The sky fell during an earthquake

This piece was started on July 1st 2020.  

I started today at 5am.  The summer has been fairly mild and I’ve been biking on the Dahon Mariner.  I’ve recently begun selling off all of my bikes and somehow this bike has become my favorite people powered bike.  

The weather was maybe in the sixties, very comfortable out, unexpected for July in Georgia.  I rode eight miles with the sun slowly above. Down close to my wheels I watched as worms raced slowly across warming concrete, desperate to reach the envied comfort of grass, they had little hope of success.  

It is easy to either feel comforted or filled with despair when you do the same thing every day.  Riding back I saw wild flowers raising their head to meet the sun, and pigeons as graceful as doves wooed me with the motion of their wings.

My mind of late has dwelled on the brightness of the future I've laid out in for myself. This is in contrast to the unknown end that I know I have no control over and also ponder alot.

I’m still haunted though.  I feel I should be doing better.  In a recent conversation with a friend, they did the back of the napkin on my state of affairs.  

“Aren’t you X? That means you’re fine, you should have no worries anymore, why be so serious, life will pass you by.” 

I didn’t disagree with the assessment, though I made plain that I do not feel i’ve gotten to the place where I can truly stop.  It isn’t enough to be in the place where I don’t have to worry. Where I am, all will be good, but I could find myself not comforted with my routine. I could still be burdened with some chicken shit routine, so I can “make do”.  There is a new level of uncertainty that says to me “Push on, shit is unpredictable.”

What happens to your psyche If you’ve always assumed the sky was going to fall and instead the earth beneath you opened up? Do you get eaten up cause you didn’t see the earthquake, or are you just glad you’re prepared and you realize you just knew some disaster was going to strike.  

I have overcome this financial hurdle.  I don’t feel like I’ve lost everything to do it.  I was never comfortable with working for the right now and just hoping future me will be ok.  I was never comfortable with the fact that the people around me, family, friends, peers, take no heed of their circumstances and act powerless. 

I grew up and watched people who were not “have” and “Have not”.  I grew up and saw people who worked incredibly hard, had families, went to barbeques, enjoyed life and they retired.  They weren’t miserable.  I grew up and watched people who most certainly wanted every moment to be of their choosing and those people did not age out well.  Half those people did not have to worry about retirement cause they killed themselves, in uninteresting ways I might add.  The other half just went into their sunset years with nothing, certainly not their carefree youth. 

I need to make one more push.