the streets are slick
filled with puddle jumping girls in white floral dresses
and their yellow fathers who watch them
or rather
the dirty water vanishing into the thirsty gutter
as they take a long drag from their fourth cigarette
wondering how their daughters got to be so goddamned lucky
clattering heels enter and exit slippery cabs
that smell like body odor and cheap sex with bubblegum
and soon disappear behind swollen doors to dark houses
where plaster people hold plastic cups and each other
to forget
or remind themselves
that they are here
and the din of emergency brakes and ambulances
punctuates the smug silence of the stars
that hang above
reminding us of what we’re made of
and what we’ll never be
savannah, the salt lick
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tags:
berlin,
salt,
spain
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After a long and lovely day at the beach, I am simultaneously soggy, crunchy, and covered in salt. I subsequently dream about being an old chew toy for some depressed farm animal that spends its days eating cud and sleeping in its own excrement. The bus stops to let others on. I’m jolted from my dreams and am quite relieved to find that I am not currently in the mouth of a dairy cow named Bess, but rather a bus. Though it has a faint odor of fish and soiled diapers, so I don’t really know which is worse.
And now, there is unfortunately a man to my left groping and caressing the seat handles with sharp nails that have exceeded the “outdoorsy ergo sexy” dirtiness level by approximately 3 centimeters. There are plenty of empty seats behind me, but he still chooses this one. I mutter a pitiful “hola” and wish I could collapse into myself like a card table. Sunglasses are squeezed onto his head in such a way that make him look like a 31st century superhero, or rather just a potbellied fly with a horrible mustache. He smells of cheese-flavored crackers and cheap cologne. He puts on his seatbelt while the bus is not in motion. I find his alacrity more than slightly obnoxious (why didn’t I bring my swatter?) as no well-adjusted individual should ever be that eager to get on a bus.
Nonetheless, the belt barely fits over his yellow shirt, which coincidentally enough matches his yellow tennis shoes that hide self-consciously beneath his jean shorts. Fiddles with the air conditioning. Smiles at me too long. Licks his lips lasciviously (perhaps he is Bess’ bovine beau, Gomer). Gropes the handles once more, with feeling. His bulbous thigh is now less than a baby carrot’s distance away from mine. Predictably, his speckled arm brushes against my chest and remains in limbo for 3 seconds too long. I scowl but he, unpredictably, does not turn to stone. He then lowers the arm rest in shame and I begin to think of East and West Berlin. He keeps looking to the window. To my side. But if I have my druthers, this wall will never come down. Communism may be bad, but lecherous men named Pepe are even worse.
And now, there is unfortunately a man to my left groping and caressing the seat handles with sharp nails that have exceeded the “outdoorsy ergo sexy” dirtiness level by approximately 3 centimeters. There are plenty of empty seats behind me, but he still chooses this one. I mutter a pitiful “hola” and wish I could collapse into myself like a card table. Sunglasses are squeezed onto his head in such a way that make him look like a 31st century superhero, or rather just a potbellied fly with a horrible mustache. He smells of cheese-flavored crackers and cheap cologne. He puts on his seatbelt while the bus is not in motion. I find his alacrity more than slightly obnoxious (why didn’t I bring my swatter?) as no well-adjusted individual should ever be that eager to get on a bus.
Nonetheless, the belt barely fits over his yellow shirt, which coincidentally enough matches his yellow tennis shoes that hide self-consciously beneath his jean shorts. Fiddles with the air conditioning. Smiles at me too long. Licks his lips lasciviously (perhaps he is Bess’ bovine beau, Gomer). Gropes the handles once more, with feeling. His bulbous thigh is now less than a baby carrot’s distance away from mine. Predictably, his speckled arm brushes against my chest and remains in limbo for 3 seconds too long. I scowl but he, unpredictably, does not turn to stone. He then lowers the arm rest in shame and I begin to think of East and West Berlin. He keeps looking to the window. To my side. But if I have my druthers, this wall will never come down. Communism may be bad, but lecherous men named Pepe are even worse.
on departures
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on the beach at night
your smile is stolen quicker than the sun
and your bright blue eyes are like footprints in the sand
soon to be swallowed by the green-eyed sea
whose embrace will always be more powerful than mine
and as the tide drags you away from my setting memory
with its sneaky, silent hands
the cool night wind whispers softly in my ears and on my skin
"i'm sorry, i hope you understand"
your smile is stolen quicker than the sun
and your bright blue eyes are like footprints in the sand
soon to be swallowed by the green-eyed sea
whose embrace will always be more powerful than mine
and as the tide drags you away from my setting memory
with its sneaky, silent hands
the cool night wind whispers softly in my ears and on my skin
"i'm sorry, i hope you understand"
sad sketch of a woman
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tags:
imperfect,
spanish,
tenses
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she was teaching the class about the difference between the imperfect and indefinite past in spanish. and in a fraction of a moment, a german word escaped her.
how do you know that word, the boy asked the teacher. he was from austria and had never fallen in love.
the teacher looked to him and smiled slightly. her teeth were a bit yellow. her gums a bit pale. i knew a german once, she said. i learned it from him. she placed her wrinkled hands on the particle board desk. i saw her fingertips turn white like ghosts from the pressure. so white they were almost red. and then they self consciously disappeared into her lap.
they rose again. slowly, self consciously. as if she had been caught somewhere she shouldn't have been. quickly, she brushed her hair behind her ears, now short and coarse from the chemo a few years back. her hair used to be below her waist, she once told the class. she smiled at this, too. and then she looked out the window. there was just a wall.
i watched her eyes the entire time.
when her gaze returned to the boy, i thought of the tornadoes that had turned a nearby town into a picasso painting in the years past. abstract and out of order, she looked as if she had just been swept up into the hungry mouth of a twister and then spit out lackadaisically among aluminum siding and rusted tractor parts. i felt hollow all of a sudden. maybe sorry, even.
the teacher cleared her throat and swallowed. alright, now where were we, she asked.
page 73, chimed the chorus of mildly disinterested students. the austrian was fiddling with his mp3 player. he was asking the student next to him why he couldn't get wifi.
she nodded. or maybe she shook her head. her fingers gripped the book tightly as some of the others searched for page 73. they turned white again.
"bueno. el indefinido es algo que pasa una vez en el pasado y no tiene nada que ver con el presente."
it was all spanish from this point on.
how do you know that word, the boy asked the teacher. he was from austria and had never fallen in love.
the teacher looked to him and smiled slightly. her teeth were a bit yellow. her gums a bit pale. i knew a german once, she said. i learned it from him. she placed her wrinkled hands on the particle board desk. i saw her fingertips turn white like ghosts from the pressure. so white they were almost red. and then they self consciously disappeared into her lap.
they rose again. slowly, self consciously. as if she had been caught somewhere she shouldn't have been. quickly, she brushed her hair behind her ears, now short and coarse from the chemo a few years back. her hair used to be below her waist, she once told the class. she smiled at this, too. and then she looked out the window. there was just a wall.
i watched her eyes the entire time.
when her gaze returned to the boy, i thought of the tornadoes that had turned a nearby town into a picasso painting in the years past. abstract and out of order, she looked as if she had just been swept up into the hungry mouth of a twister and then spit out lackadaisically among aluminum siding and rusted tractor parts. i felt hollow all of a sudden. maybe sorry, even.
the teacher cleared her throat and swallowed. alright, now where were we, she asked.
page 73, chimed the chorus of mildly disinterested students. the austrian was fiddling with his mp3 player. he was asking the student next to him why he couldn't get wifi.
she nodded. or maybe she shook her head. her fingers gripped the book tightly as some of the others searched for page 73. they turned white again.
"bueno. el indefinido es algo que pasa una vez en el pasado y no tiene nada que ver con el presente."
it was all spanish from this point on.
spit me baby one more time
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my school day began with a documentary on genocide and ended with a stream of spit in my hair and face from an unknown thief. suffice it to say, today was no good. granted, the span in between was rather nice as i was able to purchase and consume carbs and finish reading a good short story, but thanks to the primacy-recency theory, all of that has been eclipsed by the shit time i had at the park.
i was writing in my journal (oddly enough bits and pieces to remember from the past few days so that i could add them here later) at my usual park after a rather banal class. looking up from my notes, i pondered the scene as oftentimes this park is a potpourri of people and personalities. once, i witnessed a man barking at children. always be aware of your surroundings, they say.
at any rate, i caught a rather plain looking lump of a woman working her way up the incline via the ledge upon which i happened to be sitting. nothing wrong with that. relatively common occurrence. i continued my scribing. all of a sudden, i felt a gentle tugging at the hem of my dress, and then saw a hand reaching for the straps. i immediately noticed the nails: sparkly baby shit orange. this was obviously a bad person. instinctively (as i told dad later), the only child in me snatched the bag with astonishing force and conviction, and i think this took the woman by surprise. she looked at me as if she had hyperthyroidism and pulled harder. shit. i can't even win against myself with a chinese finger trap. i didn't know how i was going to pull this one off. adrenaline must have started to kick in, and i soon began shrieking at her in english. and before i knew it, the tacky nails made contact with my shoulders and soon i was supine on the ground. unfortunately for her, my body was the ball and chain to my purse, and it was safe underneath me. still in shock and unable to comprehend what had actually happened, i looked to my purse. all things were there. i looked to my tights. there was a gaping hole. i looked to her with utter incredulity, and she reciprocated by rearing her head back like some foul boar before it charges at you with its tusks and then spat in my face. to that, i responded with a nonsensical and painfully anticlimactic, "I HATE YOU." as if my abhorrence of her would have made any difference. she proceeded to run off and i never saw her again.
