Pass Gas For Me

I've had gas all day.

Since the second that I woke up until I went back to sleep. I've had gas.

I got up early this morning, around 5:30AM and took that shower that I promised myself. I took a long one too. There's another shower stall. Fauck anyone who wants this one. I'm taking a nice, long, scalding hot shower before the rest of the yokels get up. When done, I settled back down into bed, stretching out across it. The lights came on. The 6:00AM call. It's time for the dorm to rise. I fall. I go back to sleep, floating on soft, fluffy clouds. I sleep like the dead.

Later, I awoke at 8:25AM, looking at my watch and grimacing. I had to run. I hit the nurses' station, grab my gear and high tail it out of the Box. Now as I was saying, I had gas. I had it in the Way, pinching my ass cheeks together the entire ride uptown. I was fucking miserable until I got outside and ripped ass. It was so long and outrageous that I had to lean against a tree to keep my legs from buckling. Ahhhh, what a motherfucking relief. But it just didn't stop there. It continued, all day long. I'm having lunch at the corner deli, and right in the middle of a crowded dining area, it hits. My stomach turns, folds, expands, and then a bloated pressure falls downwards.

I stop eating immediately. I am surrounding by dining patrons. What kind of torture is this, I ask you? Have you ever in your life...? I stand, take my lunch and throw it out, and step outside into pedestrian traffic. I go off to the side, and belt out a long brawl. Jeezus!

It must be the coffee. It has to be the coffee. I put milk in my coffee, and that shit curdles in the stomach. On top of that I'm lactose intolerant. So that pretty much makes this an ongoing misery. I wonder to myself why is it that so little coffee can cause so much upset??

But I love my coffee. I had a cup in the morning with a half a corn muffin. For lunch...a cup of coffee, with the other half of the corn muffin and a half of a cinnamon and apple muffin, and for dinner...coffee and Chicken Fiesta. Coffee. Shit, I'm trembling with pent up excitement.

I step out into the night air with my brother. It's crisp and cool for a New York night. The cars slide noisily down the street, a collective growl. My brother bumps fists with me. "Goodnight," he says. I nod. Goodnight.

My thoughts churn. They always churn, as I head down into the Way. Tomorrow I have my anxiety session, which is making me anxious already. Tomorrow there is also a wine and cheese reading at the New York Public Library. This reading will mark our return to the circuit. My brother and I have made somewhat of a silent pact to return to some of the readings, and to be seen, to support our friends, to be a part of the community again.

It's hard. Especially when you run a reading, to go to so many readings during the week. There's a reading almost every day except for Thursday, and to make them all, all the time, is wearisome. I mean, you have a mandatory reading, your own, and then you have a score of electives. And these electives also cost money. Something that hobos have very little of. So, a level of frugality is called for.

My stomach moves, shifts. I put my hand on my belly to stop the gurgling.

When I get off the Way, I walk up the steps, crop dusting the air behind me. The relief is palatable. I feel for the people climbing, or descending behind me.

I suddenly realize that the Chicken Fiesta had Black Beans in it.

Shit!!

Hobobob