Melancholy Mornings

Last week, I was on a video call with my ex-classmate who now lives in Finland. We talk maybe once every six months, but whenever we do, it feels like picking up a conversation we never actually stopped—just paused mid-sentence for weeks. Anyway, we were talking about life stuff—bills, stress .........

A few months ago, I was at the laundromat, waiting for my bedsheets to dry and pretending to read a book I wasn’t really in the mood for. Across from me sat this middle-aged man with a bucket hat and socks that didn’t match. He kept humming—loudly. At first, I was annoyed. But then he looked up and said, “Do you know that humming helps bread rise?” .........

This afternoon, I watched my neighbor’s cat try to fight its own reflection for twenty straight minutes. I was sitting on the porch with a bowl of cereal I wasn’t even hungry for, just watching it unfold like a soap opera.

I was 10K deep into my 13K run. Tired, but not the falling-apart kind of tired—more like the okay-we’re-almost-there-just-keep-counting kind. I’d been breaking it down in sets of 100, counting like it was the only thing keeping me alive. I was somewhere around 59 when I heard it—blaring from a parking lot just ahead. “Said lil’ b**, you can’t f*** with me if you wanted to…”**