BETTY By Mr. Vincent Sagona January, 2021
There are long stretches of time where I feel sorry for myself with no one to interfere. Sometimes I sit on the couch, alone with my thoughts, and see how long l can last in my own head without plunging into despair. Then I start to listen to the sounds of the electronics in the house. The hum of the refrigerator…the bathroom fan…and it becomes the music of my mind. I lose the ability to focus on any one object and my vision becomes blurred. I feel my consciousness slip and disengage until there is no time and space.
Betty, my dog, tells me that COVID will end soon. I think she likes quarantine even more than I do. It’s gotten to the point where Betty reprimands me when I take out the garbage. Today she muttered: “trash is so 2019”. I don’t always know what she’s talking about. Yesterday she said: “the fault lies not in our stars but in ourselves”… and then napped for three hours. What is she trying to tell me? She knows things. She likes to play these little games with me. No problem. I’ve got time. I’m not going anywhere.
Both of my legs fell asleep this morning and I couldn’t walk for 45 minutes. I imagined I was a slug housed in my own lugubrious ooze. It felt cold and damp and lonely. When I finally stood, I had become a newborn colt just learning to take its first steps. My knees wobbled as I lurched forward. I ate a carrot and reminisced about life on the ranch. Then I fell asleep standing for what felt like the entire day. I awoke to my neighbor Josh knocking on the door. Betty gave
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