Can the Democrats Trade Joe Manchin for a Future Draft Choice?

The rain’s falling and I’m out walking in it. Can’t blame the rain for falling, or when it doesn’t fall for that matter.

 I’m seeking my 10,000 steps, every step the first day of the rest of my life. Should have worn gloves, or tried that old Wyoming trick of making a fist with my hands or clapping my hands together to stay warm.

So many masks out in the streets and on the sidewalks! I wonder what kind of faces were behind them? All the faces have fled, and in a hurry it seems, leaving only the masks behind. The trash company, a conglomerate that goes by the politically expedient name of Recology, has done a nice job of redistributing the old masks without concern for one’s social status, wealth etc etc. Were I still entrepreneurial I’d try to find some way to capitalize on this glut of forlorn pre-owned masks, the majority of which have been left behind by the trash company itself. 

After a mile or so of this walking , I reach Irving Street. I’m hungry but I’ve forgotten to bring my money. I can’t remember everything! At this time in my life it’s much more about forgetting than remembering, I’m afraid. In any event, I put my starvation off for a little while by reading the menus posted to the windows of restaurants, self-service if you will, and, after getting a little sustenance there, continue my walk.

Turning the corner at Stanyan, proceeding north, feeling a bit weak but determined to continue my wet walk, I decide that I’ll fight like hell against  Inherent Tiredness Syndrome (ITS) with which I’d been recently diagnosed by one of the witch doctors at Kaiser Permanente. The doctor said I must pass-up all picture-taking opportunities while out walking—resist the impulse to picturize is the way he put it. In other words, I become overly tired by making too many connections between the things I see and the things I think about, or vice-versa. I’m not a young man anymore, nor have I been one for some time. I need to let others to make connections from this point forward. My inbox and outbox must stay as still as the smallest pond in Golden Gate Park.

Finally, I reach home, a steady trudge up 10th Avenue. On the way Old Beckett’s in my ears once again: “I tried to live without knowing what I was trying.” 

The rain’s ready to reach a stopping point, it’s more a drizzle by the time I open the front door of my house. So interesting to me that the journey of 13,000 steps—more or less—began by tying my shoes and went on from there.