On the morning of October 12th, Jeffrey Riggle stepped out into the clear day which smelled like mulled cider and dying foliage. He sucked the inviting air deeply into his nostrils and contentedly breathed it back out.
He felt alive today, though he wasn’t certain what this peculiar vim hinged on. It was simply there, and he wasn’t going to complain. The neighborhood was strangely deserted, and on a normal day, this would have saturated Jeffrey’s mind with dread and seeting paranoia, but, as he rightly observed, today was not a normal day. A tender breeze swept up fallen leaves and carried them down the empty street in gentle arabesques. Jeffrey smiled, feeling at ease with such a motherly presence.
He wasn’t quite sure where he was going. He had left his apartment guided only by his desire to be in motion, however leisurely. It was when he was in motion that he felt most at home. Motion meant that he didn’t have to focus on the drearier aspects of his life, and surely, if he were at rest, these are what would dominate his attention.
Were he to stop at this moment, stop walking and sit down on one of the benches gregariously placed along the sidewalk, he would immediately, without hesitation, begin thinking of his lousy job at the accounting firm, and how greatly it sapped his energy to perform such tedious, mind dulling drudgery.
He would begin thinking of his mounting debts and how profoundly these debts kept him from leading a fulfilling life. If he didn’t have to pay back his student loans, his car loans, his credit cards, he wouldn’t have to put such long hours in at the firm, and he’d have a little money to spend on himself and by God, some time to spend it.
He would begin thinking of his lackluster love life, how he had no one in whom to confide his deepest fears and longings, no one with whom to share this peculiar experience called life, and no one to hold close every night and be held by, thus affirming his existence as a human being.
Yes, Jeffrey did not want to be bothered by such things. Above all, at this moment, he wanted inner peace and freedom. Doesn’t everyone? So Jeffrey Riggle kept moving his feet along the deserted sidewalk, heedless of a destination. He quickened his pace and kept moving.
-r. miller
*Insert Propaganda Here* 