Contemplation: a writing exercise

This is fiction. Used three words: blanket, stand (V), cautious, and wrote it in half hour. I did four using these words but the first three seemed to be things that I would like to to make into longer posts.

See Sar on My Musical Highway Project. She did pick the single best song in the world. OCeallaigh is Sar’s guest today for a fascinating look at product placement, uh, TV commercials and Spam

I am staring at myself in the bathroom mirror. It is something that I can do for hours while sipping coffee and lighting cigarettes that I hold, but don’t smoke. If it’s night I will smoke a joint, and drink water. I don’t really look at myself.

The bathrooms are the only private places in the loft. We have three: one for him; one for me; and one for company. Bathrooms are one of the few things we agree on. I tell people that I had agreed to marry him because he was the only man I could find in the early 80’s who valued separate huge bathrooms as much as I did. They think I’m joking.

Our loft has been photographed for many shelter magazines. It has exposed pipes, gleaming floors, a chef’s open kitchen, boldly colored walls including some neon, and colorful furniture. When people stay over we close the steel grating eight feet before the bed.

I tell him that the 80’s have been over for sixteen years, it’s time for walls and warmth. He doesn’t even like the colonial patchwork blanket I bought to hang over my couch in the part of the loft called my study.

He insists that our loft is a modern classic and will stand the time test. I think it’s so retro it might come back.

It’s more than a lack of walls, of course. We agree on such few things yet our conversations are interesting. The sex is even good. I have never felt in love with him.

Our conversations have become less and less frequent as has the sex. We shine with company. Our loft is a Thursday night, Sunday afternoon salon.

Our secret, something we both knew before ever meeting, is not to try to host, but to enjoy ourselves. I often cook something in advance, but we have people to do everything.

I take the cigarette out of the Lalique ashtray, and wonder if I have ever really been in love. I don’t think so.

Other women would leave. They would search for a grand love, or at least an apartment that has doors in more places than the bathrooms. True we have another house in Montauk, and it has three stories and two bedrooms. Other women would still yearn for grand romance, for a man she can stand to talk to more than once a week and with company. We don’t have kids. I’m not dependent on him. Why am I with him?

I feel lost and lonely in the loft on West Street in Tribeca, and find myself spending more and more time in the house in Montauk where my office overlooks the ocean.

The large windows facing the Hudson make the loft worthwile. I watch cargo boats drifting over the river, tall ships, cruise boats, it is a never ending symphony of flowing water and objects.

I put the cigarette in my mouth and begin to choke as they never get close to my mouth. After I recover, I realize that I will never leave. I’m much too cautious.