You stop for the night in Dothan, Alabama. For once it's not because you're falling asleep, but your back is pulsing with days of packing, moving, and sweeping--and you want to give the cats a rest. The room has that must of used-to-allow-smoking. You press the switch on a lamp; nothing happens. The alarm clock's face is dark, tells no time. You lie on the bed, which works pretty well, wait for muscles to shift, imagine your ribcage broken open, allowing the spasm over your heart to relax, so you can inhale. So you can sigh.
Your friend has made you a farewell mix. It feels like the future and the past happening simultaneously. Like hope and wist. You want everyone to hear it, but it is just for you. Another friend made you a mix when you moved to California. You were listening to it when you saw a fox run across a busy highway surrounded by dust and hills. To two dear friends, you gifted a book called "The Benefits of Looking Up" which had glossy snapshots on white expansive pages of balloons in air or caught in trees, power lines.
You feel that way right now. A little adrift, but on your way up.
You've stopped telling people you're 31. It seems to keep coming up in conversation, and you're tired of the "almost 32" justification. As the plane approached Panama city, a man from there mistook you for an undergrad. You resisted pointing out the lines in your face, the one deepening above your right eyebrow. You laugh, say thank you. Decide instead that the excitement you feel when you read the articles about the school philosophy where you're soon to be teaching must be palpable. Maybe you'll teach your students that word.
