A Monday and a day off. Quite nice, overall though there was a bout of despair, earlier in the day. I don’t understand it, I enjoy having a day off but the past 2 times I had a day off I was miserably depressed. Last week I took a Xanax to deal with it, this time I merely got out and walked around.

Last night wasn’t so bad, I was tired enough to go to bed about an hour earlier, like a little before midnight. At 12:20 I was out of bed and surfing the net. I did fall asleep but I was awoken by my own snoring. At the usual time that I go to bed, 1:00 I was able to fall asleep. I slept alright and woke up this morning feeling somewhat rested.

I went out with some shirts for the dry cleaners and a visit to the supermarket, where I saw the mighty Isis on my way out. Coming back home and after breakfast is when the despair crept in. But it was a beautiful day, a bit windy but alright to go out and run the errand I needed to run.

A while back I bought a Timex watch with a leather strap and after wear and tear over time, the leather strap started to fall apart. I held it together with a rubber band but it looked unsightly. Last Friday I was in midtown and stopped by a shoe maker and had the band replaced with a metal band, sort of like a Speidel watch band, but it wasn’t.

I liked it and that was all that mattered. On Saturday while working at the cigar shack, I looked at my watch and saw that the watch band was hanging together by a metal thread. All it took was for me to touch it when it fell apart. I guess I was fortunate that I was standing still and not walking on the street or something like that.

I tried but I could not get it together, unable to connect one part to another since a piece was missing. That meant I spent several moments looking at my wrist and wondering what time it was. Waking up was difficult since I wear the watch to bed and usually check the watch to see what time it is, rather than actually lifting myself from the bed to look at the alarm clock.

So much easier to lay there, one eye open with my trusty Timex watch one inch from my eye so that I could see its face, so blind am I without my glasses.

I anticipated some difficulty with the shoe maker since it was a cash transaction and no receipt was given or asked for. So I took the bus into Manhattan on my day off and walked over to 39th Street, off of Sixth Avenue. I walked in and they seemed busy, but the guy behind the counter sort of remembered me. Must have been the codpiece I was wearing.

I explained what happened and he took the watch and opened up a box filled with metal watch bands. Finding one that best suited my machismo, he set about taking off the old watch band and putting on the new one. It took about all of five minutes and I was soon back on the street where I ran into my old Rasta pal, Jesse.

After a brief chat it was a walk to the Path train which I rode reading Kurt Vonnegut and listening to Carole King on the iPod. It was a beautiful, yet breezy afternoon and I am glad I was able to get out and enjoy it, if only for a short while.

04 In Dark Trees