Life Span

When I scan the lay of the cards before me, do I see a full ten years?

The idea of 'future' has been with me for as long as my 'past' remembers. At the last moment of consciousness, no doubt, anxiety will focus on 'future after the gone body'. So: ten full years?

What about ten minutes?

That seems a surer bet. I'm home. No road excursion set for another half-hour, so auto accident, a feral threat always, can be kept at bay. Morning hour, sleepy suburb -- the best time for coffee and musing, for poetry, for imagination, for taking stock, for stocking up, for a clean start.

Next to nil are the chances of a misplanned bank heist to occur on this spot. Very far is this from a main transport road with suspect trucks loaded with fertilizer and chemicals designed to blow buildings into world headlines. Extremely low in priority is this place on al Q'aeda's 'Top Ten Target' list.

No. Not near enough to the urban anomie, either, that can break a skull and leave you deaf or tube-fed in an expensive care bed.

Here. Hot coffee. Muffin-cap, a Danish, rugalah, the scone. Today, a 'classic pastry': sugar-crumble on soft cake whose layers split by a cinnamon goo.

What about ten minutes? It eats me up as I digest.