Woke up cold

During my starving artist days in Passaic, I used to wake up on days like this, the first serious chill of the season warning of harder days to come. Winter in a cold water flat was always a trial, an endurance test that weeded out the weak-hearted. In those days, I jogged along the banks of the Passaic River, and the cold inspired me to get up quick, so the jog would warm me.
It is strange how far life has brought me from those days when I envisioned myself living as a writer -- not so much a best selling author, but someone whose words mattered.
Words still matter, but mostly these days to me.