Countdown

waterloo east station

waterloo east

time

Another week gone, the days arduously ticked off like items on a to-do list, the endless countdown to each Friday night, only to leave us with one glorious Saturday and one anxiety-ridden, dread-full Sunday before we’re back in the machine. That ain’t no way to live.

So I’m outta there. One more week, and on my birthday I will go out with a bang, a pile of cakes, and two bottles of Kava Brut. I am temping for a reason – I’m a free spirit, a drifting creative, a non-committer, a quitter. I refuse to devote my life to the service of others – especially when those ‘others’ are petty lawyers, earning their daily bread by feeding the rapacious beast of bureaucracy which is holding us all in its swelling grip.

waterloo east

still life

waterloo east

On the long, gently bobbing train rides to and from work I read, swallowing words like a hungry child, noting them down in my journal, savouring their meanings and origins; adding them to my ever-expanding bank for future use and abuse. Certain sentences and passages grab my attention and I am compelled to read them over and over before highlighting and leaving for a later re-read, and I long for careless days when I can spend seamless hours tapping away at my keyboard, nailing words to stories, pouring the contents of my brain into cookie moulds and watch them rise in the heat.

Inevitably, one part of me is wondering, will I ever be able to make a living off my writing? But the other part of me is saying, I can do anything I set my mind to, and a new mantra has emerged: I have something to prove.

kajsa palsson