serial times, pt 10

The Pkg

(continued from before...)

I came to suddenly, and the world faded into clarity with all the rapidity of melting Arctic ice.

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I blinked and tried to remember what the hell it was looking back at me. It wasn’t sudden, but I finally remembered it to be called a ceiling.
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Strangely enough, just after remembering a word that was in the first top twenty of words I learned as a kid, a thought that would have inspired Einstein himself crossed my mind (however, I can’t recall it at the moment, so the actuality isn’t going to live up to the hype).

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Nevertheless, a certain sense of urgency prevailed over my body. At first, I thought the urgency had to do with my packing for my flight set to leave in several hours. Then I realized that I had finished the night before, as experience had taught me that whenever I had some ganja to smoke, the rank in priority of my actually getting other things done often plummeted to heights among double-digit ordinals.

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My second thought about what the urgency could be was that there was no way I was going to be able to smoke an entire half-pound in such a short period of time (this was followed by a related thought that if I actually smoked it all, my short period of time would be extended unintentionally but predictably, thereby no longer being in the realm of “short” period of time). I realized that I could give the stuff away, but that wasn’t going to get me stoned when I was abroad.
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My third thought was the one that put the biggest jolt in me and it was an about-face from what I’d been thinking for the past hour or two. It suddenly had become a must-do that I go to private mailing center and mail the pkg. I couldn’t believe how selfish I’d been acting toward the present, forsaking the future because of a little lethargy and a long day ahead of me.
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How long was it going to have to be before I got to taste my next ganja? Four months? Eight? Vishnu help me, but Twelve?
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Well, if all went right and I avoided Big Brother and his buddy, Gluttony, I could be enjoying it the following week.

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It was this last thought, this thought of positivity, this thought of the possible great outcome of the endeavor, this actual glimpse of success, this thought of its actually working, this thought that I might be smoking ganja in a week or so, that got me off of the floor, and out the door toward MBE, pkg tucked under my arm.
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When I had left earlier that morning to start my trek to mail the pkg, the weather had been cool and sunny followed by cool and rainy. I was wearing a long-sleeve t-shirt, as a result, something out of which I’d not changed before I went traipsing up to the mailbox center.
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By the time I left on that very early afternoon, however, for the unplanned second half of the trek, the weather had warmed considerably and the sun was out, though surrounded by clouds and a bit of unusual Los Angeles humidity.

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I got less than fifty meters up the moderate hill that led to the mailbox place from my friend’s apartment and almost turned around. I was sweating profusely and my breathing was like the collective heaving at an N’Sync concert (though my heaving at that time would have been of a different nature had I ever had the misfortune to hit one of those concerts).

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I am averse to being hot and to sweating profusely, except while making wild love or playing sports, especially if I’m overdressed for what the temperature is dictating. The knowledge of the potential success of mailing the pkg was the self-motivation tool I used to keep myself going, and I welcomed the challenge of fighting through the heat spell.

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Fortunately, the majority of the way from my friend’s apartment to the mailbox center isn’t uphill, and soon I was on the downward slope of the grade toward my destination. The negative thought that I was going to be walking that majority in reverse on my way back tried to creep into my mind, but I thought of baseball and immediately was able to continue without losing it.

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I passed a filling station and a drug store and, as I stood on a corner across from the mailbox center, awaiting a streetlight to change, I was overcome with elation at my impending success. I had done it! I had overcome Sloth and Thai Chicken pizza and was going to be so happy (literally, figuratively, and pipingly, so to speak) and appreciative the following week.

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I was going to look back in deep appreciation.
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If not, it would only be as a result of my being too stoned to do anything but look for the nearest place of repose.

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(to be continued...)