laura: 'this is some bruce willis shit right here. is bruce willis going to have to die?'

matt: 'yeah, but isn't there like a 75% chance it'll just hit water?'

laura: 'but what if bruce willis is on a boat?'

see title.

rain came in today washing a bit of the staleness away, my thoughts since the afternoon a quiescent afterburn of the moment a flash lit up the sky and a long clap of thunder made life in an empty house just interesting enough to distract from the returning cold.

yesterday i was walking along lafayette street with catherine when a dried-up christmas tree fell off the back of a truck and obstructed traffic. we laughed as it slid off and watched the first couple of cars go around it, then she ran out into the middle of the street and dragged the tree off to the side, still laughing. later, driving by the same spot, we saw the guy from the truck putting the tree back into place.

'i'm virtuous,' she said.

i live for long periods in media consumption and reflection on the past, but i still have to live in real time. things happening, moments and opportunities passing, the connections to those previous events that weigh so heavily on me eroding with the inevitable passage of days and months and, at this point i have to admit, years. makes the whole thing seem so pointless.

as the year changed i didn't write a long reflection on 2007 as i have in previous years. i was in dracut for christmas and didn't get to see christine, then i was back in salem without laura and didn't get to see catherine either. laura and her parents came back for christmas in rockport on the 29th and i joined them and they took me back to brimfield that night. snow there while it only rained in salem. i spent a lot of money i don't have on books at a place called 'the book bear' in west brookfield, spending most of my time in the marxism and medievalism sections until laura showed me some of the classic paperbacks; i picked up zola's la bête humaine, which i'm reading now.

i'm struck by the country out there every time; the snow was beautiful falling and after it fell, but i can't appreciate anymore because i'm always worried about parking.  there's something sad in that.  the ride back from rockport i watched the stars when we got out there because there you can see them.  laura and i came back to salem on wednesday and thursday night i was outside her house in the arctic cold looking up between houses at the hint of starlight.  i think we're offered it only as a hint of what we're missing elsewhere.  i tend to prefer life here in almost every other respect, but at what a price.

i say this on the tail end of every break and i'm back saying it again: i need school to start again so i can set a coherent thought in decent words bolstered by days full of familiar faces and some sort of routine.