My First Thought

My first thought was to turn my back on it. I intended to let my eyelids take on the weight of the situation, where upon I encouraged them to drop like horizontal blinds on the window to the entire day. My first thought was to ignore everything and smile subliminally as I allowed the next course of action to wash over me in a pool of ignorance. Everyone else could get on with his day. The world could turn, the clock could tick. I just wanted to crawl into the dark corner I had prepared for myself.

However, the sirens would not let me forget, or hide, or play dumb. It was constant and forever echoing itself. No matter how badly my cheeks and forehead reached for each other, for a grasp that would instantly lock my eyes shut, no such grip could keep the sound from reaching my ears. And still the screaming persisted. I couldn’t escape from the noise without fleeing from the sanctuary of my paralyzed state—comfortably numb in darkness.

Head-throbbing rotations of noise finally coax me out of my asylum, forcing me to move from the spot that gave me my last bit of consolation. My first thought, to turn my back to this whole mess, to simply ignore it, was a fading fantasy at this point. My body sunk deeper into its depression, under the load of surrender. My face relaxed its clasp on my eyes. It was only a matter of time before I was forced to face reality head on. All my physical and mental strength flowed to my arm as it left the warmth surrounding my body. To prove I was unarmed, I showed my open hand to the source of my annoyance. My sweaty palm reached outward it: a sign of mercy to the cruel sirens. Just as I looked most pitiful—head buried as if to cover shame, eyes still unaware of the light creeping its way into the room, hand surrendering all defenses—I turned. Instead of begging for forgiveness, I deliver a slap to kill. My hand plummeted down from its highest peak with the mass of my arm behind it for influence. At last, some part of my hand managed to collide with its small target, the off button on the alarm clock.

For a good minute, or maybe a year, that first thought returned after the noise is gone. That first thought and I, we were sorry we ever left each other; we felt stupid for thinking we could ever stray to another. I had comfort once more. I was still curled up in the warm layers of sheets and blankets, and for the time being, this first thought promised me that everything will be alright.

But it was too good to be true. This first thought of the day is a poisonous drug that clouds my perception. I had to quit it cold turkey and suffer the withdrawal. The layers that condensed the warmth were peeled away. My eyes reluctantly unveiled themselves. The cold and the light rushed toward me like a current overloading my circuits. This sent my body into spastic contortions as if my hands and feet were suddenly and dramatically repelled from each other. Each end of my body wanted to reach some distant point in opposite directions. This was my morning stretch: the cure-all to my first thought of the day. There is no looking back once this line is crossed—until tomorrow when it starts all over.