It's 16 Miles to the Promise Land

Rilo Kiley - With Arms Outstreched

I love this song, hell the whole album is awesome. Having to go back to work is getting ever closer. The thought alone drives me insane. My boss who happens to be one of my best friends calls me everyday to see how I'm doing. Which is a good thing. Although talking to her makes me think of work and I cringe ever so slightly, when she calls.

The last time I was at work I pretty much laid the smack down on our head office manager at the head office and the owners of the company. My team was to take the fall for miss-communication on the part of the head office and sales team. All hell broke loose because sales was trying to get a deal with a major company and didn't bother letting us know that when they sent files over they wanted us to do any and everything to get them done no matter what. They promised these people the world and left it on us to handle this. What I do in real estate legal work, I guess you could say is the special ops of the business. Pardon my language but what I do is fix people's fuck ups. Be it the current homeowners, former, lenders, attorney's, you name it. Even so there are limits as to what I can legally do to fix these problems, without resorting to things best left unsaid.

Needless to say the company the head-office is trying to get business from, gave us (me) a file that pushed the limits of what I can do. At first I was just going to close the darn thing and tell them to bugger off and take it to court and have a judge dismiss the thing. But noticing it was from a company I've never dealt with before I took it to my manager to see what wanted to be done. Sadly after giving it to the boss it was forgotten until the company raised hell about it. We got it done with no help from the company. Fortunately I already left for sick time due to doctors appointments. But when I came back the following week for a few days head-office was really putting pressure on my team. We were to get yelled at during our team meeting, the owners and managers sitting in to have it out at my team. My team was dejected and I knew that this upcoming verbal assault would do no good. So during the meeting I stopped the managers and everyone else dead in their tracks and made them run for cover when I spoke up and placed the blame back were it needed to be. I vehemently defended my team, in effect telling the office heads that what their trying to say (as John Travolta in Get Shorty says) that they "fucked up, without sounding stupid." I said so much and so truthfully that I literally left them speechless with no refute from my words. They had no answer for my statements, and there was only silence. My team and I left the meeting feeling much better. Someone had to speak and I guess it was me. That was the last time I was at work.

I dread next week coming up. Going almost no where and doing nothing all this time recovering was giving me cabin fever. Mix Tape Girl had to work today. She got up and was getting ready for work when I woke up. We've pretty much had our one day of fall down here on Weds. I actually got to wear my leather jacket, which always make me happy. Now the humidity is back and it should be close to 90 again in the next few days. While MTG was getting ready I looked outside. It was foggy and misting. A gray and ugly morning. She was taking longer than normal to get ready. Putting on her shoes she sat on the bed then layed down backwards.

"I don't want to go to work" she said softly. "So don't, stay here with me," I replied. "I can't," she said. "Yeah you can, call in and well go do something," I told her. She looked at me and smiled and then looked up at the ceiling. "Anything?" she said. "Yeah" I mumbled. She reached for her mobile and actually called in. We slept for a while longer after that. When we woke up I made her pancakes and bacon. We sat outside and ate in the courtyard.

The fog had gone now but it was gray still. "We need to get out of here," I said. "Where to?" MTG said puzzled. "Anywhere" I said. "Ok let's go" MTG smiled and said. I added more music to my Ipod, we got in my car and we left. We drove down the road and onto the highway. I set northwest toward the hill country, to no town in particular but just to the hills. I played Rilo Kiley's "The Execution of All Things". It's one of my favorite albums. MTG and I sang almost all the songs. We then set the Ipod to random and heard songs from Sleater-Kinney, The Delfonics, and anything else. We talked and talked and laughed. The sun had come out now in the afternoon. The cold of the week long gone and the heat already coming back in.

I told MTG of my plans to start my own business. Doing what I do on a different level and answering to myself. Making the plans for my brother to join me in it as he has real-estate background too. I've already purchased the equipment to do it. I just need that little "Umph" to get me going. We talked and talked and talked. The hills were beautiful surrounding us. Driving through the back roads and little valleys. After heading west for a while I turned back northeast and we ended up in Austin in the evening. We stopped and ate at a restaurant my dad used to take us to when we lived there. We did the 6th Street thing after parking downtown. We stopped at Waterloo records and picked up some new music, and then got ice cream at Amy's. MTG bought some new sunglasses and a dancing chilli pepper that dances to "Feelin' Hot Hot Hot". We drove around Austin a little bit more seeing the places I lived at, in my ever moving gypsy life. We finally headed back south on I-35 around 8 pm. We listened to Rilo Kiley again. Putting "With Arms Outstretched" on continuous play-back for half the way back home, MTG and I singing every time:

"its 16 miles to the promised land
and i promise you i'm doing the best i can
now somedays they last longer than others
but this day by the lake went to fast
and if you want me, you better speak up i won't wait
so you better move fast
and somedays they last longer than others
but this day by the lake went to fast
and if you want me, you better speak up i wont wait
so you better move fast"