Growing Cold

I’ve been alive (at least on this plane of existence) for roughly 1,072,224,000 seconds.  A billion seconds.  For some reason when you put it in terms of seconds, no matter how many decimal places you throw in there it doesn’t sound like a long time.  And in deed in the grand scheme of existence and time scales and evolution, 34 years isn’t even a fraction of a millisecond compared to how long time has existed.  It’s such a small portion, a fraction of a fraction of a hummingbird wing titter, a percent of a mass of a particle of proton in an atom of a compound of a nucleus of a cell of the body of an elephantine organism of the life of this time.  It’s so small, comparatively, that it’s a wonder I exist at all.

 Fall wears Summer like a soggy poncho.  Ready to shed it, wearily, and don a brightly colored shower cap insisting it bathe in the Indian Summer’s golden light; cleanse itself of the heat and humidity, the grease and mankiness, the empty beer cans, crumpled cellophane of sandwich wrappers, and grease stained paper bags once filled with delicious confectionary creations.  Fall answers the phone like an old man with broken hearing aids; “What?!  Who?!”, it’s report is silent and crisp, cold and contemplative.  Fall (NOT Summer) reminds me of being a child; unbridled and carefree(less).  Intensely living in this moment as if I was drunk on the power of naiveté.  I can remember thinking about what my life would be like when I was a ‘grown up’, 25, 30, 35 years old.  I can assure you that little Micah did not plan on this.  Rather, I let it happen to me.  Dying and being reborn over and over again, my life resembling the editing room floor of a film school grad student in the middle of a quarter-life crisis. 

Seattle has resumed itself.  Outside looks like the insides of a once proud and stout helping of cotton candy that has now been thrown in a dirty pool of water and picked apart by the various visitors of an abandoned carnival lot.  I didn’t ask for anything for my birthday because I’m happy.  I’m satiated.  I need nothing.  I also don’t enjoy celebrating my birthday, I was born, like billions of others, the end.  But enough of this emo-bull-shit-self-pity-pee-parade.  My thirty-third year on this planet is over, it has been catalogued thoroughly in my blog and there is no need to re-hash the triumphs and failures now.  Instead I look to the future for answers, and questions.  I will not espouse my goals for this coming year but extoll my hopes and dreams from upon high, swing my arms wide and twirl in the virtual fields of the internet.  I hope I go back to school.  I dream of having a career I love.  I hope I train hard. I dream of reaching a new level in my climbing.  I hope my friends and family are happy.  I dream of transcending pettiness, selfishness, egotism, antipathy, and douche-baggery.