I was reading TrekFic earlier, and was so wrapped up in the story that the hum of my computer became the subtle feeling of warp engines, and when I looked up and realized I was in the here and now, I was momentarily jarred. I love that feeling, when a story takes over the present, and I’m not merely reading it, but immersed in it, swimming through words and images and ideas, and feeling them flow over, around, through me. I wish I could harness that kind of energy, but I have so many things diverting my attention. I wish I could afford to stay home and write, and not have to choose between time cleaning the kitchen and time at the keyboard.

I wish I still had legible handwriting. I can barely write any more, and my once-pretty penmanship has become too like my grandmother’s cramped scrawl. She used to send us clippings from magazines and newspapers about famous people with bad handwriting, so that we’d stop bothering her about it.

I wish I had a house with one more room, and a slightly bigger income, because I have a friend who needs a safe haven and a chance to heal, and I’m not in a position to offer it. Am I selfish for not opening my home to someone, because I fear that I would only enable her to not deal with her situation, or worse, that our friendship wouldn’t hold up under the strain? Or is my selfishness of the much more petty variety: I have my own space now, finally, and I don’t want to give that up. I wish I knew. I wish I had a solution.

I wish, I wish, I wish.

I wish I only ever had to deal with reasonably intelligent, competent people. I wish I had more patience and tolerance for people who don’t fit that description.

I wish they’d stop digging up and resurfacing Winchester Blvd, in some endless game of Road Median Hokey Pokey (You put dividers in, you take dividers out, you block the whole damned street, and fuck the traffic all about), because it seems like the days with cones outnumber the days without and it’s interfering with the morning quest for coffee.

I wish I could breathe, and that my eyes would stop itching and that my tear ducts would work with some semblance of normalcy.

I wish Zorro would stop being neurotic about his dinner, and that Cleo would stop barking at everything. And yes. I mean EVERYTHING.

I wish.
I wish.
I wish.