Friday night CornerGirl made yummy lasagna for dinner. Then Saturday she made me take home the leftover lasagna, so I nuked it for dinner.

Now that I've had her yummy lasagna for two straight days, I think I'm spoiled for life.

I don't see the prying eyes anymore, hardly ever. Maybe they're hidden. Or maybe they're gone, and I can actually be relevant here.

Sometimes I watch a movie and some turn of phrase will give me pause. It will make me think or wonder or ponder or wish or dread.

Who knows? Lightning may strike.

And the gist of that statement, the unspoken implication, was that, without the lightning, a life has not been lived. Only a rough semblance of a life. A cheap copy. A dream. A manifestation of wishful thinking.

An imposter.

No matter. For me, lightning did indeed strike. And boy did it burn me. Sear me. Knock me down and keep me down, shaking from the shock. Unable to rise on noodly legs.

So does this count as a life now? If so, it doesn't seem worth the hoopla.

A year ago, I outlived my mother. In a little less than a decade, maybe, I'll outlive my father. Is there a point to this? I dunno. I used to think that maybe there there was. Wait, scratch that - I use to know that there was absolutely a point.

Lightning had struck.

How do you live with no hope? I don't think you do. Maybe you can exist without it, but that's just another imposter.

Inadequate.

CornerGirl is off today and tomorrow because she's mean and clearly wants me to ask LaptopGirl to lunch one of these days.

But that's not the funny part.

The funny part started last year, when we went to Harvest Homecoming and two different people saw her with me and thought she was HatGirl and she got all mad about it.

Then this morning CornerGirl went to get her hairs done, and some girl came into the salon place and thought she was HatGirl.

Well, I think it's funny anyway.

Sometimes I get in this particular mood. I've mentioned it before, ad nauseum...

I yammer sometimes. Usually there's alcohol involved. Not tonight, though.

Who am I? What am I? How am I?

Sometimes, I enjoy contemplating these questions.

I'd like to say that I'm done with what I was doing. They paid me. There's no real purpose to it anymore. I ranted and raved for months and months. It will, most likely, never see the light of day. But they paid me, so does that make me a real writer? A professional? Maybe.

I need to come back here, to where I started. Nothing written doesn't mean nothing nothing nothing nothing. So much has happened, is happening, will I'm sure continue to happen.

It's the same stuff. Some things never change. Some things change too much. I can't even catch my breath, let alone compose my thoughts and put them into words.

I spend a lot of time trying to do what I perceive to be the right thing. Usually, I then spend a lot of time doubting my actions and decisions. I feel like I'm missing something. Like if I said or did or didn't say or didn't do some particular thing or things, then maybe things would be better.

I spend a lot of time trying to understand the motives of people who, quite frankly, are incomprehensible. I hear these words, or I think these words. I ignore all evidence so that I can ignore these words. Crazy is another word I've heard a lot, though I've never quite been ready to accept that particular description. If I did that, then I'd have to assign that word to myself as well, and I'm seldom willing to do that.

I dunno. Maybe I should.