I’m going to be a father.

This is the second bout of infection in two months. Last time forced an emergency room visit because the pain was a burning TEN, but this time I can see the white blisters even though the pain is mild. I’m on mostly the same meds: Lortab and Zithromax and steroids shots and gratuitous amounts of sleep.

When I was a little kid, I got stung in the throat by a bee. It landed on my neck and I looked down, crushing it and driving its stinger into the fleshy underside of my jaw. The swelling was incredible. I had three chins for at least as many days.

When I was a little kid, I also read that people born under the Taurean sun tended to have throat and mouth problems. I wonder how many of my annual strep infections, neck and jaw tensions, grindings of teeth, and troubles with breathing/singing coordination are a deep psychosomatic response to early belief in astrological dogma.

Which one hurt me worse: the martyred bee or the venomous belief in predestination?

Mists under the earth. What is the great force building beneath our world? The line on the test is so faint, but I can see it.

Life is beautiful and strange. I wonder about my brakes after all.

His battery died for lack of attention; he blamed it on his girlfriend. His brakes failed; despite the constant, screeching warning he’d ignored them. A lack of focus drains you of life and keeps you from stopping, even as you hurtle into doom.

Whatever, he’s a right bastard sometimes. You know, I try to pay attention and heed the lessons. Maybe I was being boastful, a braggart, currying favor with an elder. And yes, my ambitions for perfection make me oversensitive. Oversensitive and alienated from those who drift through life directionless, ignoring their own inertia and the dying light inside.

But at least my brakes are solid and my battery is charged.