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# A Day Sometimes Pivots on Its Lunch Break
(This short story is from a collection of stories about two characters-—Sanjay and Cider-—who have lived many lives. In this iteration, Sanjay is an obsessive/compulsive fellow with some heightened sensitivities, who overthinks the world around him. The story is written to represent exactly one day in his life. It is written to have exactly enough paragraphs to represent the entire English alphabet, and no more. Each paragraph starts with a sequential letter of the alphabet, and is written to have exactly one hundred words, with hyphenated words counting as two. The form reflects the main character, and is part of the story.)
(This short story is from a collection of stories about two characters--Sanjay and Cider--who have lived many lives. In this iteration, Sanjay is an obsessive/compulsive fellow with some heightened sensitivities, who overthinks the world around him. The story is written to represent exactly one day in his life. It is written to have exactly enough paragraphs to represent the entire English alphabet, and no more. Each paragraph starts with a sequential letter of the alphabet, and is written to have exactly one hundred words, with hyphenated words counting as two. The form reflects the main character, and is part of the story.)
At exactly six o'clock each morning, Sanjay awoke to an narrow band, fixed frequency signal with an abrupt onset and intermittent sustained decibel levels. Most people thought of this simply as "an annoying alarm clock noise", but ever since Sanjay read Daniel P.W. Ellis' 2001 study on "Detecting Alarm Sounds", he couldn't help visualizing the spectrogram of the shrill, grating tone that meant it was time to get up and face the day. He wondered why the alarm clock manufacturers, knowing that their products would primarily be employed in tranquil bedrooms, designed based on principles meant for high noise environments.
At exactly six o'clock each morning, Sanjay awoke to a narrow band, fixed frequency signal with an abrupt onset and intermittent sustained decibel levels. Most people thought of this simply as "an annoying alarm clock noise", but ever since Sanjay read Daniel P.W. Ellis' 2001 study on "Detecting Alarm Sounds", he couldn't help visualizing the spectrogram of the shrill, grating tone that meant it was time to get up and face the day. He wondered why the alarm clock manufacturers, knowing that their products would primarily be employed in tranquil bedrooms, designed based on principles meant for high noise environments.
Breakfast took precisely twelve minutes to prepare. Sanjay enjoyed rolled oats, which were slow to cook, but had an agreeable texture. The water took five minutes to boil, which is enough time to brush your teeth thoroughly and properly. The oats, tamped and flat in their measuring cup, were poured into the scalding liquid, stirred three times, and reduced to simmer for five minutes. While he waited, Sanjay would read. Then, the heat was turned off, and the pot was covered for two additional minutes. Time enough to arrange the bowl, spoon, and toppings: honey, molasses, dried cherries, and butter.
@ -30,7 +30,7 @@ Maybe it was because he liked to eat on the 32nd floor patio. It was a small pat
Never did an hour pass as fast as it did with Cider! Everything about her was perfect, but more than anything else Sanjay appreciated how she made him feel as if the world really was good. When she was around, all of the anxiety seemed to fade into the background. They would chat about everything and nothing, and no matter how it went, it always went right. She would smile and laugh, and he would smile and laugh with her. She would cry and complain, and he would be indignant for her sake--but without feeling frustrated or disquieted himself.
On this particular day, a lunch hour just wasn't enough. Sanjay went back to his work on time, of course, but his head wasn't in the game. He couldn't focus. When the phone rang, he let it ring two or three times, rather than answering as soon as the first rang ended. When an email came in, he sat and stared at the subject line, instead of opening it up and getting right to work. He was, in a word, distrait. This troubled him, and he racked his brain for an explanation. Sanjay liked for everything to have an explanation.
On this particular day, a lunch hour just wasn't enough. Sanjay went back to his work on time, of course, but his head wasn't in the game. He couldn't focus. When the phone rang, he let it ring two or three times, rather than answering as soon as the first ring ended. When an email came in, he sat and stared at the subject line, instead of opening it up and getting right to work. He was, in a word, distrait. This troubled him, and he racked his brain for an explanation. Sanjay liked for everything to have an explanation.
Perhaps some aspect of the conversation was left unresolved? No, all of the topics had been suitably covered. Maybe there was something that they missed, some tangent that should have been explored? Impossible; he had analyzed each subject and outlined them in his head, carefully covering those areas that she overlooked. Could it be something he consciously missed? He replayed their conversation and found nothing lacking. Try as he might, there was no logical explanation. All the ignoring of phone calls and emails in the world couldn't make it make sense, but it was still true: one hour wasn't enough.