Ambition

I knew all that I needed to know. Streamlined and efficient because I thought it made me more mature. I was a grownup and I could handle anything as long as I prepared and studied. I treated life as a task list to complete. Accomplishments would flow logically from my simple process. They did, for a time.

But I failed to account for the sour ache that was growing with each new year and step up the ladder of success. It seemed to start in my haunches and it crept slowly up my body, settling in, until I woke up one day in October and I couldn’t open my eyes. They felt so heavy, like I was coming out of surgery, and they were sticky with a layer of sleepy mucous. Like I’d slept a decade away.

I couldn’t go to the doctor. I couldn’t get out of the bed. My mattress was so soft that I sank into the memory foam. Odd that it was memory foam since I always used to love my first bed, a box spring number that was so fun to jump on. I bought this new one after my last raise. I was convinced I deserved it and now I would never be able to free myself of it.

I wasn’t thinking clearly any longer. I was groggy even though I was sure I’d gotten my usual seven hours of sleep. Maybe it was more and that was the problem? I’d slept so long my eyes welded shut, held closed by my gooey secretions.

This was not right. I had work to do. Projects and initiatives to plot and manage. My skills were in demand and I always delivered. People counted on me though nobody came right out and said it. I was quiet and dependable in a way that emanated confidence. My Audi was due for a detailing and I still had money to burn in my expense account. And none of that mattered right now because I could not move and I could not see.

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