I feel so amped up. I had 16 ounces of coffee this morning and went to the gym. I am also currently refusing to install the air conditioner unit in my apartment. I don’t know if this is self inflicted sadism or morbid curiosity, but I want to muscle through my summer without AC. Last year I remember feeling a particular distaste for the artificial cold air blowing through my bedroom and a small part of me wanted to push it away. This year I’m leaning into that craving. I want to see how my body responds to sleeping in the balmy heat. I want to feel a never ending summer in my body.
I keep the window open when I sleep which amplifies the chaos. Along with the city heat, I’ve also invited its noise into my night. There are bars on my street and I can hear crowds tipsy and giggling at 1 am. Sometimes there’s yelling or loud conversations deep into the night. I’m never really quite sure why. At 5:30am this morning I was awakened by trash collectors, the loud whirring of their truck violently cutting into my bedroom. A couple hours later I left my bed and glanced in the mirror and saw the sunken eyes of a poor night’s sleep. I dragged myself out the door and slumped into my day, late and aching for caffeine.
Fatigue is pulsing through my body as I write this. I’m at work sitting under fluorescent lighting and hovering over paperwork. My mind is flitting through the photographs of foreign landscapes I burned into it. When I leave work I’ll unwind in a humid apartment and try to drift to sleep in white linen pajamas, forcing my way through another savage night. I want to shed my structured days and descend into darkness, cradled by the untamed energies of the city.
a soft death 