A Month of Mondays

Monday, February 2nd

There are mornings when the minute the eyes open, an internal groan begins. Your mind and body are in accord. All the omens and augers are there. Any movement made that doesn’t keep you beneath the covers and semi-conscious will bode negatively for the day.

It’s going to be a bad day. Bad days can vary in severity from the plight of waking up with a bad song in your head to waking up knowing you’ve got to go to a funeral to waking up from dire surgery with anesthetic fog in you head.

My bad day started with a bad song in my head and the simple dread of going to work on a Monday morning. There are any number of good songs that would be wildly appropriate. The song stuck in my head? ‘Do You Love Me?’ from The Fiddler on the Roof*, the movie soundtrack. The lyrics are by Sheldon Harnick and I spent my childhood singing them and the West Side Story lyrics. Not a bad song in the context of the movie/musical, but as a soundtrack for getting your morning coffee, checking your email and driving to work, not a good song. And, of course, I was compelled to sing it.

(Tevye) Do you love me? (Golde) Do I what? (Tevye) Do you love me? (Golde) Do I love you? With our daughters getting married And this trouble in the town You're upset, you're worn out Go inside, go lie down! Maybe it's indigestion (Tevye) "Golde I'm asking you a question..." Do you love me? (Golde) You're a fool (Tevye) "I know..." But do you love me? (Golde) Do I love you? For twenty-five years I've washed your clothes Cooked your meals, cleaned your house Given you children, milked the cow After twenty-five years, why talk about love right now? (Tevye) Golde, the first time I met you Was on our wedding day I was scared (Golde) I was shy (Tevye) I was nervous (Golde) So was I (Tevye) But my father and my mother Said we'd learn to love each other And now I'm asking, Golde Do you love me? (Golde) I'm your wife (Tevye) "I know..." But do you love me? (Golde) Do I love him? For twenty-five years I've lived with him Fought him, starved with him Twenty-five years my bed is his If that's not love, what is? (Tevye) Then you love me? (Golde) I suppose I do (Tevye) And I suppose I love you too

I made my way into the garage, bundling my scarf around me as I prepared to enter the arctic zone. Stepping out, I reached up and hit the garage door button. The garage door went up about four inches. Not enough for me to back the truck out. I pressed it again and it went down. I sighed a little but figured this was par for the course at this point. I pressed the button again. The door went up four inches. Another deep sigh. I took a moment of reflection and stared at my shoes. Then I was ready for another go. I repeated the button pressing up/down motion for five minutes of robotic like bliss until the door finally opened all the way. I grunted my satisfaction and walked to the truck. A tank full of gas, a stomach full of coffee and a mind empty of everything save getting to work on time and I was ready to go. Driving always makes me relax and I was heading towards a good mood. I listened contentedly as NPR reported on Groundhog Day events around America.

“Dudes,” I say, to all groundhogs across the country with cold, odd people standing in anxious circles around their burrows, “stay in your holes! It’s horrible out here!”

I’m at work in no time and the day flies by like a blue jay drunk on fermented crabapples. Music of the day – the Delgados. As ‘The Light Before We Land’ crashes, the bittersweet Scot in me is pleased.

Monday, February 9th

Out of sorts. That makes it sound as if all I need is a good collating. Hell, maybe I do. What I can tell you, is that from a feet dragging, lower lip hanging morning I’ve progressed to actually despising the capital form of the letter g this gloomy morning. Every time I go to type United States, I end up typing Untied Satres. I must have Jean-Paul on the brain. “Hell is others.” It is Monday and I’m at work.

I hope whoever invented Monday is suffering some kind of bitter karmic punishment. May an eternity of brussel sprout ice cream with stewed prune topping. Or maybe standing in an elevator really needing to get somewhere and the doors won’t shut, so Monday runs to another elevator, watches the doors close on the first one and stands for what feels like years when the realization of deja open happens. Yes, yes, a dire Sisyphus situation running from elevator to elevator with no upwardly mobile satisfaction! Or how about being stuck in really bad traffic whilst really having to pee? The inventor of Monday deserves no less.

My drive in the morning ends with a ride on an overpass that leads me to the lake. This morning’s sun painted the sky hues from deep blue to blaze orange as steam rose from water. Even the grungy smoke billowing from the stacks jutting from the cityscape were tinged a beautiful pink. I looked, I took it in and I humphed.

