Well no-fucking wonder

(I guess I forgot to post this one last week, when life was good.)

The index finger moves down the calendar weeks. Finger prints rub over time. Wipe your finger off the wall, and, if you look closely you will see, inbetween the lines that define you, time that has passed. These are the wrinkles that really define how old we are.

Look again. Squint if you have to. Etched in the creases. Deep in the valley are rivers of what was. Time defined.

People ask, "Where has the time has gone?" It's there. Seeped inside your skin. You have memories, even if you don't remember. They're in you. And there should be no question about where it went or if it was wasted.

"Time flies," people all too often say. But it doesn't. You're around for it until your demise. It's here and so are you. And it's what you make of it. It's going to pass but you're awake for it until you pass out.

"You take your chances," a 5-year sober alcholic told a wino who got kicked out of the library this day on the street car. He said he was because he was drunk and didn't care. He took a fifth into the library because it's a warm, dry place to drink cheap booze. He lost his privledges. And as the man shuffles off the trolly it's easy to feel sorry for him, but harder to try to help him. The empathetic often doesn't want to be the company of those they feel for.

And so, when I take the bus home tomorrow night from the Willamette Week for the last time, I won't be questioning where the last three months of my life went. I'm aware of where I was. And though my finger prints are worn down a little more by pressing the keys of the iMac I'm typing on, the ruts still house the memories made, the stories untold, and the time taken aback. Maybe it's the warn prints that make it seem that the memories are over-flowing the inset seems. Or maybe I just have more to look back on.

This intern is hungry, and is hoping to be filled in the near future. Time in front is what we have to worry about. It hasn't happened yet, isn't dead, isn't yet alive. Sure, it will be before we know it, as another time cliche spews out of me. But when it's here we'll know it. And should make the most of it. Because before we know it's gone and were awaiting the future once again.