Nothing to do, nowhere to go

We hung out, comfortable in boredom

The hibiscus opened up overnight. Sitting on the deck with my dog, Zoey, birds singing, breezes, coffee, music and flowers.

It might rain.

Thinking about the time right before we all had cell phones and cameras at the ready, how we couldn’t take a photo of flowers or dogs or look up the weather or pull up a tune and we sat with ourselves and felt the things. We made memories we would not accurately recall years later, everything out of time and place even as the feeling was undeniably accurate. The music came through a radio, cassette, vinyl if we were lucky to have these things but mostly songs played in your head from memories made earlier.

We passed the time by reading and singing and talking and smoking and sex, because there was always another hour, another day and nothing was urgent that didn’t come through the ring on a telephone wired in the next room that you maybe didn’t hear or you ignored.

None of this made money and none of it felt unproductive or frivolous.

We made music by playing chords over and over and over on our guitars and harmonicas because there was no notification of a new email pinging at us. We were in a measure or a hook for hours upon hours to get it right, undistracted by the call of TikTok or Instagram. We were contently anxious … or anxiously content … in our boredom, our time focused on becoming good at listening, thinking, playing music, reading

Now we’re all chasing one distraction after another. Instead of sitting with the hibiscus flowers, we take a photo, write some dumb nostalgic caption and post that shit on Instagram, our minds already onto the other thing we’re probably not gonna get done today.