Maraschino Red

"You should knit a Bitter Sweater of Self Gratification!" said Red.

"A what?"

"A sweater that says, 'You're an idiot for leaving me, but I don't care, because I look totally hot in this sweater.'"

That sounded like a fine idea, so I started Joan McGowan Michael's 'Laced Front Sweater' from 'Knitting Lingerie Style'. The problem? It's taking forever to make any progress. All that ribbing is a real bitch. I've been working on it since Black Bart broke up with me. By the time it's finished, even factoring dating hiatuses, the hotness of the BSoSG might be directed at any one of half a dozen dudes. Maybe it won't be directed at anyone by then, because I'll be done being bitter. We'll see.

Greige

For a few weeks earlier this year, I was seeing the guy who developed the app pictured above. I guess I'm not seeing him anymore; it's been a month since I've heard from him. It's a thing I'm learning. People are capable of vanishing from each other's lives without explanation.

Anyway, he developed the app, and I downloaded it the day it was released. The next day at my desk, I aimed the camera in four different directions and captured four different palettes. These are the colors the camera picked up.

Later that evening, I showed him the results. He looked at me thoughtfully through a cloud of peach-scented vapor from his electronic cigarette. "How does this make you feel?"

"Dead inside!" I replied with false brightness. He was still staring at me, so I continued talking. I knew if I thought about it any more deeply than that, I'd start crying, and that wasn't something we shared, he and I. "Whatever creativity left in me is being sucked away, and my thoughts are becoming grey. I think I'm getting...stupider? Is that a word? I don't even know anymore. So...dinner?"

I've been thinking about it a lot lately, how far away from myself I've grown, how to come back around to where I want to be, to who I want to be. I feel like I keep stepping off in the wrong direction.

Road Noise

Why do I think of all of the best words to write while I'm driving? Where do they go when I get out of my car?