Talking to the Wind

Most of what ends up here starts the same way. I sit by the window with a cigar and a coffee and talk, out loud, to nobody, about whatever has been going around my head. Later I keep the parts that survive being written down. I’ve been calling these letters to my daughter, even though they’re mostly me talking to the wind.

The cigar is usually small. I don’t have the habit of smoking small ones, but a small one means I stop before I’ve talked for an hour, and an hour of me thinking out loud is a lot to ask of anyone, including future me. I always forget to take the band off until it’s about to catch fire. There’s an obvious spot to remove it and I panic anyway. Last time I ended up cutting it with Flora’s tiny scissors. (Flora, if you’re reading this in fifteen years: yes, those scissors.)

The coffee I’ve gotten into properly this year. Not just drinking it, but where it comes from, the varieties, the roast. The last one was from the south of Minas, a little stronger than I usually go. With sugar. Everyone who knows me already knows that, and I’m not changing.

I’m not analyzing anything during these. That was never the point. It’s the one moment in the week where I stop, face the window, and say what I think without checking whether it’s finished. Then some of it becomes this.

I won’t be smoking every time, because I’d like to live a while. Next one might just be a coffee.