The steam from the hot coffee, which had been sitting, waiting for me in the pot when I woke up, escaped out the window as if it were jailed for an eternity, saw a chance for freedom, and scurried away. But then, it makes me think if being imprisoned for a time as long as that would snatch the want of freedom itself. Either way, the sip was warm and delicious, a hug to begin a wonderful day, metaphors aside. And then, I began the day, which in this humble life plainly means that I sat comfortably on the couch, both my legs on the table, stretched in remarkable comfort, doing nothing. Then, I sat for a little while longer and kept sipping in intervals. Then, some birds cooed outside, and I realised time was going by, so I got up and got to writing.
It surprises me that up until a few days ago, I was wound like a spring in a convoluted contraption, and it would have eaten me alive this year again had I let things be as they were and not made a decision. The decision, of course, was to not pursue grandiose achievement and instead sit and write and to protect my time, to not be running across halls of strange hotels with a lanyard bumbling on my chest, to not be stuck at airport after airport, to not be caught in the margins of error of systems of weather and people alike, to not recite elevator pitches about things I did not make, and to not rush—at all. And it makes me think once again about the furtive steam that escaped through the window. And I thought about how it might be that the want for freedom is more important than the act of escaping, that I must protect the want, that the escaping will happen of its own volition, so long as the want remains.