like most things, the hardest part was getting up. my veins were still comprised of whitewater rapids at this point and because of that my entire body was shaking. i was just waiting for the hives. there were others relatively nearby, yet no one seemed to notice what had happened. or maybe they just wanted to pretend so. awkwardly, i grabbed my things (the bitch didn't want to take my notebooks or collection of f. scott fitzgerald stories, what a shock) and made the long walk home, where i would collapse into crying fits every 50 paces. and it was as true then as it is now that i couldn't tell you exactly why that happened. it may have something to do that i have just started the monthly process that consists primarily of tampax, tears, and cheese-laden products, or the fact that it was so hot out, or the fact that i'm realizing that things are coming to a close, (actually, i think those are all good reasons and in truth it was probably a cocktail of the three) but i suppose i will never be certain. more than anything, i think it has to do with how much i've romanticized this place. nothing like that should happen here. sure, i've heard others say they've had things stolen, been mugged in dark alleys, but not here. not in my granada.
though the truth is that even princesses can't sleep in forever. despite how it may appear occasionally, i think today highlighted a bigger issue with which i've always had problems: i have quite a hard time accepting things for what they are. no, i'm not an overt optimist, nor have i experienced any major hardships in my life. yet time and time again when these things happen (as they have before; i must bear some sort of an invisible mark), i tell myself that i've learned. i've wisened up. i "get it" now. i see. but i never do. the truth is that i don't like to think that beautiful cities can have ugly underbellies, and i hate to think that people aren't as good as they may appear. part of me thinks that i should hold on to this, as it's quite a slippery slope to becoming jaded, which is an even quicker catalyst toward complacency, but at the same time i know i am crazy not to recognize this as truth and respond accordingly.
in the meantime, my eyes are feeling heavy. i'm going to let my neurons randomly fire for approximately nine hours and hopefully when i wake up tomorrow morning, the dust will have settled some and i will be able to see a bit more clearly. i do, however, recall a quote from a shirt that i liked today, oddly enough right before i entered the park. it read, "lo importante es saber que es importante," or, "the important thing is to know what is important." and today, despite the shit storm, despite the spit and the ripped tights, what is important is that i am safe and, in spite of my blubbering, i am stronger than i think.
cafe stream of consciousness
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(since I haven't painted a picture of a typical afternoon in-between classes. will be writing more about the real happenings soon.)
I'm sitting outside the usual cafe right now, avoiding the usual work, and replacing it with the usual carbohydrates supplemented by the usual calorie-free cola. Between bites of bread, I pick at the nail polish that I reapplied only an hour ago after chewing it all off six hours before that. I don't know how I feel about this shade of red; it's red light district hooker meets self-mutilating punk. Which makes me feel overly prudish for wearing underwear today and simultaneously under-angst ridden for not promoting my favorite socially controversial causes through the medium of various lapel pins. I stare at the bread. I shouldn't eat it. I feel jowly. I begin to think of Henry VIII and about the crane they used to lift him in when he got too fat to support his most likely inbred legs (I soon visualize my grandmother's purebred corgi). I then imagine myself being lifted in that same crane with similar jowls to Henry's, while dribbling the grease and fat of a turkey leg or something equally Anglican down my chins. Well, I'm going to die anyway. Stare at the bread. Pick at my nails. Succumb. Bite. Delicious.
Now I'm thinking of stomach crunches and the work that is beginning to inch its way further away from my peripheral vision and into my central vision. I think of doing both when I return home. Then I salt and swirl olive oil onto my bread with the finesse of a great sorcerer. I will do neither. A man with a poorly tuned violin shatters my gaze with the screech of his strings, and for a moment I ponder his story. Why the violin? Why Spain? Why those shoes? But soon the sound is so haranguing that all I ask is Why me? He finishes the four minute piece five minutes too late and smiles as if he has ended the genocides in sub-Saharan Africa and found the cure for cancer within the same five-minute span. He says gracias. Others around me ignore him. He sees that I am watching even though my eyes are veiled by fake designer sunglasses. The gnat approaches and extends his hand. I pretend not to see him and take an imaginary phonecall. The hand remains on the table. I receive a text message during my 'conversation' and my phone chimes and vibrates, falling out of my hand. My cheeks become the same color as my nails. I lose. Reach into my pocket and pull out some change, demonstrating my financial support to a man whose dreams are more resistant to death than Rasputin. He cups the coins and leaves matter of factly. I can hear my money jingle in his pockets as he walks away, and decide that that sound is worlds more painful than his screeching sonata in d minor. I feel defeated and ask for my check. My proverbial tail is between my legs and I saunter back to my apartment. I know I am close when I smile at the sounds of jackhammers and general discontent. Class on Muslims in an hour. Thank Allah.
I'm sitting outside the usual cafe right now, avoiding the usual work, and replacing it with the usual carbohydrates supplemented by the usual calorie-free cola. Between bites of bread, I pick at the nail polish that I reapplied only an hour ago after chewing it all off six hours before that. I don't know how I feel about this shade of red; it's red light district hooker meets self-mutilating punk. Which makes me feel overly prudish for wearing underwear today and simultaneously under-angst ridden for not promoting my favorite socially controversial causes through the medium of various lapel pins. I stare at the bread. I shouldn't eat it. I feel jowly. I begin to think of Henry VIII and about the crane they used to lift him in when he got too fat to support his most likely inbred legs (I soon visualize my grandmother's purebred corgi). I then imagine myself being lifted in that same crane with similar jowls to Henry's, while dribbling the grease and fat of a turkey leg or something equally Anglican down my chins. Well, I'm going to die anyway. Stare at the bread. Pick at my nails. Succumb. Bite. Delicious.
Now I'm thinking of stomach crunches and the work that is beginning to inch its way further away from my peripheral vision and into my central vision. I think of doing both when I return home. Then I salt and swirl olive oil onto my bread with the finesse of a great sorcerer. I will do neither. A man with a poorly tuned violin shatters my gaze with the screech of his strings, and for a moment I ponder his story. Why the violin? Why Spain? Why those shoes? But soon the sound is so haranguing that all I ask is Why me? He finishes the four minute piece five minutes too late and smiles as if he has ended the genocides in sub-Saharan Africa and found the cure for cancer within the same five-minute span. He says gracias. Others around me ignore him. He sees that I am watching even though my eyes are veiled by fake designer sunglasses. The gnat approaches and extends his hand. I pretend not to see him and take an imaginary phonecall. The hand remains on the table. I receive a text message during my 'conversation' and my phone chimes and vibrates, falling out of my hand. My cheeks become the same color as my nails. I lose. Reach into my pocket and pull out some change, demonstrating my financial support to a man whose dreams are more resistant to death than Rasputin. He cups the coins and leaves matter of factly. I can hear my money jingle in his pockets as he walks away, and decide that that sound is worlds more painful than his screeching sonata in d minor. I feel defeated and ask for my check. My proverbial tail is between my legs and I saunter back to my apartment. I know I am close when I smile at the sounds of jackhammers and general discontent. Class on Muslims in an hour. Thank Allah.
the belgian bust
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tags:
barcelona,
belgium,
glee
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Good evening, all. I'm going to begin this entry with a supreme sigh of relief as I will not be going to Belgium this coming weekend. The initial plan was to meet my friend Erinn for her birthday in Bruges, however after realizing that it would require planes, trains, automobiles, and being double-jointed to get there, I decided that it was a no-go.
The truth is that I feel incredibly guilty for canceling and if I could I would grow a tail just so that I could tuck it between my legs, but the reality is that a broken engagement and an impulsive $150 thought are completely worth avoiding the hernia and/or ulcer that potentially await me while switching trains, speaking in Dutch (I sounded like a rogue mallard duck when practicing Dutch phrases earlier) and broken French in a foreign country all by my lonesome. For better or for worse, I know my limits, and I know that a two-day trip to Belgium is not something worthy of grinding my teeth. That would be a season finale of Project Runway. Anyway, the difficult task, more so than the money wasted, will be telling her that I won't be going. I guess this is one of those things that will help build my character or something, though it seems that with my flakey behavior I'm made entirely of phyllo dough and dandruff. There are worse things, though. I guess.
At any rate, this weekend was rather nice. First and foremost, no one was in the flat (I say "flat" when I also decide that I'm not going to end sentences with prepositions in text; they both make me feel a bit fancy and European), and therefore I was able to bite my toenails without closing the bedroom door. Libertad! Kidding. I love Loren and wished that she were here, however you have no clue how much of a vacation it was for me to not be plagued by Marisel's nasaly nuances of her favorite Glee! hits at every hour of the day. No, you dumb bitch. "Don't Stop Believing" isn't by Glee. It's by Journey. I don't even like them that much, either, but will defend them down to their last teased hair follicle out of principle alone. Now please shut the hell up before I throw you and your stickered iPod in the gas burner. That's something to sing about.
You see, Marisel was in Barcelona this weekend celebrating her birthday by most likely singing Glee songs in the Sagrada Familia with some of her twerpish friends. I politely declined the invitation to go, as I already have enough problems with popping my ears on planes. I can't even begin to fathom the possibility of them bleeding on top of that. Let it be known now that if and when I establish my own reich, Glee and flat-feet will be two of the first things to be abolished. (Yes, Marisel has flat feet. Thus the theory continues...)
