Adam's Magic Notebook

Adam wakes from a very strange dream with another hangover. Pulling soft blankets around him, rolling himself into a protective burrito, he buries his face remembering how much he drank last night. "Drink some water, you dehydrated cucumber" — the meme flashes through his head. He wants to obey, but that means getting up, and he doesn't want to do that. He doesn't want to do anything, if he's being honest.

He’d given away his winning lottery ticket. It was impulsive, but felt like the right thing to do at the time. He wondered what his therapist would think about it. He could have cashed it, and given the man half — but he was so sad to find out his uncle had lost his job, he couldn't imagine keeping it for himself. $20,000 come, and gone.

The phone rings. Wanting the noise to stop, he reaches for it. The readout says “Spam Risk”. There’s a dozen other notifications waiting for him, but he opens his Chess app and solves today’s puzzle, then plays solo chess for a while. He wins, which gives him enough happy brain chemicals to motivate him a bit.

Still not wanting to get up, but wanting to be able to say he's done something, he props himself up and opens the writing app on his phone. The premise of the last thing he worked on is a story about a guy that writes in a magical little black notebook and changes the world around him with what he writes in it. He used someone he met at a party where they were building a cob oven as his main character, a good guy with a sweet family.

Adam reads:

Camilo perches on the bench, taking a break from work. He's already had a full day, and it's only 11am. The baby wouldn't sleep, and they've been up since 5:30am. That, and he worked on his mycology project before breakfast, too, he reflects. And when he gets home the three-year-old will want attention, and — 

Camilo stops that thought spiral before he starts to feel sorry for himself. He takes out his notebook, the little black Moleskine notebook his friend Bea gave him, and shifts his focus.

There has to be a better way to parent kids, he thinks. He and his partner both work, and a lot of times they are just going through the motions without really having enough quality time to connect and enjoy the family they have. It's become a grind, and there has to be a better way of moving through life than being on what feels like a hamster wheel of survival.

Taking a gel ink pen with "accessible beige" fingerprints from his pocket, he hovers over the page for a moment, letting his mind wander. The natural building projects, helping friends on their land, a support network of all the elders, plant medicine communities, sound healing sessions...how long had it been? There just hasn't been time.

Camilo writes:

With this pen I create a universe where I, Camilo, have all the resources to support myself and my family with ease. I have my own mycology business, where I inoculate oak logs and deliver them in my pick-up truck. I teach people how to build with the soil under their feet, workshops for earth ovens and garden walls. My children are happy, and thriving, and I get to spend as much time with them as I want to. My partner and I have the time to travel, and learn to salsa dance. Family and friends are supported, and my presence is healing.

Adam lays his phone on his chest, feeling the same stuckness he felt when he wrote that. The story doesn't really make sense. It doesn't tell why the notebook is magical, or how Camilo knows that it's magical before he writes in it. It feels sappy and forced, and that's never a good combination. Adam knows he's not that good at writing, and believes the experts that it takes time...but he feels like maybe he'll never get good enough, and that makes him feel sad.

He feels so lonely in his empty condo. Adam has pushed away every serious partner, and made sure no kids came from any of his more casual liaisons. He's still too much of a kid himself. Too selfish, and too hungover too often. He can't even imagine having someone in his life he wants to make that kind of life with.

Here is this guy that just wants to spend time with the people he loves, but he doesn't have a trust fund, or these passive dividends to live off of. He has to work. What must it be like to have to work everyday, all day, and leave your kids to keep a roof over your heads? Camilo's partner works on the weekends, too, so they don't get much time as a family together. Adam wishes he could give Camilo a real magic notebook, or a winning lottery ticket, and make all of his dreams come true.

Just as Adam's thoughts begin to spiral into the shadows, the phone rings again. He looks at the display and sees his Uncle Tom is calling. The part of him that doesn't want to get out of bed also doesn't want to answer the phone. For a minute he thought that part of him might win, but Adam finds himself answering.

“Hi Adam!” Tom sounds like he's been awake for hours.

"Hey Tom. What's up?" Adam tries to sound cheerier than he feels, so Tom won't ask if he's ok.

"I was wondering what you were up to? I'd like to catch up. Would you like to meet me somewhere for a cup of coffee? Or I could bring a cup to you?" Tom asks, trying to imagine what kind of condition Adam might be in.

"Coffee," Adam says with a little moan. "I'd love a cup of coffee — I'm out of milk. You want to come by?"

