Living The Dream
It was seven a.m. on a nondescript Monday morning and I'd yet to go to sleep, not that it especially mattered. I caught a chill walking out the door in shorts, a t-shirt and a pair of sandals. The sky was overcast and the weather drizzly as I made my way to the bakery down the block to fulfill a compulsory desire for a cup of coffee and cheese danish. Dew clung lazily to the leaves of trees lining the street, droplets occasionally losing their grip and striking me with a deliberate coldness I couldn't help but slightly resent.
Young people waited for buses, cowering in store entrances and under awnings, hiding from the light rain indifferently nipping at my arms and legs. A man in a black suit and similarly black umbrella passed by, seemingly unaffected by my neighborly smile. "Somebody's got a case of the Mondays," I concluded.
The entrance to Anthony's was flanked by teenagers, which I recall finding odd. Had he enlisted teens to guard his pastry shop? No matter; a bit of fancy footwork and they were deftly avoided, left in my proverbial dust. "Kids these days," I mused. "Do they've nothing better to do than impede my pastry acquisition?"
Having acquired my coffee and danish despite the sentries, I once more evaded Anthony's Royal Guard and made my way back to the apartment, eating and drinking along the way. A 20-something wearing a backpack sped past me via the parallel sidewalk across the street. The air had begun taking on the sounds of morning risers and nine-to-fivers. A water delivery truck coasted by and came to a stop ahead. A man in a green shirt came out with two jugs. I remember thinking, "Who needs 10 gallons of water at seven in the morning?" Then I thought that perhaps he must have more than one delivery that day.
I took one last breath of the fresh morning air and stepped inside the dark, silent apartment. The outer door slammed shut behind me with a loud thud, which reverberated through the quiet hallway. My coffee and danish consumed and my belly full, I decided it an appropriate time to retire for the day, as I was rather tired, and I'd no compelling reason not to.
I settled into my futon with a contented sigh and thought of all those people outside, compelled by various forces to go places and do things, largely against their will. I reminded myself, I have no alarm clock. No place to punch in. Nobody to provide for me, but nobody to rule over me either. Lest I forget, I was still... living the dream.
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Bootstrapping a company is hard, unforgiving, relentless work. Sometimes it's the little things that remind me why I do it. What reminds you?