Anyway, my Friday was a relatively tame one, as the night prior didn't end until approximately 7 am. Another night at the Camborio, another night of shaking my ass most likely off beat to post-mole Enrique Iglesias hits. Saturday, however, was choc-full of excitement. Or at least things that made me wear something other than a dressing robe and a grimace. I started out the day with an impromptu English tutoring session, and to be honest I was incredibly terrified. I had to look up direct object pronouns, independent and subordinate clauses all before meeting up with my tutee (such a funny word!) so I could at least appear academic and knowledgeable.
I met my tutee, Cristobal, a friendly yet unfortunately overgelled boy from Cordoba, for tapas and tutoring. It turns out that looking up the nuts and bolts of English grammar was far too ambitious, as the only words he could muster (though only with probing) were "hello" (ay-low) and "goodbye" (gude-bai). Things didn't get any better when my tapa, a plate of sausages that looked like midgets' thumbs drowning in some kind of red sauce with mayonnaise, was thrust so lackadaisically at me that some of its projectile found its way onto my white blouse, clinging to the fabric like an attention-starved leech. Eventually, I decided that it was best to begin with pointing to objects and people and have him describe them in Spanish, and I would translate to English, and then have him repeat what I said orally and then write it as well. It was difficult, and I can't necessarily say that the warm-fuzzy feeling that comes with kindness was worth it, as no amount of good vibrations can remove a tomato-sauce based stain from a white shirt. But so it is. Two diet cokes were paid for, and he came out of it knowing about 20 more words and how to use them in a sentence. We'll see if I'm recruited again.
That evening I attended a party at a few Australians' flat. I didn't know them at all, but still managed to be comfortable enough around them to fall out of my chair twice while laughing. Always the epitome of grace. I went with Jeremy (the Belgian who gave Cristobal my name and number for English lessons without consulting me first...thanks!), Gregor, and Hedda, a German girl whom I actually find to be very friendly and virtually spit-free. We listened to music, drank some, and talked until the wee hours of the morning, at which point I excused myself to come home.
Today was more or less banal, as the most exciting thing I can say that I did beyond putting cheese on a piece of bread was finishing my paper on Islamic monarchies. And doing that was about as exciting as applying Preparation H to a stubborn hemorrhoid. Though, I guess you could say I rewarded myself by backing out of my Belgium trip. Guillaume asked me to go out for a drink, but as I was already immersed in my Bach mix and Belgium-fretting (on top of the fact that I am beginning to feel that my bloodstream is composed of white blood cells, red blood cells, plasma, and malted barley), I postponed until tomorrow under the guise of a stomach bug and generally "funky" demeanor.
This week should be a pretty good one. Tuesday night a group of Turkish girls are hosting a party at a pub wherein they'll be serving Turkish food (I was sold at this point), and will be doing traditional Turkish dancing. Wednesday night a bunch of people are getting together for tapas, and Thursday Hedda is having a terrace party at her place. And my weekend is 100% free. Oh, what a tough life I lead.
an update of e p i c proportions
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I should be watching a film about the reunification of Italy, but since my professor isn't present today nor does the film particularly pertain to the name of the course (Social and Political Movements in SPAIN), I will regard this film with as much relevance to my blogging as the film does to my course. Though I must tear myself away for a moment, as it appears an Italian version of Scarlett O'Hara is shrieking on a chaise lounge. What is it about hoop skirts and ringlets that make women so damned dramatic?
At any rate, I feel compelled to comment on my past few days here, as I have been treating this blog with about as much care and maintenance as the leg hair on my kneecaps. I just don't go there. There are tights for those kinds of things. Though unfortunately, a few yards of nylon can't conceal the fact that I have been remiss on updating my single follower on the goings-on with Spanish Sav. But don't worry, Mom, I won't be referring to myself in the third person for the duration of this entry...
Thus I will begin with Monday's minutia. I began it quite abysmally by completing perhaps the most asinine assignment of my life, wherein I had to comment on the different "systems" present in a specific area of my host city. I was told to choose a "busy" place where I wouldn't be disturbed. No, it made no sense to me, either. Given how confusing the assignment was phrased, I wanted to respond with an equally choppy and contradictory essay, however ultimately I decided that a good grade is worth more than good conviction, ergo I abstained from challenging the system in favor of writing about its numerous manifestations in a park setting. Pick and choose, I suppose.
That said, my efforts were soon rewarded with a cold beer and chorizo sausage, so I suppose the few hours of academic enslavement were worth it. I can only imagine how the slaves greeted their forty acres and a mule. At any rate, I consumed said concoctions with a Gregor, a Scot with whom I share two classes. He is funny and attractive, though made more so as he paid for the two drinks I guzzled prior to class.
Said class comprised of yet another absent teacher and a subsequent substitute, at which point in time we were told to rewrite the classic story of Cinderella (this was supposed to be, as I learned after completing the assignment, a mere test of our knowledge of the indefinite past, past-perfect, and imperfect tenses) and share them with the class. In mine, I decided that the lazy prince really loved the fairy godmother as she could produce social justice and an ideal welfare state that didn't crush the GDP all with a flick of her wand, and that he only wed Cinderella because he found out that FG once had questionable ties with a communist kingdom nearby and thought that, with his rosacea and all, he looked absolutely horrible in red, so it was a definite no-go. Meanwhile, he saw Cinderella from the corner of his eyes, sweeping up some soot, and figured that marrying a plebeian would demonstrate his political ingenue and general humanitarian interests well enough to appease the frustrated serfs in his kingdom so they wouldn't, at least for a while, stage a rebellion. So then the Prince married Cindy and they lived happily ever after/tax free. Only a few people understood my story. But so it is.
That night was also a landmark for me, as I decided to use my stove for the first time in my 40-some days of being here. The dish? Frozen green beans. No, it's not the height of gastronomy, but given that my cooking capacity until this point both started and stopped with a clean spread of jam on a piece of bread, these green beans may as well have been lobster thermidor. Though having never used a stove before, I decided to proceed with utmost caution. I watched a YouTube video, then meticulously applied what I had learned to my own stove. I turned to knob from "off" to the flame symbol and placed my pot on the burner, patiently waiting by the open window. Five minutes later, there had still been no change in temperature. And then the tidal wave of realization hit: I probably should have lit something. So, I quickly grabbed a lighter and placed it underneath the burner, only to watch in astoundment as a large blue flame spread over the entire counter for a split second before it proceeded to go back to normal. It only occurred to me as I was enjoying my green goodies that that was how some of my personal greats had killed themselves. Which made me wonder if maybe all of their deaths had been misunderstandings. Perhaps after dedicating so much of their time and brain capacity to other things, they too had forgotten how to use one of the most basic kitchen appliances, ultimately resulting in their demise. Though how unfortunate it would be for me to die in such a way without having a book of controversial poems, or at least some kind of addiction, first.
But I digress. Moving backwards in time, my Sunday was spent with two of my favorite vices: gluttony and sloth, respectively. You see, I was recovering from a night that didn't end until the morning, and what better way to recuperate than with a bed and thinly sliced lamb, chicken, a fried egg, and vegetables all wrapped into one pita about the size and weight of an Olsen twin? Yes, I started the day with a shawarma. Afterward, I felt a bit guilty so I spent the rest of my afternoon reading about the UN and NATO Resolution of 1973. As entertaining as that is, however, I really miss reading for pleasure (hint, reader). Though I royally pissed myself off after the thought "Damn it, I can't read; I've lost my charger" actually escaped my mouth.
In case you were curious, I was recovering from my Saturday night. It began in the evening with tapas with Guillaume, though unfortunately he brought two of his boring friends who were leaving the next morning for an equally boring country, Poland. Suffice it to say I had little desire to stick around to hear the monotony of their travel plans (Poland will be cold. Poland will have museums. Will it be cold? I think so. Too cold for their museums? I don't know. Depends on how cold it is, etc, etc), so I apologized to Guillaume (who later apologized for bringing the walking dead with him on our Saturday plans) and to the others, saying that I completely forgot that I had to meet up with some others and was running late. And that furthermore, I was a bit sick.
Which wasn't entirely untrue; I did have plans with others, and I was running late. And I was sick. Sick of their conversation. Anyway, I had heard earlier from Veronica (sweet Ecuadorian) and Gregor that there was supposed to be a massive house party in the albaicin that night, and that I shouldn't miss it. And as I had no desire to discuss Warsaw, I figured the albaicin, despite the uphill trek that still makes my quadriceps squeal like a pig in the slaughter, was worth it. In a bit of a hurry to meet up with them (we were to reunite at a Brazilian's apartment), I rushed into the nearest chino to purchase my usual beverages: vodka and orange juice. Pointing indiscriminately at the closest bottle of clear liquid, I thrust a few wads of cash at the clerk and made my way over. It was only after I arrived and began to mix my drink that I thought of my grandfather all of a sudden. And then I looked down to my bottle, and saw that, to my malaise, I had purchased gin and not vodka. He always used to drink gin and tonics, and I guess I just associate the smell of gin with him. I figured that a liking of gin could indeed be hereditary, so I gave it a shot (pun very much intended). It was terrible. But really, all alcohol is terrible. It's only not terrible if you're an alcoholic.