Twenty minutes later, Tom knocks on the front door. Adam, with all the energy he can muster, detangles himself from the blankets and jerks his body out of the bed. Feet on the floor, moving across the blue shag carpet of his bedroom, down the condo-grey runner through the hall, to the top of the wooden stairs, pulling pants on as he goes, Adam calls down, "The door is unlocked!" He never locks it.

Tom lets himself in a moment later, balancing two cups of coffee, plus a bakery bag. Adam comes around the corner to the landing and sees Tom push the door closed with his foot. He feels a little guilty for not making it to open the door. As he descends the last of the stairs, Adam runs a hand through his hair hoping to tame it without looking in a mirror.

Tom moves out to the balcony and puts the bag down on the dusty little table by the door. Pulling the cups of coffee out of the cardboard carrier, Tom hands one to Adam as he steps through the open sliding glass door. The sun peeks from behind the clouds.

"Oh! I haven’t had a chance to thank you!" Tom says to Adam as soon as he sees his face. "That lottery ticket...in the little black notebook...I just got the payout from it....did you understand you gave me twenty THOUSAND dollars?”

“Yes, I did understand that, but thank you for checking with me." Adam says with a chuckle. He can feel the man needs more of an explanation, so he continues, "I mean, well, yeah — when you said you’d lost your job and all that...well, I...felt like you’d make better use of it. I was going to use it to gamble, and well, I'm not very good and probably would have lost it, anyway.”

Tom nods slowly. They enjoy their drinks in silence for a moment, feeling the unique bliss of coffee at the perfect temperature. Tom opens the bakery bag and motions to Adam to help himself. Not yet sure if this is a "carb and grease" hangover, or if he is going to need to give his stomach time before he tries to eat anything, Adam holds up his coffee cup and nods to it as his response.

"How's the writing going?" Adam asks Tom. He hoped Tom was having an easier time than he was. Tom should be, he'd been writing for about a decade longer than Adam, and went to school for it. Adam's Bachelor's in Communications didn't have any creative writing requirements, and it showed in his work.

Tom smiles evenly, holding back how much he wants to gush with gratitude. "I actually just wrote a short story! I was trying to get back into my last project this morning, and couldn't find anything alive in it. Then this orca came to me with a story, and I wrote it down. I'm meeting with my editor later to see if she thinks there's a marketable story in it, or if I should refocus on 'The Time Traveling 8th Graders That Save the World' — I love the idea of that story, you know," Tom shrugs. "We'll have to see."

Adam nods. "I want to hear all about Elsie!" he says.

"I can come back later or call you and read it to you, if you'd like, but I'm going to take off soon to go look at apartments. I'm hoping to find one with a view that has good fuel for the imagination, now that I have a deposit to put down on one!" Tom smiles appreciatively at Adam, "I really can't thank you enough."

Adam says, "You've thanked me plenty. I was just doing what I felt was right. I'd like to be able to make everyone's dreams come true. I was just working on a short story about that this morning. I wish I was the kind of comfortable where I could give $20,000 a day away and still live comfortably. There wouldn't be any tent cities down there," Adam says, pointing downtown.

Tom beams at his nephew. He knows Adam has been depressed and self-medicating, but the content of his character...that feels so good to be related to. Thinking of Adam's depression, Tom pulls a bottle of Vitamin D3 out of his cargo pants pocket. "Hey, Adam," Tom says tossing him the bottle, "I think you need this. It's lichen-based, very bioavailable. These changed my life a few months ago. Start with two."

Adam nods, and goes inside to get some water. At the sink he washes his face, and runs water through his hair with his fingers. He notices he's getting hungry. He opens the vitamin bottle, shaking two onto his still damp palm. The capsules stick, so he uses the edge of his nail to gently dislodge them, then takes them with enough water that they won't stick going down.

Adam finds Tom heading in from the balcony on his way back out. He indicates it is time he get going, and Adam walks him to the door. Adam thanks Tom for everything, and wishes him luck. "It truly was amazing that you came over when you did," Adam says, "I really needed that coffee. Thank you."

After watching Tom drive away, Adam goes back out to the balcony and unwraps himself a croissant breakfast sandwich. He thinks about Camilo again, and wonders how he might grant his wishes. He thinks about how nice it might be to be a true philanthropist, throwing money at everyone's problems...seeing which suffering can be solved with money, and what can't. Tom's suffering can be, apparently. Adam's can't...not having money anyway. But giving it away, maybe. Seeing Tom so happy was definitely motivating, he thinks.