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Exercise every day.

It’s 10:30; maybe a quick run before I finish this article. It’ll get my mind off of cascading style sheets. What’s the difference between an id and a class anyway? I know, I know, but really I don’t know.

It’s supposed to thunder storm tonight.

It’s a little nippy.

Ugh, why am I always stiff at the origins of my biceps fems? Greater trochanter. Tensor facial latae. Iliotibial band. En do plas mic retic tic tic culum. Mitochondria. Phlegm.

Okay, here goes …

Thud. Thud. Thud. Breath.
Thud. Thud. Thud. Breath.
Thud. Thud. Thud. Breath.
Thud. Thud. Thud. Breath.
Thud. Thud. Thud. Breath.
Thud. Thud. Thud. Breath.
Thud. Thud. Thud. Breath.
Thud. Thud. Thud. Breath.
Thud. Thud. Thud. Breath.

My knees haven’t bugged me in months. That’s so great. I wonder why. I’m going to turn 50 in a couple years. My beard has gotten really gray. I can’t even remember what 50 looked like when I was younger. Am I really 50? That’s way past halfway, isn’t it? When I turned 35 I thought I was halfway. I’m not ready to be halfway. What have I done so far that I could be past halfway?

Thud. Thud. Thud. Breath.
Thud. Thud. Thud. Breath.
Thud. Thud. Thud. Breath.

I saved someone’s life once. I don’t even know what she’s doing now. Isn’t it my job to find out what she’s doing with that life now?

Thud. Thud. Thud. Breath.
Thud. Thud. Thud. Breath.

I made a kid. She’s great. That’s hardly my doing. That’s not true. Still, all that stuff about who I thought I’d be as a Father. That’s not true either.

Thud. Thud. Thud. Breath.

Why do I do this so late in the day? Cramp.

Thud. Thud. Thud. Breath.

Thud. Thud. Thud.

Breath.

Thud.

I guess it’s not a cramp. My brain. My lovely brain. What would it be like to turn off the planning, reflective part right now and just let you let everything else that’s kept my body going keep going. Just think about breathing. Oh brain, let me just breathe.

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“She has a big sense of Duty. We took a survey and that was at the top for her. It was near the bottom for me. I can imagine her wiping my ass someday. Out of Duty.”

“Yeah my ex is like that, just showing up and taking care of things. That’s just the way she is. I’m like that too, I think.”

“I have no Duty. Maybe I have Duty to my mother— as a Son. I guess that’s the problem I have with Duty. It’s something you do in your generic role as Something.”

“Oh I don’t see it that way at all. It just means commitment. You have Duty with the men in our group.”

“I do? You think I have an obligatory attitude?”

“Boy, you really see Duty as a negative thing.”

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DUTY

(breath)

DUTY

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DUTY

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DUTY

When she told us about Ethiopia’s “Bloody Saturday,” her father’s torture and imprisonment, and the sequential execution of her brothers from oldest down until it was her turn, and her escape at the age of 12, by herself, through Sudan, Egypt, and into Saudi Arabia, then San Diego, it was easy to understand why she lied to the immigration judge. It was easy to see why she ignored the deportation orders and why she felt she would be killed if she was sent back, and why it might have been the ultimate escape to gently rock our otherwise inconsolable baby for hours on end. Was it out of Duty that we searched and found and paid for the lawyer and the interpretor and the psychiatrist and the plane trips back to San Diego for her court appearances? She told me I saved her life. I believe her. Did I do it out of Duty? Was it Duty as a Father that, when I was pushed out of my home, kept me from fleeing and instead moved me to set up another once-a-week home for my daughter? Is it my Duty as a Son that pulls the words “I’m on the next plane” out of my mouth when my mother calls from the hospital in Delaware, scared and alone and on the edge of death? Is it my Duty that I run? Because to not run and not feel the stiffness at the origins of my biceps femoris denies some Duty to Life itself? To not breathe all the way into my sinuses is to ignore my Duty to the one skull Life gave me. To taste the salty mucus in my moustache, to try a little harder up the hills, to want to live a little longer, a little more effortfully so my daughter can witness someone fully desiring Life— in her father— is my Duty. It’s my Duty to my colleagues to give them a Designer who cares about The Work enough to give it his best energy, my readers a Writer who tries to make his words come from and invigorate breath and pain and bliss and freedom and plain ol’ depth of experience. It’s my Duty as a Lover to care deeply for this precious body so I can wield some credibility as I tend to hers. It’s my Duty to the Stoneworkers to pound a little harder on the fabric of our city, to the trees to graze their bottle brushes with my head and hands. It’s my Duty as a Human with a ridiculously, ironically, brutally short and miraculous life to breathe, to taste, to try hard, to let my ribs float open and my feet pad pad pad down the sidewalk— to run, because I can, for now, at the very least.

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