leaving my house for a week.  this is among the most menial and time consuming tasks i must do as an obsessive compulsive.  i will not bore you with the details, because, though they fascinate me, they will not fascinate you, i know.  but i did check my locks on my doors and windows six times, then turned my car around a quarter of a mile away to check them again. 

crap.  the bedroom window.  i’ll be thinking about whether or not i locked that for the next week.

if someone is watching me i pretend i am going up to get something.  then i have to bring something down, something of value, that i might need on a trip.  they don’t know i’m leaving for a week though.  but still, i bring something down.  just to look normal. 

i think about rob as i pack.  rob used to work with me.  he took three hour breaks.  he chain smoked every thirty minutes.  he was greasy.  he was creepy to girls.  he was fired.  people are fired all the time where i work, because we have so many employees.  these people moving in and out of my life.  it’s all like watching a stressful film where you only know the characters briefly, and then you never see them again.  i think about peresa, the girl who always sounded like she was on the verge of bursting into tears when she asked you for anything at all.  and then in the break room she always bursted into tears.  i think about amanda.  “manda” she wrote on her tickets.  i think about how much i hated her and how glad i was when i realized she was working her last day.

it’s been an odd summer. this album reminds me of being sad in the summer.