The Replacement

It's one of those days. The kind of day that drops you off at work, bleary eyed and incoherent. You don't remember the drive to work. You're wondering if perhaps you teleported in your sleep and if you did, why HERE? You shuffle your way through loud coworkers and people nagging you for things to your friend. Your friend the coffee pot. "Hello friend." "Hello addict." You turn it on, which is considerably harder than turning Hoop on, and wait. You wait. You wait. Suddenly you realize, nothing is happening.

Sometime in the middle of the night, when no one was around to care, the coffee pot died peacefully in its sleep. But like an irrational relative at the deathbed, you try to revive it. You jiggle it around and moan, "Please! Please, don't go." Then your coworker walks in. "It's dead!" You tell her pitifully, showing her your coffee grind covered hand as proof. "Now what am I going to do?" The coworker sighs and walks over to the machine. But instead of joining in on the death wail, she reaches over and plugs it in.

"You're really a dip shit in the morning, you know that?"

"It's ALIVE!"

"Make me a cup while you're at it and I won't tell anyone."

I don't know where my brain has gone, but it certainly isn't here. It hasn't been here for awhile. Maybe it's in Aruba somewhere. Lucky bastard. My days are spent in a blur. Get up. Drive to work. Fuck off. Do something productive. Fuck off. Drive home. Make dinner. Eat dinner. Do dishes. Work on computer. Think about working on the house but then watch TV and fall asleep instead. I took on the blog to avoid boredom at my dead-end job. Then I took on writing a story to avoid boredom on the blog. Then I took on projects to avoid the writers block I had from the story. Now my interest has been renewed in all of them and I don't have time!

I quit smoking to be supportive of my Mom and now she's become such a health nut I can't stand talking to her. Every casual discussion turns into some big lecture about the benefits of walking or the importance of fiber. I can't comment about the smell of bacon without her breaking into some long winded speech on how my smell receptors have started working again now that I don't smoke. The other day Papa Bear called me, freaked out, because Mom had started drinking apple vinegar. When I mentioned it to her she got defensive. "It's not just for horses ya know!" "OK, I believe you." Weird-o.

I don't miss smoking. I have cravings still. Most of them only last two minutes. Some last two hours. But I don't really miss the act of having a cigarette. What I miss is the social interaction. I don't sit at lunch with my coworkers anymore. I don't hang out with my friends. They all smoke. I don't feel comfortable going out to a bar or club. I can't sneak off with my Mom to bitch about our lives. Hoop and I don't relax outside. Now I park at the mall at lunch so I can read, away from temptation. Hoop goes outside alone. We spend our weekend doing things inside. Safe.

The strangest part about all of this is, I spent the majority of the year trying to give purpose to my life. I did everything I could to make it better. Now I don't even recognize the girl in the mirror anymore. She's regretful, a feeling I've never felt before. She regrets the house. She resents being healthier. She feels the boy took too long to ask. She gave up on the job and stopped thinking about school. She doesn't get crazy anymore. I can't decide if she's boring or bored. She's like a dozen other girls I passed on the way here. So I've made a decision. As of the first of next year, I'm kicking her out.

I just don't know what I'm replacing her with yet.