My alarm goes off at 5:43 a.m. because 5:45 is for quitters. I wake up completely fine and not at all like a raccoon that got hit by a Waymo (true story — Vin has actually seen this).
First up on my agenda: gymmaxxing. I do pull-ups until my arms stop working, chug something called “Alpha Surge Pre-Workout” that I bought because the guy on the label has abs along with a Celsius and finish with a seventeen-minute mobility flow I found online. I don’t know what mobility means. I do the moves anyway. And of course, I’m at the YMCA with the teen summer membership because who doesn’t love free stuff?
By 7 a.m. I am built different.
Then I open the APUSH summer packet. Chapter 2: Colonial America. I read the first sentence four times before accepting that this isn’t going to happen. I open Jocz Productions on YouTube like every other APUSH student in America (he’s better than Heimler, trust) and watch Mr. Jocz explain the Columbian Exchange in eleven minutes while I eat cereal directly from the box. Honestly? Better than the textbook. Jocz gets me.
I write two sentences of notes and decide I’ve done enough for my future. Time for boba. I deserve it. I survived Colonial America, and I also managed to read a sentence about Jamestown. I bike to Boba Bliss in Mountain View, which — as my sources had not warned me — is permanently closed. The sign says “Thank you for your support!” I did not support them enough, apparently. I stand outside in the sun like an idiot while a man in a Rivian drives past and doesn’t help.
On the bike ride home I pass Alta Mesa Cemetery, which hits different in July. During prep you at least go with a few people, united in avoiding whatever’s happening in the J-building bathroom. Alone in summer it’s just me, the silence and the awareness that Steve Jobs is buried fifteen feet away — even he couldn’t have shipped my Chapter 2 packet on time.
I’m home by noon. The day is young. The packet is not done. Life is good?
P.S. to the boba addicts: Boba Bliss in Mountain View is not actually closed.
