I woke up in a daze. Somehow I figure that’s an oxymoronic phrase, because the moment of wake is never awake, your consciousness is hitting Snooze ten to twenty minutes after you’ve discovered this blanket feels like your blanket, this pillow is soft like your pillow, this room is a room you’ve entered and left and smelled and stomped on and talked to. The signs are all around you. But if you woke up in a daze the sheets would have no texture, the memories of lying side by side with Tracy/Shaniqua/Insert-Name-Here on silky sheets reproached; the next-door-neighbor’s dog’s girlfriend down the way her bark is haunting groan of your doppelganger crawling up the side of your apartment. Your grandfather is dead.He rests his headOn your happiness. Yes the signs are all around you and to wake up in a daze is to wake up with light shining in your eyes and the blood of your guardian angel seeping through your pajama bottoms. The signs are all around you and to wake up in a daze is to greet your husband’s parents as you open your eyes with drool on the dinner table. And everyone’s watching. And no one seems to care that they’ve woken you at five in the morn or find anything wrong. And your son’s name is Pepper and your dog’s name is Jude and you’re sure as fuck that WASN’T TRUE BEFORE. Waking in a daze puts reality in a coma—won’t somebody wake her? Reality needs medical attention. She needs you to pay attention. Won’t somebody wake her—Can’t somebody wake her? THE SIGNS ARE ALL AROUND US.