To start with, there was no morning this morning. That was my dawn, a grey mournful dawn. With a much diminished gusto. And a Monday to boot! According to the unparalleled accuracy of my Apple watch – the perpetual modern accoutrement  – it was literally one minute before noon, 11:59 am when I assembled my rumpled carcass sufficiently from the virginal lair to clock my progress.  Humiliating that it was!  Well, at least it would be normally were it not for the fact that the atmosphere today – I nearly said “This morning!” – was decidedly damp, raw and uninviting, certainly not inspirational of a casual cycle about the neighbourhood as would regularly be my wont.  Instead I thought of peanut butter.

It wasn’t that I was ravenous but the distance from the trough last evening at eight o’clock had succeeded to propel me to a faint acquaintance with that sauce of all sauces for any meal; namely, an appetite! Contemporaneously I mounted within my mind the assembly of sliced green apple, Champfleury cheese (‘the undisputed king of soft cheeses“), baguette (“Everything“) bagel and Sunsweet pitted prunes (“from the fertile central valley of California“). To this conglomerate I was drawn to the allure of MaraNatha creamy organic peanut butter.

Peanut butter I understand is a peasant dish, which is to say unimaginably nutritious and affordable. I once read about it being as common as beer for those who survived upon minimal expenditure. Full of vitamins, that sort of analysis. Indeed now that I think back upon my student days there is strength to the suggestion. What however it fails to capture is the decidedly mediocre comfort that persists after its accommodation. Peanut butter like any other base appeal has little lasting endurance. At best it is a compromise between it and something more ripping of salt and sweet. It is in my opinion as much a deceit as alcohol or nefarious combustibles.

Truncating this less than enthusiastic start to the day was a matter of objectivity and resolve. It was too late in the day to pretend otherwise. My Protestant Work Ethic was of historical repute only. But with the acceleration of time inherent in a late morning beginning I had to address the erstwhile mandate for control with an uncommon plan of action.

Such is the nature of activity withdrawn from its usual expression that the alternative is merely recovery. It’s too late to reignite the embers of custom. Driving off the road always requires a moment to get back on the right path.  An elongation of the pattern. Best to keep it a private remorse and devotion especially when it is characteristically less prominent than usual. Differences survive inadequacy.  Who hasn’t some affiliation with falling off the wagon.