Troubles

Trouble

Trouble...
Trouble, trouble, trouble, trouble
Trouble been doggin' my soul since the day I was born
Worry...
Worry, worry, worry, worry
Worry just will not seem to leave my mind alone -"Trouble" Ray Lamontagne

I was glad for the peace and quiet that came to the house in the wee dark hours. I sat in my attic library, reading over some old forgotten lore I found in a little out of the way book shop in London. Its pages were worn and brittle and yellow with age and it's binding had been crumbling. I taped it carefully with matching duct tape.

But unlike the quiet of my room, my mind was abuzz with thoughts and memories of the week. The strange, crazy awesome, troubling dream about the lead counselor and the one on one session I had with my counselor made me compare the two men who were in our world. I sighed and closed the book and set it on the steamer trunk I used as a coffee table between the two twin beds I used as couches. I reached for the glass of wine and took a sip and lit another one of those turkish blend cigarettes.

It was almost 18 weeks till our new adventures, and I wasn't sure I would make it. No matter what I did, I was still too anxious and thinking about the strange beings in our lives, in all our worlds, made me even more anxious. I was maintaining as far as the withdrawals, but that was all. I felt like Al Pacino in Panic in Needle Park, about a period when there was not going to be any heroin on the street. Since October, we had been like those junkies, surviving on the merest taste , a picture there, an article there, so tempted to post anything that looked like news.

My mind went again to the two men in my personal junkie universe. One was like Southern Comfort, smooth and dark with delicious bite. The other was like Cotton Candy, sweet and delightful. Both had their own brand of comfort, both gave so much pleasure to the consumer. Yet both could hurt you. Southern Comfort could leave you with your head aching and your stomach churning, and the other could put you in a sugar coma.

But above all they could not be mixed. Eating a big cone of spun cotton candy then knocking back a couple of shots of So Co, could be a hazardous combination. So, if you like both you have to take them one at a time. But, as I thought, which did I really like the most?

Southern Comfort is just that, comfort. If taken in moderation, you are just fine. Say, once a week. Tuesdays are good. I had no real responsibilities on Tuesdays. And if I got a buzz, that was okay too.

But cotton candy? Almost exclusively a once in a while treat. I have seen packaged cotton candy in stores, but the best cotton candy was the one you bought at the fair, fresh from the floss machine. When you put your tongue on it, it sizzled and then disappeared, leaving that wonderfully sugary sweet cherry taste.

I sighed. How could I compare the two counselors to consumables...but then I laughed...Weren't we consumables as well? I wondered what I was? Was I cup cake? A piece of peanut butter candy? Maybe a banana split? I doubted I was that sweet. Was I champagne? Did I make their heads spin? Or was I cognac, all fire in the glass? Or was a stout? Bitter and nutty, something with a bite?

These were the sort of thoughts that wondered through a mind too tired for legend and lore. I got up and blew out the candles in front of Our Lady of Perpetual Help (and boy did I need help), turned off my computer and the lights and went down the stairs, feeling that ache that will not be salved til summer, and the questions of southern comfort versus cotton candy floating around in my brain.