At any rate, once my throat was sufficiently burning like that of a fire-breathing dragon, we made our way to the party. I didn't drink enough to not notice the incline of the hill, and therefore was casting aspersions and imagining various anvils and grand pianos falling on the Portugese prick who decided that taking a 2 euro a person cab fee was just too much. Oh well, we can't always get what we want or something. The party was, for a lack of a better term, insane. The basement, where it was being held, was only found after heading down a labryinth of passageways and stairwells. From the top of the stairs, I could see a room that seemed to be the size of my house, and heads nodding up and down to the rhythm of a Pitbull song. Speaking of, there were dogs wandering through people's legs as well. My gin was quickly usurped from me by an unknown party guest, but for all intents and purposes I wasn't too upset. I wanted to keep my wits about me, especially in this setting. To do so, I ended up spending some of the night taking advantage of some of the unfortunate drunks by leading them to say very stupid and hypocritical things to make my calves feel better, as well as dancing with those whom I deemed fit. And there were quite a few of those.
However, the night ended, yet again, with me feigning illness in order to escape to a warm bed. This time, I was convincing enough to have a taxi ordered for me (sidenote: I cannot even begin to describe how elated I was to see Mr. Cheap puking his guts out over the balcony upon my exit; I felt as if I had won something) by Gregor, who made sure I got into my apartment alright among other things.
I'm afraid I'm going to have to take a pause now as my fingers are cramping up and the lights are coming back on in the classroom. It's time for our halfway break. Surprise, Italy is still divided. Surprise, woman in curls is still shrieking.
At any rate, I feel compelled to comment on my past few days here, as I have been treating this blog with about as much care and maintenance as the leg hair on my kneecaps. I just don't go there. There are tights for those kinds of things. Though unfortunately, a few yards of nylon can't conceal the fact that I have been remiss on updating my single follower on the goings-on with Spanish Sav. But don't worry, Mom, I won't be referring to myself in the third person for the duration of this entry...
Thus I will begin with Monday's minutia. I began it quite abysmally by completing perhaps the most asinine assignment of my life, wherein I had to comment on the different "systems" present in a specific area of my host city. I was told to choose a "busy" place where I wouldn't be disturbed. No, it made no sense to me, either. Given how confusing the assignment was phrased, I wanted to respond with an equally choppy and contradictory essay, however ultimately I decided that a good grade is worth more than good conviction, ergo I abstained from challenging the system in favor of writing about its numerous manifestations in a park setting. Pick and choose, I suppose.
That said, my efforts were soon rewarded with a cold beer and chorizo sausage, so I suppose the few hours of academic enslavement were worth it. I can only imagine how the slaves greeted their forty acres and a mule. At any rate, I consumed said concoctions with a Gregor, a Scot with whom I share two classes. He is funny and attractive, though made more so as he paid for the two drinks I guzzled prior to class.
Said class comprised of yet another absent teacher and a subsequent substitute, at which point in time we were told to rewrite the classic story of Cinderella (this was supposed to be, as I learned after completing the assignment, a mere test of our knowledge of the indefinite past, past-perfect, and imperfect tenses) and share them with the class. In mine, I decided that the lazy prince really loved the fairy godmother as she could produce social justice and an ideal welfare state that didn't crush the GDP all with a flick of her wand, and that he only wed Cinderella because he found out that FG once had questionable ties with a communist kingdom nearby and thought that, with his rosacea and all, he looked absolutely horrible in red, so it was a definite no-go. Meanwhile, he saw Cinderella from the corner of his eyes, sweeping up some soot, and figured that marrying a plebeian would demonstrate his political ingenue and general humanitarian interests well enough to appease the frustrated serfs in his kingdom so they wouldn't, at least for a while, stage a rebellion. So then the Prince married Cindy and they lived happily ever after/tax free. Only a few people understood my story. But so it is.
That night was also a landmark for me, as I decided to use my stove for the first time in my 40-some days of being here. The dish? Frozen green beans. No, it's not the height of gastronomy, but given that my cooking capacity until this point both started and stopped with a clean spread of jam on a piece of bread, these green beans may as well have been lobster thermidor. Though having never used a stove before, I decided to proceed with utmost caution. I watched a YouTube video, then meticulously applied what I had learned to my own stove. I turned to knob from "off" to the flame symbol and placed my pot on the burner, patiently waiting by the open window. Five minutes later, there had still been no change in temperature. And then the tidal wave of realization hit: I probably should have lit something. So, I quickly grabbed a lighter and placed it underneath the burner, only to watch in astoundment as a large blue flame spread over the entire counter for a split second before it proceeded to go back to normal. It only occurred to me as I was enjoying my green goodies that that was how some of my personal greats had killed themselves. Which made me wonder if maybe all of their deaths had been misunderstandings. Perhaps after dedicating so much of their time and brain capacity to other things, they too had forgotten how to use one of the most basic kitchen appliances, ultimately resulting in their demise. Though how unfortunate it would be for me to die in such a way without having a book of controversial poems, or at least some kind of addiction, first.
But I digress. Moving backwards in time, my Sunday was spent with two of my favorite vices: gluttony and sloth, respectively. You see, I was recovering from a night that didn't end until the morning, and what better way to recuperate than with a bed and thinly sliced lamb, chicken, a fried egg, and vegetables all wrapped into one pita about the size and weight of an Olsen twin? Yes, I started the day with a shawarma. Afterward, I felt a bit guilty so I spent the rest of my afternoon reading about the UN and NATO Resolution of 1973. As entertaining as that is, however, I really miss reading for pleasure (hint, reader). Though I royally pissed myself off after the thought "Damn it, I can't read; I've lost my charger" actually escaped my mouth.
In case you were curious, I was recovering from my Saturday night. It began in the evening with tapas with Guillaume, though unfortunately he brought two of his boring friends who were leaving the next morning for an equally boring country, Poland. Suffice it to say I had little desire to stick around to hear the monotony of their travel plans (Poland will be cold. Poland will have museums. Will it be cold? I think so. Too cold for their museums? I don't know. Depends on how cold it is, etc, etc), so I apologized to Guillaume (who later apologized for bringing the walking dead with him on our Saturday plans) and to the others, saying that I completely forgot that I had to meet up with some others and was running late. And that furthermore, I was a bit sick.
Which wasn't entirely untrue; I did have plans with others, and I was running late. And I was sick. Sick of their conversation. Anyway, I had heard earlier from Veronica (sweet Ecuadorian) and Gregor that there was supposed to be a massive house party in the albaicin that night, and that I shouldn't miss it. And as I had no desire to discuss Warsaw, I figured the albaicin, despite the uphill trek that still makes my quadriceps squeal like a pig in the slaughter, was worth it. In a bit of a hurry to meet up with them (we were to reunite at a Brazilian's apartment), I rushed into the nearest chino to purchase my usual beverages: vodka and orange juice. Pointing indiscriminately at the closest bottle of clear liquid, I thrust a few wads of cash at the clerk and made my way over. It was only after I arrived and began to mix my drink that I thought of my grandfather all of a sudden. And then I looked down to my bottle, and saw that, to my malaise, I had purchased gin and not vodka. He always used to drink gin and tonics, and I guess I just associate the smell of gin with him. I figured that a liking of gin could indeed be hereditary, so I gave it a shot (pun very much intended). It was terrible. But really, all alcohol is terrible. It's only not terrible if you're an alcoholic.
At any rate, once my throat was sufficiently burning like that of a fire-breathing dragon, we made our way to the party. I didn't drink enough to not notice the incline of the hill, and therefore was casting aspersions and imagining various anvils and grand pianos falling on the Portugese prick who decided that taking a 2 euro a person cab fee was just too much. Oh well, we can't always get what we want or something. The party was, for a lack of a better term, insane. The basement, where it was being held, was only found after heading down a labryinth of passageways and stairwells. From the top of the stairs, I could see a room that seemed to be the size of my house, and heads nodding up and down to the rhythm of a Pitbull song. Speaking of, there were dogs wandering through people's legs as well. My gin was quickly usurped from me by an unknown party guest, but for all intents and purposes I wasn't too upset. I wanted to keep my wits about me, especially in this setting. To do so, I ended up spending some of the night taking advantage of some of the unfortunate drunks by leading them to say very stupid and hypocritical things to make my calves feel better, as well as dancing with those whom I deemed fit. And there were quite a few of those.
However, the night ended, yet again, with me feigning illness in order to escape to a warm bed. This time, I was convincing enough to have a taxi ordered for me (sidenote: I cannot even begin to describe how elated I was to see Mr. Cheap puking his guts out over the balcony upon my exit; I felt as if I had won something) by Gregor, who made sure I got into my apartment alright among other things.
I'm afraid I'm going to have to take a pause now as my fingers are cramping up and the lights are coming back on in the classroom. It's time for our halfway break. Surprise, Italy is still divided. Surprise, woman in curls is still shrieking.
carnaval de cádiz or how to smell like piss without trying
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This Saturday, I made my first trip outside the increasingly familiar granadino grounds to the west coast of Spain: Cadiz. Every year, they have a carnival there (no bearded women or funnel cakes, unfortunately) wherein people dress up and set the night on fire with copious of amounts of alcohol, and from the smell of it, other mind altering substances. Though really, I had a hard time discerning the difference between the Carnaval and a typical weekend for the average Spaniard, just a little more pantyhose and lipstick.
A little background on Cadiz and the Carnaval before I continue: Cadiz is the oldest city in Spain, and possibly the oldest in southern Europe. Its carnival is the second largest in the country, as well. It is also a four and a half hour bus ride away from Granada, which meant (for me), that its reputation better be worth the potential blood clots I could receive while packed into a plush corner like a wad of tobacco in a baseball player's mouth.
