sometimes i feel like i don't have a partner

sometimes i feel like I'm all alone
it's the city I live in...


This past week was much too lonely. The coming week can't possibly be anything like it. I can't allow it. Nope.

I'm feeling that restlessness in between my ribs, like something is trying to stretch me or crush me there, like my lungs are forced to push honey in and out, then suddenly nothing, no air, something too light.

I walked to Comm. Ave today, to Guitar Center. I had driven myself crazy last night trying to tune my guitar, and then decied, duh, I need to buy a tuner. So today that thought served as a beacon. Yes, Jo, you have an excuse to leave the apartment. Go get the damn tuner. I planned my purchase the whole way, playing and replaying the coming transaction with each step. I walked down Longwood toward Kent, turned onto this little street called Marshal. There are brick houses on one side, brick condos on the other. I crossed Beacon and walked up to the park on Amory, walked on the grass that can't decide if it's frozen or not. A little white dog yapped around my legs and I stopped my brain to say hello to her. She seemed to smile and slid back down the hill to her owner. I thought, "You go in, there's a person on the left who stamps the receipts as people leave. You can ask him where the tuners are. Nevermind, you know where they are; to the left. You go back to the counter there, and there are always two people working. They're always just kids. Always boys. Ask one for a tuner for an acoustic guitar. You want one that's about twenty dollars. Simple. He'll be the expert, let him show you the choices. Choose one, then pay with your debit card. You can pay with the debit because you found that check in a card Mom sent in November. You'll have to tap in your PIN. It'll take a bit. It'll take a bit. You'll have to wait. Then get the receipt, but don't put it away. The boy will tell you to show it to the person at the door as you leave. You'll say 'thank you.' You'll walk over with your receipt and the bag with the tuner in it. The person will ask for it. You show it to him. He takes the receipt, stamps it, gives it back. You go out the door, turn left. It's done after that. Go straight home."

It took three revolutions of that before I reached Guitar Center. It's a long walk, but it prepared me. The receipt-stamper was a girl, and I was surprised that I hadn't allowed for that possibility in my brain. The boy who helped me asked if I wanted a chromatic tuner. I said yes, and that I didn't know why they bothered making the old kind. He laughed a little. "You want something simple, right?" I nodded. "This is your best bet. It comes with batteries, they never run out, it's chromatic... twenty bucks." "That's the one." He took my debit card when I handed it over. He swiped it for me, then I used a lil stylus to put in the number. It slipped out of my hand and onto the crowded counter. My heart raced. I felt my skin burning. The words came out slowly, though, like I'm not a freak, "I'm sorry about that." He smiled back, "Oh, no prob, I got it. Okay, make sure you show this receipt to the girl at the door..." I was nodding already; I knew that part. Nodding, turning, there's the girl, she stamps, out... The air was cold and I breathed it in sharply, like a new baby shocked into extra-womb life. There were tears bobbling on my lashes. Fucking tears.

Did I mention I have an appointment with my doctor for the first week of February? This has to stop.