99 Years

Not because I understood. Not in the least. Just the opposite, in fact. I have a congenital disability. I was born without a big picture. Other people have one. They try to lend me theirs but it doesn’t work. It’s like when I tried to learn to watch television. I wanted to watch with everyone else. I tried but I could not be convinced. Wanted to be, but couldn’t. So I take notes. Because it doesn’t make sense. Nothing fits. Because there is no way of drawing a line under anything. Because the story is false. Yet it all seems so helplessly urgent! When you don’t understand what is being said you must struggle to catch every word. Because the room refused to stop spinning, I took notes. Here, then, are my attempts at a raft. Incomprehension. Is the basis. Confusion. An abiding and adoring panic. That sea. What country are they calling this now? And what am I supposed to be -- don’t even say it. All I know is what the woman at the next table is saying. Between bites of her donut. “This is the job. My father is 99 years old. There is absolutely nothing wrong with him.”