September & The Sea

I woke up late as usual. Annoyed, I crawled out of bed and wandered out to the kitchen. I was probably hung over and too young to drink. In the morning, when I looked at myself in the mirror, I always looked dazed and tired like I was permanently lost at sea. My mom was already awake and watching TV. I was wandering through a fog bank, the sound of the television a dull hum I swatted at like a gnat.

This morning was strange because we usually listened to the radio. My dad left for work before the sun was up. I was in my 3rd week of junior college. I was forced to bitterly swallow the truth that I had placed into a remedial math class. I had to relive this humiliation weekly. The black coffee I poured myself from the French press went down far smoother than this weekly dose of humble pie.

At this age, humility was a tempest. She was a fiery mistress. I was in that strange place directionless boys drift listlessly through after high school. I think it’s purgatory or Tierra Del Fuego. I comingled with apparitions and phantoms and wandered the midnight streets with the monsters and cryptids. When you’ve been up all night, just before the sunrise, when it’s cold and the morning dew begins to blanket the earth, the streetlights shine on the damp blacktop and it twinkles like little diamonds spilled from the pocket of a giant.

I can’t remember if I ate breakfast that morning. My friend Kyle was coming to pick me up for school in his old mint green mustang from the 70’s. It looked cool from the outside, but it was like riding next to the engine of a giant ocean tanker. We had to yell at each other over the roar of the motor and the Wu Tang Clan on our way to class. We were the lost boys.

I stood there with my coffee and looked at the television. We had one of those TV’s that weighed like a thousand pounds. Back then, they were not flat screens. I’ll never forget that moment. This morning was strange because we never ever watched TV. My mother thought it would make us brain dead for the rest of the day. We practiced our radio ritual with religious zealousness for my entire childhood and early adulthood. I thought she was watching a movie, which was even weirder. I don’t know if it was because I was young and perilously self-absorbed, but I didn’t realize anything was unusual until I looked at her. We both watched an airplane fly into a giant tower.

“What are you watching?” I said.

“Weirdo,” I thought to myself.

“That’s New York. We’re under attack.”

“What?”

I said over the lip of my coffee mug.

The steam morphed into an exclamation point.

“Somebody just crashed a plane into one of the towers.”

“What, that’s actual footage?”

“Yeah, they’re replaying it.”

While we were talking, we watched as a second plane crashed into the other tower.

Even listless vessels can feel the swells rise. They see the skies turn into cobalt grey asphalt. They can even hear the thunder begin to growl like a great beast rising from its celestial slumber.

I stood still, frozen in place. I heard Kyle’s honk from out front of the house. I had to go to class. I wondered if I might escape the torment of Math 10 this week because of this tragedy.