The Absence of Living

To-do, 19th Oct

Laundry (!)
Mother's b-day present
Office filing, D through H
Phone bill (do ASAP; three days away from getting cut off)

A welter of inscribed Post-its, scraps of legal paper and envelopes litter Alex's somber bed-sit like forgotten manuscripts, each one carefully documenting, in its own significant way, his unremarkable life.

***

Alex sits at a table in a familiar French restaurant because the previous Tuesday, in a rare moment of genuine spontaneity, he crossed off number seventy five on his "101 Things To Do Before Turning Thirty" list:

75: Ask a complete stranger out on a date.

It is a decision, like most, he now regrets. His date is a slender woman named Alyssa, or maybe Alicia (Alex didn't quite catch it during the initial pleasantries and is now too embarrassed to ask). She is pretty and is an effortlessly imposing figure, despite her trim build. She is taller than most men in the restaurant, and her features seem elongated to almost comical proportions: the high, extraordinary cheekbones; the long, willowy fingers emphasized with a tasteful manicure; the pale and infinite threadlike legs, every now and then revealing themselves from beneath a red satin skirt through a simple shift in position.

In spite of this, Alex is bored. Life, he postulates to himself, made a forgivable mistake in crossing their respective paths in the queue for the checkout at their local grocery store. He had been purchasing pens and a fresh packet of Post-its; she held under her arm cookies and tofu steaks.

***

In between the main course and dessert, Alex re-adjusts himself and makes a renewed attempt at interaction. They had been discussing Breakfast at Tiffany's. Alex meant the movie; Alyssa talks about the book. He hears:

"... but for me, Capote's fiction is sullied by the fact that he never truly lives the American dream, or American life for that matter. He only views it, you know? He's always so... I don't know... aloof. I mean, you can't document something you haven't lived -- or something you refuse to experience. It's like trying to write about the outside world if you've spent your whole life housebound, looking at the passing world through a window! That's only my opinion, anyway... What do you think? Is it just me or..."

***

To-do, 20th Oct

Pay Phone Bill! Urgent!
Return video rentals
Make appointment with dentist, possibly
Re-schedule Friday's meeting with HR

***

Not many days later, Alex is driving to his mother's house and in his head is performing his favorite endeavor -- that is, planning the next few weeks of his life and contemplating the activities he has scheduled.

Sign up for pottery class at local community college
High-school reunion; have suit dry cleaned)
Friday, 4.20: root canal

His mother's birthday present rests on the backseat of his car. The gift is small and sentimental, the only type of gift of which his mother approves. It is a framed photo of him and his mother. In the picture he is seven or so, laughing, astride his mother's shoulders, reaching for and coming close to touching the sun. It is a precious time, now imprisoned behind glass. It is an age just before a child therapist taught Alex to keep his emotions under control by listing everything that bothered him. More importantly for Alex, it depicts a time long before he learned that life was much more comfortable observed through a windowpane.