Dirty Desk

Shot Focus

I’m here because I am having trouble with focus. I am having trouble composing words from those cryptic processes in the brain and directing them through my cricked neck and cramped shoulders into my hands (sorted by letter), fingers (further sorted by letter), and then int cyberspace now (i guess).

My toes on my right foot are colder than the left. My right arm has been falling asleep more often than seems reasonable. I pulled a muscle in my right shoulder a week ago and maybe someone would say its blocking the flow of chi to that side of my body. That person wouldn’t be me.

It’s cold in my house—around 49 degrees since I turned up the heat, and due to the brightness of the screen I can see very little of the rest of the first floor which is quite dark. I know my dog is sleeping on the other side of this couch because I can hear him breathing. I know where my coffee mug and beer can are because they both reflect enough to be seen in my periphery, but mostly I see only these words, a keyboard with a missing “f4” button, one fingerless striped glove, and one orange mitten that can be pulled back to serve as a fingerless glove. Inside those articles of clothing are my hands of course. And when I look at the hands they represent me.

Hands—I think—are a private sort of thing. Our faces are us to the world but our hands are us to us. My hands, recently, have been failing to tell the story about a young man in a place that was once home to the republic of Japan. Before the bombs of course. Before the fog covered so much of the planet, before America became Mainland. “It’s a good story,” I keep telling my hands, but they have grown board and wonder. Maybe my hands are like my dog. Maybe I need to take them on a walk and let them meander and smell and play with other hands if I’m ever going to get them to sit still and do what I ask. Maybe my right hand is mad at me and is denying the blood I give him—perhaps he’s falling asleep in protest because he’s cold, and why does the left side always get that nice thick orange mitten?

It’s hard to say.