The Winter Reprieve

Time. That was all Emery had and he knew it was supposed to be a luxury but it didn’t seem all that lavish to have nothing to do for hours on end except stare at your navel and contemplate your failed career. And frankly, even his ability to contemplate his excess of time was falling apart. He contemplated in a less-focused manner every day, losing a small percentage of brain function for each second he spent unable to activate his mind.

Attempting to give his schedule some shape, he made it a goal to take a walk every day at noon. With this imposing block stuck into his daily schedule, he was forced to get out of bed by 11. Then, the time before noon could be spent getting everything ready for the walk. Most days that amounted to simply putting on shoes and getting dressed, which was challenging enough.

Initially, the length of the walk was determined by the afternoon schedule, which on most days was free and clear. On those days, if Emery returned from his noon walk unusually early, he started taking a second walk later in the day. As the weather began to cool down he found himself unable to tolerate the single long noon walk anymore and began to rely more heavily on the two walk schedule, which eventually had to be broken into a three walk system with scheduled warmth stops along the way. By December he was working his way towards a five walk program.

Soon the walking began taking up much more time than working. Emery’s day consisted of hours of walking/stopping in warmth spots, and eventually he started to worry about staying out too long on his first walk because it would push the time of his second walk back so far and he’d find himself taking his fifth walk at midnight. He began to turn down social engagements and free meals because they would interrupt his walking schedule, leaving him without food most nights. One day he realized he had been starving for a full week.

The first day off from walking was a small luxury. Just a little vacation to give him some time to rest. The next day he decided that, as the rest of the world was taking two-day weekends, he could certainly afford a second holiday. By day three he had forgotten to set an alarm and found himself waking up at 12:30, half an hour into his first walk’s scheduled time. He decided to stay in rather than push his schedule back. By day four he was back where he had started, sitting on the couch, losing brain function and worrying that his life was amounting to nothing. By day five his worries had become so abstract as to no longer be all that worrying. Instead they just sat in the pit of his stomach, causing baseless anxiety. His winter reprieve was over.