You fall out on the beach after a brutal winter that feels like something out of a Russian novel. You are amazed that somewhere there are people who sit on beaches and soak up this incredible sunshine and you immediately wonder what they know that you don't. Because it is not only the winte,r but an exhaustion from stress and work and stress and work. Chicago seems like something out of a Siberian winter and the people you remember from the trains and coffee houses going through their days seem more like coal miners than a thriving middle class. And then you realize you are a coal miner.
Why else would you spend your time in an area of the country that is frozen for eight months? Why would you live near industrial centers spewing toxins and God knows what else? Why else would you live in an area that is just for people to work and work and work. Because down here in the boot of the country in Naples Florida this is where people come to get some relief and it makes you wonder as you stare at the Gulf and hear the surf like someone who has just come back from a war because you have come back from a war for survival--if there is a different way to live.
And you hear all sorts of other languages: French, German, Italian, Russian, Spanish, and you have to wonder if the whole world has been sold a bill of goods. That you are supposed to spend the majority of your life working in areas you take vacations from to see how life should be and then go back. And of course the world doesn't wait or care. Your small hell will be waiting for you when your week ends. So you just stare at the water and feel the sun and hear the surf and then you just sit down in the sand and face that glorious sun and drink up your missing Vitamin D, muttering...I made it.
www.billhazelgrove.com
Rocket Man is scheduled to blast off April 26th
Why else would you spend your time in an area of the country that is frozen for eight months? Why would you live near industrial centers spewing toxins and God knows what else? Why else would you live in an area that is just for people to work and work and work. Because down here in the boot of the country in Naples Florida this is where people come to get some relief and it makes you wonder as you stare at the Gulf and hear the surf like someone who has just come back from a war because you have come back from a war for survival--if there is a different way to live.
And you hear all sorts of other languages: French, German, Italian, Russian, Spanish, and you have to wonder if the whole world has been sold a bill of goods. That you are supposed to spend the majority of your life working in areas you take vacations from to see how life should be and then go back. And of course the world doesn't wait or care. Your small hell will be waiting for you when your week ends. So you just stare at the water and feel the sun and hear the surf and then you just sit down in the sand and face that glorious sun and drink up your missing Vitamin D, muttering...I made it.
www.billhazelgrove.com
Rocket Man is scheduled to blast off April 26th