Once in the parking garage, I maneuvered my big, brown truck into a tiny parking space, front end out to aid in a quick escape later. I rushed into the building, was hit by a blast of warm air and really bad muzak. I headed to the elevators and my impending day. >From the four passes I have with me at all times, I choose the ‘make the elevator move’ pass. I hit the button for my floor. Nothing. I bashed my head against the expensive granite tiles that make up the walls of my morning amusement. I sighed. I headed to another elevator. I think you can guess the rest of the story.

When I made it up, I took another pass and entered the beige halls of Work. Setting all of my stuff (portable cases carrying 108 of my favorite cd’s, 2 books and my noise reduction headphones) on my desk, the java quest began. A good, hot mug of insanely hot coffee gentles my fiercest moods.

With a mug filled and scalding, I headed back to my desk. I have my computer set up so that the monitor faces the wall and blocks my cubicle mate. Her fondness for rolling tissue into ropes and sticking them up her nose as she speaks to me predicated the monitor placement. Taking the ropes out and examining them as we spoke solidified my decision. Her puking in the garbage pail between us made it happen. This position blocks sight of her and affords me a view of Lake Michigan. The lake fought off the brittle cold by emitting a rolling steam that made it look like a swirling cauldron. In the horizon, a bank of dark clouds clung to the water looking more like a vast mountain than a bank of today’s snow. All was tinged by the pinks, oranges and purple of morning light. It was incredibly beautiful.

As I held the hot mug to my cheek, it eased away the last of the cold as I stared out the window. When my patient and very old computer booted up, I entered a billion passwords until window upon window of my day lay scrunched together on the taskbar. Plugging the headphones in, the time to choose music was upon me. Monday means Rufus. Rufus Wainwright – Poses. I clicked repeat all on the CD player, sat back and began my day. By the time Rufus sang his version of ‘Across the Universe’, my savage beast of a morning had been thoroughly soothed. My coffee sat cold beside me and half of my day was gone. I was smiling. Music is always magical, transforming and it is the oxygen that lets my soul breath. Rufus, where ever you are, thank you

Monday, February 16th

I saw you this morning, Dressed for a funeral. I think the look in your eyes would be the look on the face of a man drowning, His mind set on sinking to the bottom. I don’t want to follow you down.

My music is no match for your sad heart, So big it holds an army of attacks. I look down and see my past scattered in bits and pieces around me While you’ve wiped you clean. These morsels of memories hold me up, when you fall to your knees Bereft of candy crutches and catchy tunes.

I’ve seen only a single smiling face today, Chocolate in continence and sweet in nature. She carried dying blooms away As others dragged their feet along the beige corridor of the week ahead. More is the pity that the sun doesn’t shine Deep in the trenches we’ve dug with our warrior wits.

The more we protect our selves, the farther from all that is warm We are. But don’t you know, I’d run a red light for you, I’d draw outside the lines Eat the rinds, Step on angry toes, All for the sake Of a fleeting smile And your little boy laugh That lights the gray day Like lightning flashes. Please don’t be Unhappier than me.

Rufus isn’t going to do it. I put in NIN, scowl and get a surprising amount of work done.

Monday, February 23rd

It occurred to me as I drove to work this morning that I shouldn’t try new sleeping medication on Sunday nights. When the alarm went off this morning, my whole existence was still wrapped up in a dreamworld that still clings to me. Everything I did before I left the house, I did on autopilot. Apparently, I hit the snooze alarm about twelve times. When it took me out of my semi-comatose state the last time, I came to saying, “He is fortune’s fool, but I am fortune’s embarrassing second cousin!” I was trying to make toast. Maybe toast is a way to get on fortune’s good side. It’s an excellent way to freak out a room full of cats pulled from their slumber by an over-medicated Shakespeare zealot still in deep REM. I ran to the alarm and turned it off and all of the fuzzy heads went back down except the blue-eyed Cagney. He was the toaster. I’d have to make major amends before he’d put his head back down. Luckily, I keep a bag of tarter treats on hands for occasions in which instant forgiveness is needed from a feline friend. As he crunched away, all of the kitty heads popped back up. They all got some, too. At my feet twined more treat obligations. The bag was soon empty.

