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October 12, 2001 routine
For someone like me, the only thing more comforting than routine is the development of a new routine. This takes time, but not much. Since moving to this rent house, my days are as follows:
The clock-radio is the first to stir by playing at 6:00 a.m. a channel devoted to prayer. I listen to the broadcast for a full second before hitting the snooze button. Over the next nine minutes, I pinch off a dream. After another full nanosecond of radio-prayer, I'm up. On my feet, nocturnal wood having gone the way of the Amazon rainforest. I turn on two bedroom lamps, slide my feet into fleece-lined slippers and shuffle into the pink-and-maroon-tile bathroom. I do not turn the light on in there. After urinating with the force of an infant's drool, I put on some baggy-ass lounge shorts, turn on a lamp in the living room, turn up the thermostat (I like it cool when I sleep) and go out to retrieve the newspaper.
At 6:10 a.m., the automatic coffee-maker has begun making automatic coffee. By the time I amble into the kitchen, it is dripping its last few drips before it shudders and goes quiet. I am reminded of my trip to the bathroom only moments before. I turn on this computer and, while it is "booting up," I pour a cup of coffee into a Martha Stewart Everyday Collection mug. I pick out a silver spoon from a group of silver spoons I inherited from my paternal grandparents and I add to my coffee sugar and French Vanilla Coffee Mate. I move over to my desk next to the big picture window that overlooks the park and I check my email. Then I read the newspaper and consume two cups of coffee.
Awake now, I decide on breakfast. It is usually cereal, wheat toast or a bagel. Sometime during breakfast, the Bowel Movement Express leaves the station. The train runs on time. A shower and some grooming later, I turn on the bedroom TV to Matt and Katie and decide which terrorist trick will most likely cause my demise while, simultaneousy, I decide what to wear. The latter decision takes roughly the same amount of time as my wake-up radio devotional. Then I dress and make my bed carefully turning down the gray pinstripe cotton sheet which overlaps the purple blanket which overlaps the white chenille bedspread. Then I'm off to work.
I enter the car in my garage and activate the automatic garage door. It is apparently on loan to my landlord from the Smithsonian. I back out and I close the garage door from my car. It takes me something in the neighborhood of a minute to drive to work. After impersonating a lawyer for the length of the workday, I return to an empty rent house. Usually, I yell "Honey, I'm home, but you're not!" Then I empty my pockets into a tray, turn on this computer and grab a cold green bottle of Perrier from the fridge. I fiddle around until I begin to starve and then I spend literally seconds whipping up an off-balanced, unsatisfying meal with poor presentation. Then it is on to nightime hygiene, reading, television and sleep.
God, I love routine.
© 2001 by the beastmaster