Friday

6 October 2017

— after fitful sleep

 

Good Morning All,

Lord love a duck!

Around 10:00 last night, after writing to all of you that my computer screen was refusing to light up and that my life as I used to know it was—for all intents and purposes—over, I finished the last finger of scotch, sat here looking into that rectangle of darkness, and said softly: “Computer, my compatriot, my constant companion, I am very gently going to close your lid down now, so that you can sleep and rest and dream your favorite computer dreams. I have left on a small night light to your right. I would leave you a nice glass of warm milk and biscuits if I thought you’d like them. If there is anything else you might like, anything whatsoever, you have only to name it.

“I shall go to bed myself and hope for sleep. My other great hope is that tomorrow morning when I caressingly open your beautiful lid, easily the most beautiful computer lid I have ever seen, not to mention your lovely ebony black keys that contain all knowledge, not to mention … well, dear friend, I was wondering if you can tomorrow morning find it in your heart to light up your screen again, just as you have always done, my oldest and most trusted confidant, who has selflessly helped me write my poems and inflict my Day Book upon people all around the globe. If you do so, you will--I assure you--have me eternal and undying gratitude.”

Not that I got a lot of sleep last night, and when I did I dreamt of beautiful birds crashing into picture windows and dinosaurs thrashing around in tar pits despite the ropes several men in baseball uniforms and I had around their necks trying to haul them out.

I did know that busticated mechanical things sometimes fix themselves if left alone for awhile. I reminded myself of this several times in between reading another chapter of The House of Mirth and trying to get back to sleep.

The cats, in the way of cats, knew I was distressed and as such both spent the night at the bottom of my bed.

At 6:00, I gave up on sleep, fired up the coffee machine, fed the cats, and approached this desk while whispering a few bars of Hail Mary, Full of Grace. The closer I got, however, the more I could feel my pulse pounding along the top of my head, enough so that I retreated to the kitchen and took my blood pressure pill early.

I mean, what if it did not light up? I do have everything backed up on an external hard drive and up there in iCloud, but a new computer would go me 10,000 kroner ($1,500.00), and even if I could figure out how to load in everything from my external hard drive, how long would it take?

Okay, Bheka, enough. March yourself over there and see what happens. 

Which I did, and you can see for yourself what happened. My good old, trusty old, wonderful old computer lit up as beautifully as ever! If it could speak, I’m sure it would have said: “Talk about a storm in a teacup!"

Go Well and Stay Well,

Bhekaron

 

P.S. Two Holly snaps: