Man of Action III

by G. Sax

So last time I wrote about procrastination, which is something I’m very good at. But the point of the exercise was to slap myself in the face with it like a cold fish in a cartoon or a gloved feminine hand in a 1950s romance. I don’t want to be good at procrastinating anymore. Let’s time capsule these things and move on:

• Delivering Sunday newspapers at noon to old people who wake up at 5 a.m.
• Arriving in high school homeroom at the bell…everyday…for four years.
• Nearly missing high school graduation.
• Blinking at the dawn with 4 pages more to write for the big college paper. Doing it again. And again.
• Showing up for the game in the 3rd inning, the 2nd quarter, the 2nd period.
• Arriving late to the job, to the party, to the wedding, to the…you name it, I’ve been the last one there.
• Doing my taxes on April 14th.

This year, I did my taxes by April 8th. Federal and two states. It’s a start.

Today, I’m writing in the morning. Writing before I do anything else. Writing fresh, rather than only at the ass end of the day, when I’m spent and my voice is cracking.

And I have a full-time job that I must go to now. On time.

Man of Action II

by G. Sax

Springbok
Last night the air smelled so good. Rain pure, washing away the last bits of dirty air from an overlong winter. The weekend was grand and not even an early case of the Mondays followed by nearly 11 straight hours of deskwork could wipe the smile off my face.

I’ve officially been in Minnesota for a year now after about 10 years away. The way I used to feel about springtime as a kid on my way home from school was the same way I felt last night as I locked the garage and wobbled toward my apartment after a long day. Youthful, full of a certain thrill that an incredible summer lay before me, unrepentant in my zeal for the tastes of life.

I’m not so young, of course, though it feels good to be regularly mistaken for a twentysomething. I have my hair and my hair is brown. My wallet remains empty, but maybe this is what makes me lean more toward 18 than 38.

With spring and summer here and now, I’m going to get me some of that green real soon.

What’s Up With Hope?

by G. Sax

Do you got it? I have it up on point most of the time. It’s ready for my action. It often enters my sentence structure in an overpolite or cliché manner. But it’s there, whether it feels itself being used for trite New Year’s purposes, such as this, or for thoughtlessnesses like “I hope you’re feeling better” and “I hope you have a nice day” and “I hope to see you again around sometime.”

All the same, I have hope. Because why not? What, should I be all like, “I’ll never have a zero balance” or “I can’t do anything about my career path” or “I won’t ever have nothin’ nice.” I am totally capable of negative nellying, but I want to stop that and focus on the hope.

Not no Bill Clinton shit either. I think that’s all real adorable how he used his hometown of Hope, Arkansas, as a political base to launch the bastardization of “Don’t Stop” by Fleetwood Mac, but I would rather not drive hope into the ground. Hope is a soap bubble floating on cool air. Hope is a birthday balloon bouncing in a finished basement. Hope is dust specks in soft morning light through vertical blinds.

I hope big. I hope broad. But some of the best nuggets are in the unexpected grouty connections that hold together all things hopeful.

I promise to never lose hope.

How could I? How could I lose it when I am so utterly filled with excitement over the smallest of things? People getting along. Smiles. Envelopes full of cash. Or how about this little gem…

I built a snowman with my children and my niece and nephew. Yes, I currently live where it doesn’t snow but I was in Minnesota for Christmas. So we built this snowman out behind my sister’s apartment, and by nightfall someone had knocked it over. I promptly went back out and rebuilt it. The next morning, someone knocked the head off. I repaired it. Then the head was busted in two. I built a new head. Knocked over again. Tipped back up. Arms busted, eyes removed, smile pulled apart…all rebuilt better and stronger.

My daughter, Anais, helped with a couple of the rebuilds. One time after we were heading back up the back steps, she said with no prompting, “I love you, daddy. And I love the snowman, too.”

That kind of thing will fill you up with hope real fast. I never gave up on that snowman, and it stood proud as I passed it one last time on the way to the airport.

Maybe it’s been knocked over again since I left. I hope not.

I have hope for 2006, and I hope you do, too.