espresso

it remains cold. the trees on the leaves are frozen. the cats sit around and bat at things. the espresso reamains dark. frost is on the grass.

it seems to me that we live our lives in most peculiar ways, never knowing exactly what the point of it all is. is the point to sit and blog about endless insane subjects? is the point to cook up burritos with green salsa and sour cream? is the point to read again how our commander-in-chief is messing up this country to the very best of his ability?
i'm going to get out there and do some gardening this spring. vegetables and tomatos and cucumbers and cilantro and all of that kind of stuff, maybe even a tomatillo.
i noticed there is a job at IFCO, which makes pallets. that would be rough work. it would be in my financial interest to get over and apply for that job right now. however, it is to my disadvantage that i don't speak spanish, because i'm thinking it might be one of those situations where everybody else is speaking spanish, and that is kind of a problem because then i can't figure out what is going on. on the other hand, it would be a lot nicer to do almost any other kind of job. nothing against albany, but the commute over there would be a drag, and as much as i love pallets and what they do for people, i don't feel any personal attachment or commitment to them.
i'd rather work out on some sort of farm, far from the hustle and the bustle of the city. or rather, i kind of imagine that i would. it is always quite nice to get out of the city and enjoy the peacefulness of the countryside. on the other hand, i've always been in a town or city, mostly because of whatever job i was currently working at.
i did dial-a-bus for a while, and it was nice to do something on a volunteer basis. that mostly involves driving old people around from one place to another. i was thinking of trying to be a nursing assistant, but that may be too much for me. i'm not sure that i have the personal abilities to do a good job at that kind of thing, and i wouldn't want to be doing a bad job, as in ending up being rude or dismissive to old people, all of whom are having a tough time if they are in a nursing home, so i think for the moment i would rather just get some sort of manual labor job and do that. so i guess i should start learning spanish.
perhaps i should get into insurance. sit around and analyze policies. that would be good. then i could also go down to florida from time to time and enjoy the sunsets and the mixed drinks and the beaches.
or i could be like ezra pound and go crazy, make up stories about my life that made it sound much more exciting than it actually was. no, i wouldn't want to do that. something about ezra pound really bothered me. he was not truthful about his life, tried to create a fake impression of impressiveness around himself, which isn't something that i would be interested in.
then again, i could get into writing long blog posts that go nowhere. that might be something to do.

JOE'S DREAM
Joe went over to salem to sit around in some bars and smoke some cigarettes, mostly at those slow-moving bars where the motions happen not at all, and then suddenly. He was digesting a burger and fries. On the way back, the dark of the night was getting to him. He was feeling something through the impressions of the fog, and a nervousness was getting into his viscerae. Suddenly, he decided to head over on Independence highway over to Albany rather than go to Corvallis, and soon was passing over the rolling hills and fields of that area. He had the idea that something was going wrong, and that alcohol was going to relax him or take him out of his situation in some way, and so stopped by the bar, which was closing, and went over to the 7-11 and got some wine. He was strolling down by the train tracks, and over to the river, recalling the "cherry wine" of the Van Morrison song, and the long nights of his youth, and then was on a park bench, and then back in his car, taking a drink every once in a while and staring up at the stars. A guy came around, walking down the street at him, a very skinny guy, with a little goatee and a bizarre look on the street. He got out of the car and said, "Who are you and what are you doing?" Somehow he found out that this guy was out scouting around from his sister's house, and that at certain times in the past he had been employed, "doing laundry." Making things whiter and cleaner. Somehow that seemed interesting, and they went over to get a coffee.