the wait for something beautiful

She waits for spectacular views of the beach that aren’t as far away as they had seemed a few weeks ago. She waits to walk the shore, avoiding the tiny crabs but also displacing some of them from their homes(she loves shells). She longs for it, the breathtaking view, but more than the view she awaits a time when she would be free of concern. You see, she is caught up with matters of the week and her only silver lining is the wait for something beautiful, the wait makes the stinking week seem alright. Work to her is a spectacular “means to an end”, nothing else, and she is more than okay.

She decides to walk home from work, not really for fresh air but for some exercise she hadn’t otherwise made time for. She walks on broken pavements of her hometown, which she defends to one and all, complaining about nothing; not the traffic, not the noise, not the excessive concrete. As she walks ahead, she looks up every few seconds, giving her neck a break from the necessary “watch your step”, and when she does she sees the magnificent trees that watch over her. Her city is filled with them. Her city is protected. She is filled with gratitude.

Her monotonous but relaxing walk is disrupted constantly by her thoughts, thoughts that take her back to her workplace, pending submissions, deadlines. She paces forward to avoid these untimely, unwelcome thoughts. Her increased pace has caused a change in the subject of worry, all she had to think about now was not tripping over debris. Or stepping into cowshit. Or falling into a man-hole. Or…

“Get a grip! A few more weeks and all the anxiety will be gone”. She walks forward, faster now than before.

She is getting closer to home now feeling a sigh of relief thinking about how she will drink up a nice hot cup of tea when she gets home. Hot is key. Anything less than hot? Well, nothing could be worse than a not-hot cup of tea. Okay, obviously there could be worse things, for instance, a person who likes a not-hot cup of tea. If you are into that sort of pleasure, might as well indulge in some melted ice-cream and those soggy french fries left-over from last night. Yum!

“The tea will be hot!“, she knows it. She goes over the inventory of all the ingredients in her head, just to make sure nothing threatens the relief she was looking forward to. Yup, milk waited at home for her, no worries. So did the relief.

“BZZZZ, bzzzz”. Her phone seems to be ringing right when she is about to cross the road. Should she pick it up and then cross? Or should she cross the road first? “BZZZZ, bzzzz”. “Yes, hello?”.

Perhaps the second vibration is all one needs to become decisive in any situation.

“…”, says the other person.

“Oh I would love to join you but I have an extremely hectic day tomorrow, not to mention all the work I have left to finish in preparation for the crazy day”. In a matter of seconds she ends the call she otherwise spends days hoping for, but in the midst of her routine, she forgets that she could have had her dreamy moment that evening. But no, she had to cross the road and get to her cup of tea. That piping hot, perfectly brewed cup of dehydrating fluid that offers us a temporary kick and a long-term dependency. Sounds an awful lot like her friend’s innocuous relationship, the one she disapproves of. “There is nothing more toxic than an unhealthy relationship”, she remembers her irrelevant, unoriginal advice.

As she crosses the road, the thought of why she instantly refused to hang out, even for a bit, crosses her mind. She wasn’t gonna work right away, she was probably gonna stick to her darling friend, the Television, for the next couple of hours at least. Eventually, a panic attack would make her realize she needed to attend to the “more meaningful things in life”. How important was her pending work anyway? She could probably finish it in the morning.

She could make it tonight. She could even see herself feeling better about herself by the end of her meeting with this person. That would mean better productivity the next day, maybe the same night too. This was definitely a better idea than that lousy cup of tea and time wasted on another movie she had already seen. She was gonna call back, get home and change, and then head there right away.

But she didn’t. She got carried away by the comfort of her home. Her home, her sofa, her perfectly un-made bed. Ohhh it just lay there waiting for her! And how could she have said no to that hot cup of tea? Why did she need to say no to all these beautiful things that make up a wonderful life? What pain? What is there to be angry about? She just needed to put the water and some ginger to boil and endure a few minutes longer.

Small bubbles form in the vessel, its time to put in some sugar. The bubbles get bigger, the water comes to a boil and in go the tea leaves! This is the moment she has been waiting for, she looks into the fridge for the milk and well, it doesn’t seem to want to be found. Wait there isn’t any in the fridge! Oh right, it was outside.

Outside? What no! It has been outside in the heat the entire day and well she has no choice but to risk it because a grocery store was too far away and she had sacrificed too much to enjoy that cup of tea. And so she puts in a tablespoon of milk in what she hoped would be a perfect cup of tea.

She turns away to get her favourite cup, white with a thin brim, and the sieve. Little curdles of milk waiting to disappoint her hopes for a perfect cup of tea.

…and out goes the electricity.

To bed then. To work again the next day. She waits for spectacular views of the beach.

But she would fucking go out tonight.