He was on hold for the eleventh time in two weeks. Most places have foresaken easy listening or Motown hits on their hold music for advertisements and reassurances of impending real-time human interaction. While he was leaning back, waiting for the ad to be interrupted by a live human voice, the only thing he could think of was two other people he should be waiting on hold to talk to.
The conversation he finally had was another block of dialogue that would certainly never catch the notice of the Academy, but was recited earnestly nonetheless. When he hung up, he breathed deeply with relief.
He knew he ought to call someone else, wait on hold, talk to them. He knew he had work to do. Books to read. He knew he should get some water, write an e-mail, make a to-do list. But he sat back in his chair and looked at nothing at all and knew it was possible he might never understand.
He had come to believe, as others had, that life is nothing more than a quest for understanding. To understand. To see clearly, without bias, without preconception. Without judgement. Himself, the world, women, men, children, his family and his closest friends. Without judgement.
Every time something happened during his life that forced him out of his comfortable existence and made him see how something really was, he found how far he was from understanding. Every time this happened, he only saw greater gaps in his understanding, and thus it seemed like he was living in reverse, getting further and further away from that which he had thought he was driving toward as fast as he could.
He had thought the other day that any emotion he felt could be expressed as anger. He knew the process of translating sadness to anger so well now that for a long time he had done it unconsciously. Same with fear and frustration, even weariness. So when he woke up and felt pissed off he knew it was probably something else, lost to him now. So when he woke up he was tired and he just wanted to go somewhere quiet where nothing had changed.
The cell phone signal was weak.
”Where are you?” She asked.
”At home, where are you?” He replied.
”At home.”
”I’m tired,” he said.
”Yeah.”
”Do you ever feel–” he began, and they got disconnected. He walked to the other end of the apartment and called her back.
”Hey.”
”Hey,” he said. “I was just gonna ask you, do you ever feel–”
”John, not now. I can’t, not right now. I just can’t.”
”I don’t–”
”I’m just tired.”
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