For my costume, I was really unsure what I wanted to do until nearly the last minute. I couldn't find anything at the chinos (Chinese stores that are almost always open and almost always have things you don't need) that didn't make me look like packaging for the latest cavity-causer at the grocery store. Ultimately, I decided to be Madonna circa 1980s again, as for better or for worse, I only had to buy lace gloves and beads. I used the remainder of the arm-length gloves I cut to make my bow, and donned red lipstick and black nail polish as I tried to channel "Like a Virgin" to look Like a Bad Ass, but I don't know if it worked. Here's a closeup:
Upon arriving, we had approximately three hours before it was considered appropos to begin consumption of alcohol, though I, the hopelessly responsible individual, decided I didn't want to drink very much as the risk of being separated from the group was high, and given the nature of the others and the size of an unfamiliar city, I knew that if I did get separated sober I would most likely crumple and cry; I couldn't fathom how I would respond if slightly inebriated. (It should be mentioned that the student group who went seemed to promote the opposite, as there were raffles for handles of rum and vodka the entire way. I would have been happy with a t-shirt or visor.) That changed within half an hour. Drunker than my uncle Ted who likes to wear womens clothing and gyrate to Rod Stewart at family reunions. So, we walked around for a bit and took in the city, put our feet in the Atlantic Ocean, and took pictures of some of the more eccentric costumes. For Spaniards, though, the word eccentric typically connotes excessive display of supersized genitalia on mammals. I wasn't able to capture this in time, but a father was walking around with a missile-sized penis on a cart as he was dressed himself like a gorilla and was holding his little daughter's hand.
At any rate, it was beginning to get darker out and my legs, guarded only by the roping of fishnet tights were beginning to look glow-in-the dark and had goosebumps so numerous it appeared the holy bible was written in Braille on my calves. For that reason, and perhaps to the annoyance of some, I chose to linger a bit too long in front of the cheese section of the heated grocery store while contemplating my cheap dinner. We decided to eat before the festivities really began, and took our baguettes and other foodstuffs to the street. I felt incredibly urban. Which made me feel really cool. But then I remembered I was on my period still, so not that cool.
We finished the modest meals and then headed close to the Cathedral, where there was live music being performed by dwarves and copious amounts of drinking and bottle spilling. Don't try and tell me that the Spanish are still highly Catholic. Although, depending on your stance on alcoholism and obsession with little boys, maybe they are. I digress. I felt a little bit overwhelmed given the size and nature of the crowd (cue memories of first day of big middle school where the hallways seemed to be rife with predators of the Serengheti, and I was a helpless wildebeest with a gimp leg), but I tried to shrug it off and laugh. Danced a little bit, drank a little bit of my pre-packed beer, and talked some with other Spaniards. More and more people crammed into the plaza, and I could hear more and more bottles breaking. I think that this really is an event where, if you are sober and/or bleeding from a southern orifice (like I was), you should do your best to not come. I know I can be equally obnoxious when drinking, but I swear to god, after the third German in a row sprayed me with spittle while they attempted to speak English to me, I wanted to call it a day. It seemed like every other minute I was being poked and prodded with various trident accessories and beer fireworks landed conveniently on my face. I didn't know I had signed up to be in the Splash Zone of Sea World. Ugh. Meanwhile, my company was growing more and more downy cheeked and exaggerated in their movements, and soon I was swallowed by a group of birdish black and white Natalie Portmans. And you guessed it, separated from the group.
Interior walls began crumbling and adrenaline began pounding, and I began punching wildly at my phone. The others had already begun calling me, but given the noise of the crowd, it was impossible to hear them when they told me where they were and asked where I was. Finally, I found a familiar face (though not someone from the group, and surprisingly enough it was the German named Nicolai who didn't spit as he spoke), and he dealt with my trembling self and helped me wind around the streets to find the others. And then they were there, sitting and expressing regret as they had been pushed into a corner by a stampede of Bart Simpsons. I quickly forgave them, but only after they pitched in to buy me chicken shawarma.
As I tore into the food as if I were a lion and it were a wildebeest (how quickly the tables do turn), there were several drunks who stopped and stared at me and wouldn't budge. Increasingly aware of my own bleeding and cold state, I stopped chewing and stared at them hard (only my friends know this scowl, they call it the Medusa) until they left. Granted, if one of them resembled my Javier I would have been more kind, but as it is becoming more and more obvious, I tend to attract Javier's cousin, slightly inbred with a dash of Asperger's syndrome.
After most of the others sobered up and began to realize we STILL had three hours before we could board the bus, they also began to realize how effing cold it was outside. Proceeded to cram ourselves into a salsa bar for warmth, and that was where I began to talk with a group of middleaged gays. We got on quite well after they immediately congratulated me on my stellar Madonna costume, though particularly bonded after discussing Barack Obama's attractiveness at some length. I felt a bit pretentious at the time, but I noticed one of them was dressed as a person who runs with bulls (red bandana, white everything else), and so I asked them if they had read "The Sun Also Rises." Of course, they told me. Hemingway is an institution in Spain. So we talked books for a bit and they taught me a few steps in salsa (something I desperately need to practice as I still resemble the Tin Man when making movements), but they were all incredibly nice and a much preferred way to spend my remaining hours at Cadiz.
Quickly, 4:00 a.m. approached and it was time to return to Granada. The busride home was a potpourri of smells and sights, as several times we had to stop for puke breaks. I felt as if I had bathed in a sewer and dried myself using a soiled piece of toilet paper, though my only comfort was that a) I had made it on the bus and would soon return to my immaculate bedroom and b) I was not Charlie Sheen. Exhausted after spending a third of a day on a bus and the rest in a whirlwind of alcohol and latex, I soon crashed onto my bed and dreamed of better times.
Here are some of the photos I took:
A little background on Cadiz and the Carnaval before I continue: Cadiz is the oldest city in Spain, and possibly the oldest in southern Europe. Its carnival is the second largest in the country, as well. It is also a four and a half hour bus ride away from Granada, which meant (for me), that its reputation better be worth the potential blood clots I could receive while packed into a plush corner like a wad of tobacco in a baseball player's mouth.
For my costume, I was really unsure what I wanted to do until nearly the last minute. I couldn't find anything at the chinos (Chinese stores that are almost always open and almost always have things you don't need) that didn't make me look like packaging for the latest cavity-causer at the grocery store. Ultimately, I decided to be Madonna circa 1980s again, as for better or for worse, I only had to buy lace gloves and beads. I used the remainder of the arm-length gloves I cut to make my bow, and donned red lipstick and black nail polish as I tried to channel "Like a Virgin" to look Like a Bad Ass, but I don't know if it worked. Here's a closeup:
Upon arriving, we had approximately three hours before it was considered appropos to begin consumption of alcohol, though I, the hopelessly responsible individual, decided I didn't want to drink very much as the risk of being separated from the group was high, and given the nature of the others and the size of an unfamiliar city, I knew that if I did get separated sober I would most likely crumple and cry; I couldn't fathom how I would respond if slightly inebriated. (It should be mentioned that the student group who went seemed to promote the opposite, as there were raffles for handles of rum and vodka the entire way. I would have been happy with a t-shirt or visor.) That changed within half an hour. Drunker than my uncle Ted who likes to wear womens clothing and gyrate to Rod Stewart at family reunions. So, we walked around for a bit and took in the city, put our feet in the Atlantic Ocean, and took pictures of some of the more eccentric costumes. For Spaniards, though, the word eccentric typically connotes excessive display of supersized genitalia on mammals. I wasn't able to capture this in time, but a father was walking around with a missile-sized penis on a cart as he was dressed himself like a gorilla and was holding his little daughter's hand.
At any rate, it was beginning to get darker out and my legs, guarded only by the roping of fishnet tights were beginning to look glow-in-the dark and had goosebumps so numerous it appeared the holy bible was written in Braille on my calves. For that reason, and perhaps to the annoyance of some, I chose to linger a bit too long in front of the cheese section of the heated grocery store while contemplating my cheap dinner. We decided to eat before the festivities really began, and took our baguettes and other foodstuffs to the street. I felt incredibly urban. Which made me feel really cool. But then I remembered I was on my period still, so not that cool.
We finished the modest meals and then headed close to the Cathedral, where there was live music being performed by dwarves and copious amounts of drinking and bottle spilling. Don't try and tell me that the Spanish are still highly Catholic. Although, depending on your stance on alcoholism and obsession with little boys, maybe they are. I digress. I felt a little bit overwhelmed given the size and nature of the crowd (cue memories of first day of big middle school where the hallways seemed to be rife with predators of the Serengheti, and I was a helpless wildebeest with a gimp leg), but I tried to shrug it off and laugh. Danced a little bit, drank a little bit of my pre-packed beer, and talked some with other Spaniards. More and more people crammed into the plaza, and I could hear more and more bottles breaking. I think that this really is an event where, if you are sober and/or bleeding from a southern orifice (like I was), you should do your best to not come. I know I can be equally obnoxious when drinking, but I swear to god, after the third German in a row sprayed me with spittle while they attempted to speak English to me, I wanted to call it a day. It seemed like every other minute I was being poked and prodded with various trident accessories and beer fireworks landed conveniently on my face. I didn't know I had signed up to be in the Splash Zone of Sea World. Ugh. Meanwhile, my company was growing more and more downy cheeked and exaggerated in their movements, and soon I was swallowed by a group of birdish black and white Natalie Portmans. And you guessed it, separated from the group.
