste of wine, with every kiss on the glass. No glass kisses for a long time, by the way. That’s how a life with debts looks like. Worries comes first, I guess. I guess wrong. No sunset for these eyes today. Next business day, like the invoices. Still dark. Foggy. Less hot than yesterday. Now that I look at the watch, it's time to get indoors. Forgive me the rest of the bands but in Spanish,  Soda Stereo is just the best of the best… the GOAT, like I’ve heard here. I’m listening to them just now. A pleasure for my soul. At least. At last. “Es un delirio de condenados”. Yes indeed. “Encendió mi conciencia con sus demonios”, definitely.  And now that my consciousness is on, I can state, as a figure of speech,  that depression is more a luxury when we come from the underdevelopment. I mean, look where we come from. Seriously? Can we afford to get depressed? It’s an interesting thing to write and argue about. A next day. A hangover next day. Surprisingly, no work today. I asked for a few days off since I thought I was going on a trip. That’s the thing when planning so early. No trip but I still keep the days. I would like to say I’m going to take advantage of it,  and use them wisely, but I know it won’t be so. A procrastinating life, breathing depression from the air and halfway broke, is, is a, is not a, not a promising picture indeed but, I have colors in the sky as a gift from the sun. Let there be sun then. Sunrise is written in English almost like smile is in Spanish: sonrisas then. Let’s go. Let’s hope. Why not, right? Cortisol: what am I going to do with you? Chocolate, I guess. There is a little tiny black spot at the ceiling. It might be a mosquito. It looks smaller than a fly. I guess it is there to get fed from my blood. It is still there. I can see it from we are I am. The thing is that I’m feeling itchy already just because I know it is there, and I find the whole thing a bit funny. Body is already suffering not knowing if ever get to happen. Mind does that. Everything we sense is pretty much perception coded through that we've been storing in our head. What have we stored so far? What have we coded in that space we relate with love? Have we stored suffering there? Now we know why love hurts, right? How about buying food, pizza, for example? We understand that the way we’ve been storing moments, and the feeling we relate them with, somehow determines our character, and by our character, our attitude.  What's the difference between them, by the way?

 

A new Friday afternoon has come. I had a great end of August.  Actually the last day of August is the most important day in my life, and, for the record, it was just perfect. That was yesterday,  just like the song. No work today, no work tomorrow, and not on Monday either. In this country that means no money as well. My worries are now manifesting themselves as boils in my face. I have one on my nose now. That one could mean the rent, for example.  I got an infection in one ear, probably because some other debt I must honor by next week. So stoicism hasn’t worked out pretty much at the end. Today, I drink. What else? Nothing to get profit from, right now. I’m waiting for tomorrow,  for a brighter tomorrow.  Let’s see. Sun is still shining, so we can smile and remember. I was thinking about victimism, and it turns out that it is exactly as the Spanish interpretation:  blame others for your own misfortunes. How should we understand a misfortune in the first place? I mean, is it something derived,  kind of like a consequence,  from any chain of events? Is it just shit happening and that’s it? Or maybe it’s  something we could blame someone for? Let’s assume we could actually blame someone for that thing is happening to us. Then what? How come blaming solves anyhow whatever problem we have to face? The need of not being accountable is stronger that the acknowledgement of the self on it. And perhaps that is because guilt weights more than taking any responsibility. That could explain procrastination. Avoid is an interesting word, also the words that we read from it… avoid a void, indeed! The balcony. I feel like I’m losing it. You see, I don’t live alone. I understand I have to share it, but it sort of bothers me this fact that I feel, it is not being equally shared: victimism again talking through my words. Who cares! Does it matter at all? I don’t think so. I believe I just need a better income, to be honest. I think the rest is just hanging in there, precisely for not being stable enough to purchase anything that helps you forget. I write because I can’t take my car to go out with no explanation. I can’t even have any alcohol outdoors because I’m always the driver. I can’t take the fucking balcony for myself because I’m not the smoker. See. I just need a better income to bear my so made up problems, and not playing victim again anymore. Sorry for taking you here and make you witness an average forty four old man complaining for a life he chose, and trying to blame anyone else for it. Diapers. I’ve changed some. I may have to change a symbolic diaper for my mind. It’s time. I have to talk to the administration office, and tell them I can’t pay the rent now. Let’s see how it works for me…