III: No promises

It's cold out. It's the kind of day that reminds you what it means to be a Canadian. In these times of uncertain climate, during the warm weather, I sometimes fear the cold will never return. It needs to be something I can count on, my constant. If it's cold in January, the world is all right.

I didn't sleep great last night. Maybe all the delving into my past, flipping through the pages of this blog at random, got me too keyed up. Some posts I have read many times. there are probably huge spans I haven't re-read since I wrote them, but if I did I would be instantly transported back to that place and time. I want to tell you something about my life in January 2013.

I am sitting in my basement listening to the REM two-disc retrospective I bought not long ago, feeling it was a good deal and realizing there was a great deal of their material I had no familiarity with. I've become very absorbed by their IRS recordings. I buy so many CDs, many of which I haven't even listened to, because I never know which one is going to become my obsession. Last February I acquired the Eels' El Hombre Lobo. I didn't end up listening to it until September and it became my big thing for a while. I still need to see my way to writing it up on the blog. In part I'm earnestly searching for great music. And in part, just like in 2008 or 2009, I secretly hope the greatest CD in the world is going to be something I heard before anyone else. There are a few CDs I feel that way about, and the disappointing side of that is that it might just be my own mind giving them more credit because they are obscure and personal, not because they're excellent... but it's a sign of growth for me since starting SOTW that so many of my favourite CDs are ones that many people I knew got to first. Forever playing catch-up.

I'm listening to it on my third iPod Nano, a 16Gb with a touchscreen. Sigh, so modern. When I started this I only had a barely-used discman! I found it during the move, you know, and considered reviving it for kitsch value. But the batteries, left inside when I abandoned it for my first Nano at Christmas 2006, rusted out and I left it to the garbage.

I'm sitting in a new chair, which I got in exchange for helping Ross sell his old treadmill on Kijiji. To combat the cold I have a Nirvana hoodie, only my third ever piece of band merch. I went to an Aerosmtih concert back in November - by myself because I'm my own best friend - and only briefly considered getting an official tee. It's getting harder and harder to explain my love for that band, and when they released that new album I thought for half a sec that I'd outgrown them at last... but it has its moments, and the back catalog is still rad. Can't fight it. I wonder if this will be their last stand. That album wasn't going to be good, but there's half a chance - I don't like the odds but I'd peg them at higher than they were in 2012 - that if they record one more album it will be better. It could be really good, if they used that last album to wring a decade of expectations out of their systems. Of course I could be way off base. It wouldn't be a huge seller either - not a chance. But it stands that fraction of a chance of being that much better.

I drifted in and out of sleep at intervals last night. Waking up in silence and darkness and not even wanting to acknowledge my situation by rolling over to check the time. I just gutted it out, lying there for moments or ours, I don't know. My dreams, when I slept, were messes, tangled fragments of half-imagined reality. I think the silence tortured me.

Every night - nights before work anyway - I try to go to bed sometime between 12 and 12:30. I set a DVD to play for 45 minutes or an hour, lately Seinfeld. This is the way it's been since I used a VCR for the same purpose. I usually fall asleep before the sleep timer goes off, or if I don't think I'm going to make it, I extend the deadline, since silence is the enemy. The alarm is set for 7:30, with a 10-track playlist (roughly 40 minutes) of random songs set up ahead of time. This is a trick I've been using since Sheridan, because I realized I simply could not stand drive-time DJs. When I was in University, I would listen nervously for a few songs before finally deciding it was time to get up. Nowadays I let the whole damn thing play through. The timing works out. I wake up and the music is over and I know I'm on borrowed time. Usually it's around quarter after 8. If I'm working at 9:30 then I need to be out of bed at 8:32. This is give or take a few minutes, but I've found 8:32 is the number I can cling to. That gives me, if I'm lucky, 20 minutes to roll back and forth in bed savoring the comfort of my bed. This is key. I tried to tell Amanda about this strategy but she didn't get it - why not just set the alarm for the time you need to get out of bed? Because waking up when you're supposed to wake up is a hassle and it leads to more hassles and leaves very little room for error. But that breathing room... oh my, that's bliss.

The time it takes me after 8:32, to pry myself out of bed, dress, come downstairs, turn the computer on, use the toilet, and shower to my satisfaction is 20 minutes, almost exactly every time. Since it started getting cold I gave in and started taking the bus to work. Like my 8:32 wakeup habit, the time I need to get off my ass and get to the bus stop is 9:05. This was after an unfortunate period of trial and error when I kept pushing it back to see what happened (what do you think) and I realized that I'd rather wait a bit too long at the bus stop than miss it. Call it the result of years of commuting to Toronto, this fascination with timeliness, punctuality, knowing exactly how long things take. Routine. Not a bad routine. And when the weather gets nice it will be changed. And you forget routines, once they're gone, they're gone. Over the years, the various semesters, I've had so many different routines I wish I'd written this much about.

The bus gets to the mall sometime between 9:15 and 9:20, maybe even a smidge later. I hate myself for eating breakfast there, but there's that gap before I have to be at work that's more convenient for eating breakfast than the one between shower and bus.

The day passes. I help people find the newest Maroon 5 CD. I try to upsell them some Pure cards. I nod along to Kyle's stories. I talk about the Walking Dead with Meg. If I can I play some decent music (shhhh don't tell anybody.)

I come home, eat dinner... watch TV. Write if I can. This routine has been locked in place for months. I keep wondering what if anything is in the future. But things change, sometimes on purpose and sometimes not, so I wrote this. I wrote it all down. There it is.

Keep on rockin'
-Scotto