Devotee of Foot.

Give it up.
Give up the idea that you were special, or important or noticeable.
Give up the notion that the world is ahead of the next thicket, that there is only one more hurdle, that it is really just a matter of time before you are discovered.
Give away the hope for a fresh start, a new beginning, stuff it in the salvos bin and tell the bell ringer his t-shirt says camp wood and it's pouring rain and who does he think he is expecting generosity from in a recession anyhow?
Give up trying and erasing and practicing and editing and rethinking and spell check and doubling back and posture and sucking in your gut and writing a budget and improving your stroke, meeting someone new, apologizing, being forgiven, scratching an itch give it up give it up give it all up.


In The Awakening, by Kate Chopin, which was originally titled A Solitary Soul, the main character, Edna Pontellier, is a lady of wealth and privilege. She falls in love with a younger man during a summer she, her husband, and her two young sons spend on Grand Isle. He goes away to forget her and the risk of ruin.
When she and her family return to their lavish home in new orleans, she slowly dispatches with all her proper wifely duties. Her husband goes away and business, and in his absence, she take up with another younger suitor, sends her children away to country for a visit, so she can move out of her house, and slowly withdraws further from her societal requirements.
At the end of the story, her summer lover returns, only to leave her before they can culminate their affection with a note that says simply, "good by i love you... because i love you good by."
She returns to Grand Isle, and drowns herself.

This book must have been patial inspiration for Less Than Zero. The thematic similarities are astonishing. Characters basing the weight of their purposes in life by their possessions, by their entertainments; whims creating deeper impacts than any clear decisive processes; people driven by their desires and follies; selfishness beyond comprehension; actions begetting actions and hurtling headlong into one's doom while the maw is propped open with pride; the greatest act of narcisissm of all: suicide.

On my side, I wear the words 'disappear here' forever burned into my skin.

Spring is a time of rebirth. It is a time for awakening. But these are dark days, and what do we awaken, when the earth is uncovered and the sleeping green allowed to fertilize and grow?
I wonder if it is not a better idea to burrow deeper, and hold onto something simple. The action of standing still, while wind may scream away your breath, rain pummel your eyelids, ground drift away like sand.

What if we need to sleep standing up?