Powedered Creamer
A resevoir of strength that has me assured of its endurance and sustanance. I trust this, my heart.
But I have a fear of excess - of using too much.
Sure: you may have seen me drink myself silly or smoke a cigarette every twelve minutes for five hours.
But in my day-to-day life I have a tendency to never use the last of anything, or much of anything.
I always leave a remnant.
A little in the bottom of the cup.
It is an expression of the possible need - or desire - to finish it later.
That *right now's* satisfaction is secondary to the possible desire I could have in the future.
There is a quote from C.S. Lewis that has always impressed me. In his autobiography Surprised by Joy he describes his memory of perfect joy as
an unsatisfied desire which is itself more desireable than any other satisfaction.
It is as though one day I may need to look back on this very day, and find some relic of this moment to placate myself in the future.
There are so many papers and strings and pinches and trimmings of things that pass by my life. They are there for me to look back on. And hold.
Now, somethings are perishable, though. I realize this. They aren't substantial. Short-lasting. Moments' pleasure.
Bits of cool refreshment on life's parched journey.
When I discovered poetry I was ecstatic. I found Sixteenth Century love: immortalized in a sonnet. But it was still intact. It was alive and passionate and rich.
Never spoiling.
And you can go back to a poem and read the sensory triggers over and over. It's never used up.
Never rank or old.
I like the idea of something that keeps it's freshness on its own. Because I would no doubt spoil it.
I like the idea of something that retains the potency of right now for just in case I ever need it later.
Like powdered creamer in my coffee.
Yesterday I spent too much money.
I must cease such spending! I buy little-boys shirts. I buy cd's.
Too much!
The fella at HMV was all, "what's goin on?" but his boss had him on an errand, and I wasn't in the store long, so he didn't chat.
I wouldn't really ask him out.
That's another reason why I hold on to resources for the future: because I fear the follow-through for right now, but I trust that one day I'll be ready to finish something that I start.
I got a phone call from the Leiutenant, Joshua Johnston, my dear friend.
The Air Force is sending him to graduate school: and he chose the University of Maine.
We graduated together from our English department. He won the departmental award. He was vice-president of the honors' society.
I was just the historian.
I was only cum laude. No magna. No suma.
Maybe at a big school that would be good enough, but not ours. I should have been 4.0. No sweat.
He said that after high-school, he entered college feeling like "the man" and that he could handle it all, and that he doesn't have that feeling now.
I reminded him of his academic standing in undergrad.
And then of mine.
I told him I never really competed for all the awards he won: even though I told him I did.
I just never tried.
That made him feel like maybe his recognition was less deserved, he said.
Foolishly, I lost my scholarship as a freshman and subjected myself to years of working alongside my studies. He never worked. Most of my friends didn't.
Generally, people in private schools are there because they can afford it.
I didn't "dick around" in college so much as I just spread myself thin. I wanted to do everything.
If he feels inadequate entering graduate school, then how the hell should I feel?
The truth is I do feel adequate. I feel like I have another opportunity. A more substantial opportunity.
But I'll not mourn my 3.4 GPA.
Becuase college is not the highest point on my measurement.
Had I ended it all at highschool I'd be bitching about the 29 I made on the ACT (Shoulda been a 31!). But that doesn't matter any more.
Today I bitch about the 1,670 I made on the GRE.
It's like as long as you keep on going then the failures lose importance.
My performance at the next level will outweigh any shortcomings in the last, for better or worse.
But I stocked up on a lot of powedered creamer in college - a lot of non-perishable experiences - and I'm certain it will carry me through life, into the Best Years.
Good thing it's not real milk.
Because nothing stays fresh in my fridge!
