There was not much new to the new year now, it seemed. Driving across the state, I ate a bag of wasabi-flavored smoked almonds in about 30 minutes, taking it by the handful, popping them one by one, wiping the salt and debris off my hands and swearing “no more”—then repeating the process a minute or two later until it was all gone. The days are like this, though not as sweet. Even the full moon, with its colorful name, was nothing to write home about. The last of its kind, they say. I rose in the early morning to repeat the process then sunk on my couch, unable to make anything light. I went for a book, for a trigger, then opened my laptop to write. It would have been my father-in-law’s 81st birthday yesterday—instead, it was our dog’s. I gave her a new bone before she went to bed, but she didn’t seem to know what to do with it.

Categories: prose, writing

Tags: death, journal writing, mid-life crisis, prose, short form, stream-of-consciousness, William Pearse writer, writers block