Interior walls began crumbling and adrenaline began pounding, and I began punching wildly at my phone. The others had already begun calling me, but given the noise of the crowd, it was impossible to hear them when they told me where they were and asked where I was. Finally, I found a familiar face (though not someone from the group, and surprisingly enough it was the German named Nicolai who didn't spit as he spoke), and he dealt with my trembling self and helped me wind around the streets to find the others. And then they were there, sitting and expressing regret as they had been pushed into a corner by a stampede of Bart Simpsons. I quickly forgave them, but only after they pitched in to buy me chicken shawarma.
As I tore into the food as if I were a lion and it were a wildebeest (how quickly the tables do turn), there were several drunks who stopped and stared at me and wouldn't budge. Increasingly aware of my own bleeding and cold state, I stopped chewing and stared at them hard (only my friends know this scowl, they call it the Medusa) until they left. Granted, if one of them resembled my Javier I would have been more kind, but as it is becoming more and more obvious, I tend to attract Javier's cousin, slightly inbred with a dash of Asperger's syndrome.
After most of the others sobered up and began to realize we STILL had three hours before we could board the bus, they also began to realize how effing cold it was outside. Proceeded to cram ourselves into a salsa bar for warmth, and that was where I began to talk with a group of middleaged gays. We got on quite well after they immediately congratulated me on my stellar Madonna costume, though particularly bonded after discussing Barack Obama's attractiveness at some length. I felt a bit pretentious at the time, but I noticed one of them was dressed as a person who runs with bulls (red bandana, white everything else), and so I asked them if they had read "The Sun Also Rises." Of course, they told me. Hemingway is an institution in Spain. So we talked books for a bit and they taught me a few steps in salsa (something I desperately need to practice as I still resemble the Tin Man when making movements), but they were all incredibly nice and a much preferred way to spend my remaining hours at Cadiz.
Quickly, 4:00 a.m. approached and it was time to return to Granada. The busride home was a potpourri of smells and sights, as several times we had to stop for puke breaks. I felt as if I had bathed in a sewer and dried myself using a soiled piece of toilet paper, though my only comfort was that a) I had made it on the bus and would soon return to my immaculate bedroom and b) I was not Charlie Sheen. Exhausted after spending a third of a day on a bus and the rest in a whirlwind of alcohol and latex, I soon crashed onto my bed and dreamed of better times.
Here are some of the photos I took:
nights and days
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Saturday
After a brief 16 hour nap, I decided to greet Granada with my roommate. We wandered through the Albayzin, where she purchased me a cup of Egyptian tea, she herself ordering fresh squeezed orange juice. From Valencia. Though, despite how fragrant they were, she made sure to do a quick inspection for maggots, as the last time she ordered fresh squeezed anything it came with fresh squeezed maggot bits. I had a bit of an internal discourse with myself for a moment, wondering if maggots in oranges make them more organic, and therefore more fresh, or vice versa. At any rate, the only thing floating in my tea was a bit of mint that had managed to pass the strainer.
Onward. Her name is Loren, and she is part Brit, part Basque. She is an atheist, enjoys street music from the UK, and smokes quite a bit but is, strangely enough, in favor of smoking bans. When Bellarmine's smoking ban took place I was surprised not to see the scornful eyes of smokers turn red and emit blood like those of angry horned toads. But I digress. It was pleasant to see a person who has a vice and recognizes that they are not things that should be catered to. Though I must admit, it is kind of comforting coming home and vaguely smelling tobacco from behind her door (don't worry, mom, she's opened a window).
Later that night, after I reciprocated her purchase of an eccentric and exotic treat with frozen carbohydrates and cheese, we went to several bars together. We left at around 11:30, which, in the few weeks leading up to my own departure, was around the time I'd be REMing and dreaming most likely of Benjamin Bratt. I have to admit, with some of the prices, they are almost goading you on to become an alcoholic. Certain places like La Chupiteria (in English this equates to The Sucking Place, but doesn't it sound so much more pretty in Spanish? You could say some of the most vile things to someone in Spanish and they would still smile at it...maybe that's why I enjoy it so) charge only 1 euro per shot, and there is a list of over 100 shots ranging in strength from which you should try. And with each shot you purchase, you receive a coupon. If you save enough of these coupons, you're eligible for prizes like graphic shirts and sun visors. And cirrhosis. I had some blue concoction that turned slightly green when the alcohol was added. I don't know what it was. It was just number 43, and I like that number. At any rate, we soon left that bar as it tends to be armed with Jersey Shore extras at all times, and went to a few others. One was called Playmovil and it was Lego-themed. I found it ironic that so many macho men went to a place like this, puffing their biceps and downing beers, while under the flashing lights of tiny plastic toys. The last place was just a hop across the street, and was also where I had the pleasure of telling a Moroccan man that just because his Moroccan girlfriend wasn't physically at the bar did not mean that he wasn't physically bound to her. But maybe that just makes me a prude and no fun. Either way, he must have had halitosis. Moroccan maiden can have him and his litterbox for a mouth.
Sunday
This day was a rather uneventful one. Thanks, god.
Monday
That day, I trekked around the city some more, taking in the sights and sounds, and making the path from apartment to international building to school a certain amount of times so that I can soon start charging others for rides on my back. It's all pretty close together. I wandered to the Albayzin, to the Gran Via and then finally to the Federico Garcia Lorca Park, where I read some pretentious literature for a bit until I decided I would rather eat yet another pizza than another short story by Nabokov. The pizza was a great choice. Later that evening, I pondered over going or not going to the free salsa lessons at a nearby pub as if I were contemplating the just war theory. Regardless, I found a safe middle ground and decided that if I did not leave the apartment that could be far more dangerous than actually leaving. Walls get small really quickly, sometimes. And so I left, tights getting wet in mud and construction grime, arriving at the 10 pm session. The later, cooler one. Or so I told myself.
I quickly made an ass out of myself by saying that I had never heard of the Czech Republic to a Czech girl (when the truth was that the music was too loud...I thought she said she was from Checker's, in which case I was about to talk about how much I enjoy their seasoned french fries). I'm sure she thought I was stupid, but so be it. Another girl named Isabel approached me (I think I have inherited the comforting, smiley face like my mother). We didn't have much in common and she blushed every time she spoke, almost as if it were some kind of rosy morse code. But I wasn't cruel. We're all in the same boat, anyway. Turns out she's studying at the same faculty as me. It also turns out she's studied in Russia before and has spent an extensive amount of time at the Peterhoff Palace and St. Basil's Cathedral. It also turns out I burned her turquoise blouse to a crisp when I breathed fire from my incredulity. I've got Anastasia on DVD, so it's more or less the same, anyway.
Soon after, I mosied over to the dance area. Quickly began to stab my feet into the ground as if I were fighting a rogue army of fire ants, and apparently was so entertaining that a group of Colombians came over and tried to teach me how to properly salsa. While I never acquired that ability, despite their constant reassurance that I was doing well, I did come out of it with cocaine and coffee. Kidding (mom!). They all seemed rather nice, and we actually had a lot in common. Their names are Nicolas (good teeth, knows how to rumba), Miguel (he's petite and has dreadlocks), and Juan (or as he calls himself, Gordo) and are all studying Fine Arts. They hate Shakira and don't think that the two most popular Gabriel Garcia Marquez books are his best. Go figure. I much prefer Kelly Clarkson's underground EP, too. Regardless, they seemed very friendly and vastly more interesting than some of the other people there (re: bros wearing sweatpants and double-collard shirts, fist pumping to anything with a semblance of a beat). They're all bilingual with the exeption of Gordo, so the pact (we will see if I ever see them again, though I think numbers were exchanged) is for me to help them with their English and for them to help me with my Spanish, as it turns out Colombian Spanish is one of the cleanest dialects of them all.
That's all for now.
After a brief 16 hour nap, I decided to greet Granada with my roommate. We wandered through the Albayzin, where she purchased me a cup of Egyptian tea, she herself ordering fresh squeezed orange juice. From Valencia. Though, despite how fragrant they were, she made sure to do a quick inspection for maggots, as the last time she ordered fresh squeezed anything it came with fresh squeezed maggot bits. I had a bit of an internal discourse with myself for a moment, wondering if maggots in oranges make them more organic, and therefore more fresh, or vice versa. At any rate, the only thing floating in my tea was a bit of mint that had managed to pass the strainer.
Onward. Her name is Loren, and she is part Brit, part Basque. She is an atheist, enjoys street music from the UK, and smokes quite a bit but is, strangely enough, in favor of smoking bans. When Bellarmine's smoking ban took place I was surprised not to see the scornful eyes of smokers turn red and emit blood like those of angry horned toads. But I digress. It was pleasant to see a person who has a vice and recognizes that they are not things that should be catered to. Though I must admit, it is kind of comforting coming home and vaguely smelling tobacco from behind her door (don't worry, mom, she's opened a window).
