My most depressing meals are those eaten without you. Meager hunger, the naughty child playing with a pocket knife under his desk in the middle of class, twirling blade with tiny fingers, an expert hoodlum already, eager to be ignored, camps in my stomach; a place for prairie preservation and butterfly restoration, a quiet visitor in a turbulent landscape. The captain has turned on the “unbuckle your breath” sign; a breath of fresh untainted pre-recycled air in an otherwise stale aluminum canister. Just because I have never held your hand under a seat-back tray does not mean I do not think about it often.

The majority of meals are taken in the glow of the 22nd century fireplace, unmanteled, unfettered by the silence of contentment, the quiet enjoyment of past-present company. Food is coal. I attempt to be the little engine that could. Chewing canned garbanzos I realize how often my parents read me this locomotive story as a child, the unknown inspiration, the invisible hand in my personal economy.

“I think I can”. No one has said this to me. I scream “I know I can” inside the bleached dry, fused calcium buttresses housing insecurities, housing echo chambers. Occasionally someone near-by hears the noise pollution leaking from my ears. The longer they stay, the more they consider clean up. Dish soap will not clean the ducks orbiting my chin from the errant Eustachian bonding agent spill. I become annoyed. I aim the tanker ship toward shore.

Before slipping into frigid sleep meager hungers punch out. I am unsure why antiquated punch clock time systems are still used in this modern age. I am told “If it ain’t broke don’t fix it.” I try my hand, regardless, at the handy-man business. All my fingers have been hammered. I have stapled my tongue to my lip. I consider the error an improvement.