What a day! I don’t even know where to begin. But, the story must begin; so I must choose a point and let the pen flow…or rather let the keys be typed or something ’nother.

Let me start two days ago. All of sudden on Monday night my I-can’t-live-without-it Nokia (I’m not sure what model) cell phone shut off randomly. No keys were touched, no toilet water broke its shell (another long story altogether), no direct sunlight burnt its organs. It just shut off. All by itself. I figured it needed a break. It has been working extra hard lately.

Two days pass. Mr. Nokia (I see my phone as a male, so no sexist comments here, that’s just the way it is) keeps taking breaks. Why? I don’t know. I gave it a few good hours of rest by letting it sleep at times during those two days. And today, of all days (why?), he decided to die. And when I say die, I don’t mean pretend die. I don’t mean it’s life source (battery) ran out, or that he needed yet another break. I mean he literally died.

He broke down and died, like an old mule who’s been over-worked through 20 years of field-tilling and laying it down to produce numerous muling-crumb-snatchers. He fell over in the heat of the day and just layed there.

Okay, is that enough metaphors and analogies for ya’? I guess so. So, I took Mr. Nokia (I still want to call the cell phone that now for some reason) to the vet (oh gosh, I’m still doing it). I took the phone to Cingular to see what the problem was. Of course, they told me what I just told you. The cell phone is dead. I had two options: buy a new one from them (the cheapest one was $219) or get a cheap $50 phone from Wal-Mart and switch the SIM card. I chose the latter. The reason I had to do this was because I wasn’t eligible for an upgrade for another three months. Therefore, they weren’t willing to work with me. They couldn’t bother helping out a broke college student who can’t afford the $4/month insurance fee. Cell phone companies, Blah!

I got a new phone from Wal-Mart. A Sony Ericsson something or another. Cheap Plastic. Cheap Parts. Cheaply Made. Fifty-three dollars after tax. It does have a decent ringer on it though. I might actually consider just getting myself a new phone whenever I feel like it and replacing the SIM card for now on. It would keep me from having to sign a two-year contract to get a cheap phone that won’t last from Cingular. Just keep their service and get whatever phone I want from Wal-Mart or wherever else I can find Cingular phones. Not a bad idea if you ask me. Of course, I would have never found all this out if it wasn’t for the guy at Cingular who felt it wasn’t worth the money to buy one of their phones for three months. I’m sure if it was longer he wouldn’t have let me in on this little secret.

One other point of interest and I will be off of this whole cell phone subject, save your phone book to your SIM card. I never knew you could do this. So, now I have to get all of my numbers back, some of which will be lost forever, probably. Remember, save your phone book and whatever else you want to keep to your SIM card.

Anyway, there was a little hope and promise in this awful day; something that brightened my spirits while dealing with the cell phone debacle. Moments after my phone died forever, while I was working at the library, I found half a sheet of paper with quotes on it. Here’s what it read

Flesh goes on pleasuring us, and humiliating us, right to the end. ~Mignon McLaughlin, The Second Neurotic's Notebook, 1966

Few of us have lost our minds, but most of us have long ago lost our bodies. ~Ken Wilbur

Nothing tastes as good as thin feels.

“We turn skeletons into godesses and look up to them as if they might teach us not to need.”

X Futura Condensed

That’s exactly how it looked on the sheet of paper, except the “X” is a little bigger. I can’t reproduce that here with text.

But, it was sort of an omen, a prophetic sign to let me know that life will get better. The reasoning behind this is that I’m doing Body For Life again. I think the quotes were given to me by divine intervention in some way. And I’m a fairly big skeptic when it comes to divine intervention. I’m not the type of guy who will tell you everything happens for a reason. I’m more along the lines of getting what you put into things. There’s no such thing as predestination kind of guy. That’s not to say I’m not religious or spiritual, I just have a slightly different take on some things. I’m getting off subject now.

The paper was there, wedged between a bookshelf and a book. I found it while I was placing books on the shelf in the monotonous cycle that is my job. I have to take into account what is meant by finding this. I can’t just throw it out the window without giving it so much as a second look. It means something, though that last quote is a little distant from the other three. But they are all interrelated, and I found them. I found them in only my second week of the Body For Life program.

The quotes definitely lightened the load for the day. It renewed that bit of lost motivation I had gained from the death of my cell phone. I almost didn’t work out today because I had to run around town and get a new phone, but those quotes stood in my mind. And I’m still on track because of them. Whether it was fate laying her hand down on me or just a freak coincidence, it did something for me.

If that sheet of paper plays no larger role by existing in this universe other than its role today, it motivated me to do my lower body work out, it restored some of my faith in the unknown, and it made me a better person, if only for the few measly hours left in the day.