Later that night, after I reciprocated her purchase of an eccentric and exotic treat with frozen carbohydrates and cheese, we went to several bars together. We left at around 11:30, which, in the few weeks leading up to my own departure, was around the time I'd be REMing and dreaming most likely of Benjamin Bratt. I have to admit, with some of the prices, they are almost goading you on to become an alcoholic. Certain places like La Chupiteria (in English this equates to The Sucking Place, but doesn't it sound so much more pretty in Spanish? You could say some of the most vile things to someone in Spanish and they would still smile at it...maybe that's why I enjoy it so) charge only 1 euro per shot, and there is a list of over 100 shots ranging in strength from which you should try. And with each shot you purchase, you receive a coupon. If you save enough of these coupons, you're eligible for prizes like graphic shirts and sun visors. And cirrhosis. I had some blue concoction that turned slightly green when the alcohol was added. I don't know what it was. It was just number 43, and I like that number. At any rate, we soon left that bar as it tends to be armed with Jersey Shore extras at all times, and went to a few others. One was called Playmovil and it was Lego-themed. I found it ironic that so many macho men went to a place like this, puffing their biceps and downing beers, while under the flashing lights of tiny plastic toys. The last place was just a hop across the street, and was also where I had the pleasure of telling a Moroccan man that just because his Moroccan girlfriend wasn't physically at the bar did not mean that he wasn't physically bound to her. But maybe that just makes me a prude and no fun. Either way, he must have had halitosis. Moroccan maiden can have him and his litterbox for a mouth.
Sunday
This day was a rather uneventful one. Thanks, god.
Monday
That day, I trekked around the city some more, taking in the sights and sounds, and making the path from apartment to international building to school a certain amount of times so that I can soon start charging others for rides on my back. It's all pretty close together. I wandered to the Albayzin, to the Gran Via and then finally to the Federico Garcia Lorca Park, where I read some pretentious literature for a bit until I decided I would rather eat yet another pizza than another short story by Nabokov. The pizza was a great choice. Later that evening, I pondered over going or not going to the free salsa lessons at a nearby pub as if I were contemplating the just war theory. Regardless, I found a safe middle ground and decided that if I did not leave the apartment that could be far more dangerous than actually leaving. Walls get small really quickly, sometimes. And so I left, tights getting wet in mud and construction grime, arriving at the 10 pm session. The later, cooler one. Or so I told myself.
I quickly made an ass out of myself by saying that I had never heard of the Czech Republic to a Czech girl (when the truth was that the music was too loud...I thought she said she was from Checker's, in which case I was about to talk about how much I enjoy their seasoned french fries). I'm sure she thought I was stupid, but so be it. Another girl named Isabel approached me (I think I have inherited the comforting, smiley face like my mother). We didn't have much in common and she blushed every time she spoke, almost as if it were some kind of rosy morse code. But I wasn't cruel. We're all in the same boat, anyway. Turns out she's studying at the same faculty as me. It also turns out she's studied in Russia before and has spent an extensive amount of time at the Peterhoff Palace and St. Basil's Cathedral. It also turns out I burned her turquoise blouse to a crisp when I breathed fire from my incredulity. I've got Anastasia on DVD, so it's more or less the same, anyway.
Soon after, I mosied over to the dance area. Quickly began to stab my feet into the ground as if I were fighting a rogue army of fire ants, and apparently was so entertaining that a group of Colombians came over and tried to teach me how to properly salsa. While I never acquired that ability, despite their constant reassurance that I was doing well, I did come out of it with cocaine and coffee. Kidding (mom!). They all seemed rather nice, and we actually had a lot in common. Their names are Nicolas (good teeth, knows how to rumba), Miguel (he's petite and has dreadlocks), and Juan (or as he calls himself, Gordo) and are all studying Fine Arts. They hate Shakira and don't think that the two most popular Gabriel Garcia Marquez books are his best. Go figure. I much prefer Kelly Clarkson's underground EP, too. Regardless, they seemed very friendly and vastly more interesting than some of the other people there (re: bros wearing sweatpants and double-collard shirts, fist pumping to anything with a semblance of a beat). They're all bilingual with the exeption of Gordo, so the pact (we will see if I ever see them again, though I think numbers were exchanged) is for me to help them with their English and for them to help me with my Spanish, as it turns out Colombian Spanish is one of the cleanest dialects of them all.
That's all for now.
flight notes
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it occurred to me after waking from a completely unfulfilling "nap" (it consisted of me forming a 'z' knocked helplessly on its side between two seats, head perched on a mini-pillow ((also mini is its comfort, though i will most likely steal it anyway)) when the flight attendant's voice told me that the Captain Has Turned On The Fasten Seatbelt Button (heart plummeted accordingly, much like the plane did in my mind) that i wasn't afraid anymore. shit will happen, sure, but at the moment, i much prefer looking at the stars than the abyss that grates its watery teeth below me.
they're both the same hue, yet thanks to estrogen or optimism (i can't say which at the moment), i am attracted to bright and shiny things. though come to think of it, that could make me more like a barracuda, in which case neither estrogen nor optimism apply.
from where did this optimism/estrogen/scaliness come? i would have to say that it was while on the plane, reading a recent e-book purchase of la luna azul, of barnes and noble español acclaim. it's cheesy and a mystery (what a surprise!), but most importantly, i can understand almost every single word. lots of times i consider my doubts to be similar to saddlebags: somewhat unavoidable yet treatable, though potentially devastating to the meek or shallow individual. when i realized that i understood nearly every phrase and preposition of the book, and realized that arguably the most difficult part of my journey (transplanting my sorry ass across an oceans sans shark bites or chafing) was already well underway, i decided then and there that the rest will fall into place accordingly. i say this now, though if my baggage is lost i will weep as if i've just lost a child.
at any rate, today's agenda consists of arriving, clearing customs, retrieving my bags and making my way to the iberia terminal. which i, thanks to copious amounts of cyber sleuthing and e-mail hounding, know is terminal 4 and that there is a shuttle that runs every five minutes. then, i arrive in granada, amble about with slitty eyes and dehydrated skin, hail a taxi, and see what kind of mess i have gotten myself into. hopefully the apartment will be clean; if not, the pilfered pillow may be of substantial service. hopefully the roommates are nice, too. i've had bad experiences with those and college housing. two cutters and a girl who wanted to move to new zealand with her shoeless boyfriend to sell tea bags. in each case, gag. i suppose that so long as they practice good hygiene and do not speak to me in the morning (as it takes a few hours for the icy sludge that is my morning demeanor to melt away), everything should be, for all intense and porpoises, fine. (though i must say i am sufficiently disappointed with my arrival pastry. it was thrust at my face with cold indifference from a male flight attendant named jamie, and was about as hard as a prehistoric triceratops turd, most likely with a flavor to match. well, bienvenidos to you too, jamie.)
so yes, today's doubts are slipping away slowly with each mile i travel, though doubtless i know they will soon return. in the meantime, though, i'm enjoying my suddenly lighter, more youthful mind and figure.
pre-trip scribble
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I write this with approximately two and a half weeks until my departure. Sitting to my left I have a to-do list with bullets so seemingly ceaseless that I wonder if I am on my way to transcribing Moby Dick from the written word into Braille. We will have to see. That would be an awfully tedious task, however equally as tedious (albeit necessary) is the act of crossing out the aforementioned "to-do's."
The list consists primarily of rather mundane tasks, such as making photocopies of potentially important documents, purchasing and assembling a binder to house said documents, packing precisely 4-6 cardigans in my luggage like a savvy traveler (as opposed to the overly cautious traveler's 5-7!!), and other trivial things that I will bore neither you nor myself with mentioning. There's already Tylenol PM for that. Or a Larry King special. Thank god he's not on air anymore.
At any rate, on to more pressing things. I'm equal parts nervous as I am excited. At night, when I'm not dreaming of Granada and the fateful (and free, thanks to Andalucian law) tapas that will enter my belly, I dream of crashing cars, burning homes, tidal waves, and missing teeth. Those, according to the google god to which I pray multiple times a day, are all indicative of stress. Which I, the self-diagnosed hypochondriac, surely must have. All jokes aside, I probably have a mood disorder. All jokes aside again, unnecessary amounts of stress and an ungodly desire to always be in control are two things on which I need to work, and two things that will hopefully be serviced upon my five month stay in Spain. Courses are tentative, subsequent moods and emotions are tentative, housing is surprisingly planned but depending on how scratchy my rented sheets are may be tentative as well, and frankly, all future experiences are tentative. All throughout life (I say this as if I've half the age of an old Galapagos tortoise) I have despised ambiguity (its power on the human thought process, I suppose, is what I envy most about it) as well as the thought that most things are and should be both grey and elastic (though I am more or less a relativist), so hopefully my bones won't break upon my shift from a rigid, plan-based world to that of the formless fluidity that is la vida Español. Again, we will have to see.
Ultimately, I know that everything will be all right. Everything will always be all right, and well, it will have to be anyway because (pardon the melodramatics) death rights all things. After all, it's what people have in the back of their mind when they say "After all." On another note, I also know that I am unnecessarily nervous when I mention that death, as opposed to a taxi cab or a glass or three of sangria, is what will make everything OK. Silly, silly girl. Anyhow, the to-do list still antagonizes me with its dark blue bullets piercing at my rods and cones. Time to shut the planner. An itinerary is based on time, anyway, and what the hell do people really know about that? People try to reassure me by saying that I've got a lot of it yet also that I have so little, and frankly I find the concept of simultaneously having a lot and a little of the same thing quite confusing, so I'm going to ignore both sides of the coin and take my own advice. Which is, tentatively, to stop trying to quantify time but rather to simply start enjoying it. Could this be, dare I say it, progress?
