“Till you have drench´d our steeples”
I.
“You really thrive on days like this, don´t you?,” asks this girl at the office once the clock finally hits eight, eight-thirty p.m. as the last waning traces of stormy clouds dismount then melt off somewhere beyond the concrete skyline and the slums past the train tracks and the river, giving way to a placid, cool evening air. “The hardest of our days so far and you were not afraid for one second?!”
“Hey c´mon, I was scared witless,” I tell her with a smirk then nod out to my own reflection on the window.
“You loved every minute of it. I was terrified but your eyes just gleamed. We could see it in your eyes. That´s masochism. You´re nuts.”
“I´m like, a Corporate superhero. Fastest boy alive and all that,” I tell her under a toothpaste ad-like smile. “Corporate Batman!”
If you saw me then, you´d swear all the panache and the bravado were true, too:
Upon reaching the toilet at the mall afterwards, to change my clothes and get into my jogging gear, I locked the door to the stall, lowered the toilet seat and sat down.
I stretched out my left arm and looked at my hand- - it was shaking, trembling- - and so was the rest of my body.
II.
The best moment of my day is...
There´s this slope going up the avenue, it starts once the last traffic light lets go the swarming ocean of red lights past the last large intersection. And they speed up uphill.
It´s on that very block I stop walking, regardless of my current walking speed, and speed up as well- - but that´s not jogging, no, that´s actual uphill running with a somewhat heavy backpack behind me, sneakers ready to burn rubber on the sidewalk.
Car-chasing like a dog you know? Close to howling out. Actually trying to keep up with the cars. Then sweating, panting.
The very best moment of my day comes right before I take that first step in running: It´s right then, right there, right in the thinking that regardless of what I do, regardless of any effort or performance, what it boils down to, ultimately, is that it´s probably gonna hurt so much in the morning once my calf muscles have all cooled down..
III.
So whatever comes our way - - it´s the computers crashing and the phone lines down, then the whole sky pouring down as the lights go out then start flickering on and off as we hope to god the generators to kick in and keep up - - Until you catch a glimpse of yourself running across the office with 3 literally purloined, stolen desktop CPUs in your arms at once to replace your team´s - - Until you get yourself leaping steps in the stairway with a borrowed password you shouldn´t even have - - Until there´s that fleeting moment that takes you back to that time maybe ten years ago when the milkshakes at Red´s (where we first kissed between jokes at Aquaman´s expense as it should be the norm in dating) were so expensive that me and D. and G. could only afford it maybe twice a year and now these days the red wine flows intertwined with the champagne like f*cking Coca-Cola at a McDonald´s - - so whatever comes our way, man, the only thing that will ever actually make any sense in blurting out amidst the chaos is- -
I call out to whoever is standing by me when it gets darkest, then politely ask if I can ask him, or her a question. “Yes,” I´m told everytime.
Then I ask if the theme song for 21 Jump Street was an Oingo Boingo song, even though I know it really wasn´t, and smile - - because it takes everybody back and out of the horror movie loop even if for a single second - - and my hands shake then tremble inside my pockets anyhow.
IV.
So hey-- rain it might, but baby you wanna see my steeples drenched?
Rain harder, then, because I´ll car-chase and follow suit every time, see? And play just as hard as you pour down.
Still on the Oingo Boingo song, though, a line: "The fire in your eyes - may it never go out" -- and my eyes are spitting out searing, white-hot lightning bolts right now.
“You really thrive on days like this, don´t you?,” asks this girl at the office once the clock finally hits eight, eight-thirty p.m. as the last waning traces of stormy clouds dismount then melt off somewhere beyond the concrete skyline and the slums past the train tracks and the river, giving way to a placid, cool evening air. “The hardest of our days so far and you were not afraid for one second?!”
“Hey c´mon, I was scared witless,” I tell her with a smirk then nod out to my own reflection on the window.
“You loved every minute of it. I was terrified but your eyes just gleamed. We could see it in your eyes. That´s masochism. You´re nuts.”
“I´m like, a Corporate superhero. Fastest boy alive and all that,” I tell her under a toothpaste ad-like smile. “Corporate Batman!”
If you saw me then, you´d swear all the panache and the bravado were true, too:
Upon reaching the toilet at the mall afterwards, to change my clothes and get into my jogging gear, I locked the door to the stall, lowered the toilet seat and sat down.
I stretched out my left arm and looked at my hand- - it was shaking, trembling- - and so was the rest of my body.
II.
The best moment of my day is...
There´s this slope going up the avenue, it starts once the last traffic light lets go the swarming ocean of red lights past the last large intersection. And they speed up uphill.
It´s on that very block I stop walking, regardless of my current walking speed, and speed up as well- - but that´s not jogging, no, that´s actual uphill running with a somewhat heavy backpack behind me, sneakers ready to burn rubber on the sidewalk.
Car-chasing like a dog you know? Close to howling out. Actually trying to keep up with the cars. Then sweating, panting.
The very best moment of my day comes right before I take that first step in running: It´s right then, right there, right in the thinking that regardless of what I do, regardless of any effort or performance, what it boils down to, ultimately, is that it´s probably gonna hurt so much in the morning once my calf muscles have all cooled down..
III.
So whatever comes our way - - it´s the computers crashing and the phone lines down, then the whole sky pouring down as the lights go out then start flickering on and off as we hope to god the generators to kick in and keep up - - Until you catch a glimpse of yourself running across the office with 3 literally purloined, stolen desktop CPUs in your arms at once to replace your team´s - - Until you get yourself leaping steps in the stairway with a borrowed password you shouldn´t even have - - Until there´s that fleeting moment that takes you back to that time maybe ten years ago when the milkshakes at Red´s (where we first kissed between jokes at Aquaman´s expense as it should be the norm in dating) were so expensive that me and D. and G. could only afford it maybe twice a year and now these days the red wine flows intertwined with the champagne like f*cking Coca-Cola at a McDonald´s - - so whatever comes our way, man, the only thing that will ever actually make any sense in blurting out amidst the chaos is- -
I call out to whoever is standing by me when it gets darkest, then politely ask if I can ask him, or her a question. “Yes,” I´m told everytime.
Then I ask if the theme song for 21 Jump Street was an Oingo Boingo song, even though I know it really wasn´t, and smile - - because it takes everybody back and out of the horror movie loop even if for a single second - - and my hands shake then tremble inside my pockets anyhow.
IV.
So hey-- rain it might, but baby you wanna see my steeples drenched?
Rain harder, then, because I´ll car-chase and follow suit every time, see? And play just as hard as you pour down.
Still on the Oingo Boingo song, though, a line: "The fire in your eyes - may it never go out" -- and my eyes are spitting out searing, white-hot lightning bolts right now.
posted by 186282mps at 11:55 PM
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