I’d gotten up too late to break my fast and making coffee seemed… loud. I opted for getting ready for work. This particular Monday, this consisted of staring at my closet; slack jawed, for about ten minutes. I drag on things that vaguely matched and seemed the least covered with fur. I checked my email, which seemed to consist of messages and attachments with titles that included the word ‘edit’. ‘Edit’ suggested thinking. I shut the computer down and headed for the garage and my Monday morning commute.

Running down the checklist, I grabbed my bag. Going to the kitchen, I noticed my coat was MIA. After standing motionless for a minute, the image of the coat in the front hall closet filled my brain as a 15 watt light bulb went on over my head. Coat on, I did pocket checks and found keys and all the necessary passes to get me parked, on the elevator, through the door and punched in. With a grunt of satisfaction, I was work bound. But behind the wheel, as the truck groaned her way to life, my checklist prodded me. I checked my pockets again. No wallet. No wallet means no driver’s license. That would be bad.

I sit motionless as the 15 watt bulb condescends to turn on again. Yes, always check back pockets of jeans for missing wallets. Back in the house, under a pile of unmatched socks, are the jeans I wore Saturday. In the back pocket, my wallet. In the wallet, a drivers license with a picture of me that reminds that there are whole days that I go through awake and marginally cheerful. A marvel, really.

Back in the truck, I ease out of the garage and down the desperately in need of re-tarring driveway flanked by a muddy lawn. Up and down the street are yards filled with odd jobs it isn’t warm enough to more than contemplate for even the most die hard gardener. The sun in the sky and white puffy clouds that keep it company don’t fool me for a second. I saw the weather report as I popped that damn slumber pill last night. There were clouds with snowflakes on M, T and W. This early morning sun is a sham, a joke, a bright lie! I shake my fist at the sky, grunt and decide to concentrate on staying in my lane. I imagine the woman in the tiny red sports car would have appreciated that as I cut her off with my big brown truck. Her high pitched car horn and her furrowed brow in my rear view mirror elicit another grunt and a shrug. Except for my waking words, I am still pre-verbal. I know quite a few people that would take great joy in this rare state. I haven’t even worked my way to monosyllabic. Wow. Maybe taking that pill at 10:30 p.m. was the mistake. Although, what I really suspect is that just being awake altogether is the bad idea.

As I look around me, commuters jockey for position. Two men to my right glare at each other through the tinted windows of their over-priced sedans, but neither gives an inch to the others driving agenda. One wants to go west, the other east, and both are trapped going south because driving is a competition and their manhood is on the line. Normally, I’d be howling with laughter, but all these macho metro matadors get is another grunt. There is only one thing preying on my mind now. Java. The procuring, the drinking and the bodily assimilation of java.

At work, I boot the computer up and sit down. It’s almost ten minutes later that I realize it’s been patiently waiting for my password. I was apparently mesmerized by its flashing. Looking up, I see my sister standing next to me. She sings a song of coffee and indicates with frantic gestures that she needs some. I look up at her and grunt. I need some, too.

My morning was medicated and dream addled but Dianne’s was BAD. She writes some lyrics to expel her morning:

Song set to Gloomy Sunday

Monday is Gloomy, my eyes are not open yet My body last night was restless and slumberless My 'Fridge made a mess, the disposal is on the fritz When the week starts like this I get quite depressed Dreaming I was only Dreaming I awake and I find appliances on decline

You’ve got to feel for her. I wasn’t fond of this morning, but I didn’t have to deal with anything.... wet.

The coffee has kicked in and Ryan Adams wraps his voice around my soul. I nestle in and set to being a productive little worker. Looking outside, it occurs to me that it might have been the cloud with snowflake gif that lied. The lake glistens in the sun as terns dance in mid air.

I can hear Dianne laughing over the sounds of smoky coughs and murmured morning conversation. Heads in almost every cubicle are propped up on hands as eyes stare limply at screens full of bizarre, phonetic spelling and indications of a system soon to crash. Ryan sings in my ear that love is hell. Well, he’s mostly right. But, Mondays are worse.

Jennifer Jordan ©

* this movie featured Isaac Stern as the Fiddler