How did now become now?

A cloud of breath rose in front of my face. Standing at the gate, on the threshold of the airplane's door I could see the red and brown highrises of The Bronx, I could see men working on the concrete below, covered from the cold despite numb unsheathed faces. Some bitchy woman behind me kept complaining about the temperature. "Don't take this for granted," I told her, "Its 2 degrees in Chicago right now." "Well, I'm not staying in Chicago, I'm going to Dallas," she informed me, and without invitation squeezed in against me as I stepped on the plane.

Everyone settled in their seats and the overhead compartments clicked close. One of the workers from the ground came down the aisle with a big bucket of something to defrost the rear doors, we taxied, a pretty girl about my age had a panic attack, we returned to the gate, she walked shamefully quick to the front door of the plane and we taxied again...

In Chicago I had only a couple minutes to change flights. Descending, I marveled at the great sprawl beside the lake, the frozen solid suburban patches of white, the daunting black skyscrapers in the distance. Our steward just hoped his car would start. It was -5 now and the sun was still above the horizon. Inside the terminal I could be perceived only as a long transparent six-foot blur that came into the shape of a shaky twenty-something with a blue backpack at gate B11, the men's room, and the front of the line at the sandwich counter, which I intended to cut gracefully. "My plane takes off in 5 minutes!" I shook frantically from my throat, "Can I just pay for this?!!"

I'm sitting now beside my favorite coffee shop in Oakland. The passing activity of cars and people is but a refreshing murmur. The air is crisp and a thin fog is burning off. (Its not even 11am and I'm out of bed - sometimes time changes work in your favor). I'm not sure what to do with myself, what to make of anything. In a week Will is going to be snoozing on my couch, we'll be counting t-shirts and loading in and out of a practice space. We'll be breaking our bank on guitar strings, chords, drum sticks, and some more unfortunate purchases since our van was broken into a few weeks ago. Then its back to the highway and back to the stage!

I dwell beneath a constant drizzle of uncertainty. Always wet with questions that can't be answered, concerns that can only be speculated upon, one way plane tickets, knots in my neck and back, loves I'm always leaving, and long hours of impatient anxiety. The future is a hazy black curtain and a list of cities and dates on our myspace page. Its a constant competition, its a business and I am a businessman, contracted with numerous parties, employing, outsourcing, hiring, firing, signing and initialing, schmoozing and shaking hands, grinding gears and grinding teeth, clawing for opportunity....

But here I sit in a dull and pleasant moment. I am eavesdropping on the gossip of the pecking pigeons and coffee shop patrons. The sun is kissing my cheek. There are pretty girls and eccentric homeless folks to slyly stare at. Old folks are ambling by, paramedics are getting early lunch, and art school kids are just starting to get belligerent. James is gonna show up any minute now and smoke a couple cigarettes. I'll refill my coffee and our conversation will twist and turn and we'll pause and we'll sigh. And then this moment will quietly collapse into the next one and the next one and the next...

...and so on to infinity.