A day in the life (aka: yeah, all of this really happened).

Rotten luck wakes up a few minutes before you, and starts working right away. Once you recognized its mark, there's really nothing you can do: it's up and running, and it won't cross its arms, or sit down and rest, until everything it planned is set up to cause you as much damage as possible.

I had enjoyed a relatively calm period, without its unpleasants twists of plot...and now here it is, back again. Take yesterday, for example: I was the most peaceful person ever when I woke up, relaxed and without a trace of the terrible headache that had prevented me from doing anything productive the previous day...oh heavens, how good you can feel after ten hours of sleep!
No, wait. Ten hours of sleep? Something must be wrong. I went to bed at midnight, and now it's 9.51. Ten to ten. I have to be at work at ten, and look at me, self-conscious in my lounge clothes, with sleepy eyes and the beginning of a guilt feeling that has still not left me yet.
What followed would be worth a grotesque comedy: I almost broke my coffee machine because I unadvertedly forgot to put water in it (first thing I usually do, when my head actually works), I encountered a huge queue at the ticket office because all automatic counters were closed, and...well, I can't say I found a mad and enraged boss when I arrived at the office, but the smile with which she warmly advised me to come and help her with some heavy work today at 8.30 resembled more a hyena's grin than anything human and friendly.
And then, the grades of my exams: all that was left to wait for before booking my holidays...and now, on the deadline for publication, one is missing. The one I am most worried about, the one that can make my vacation plans vanish into thin air. Come on, please, tell me that all this is a joke. And, even if it's not, why the hell is it happening to me?

I haven't killed anyone, harmed anyone, offended anyone - not that I know. Is this some bad karma from my previous life? Come on, what was I in my previous life, a reckless street criminal? A children kidnapper? No way. Besides, I don't believe in reincarnation, or whatever sort of gods, fancy destiny. It is, probably, just a series of unlucky coincidences, and it seems that I'm not skilled enough to go through it without wreaking havoc everywhere I go.
Which leads us to today.

No, I didn't start working at 8.30 in the end, that was my tiny bit of luck. I could avoid waking up at 7...and what for? To be awake at 5.30, perfectly conscious, not at all tired, and furiously thinking about my dissertation.
Do you ever get that feeling, that if you do not put on paper an interesting thought you have right now, you might as well forget it completely in the span of one minute? I get that all the time. And this morning wasn't an exception: here I am, on the road again, awake at 6 with my laptop on my knees, typing madly on my thesis's open file, fearing that words and sentences will escape me if I try to hold on to them for too long.
That's madness, fucking madness. And what follows is even worse: from sending the wrong message to the wrong person, giving away too much of a mood swing that just needed enough time to pass and disappear, to being blamed by my boss for I-dont'-know-what that I surely haven't done, to being almost beaten up by a complete stranger in the queue for lunch.

His reason for punching me in the face? I had jumped the queue and stood for too long in the way of his precious wife and child. Jesus christ, I thought that those things had stopped happening after the Middle Age. 

Calm down, buddy, I'm just looking at the food on display, I should have answered - rather truthfully, anyway. Or maybe I should have sounded annoyed, pointed out to his merry family that he was being quite a bad example for the child, and that, in any case, children shouldn't be allowed to play with the sushi on the display rails.
Quite effective lines, I must say. And guess what I replied, instead, when he finally apologized for being too violent?
Don't worry, it's alright. That's what I replied. And I still don't know why.
Perhaps because I felt tears on the corner of my eyes, the urge to run away, disappear completely, run to the highest peak I could reach, shout leave me alone! at all the people waiting down with their burden of disappointment, spite and bullshit - up and ready to be thrown on me.
I felt the concrete chance that half the world I know in this corner of the world was hating me for my recent less than considerate words and actions, and that the remaining half hadn't begun yet, because, well, they still hadn't come across me during the day.
Really, I just wanted to lock myself in a bathroom stall and cry my heart out. But there was no sign leading to the ladies' room in Victoria Station, so I simply took my sushi box and walked away with my eyes cast down, still wanting to explode, or dig myself a hole into the ground.

Here's to the end of June, then, and to July 1st as well. Sometimes rotten luck simply decides that you're its target, and it doesn't stop shooting until you raise your hands and admit you're screwed.

(On air: Tori Amos - Crucify)