The flu

Laying there with the wheels spinning, only they don't touch the ground.
Fixating on yet another thing that can't be fixed.
Or even touched.
It's all the same.
Shudders and sighs.
Not caused by anything exciting, just a virus.
In the system.
Then there's the heaviness in the lungs.
Like running uphill, only without legs.
And still the wheels on the bus go round and round.
Today it's problems at work.
Then it's on to problems in the past.
Boys.
Then parents.
Then back to boys.
Then back to parents and further back.
Finally, in a desperate bid for sleep, fixate on something good.

Early morning in the station- Grandma is brewing coffee and cooking scrambled eggs. I am sleepy. Grandpa has already opened for business. Sunlight streams through the screen door that divides public and private- when night comes, the heavy metal door will be shut, and we will be sealed inside. It is warm. There is soft butter in a bowl on the counter. This is where I would live, if my life were like "Groundhog Day," and if I had a choice.

Then I sleep. The sleep of the just, perhaps. The sleep of the innocent, not likely. The sleep of the dead, not yet- but sleeping with the dead, surely. Because they gave me those moments. And I keep them.