Nine Past One In The Newsroom

It's 1:09 (a.m.) and I'm sitting in a brightly-lit newsroom on my own. Technically it's Wednesday morning, but I don't think so. We got the paper set to bed more than an hour ago and I've finished interviews for next semester's officers. What am I still doing up here?

I figure if I go home I'll just fall asleep, so if I want any time to think I should do it someplace too uncomfortable to nap. I've tried sleeping at my desk before and it just doesn't work. I'm forced to sit here and look around me and do some pondering. Deep, deep pondering, Drew, deep pondering.

(Drew makes fun of the way I write my blog. He insists that I copy edit it or something before posting it. I don't. Things just tumble round in my head and topple out into this, that's all. I write the exact same way he does. What's wrong with writing like you talk?)

This is just randomness. I saw today that my sister quoted a Billy Joel song and that made me proud, although I don't know why. Last night was wretched up here; I wasn't in a bad mood, but I was moody and God bless the guys for keeping me cheered up. I've got my wits back now, though, and feel like I'm doing better than fine. The fact that I was able to pull my life back from total disarray was uplifting.

I like the newsroom empty like this at the end of the day. I like pacing around the room and tidying things . . . I like it because it's mine. I don't think you can totally claim ownership of many things, but this place belongs to me. Of that I'm certain. And certainty can be nice. It can still hold surprises--like the fax in my box about an all-expenses paid trip to DC for a conference in mid-February. Is one month into the semester too soon for me to go back home, even if it's for a conference?

And is it bad of me to look forward to the end of the paper's semester because of all the parties and celebrating?

I didn't think so.

Coldplay has a song called "Don't Panic." It's rather good.

"We live in a beautiful world,
Yeah we do, yeah we do,
We live in a beautiful world . . .

"Oh, all that I know
There's nothing here to run from,
'Cos yeah, everybody here's got somebody to lean on."

Also, work is still being done on the next great American novel. I need suggestions. I need the names of feelings and emotions . . . anything, good, bad, sideways, but not typical labels like "happy" or "angry." Give me vicious, somber, ebullient, oppressed, exuberant . . . as many as possible. I need to finish this thing and get it out of my system before it shreds me up from the inside out.