"You said the union forever!"
by |
tags:
break up,
farewell,
The White Stripes,
the white stripes break up
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3
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Sequentially speaking, your self-titled album was what I listened to as I began my initial drift away from Nena and A.F.I., and I can't thank you enough for that, though I still know all of the words to "Girls Not Grey." I turned to you when Ms. Poynter, the witch who wore furry, cheetah-patterned platforms every day, wouldn't accept one of my assignments because I paper clipped the pages and didn't staple them. You also helped me muster the courage to take her stapler and throw it out the window while she wasn't looking. She never knew it was me. Sugar never tasted so good.
Next was "De Stijl." I didn't have braces anymore and, as it happened, was a pretty likeable person. A boy who saw your CD art as I pushed it into my walkman once asked me out while saying I was "pretty good looking for a girl." I could only watch the flakes on his lips tremble while I was drowning in the smarminess, and I turned him down. He kissed me anyway, and I didn't like that at all. I put this album away for a while and started listening to fast music written by raccoon-eyed girls with hard sounding names. But then I found myself sneaking back to "Little Bird" because I could only hear a girl yap about how guys don't "understand" for so long before I wished I lived in Victorian society. On my way home from my grandfather's funeral, the day I fucked up "Amazing Grace" on my violin, I repeated "Truth Doesn't Make A Noise" so much that I broke my CD player. But after it broke, I felt much better.
"White Blood Cells." This album was one I habitually turned to when I felt ill at ease with things. Anxious, unnerved. Once when I received a phone call from a boy who never noticed me in middle school overdosed on pain pills and the nurse in his rehabilitation center asked if I could come visit him. Because he wanted to talk to me. She said she thought it might help. I didn't go. The time I relapsed into bad behaviors again. Whenever I would say goodbye to my dad the two times a year I would see him. The time I cheated on my first test and thought I could have an MI at any moment. The times I would skip ballet class in favor of just sitting in a parking lot, listening to you, and thinking about things. Lots of times it involved the future, and lots of times I wished I could dive into the world I imagined when I listened to "The Same Boy You've Always Known." It wasn't happy, I didn't think, but it was different.
I played "Elephant" the first time in a classroom. It was for my Humanities class. I did an analysis of "Seven Nation Army," and it bored everyone to tears. Except for my teacher who said the bass line was like a mantra. The rear of her Honda was smeared with peace signs and Elizabeth Cady Stanton quotes and she corrected papers in purple so students wouldn't feel as inadequate for not knowing the difference between Greek and Roman columns. I cried when I saw "Ball and Biscuit" performed live, and also when the acid tripping man behind me threw his sweaty shirt toward you guys but instead smacked me in the back of the neck. When he leaned in to apologize to me I saw the small metallic ball in his tongue reflect my face. His muggy breath smelled like fermented yeast and cigarettes. I was terrified. But it was my first concert, and I later smiled as I considered him to be my first encounter with an "eccentric."
Next was your break-up album, "Get Behind Me Satan." Renee broke your heart. And following suit, I listened to you the most when mine was broken as well. Or at least so I thought at the time. Everything is so saturated in high school, anyway. Several years removed, it seems like a dream and very foolish one, at that. However, what I do remember is that angrier I was, the more I played "Red Rain." I dyed my hair dark this year and quit ballet. I made a girl cry on the stand while I interrogated her during a mock trial. My team won, so it made things seem OK. My mother and I got into a lot of fights this year. I had sex this year. My grades went down. (Funny how those go hand in hand.) I was an asshole, but it seems like you were, too, and maybe we all had to go through this phase. I liked knowing that I wasn't alone.
I had a release-party for your final album, "Icky Thump." It wasn't anything I expected, and I was glad. Don't know if I could have dealt with such an emotional album as the last, though there were traces of it on tracks like "You Don't Know What Love Is, You Just Do As You're Told," but it was played with confidence, not arrogance. You weren't sick anymore, and neither was I. Even though soon after I got mono and had a rash all over my body for approximately two months and had to put a salve on it so often that I was shinier than a disco ball. Was cheated on this year, probably on New Year's while I was at home, still red and sticky. But it ultimately ended up being OK, as he didn't need to be part of my future anyway. Speaking of, I listened to you all while I had a melodramatic meltdown about just that. "Prickly Thorn, But Sweetly Worn" blared triumphantly in my car after I had made the impromptu decision not to go to a large school out of state but rather a small, Catholic one in my hometown. I was satisfied, at ease, and everything seemed OK even though I never knew all ten of the commandments. Knowing the lyrics to "Effect and Cause" seemed good enough.
So here we are, February 2, 2011. You all have parted, and I won't have any more stories like "Do you remember the one time at Bonnaroo when I lost my car keys while they played 'Black Math' and we thought we were going to be stranded in Tennessee until we died?," and I'd be lying if I said that part of me doesn't feel packed up and stored away, too. And yeah, it makes me sad. I feel older. But I guess that more than anything, you two have been part of great memories. You've made them, you've complemented them, and you've detracted from the more painful ones. And for every album and every song you've written, I just wanted to say thank you. I'm not going to delve into the chorus of a well-known ABBA song of the same theme (or for that matter an equally banal song of a similar name by Fall Out Boy), however the point remains. I am so thankful that your music, be it sweet, angry, angsty, sexy, absurd, somber, buoyant, or belligerent, has been such a constant part of my life in possibly one of the most confusing stages of it. I could tell several years ago that we were gonna be friends, and nothing is going to change that. Thank you, Jack and Meg, for creating and sharing something infinite with your finite fingers. I don't know if there's anything more special or powerful than that.
Steps
by |
tags:
babies,
family,
marriage
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“Did you see her birthmark?” he asked.
“No,” I said.
He reached over to the lap of his wife and grabbed the infant, clasping her tiny leg in his arm like a man does a turkey drumstick at the state fair. Nate, the man in question, pointed to a tiny tan dot on his three-hour-old daughter, Madeline’s, knee. “See it now?” he asked. “It’s the shape of Texas. Almost the size, too.” He laughed. A snort escaped. He reminded me of Babe the Gallant Pig yet not as gallant.
“No, not really. I had one when I was born, too,” I said. “But it went away when I got older. That will probably happen with Madeline, too.”
I looked to that poor baby as Nate began to spout about how she looked like Dan Aykroyd from The Coneheads. I wanted to say that that was a vast improvement from looking like her father, but I didn’t. Instead, I focused my energy on Lindsey, who had now taken Madeline back into her arms.
Lindsey was my manager at work (a local grocery), and over the years we had grown fairly close. I felt comfortable complaining to her about old people who paid in dirty and exact change, obnoxious soccer moms who let their snot-nosed children run around like banshees, and especially about George, the head manager, who went into conniption fits if there weren’t enough homemade crouton samples out for our largely dentured clientele. In exchange for these effusive emotional dumps, Lindsey would often inform me of her love life, or for a while, her lack thereof. I never really understood why she married Nate in the first place, let alone dated him. And unfortunately it seemed like she didn’t either. I asked her once why they even got married and after much thought, the best answer she could give was that she thought it was just “a natural step.” Yet after a myriad of affairs and shouting matches between them that preceded this natural “progression,” I wondered if she thought the next step would lead her here, swollen-footed and with a baby planted on her lap like an anvil on Wiley Coyote.
I remember one particular morning she came to me and asked if I could talk. Immediately I worried if my till was short or if the beak-nosed woman called and complained when I said I wouldn’t give her a discount on an apple with a non-existent bruise. “Uh, sure,” I said.
Her subsequent words rolled off her tongue as heavy and awkward as a fat child canon-balling off the diving board, and I was the oblivious sunbather about to get drenched. “I’m pregnant.”
As a sometimes-supporter of government enforced sterilization, it was hard for me to convey the properly elated response to the glowing mother-to-be, however I felt that had there actually been some semblance of happiness on her face as she uttered those few choice words, I may have been more receptive. Unsure of how to respond, I muttered a simple and ambiguous, “Wow, were you expecting this?”
She looked down to her hands and began picking at her cuticles.
“Lindsey?” I asked.
“…no.”
Another pause.
“It’s Nate’s.”
Even worse.
“I thought you were going to leave him?”
She continued to pick at her cuticles. Her mouth began to form a pale pink asterisk and as she squinted her eyes I could see small wrinkles forming at the sides. And then she winced and stuck her irritated finger in her mouth like a child. “Goddamn it.”
“So you’re staying with him?”
She took her finger out of her mouth and began shaking it like you would a dirty rug. “I have to, now.” She sucked her finger once more. “I’m having a baby. Oh god, I’m having a baby.”
I have never had a single good experience with a baby. When I was a child and there were babies around, I thought of them as nasty, attention seeking toys whose batteries never died. And when I was older, the first baby I held was my cousin, Hope. She was overdue and resembled an Inuit. I found her to be quite peculiar and loathsome, as it seemed that she was allergic to the sound of others breathing. Subsequently, she was almost always crying. I put Benadryl in her formula once when I was babysitting to quiet her. It worked, and her parents never found out. I got an extra tip, too, so maybe that counts as a good experience. Regardless, I still didn’t care for her much. Babies, either.
“And you’re not going to…”
“No, I could never.”
“Right. Have you told him yet?”
“No, I’m afraid to.”
“Well, he is your husband.”
“I know. That’s why.”
Perhaps this is another dynamic of marriage that I will never understand, but it’s always seemed to me that lots of people get married so that when they do become pregnant, it’s not taboo. All of that juvenile grit is removed from the act, it’s all filed and polished and then voila, you’re no longer having unsafe sex but rather “family planning,” even though all of the sweat and grunts are the same. It’s one of those natural steps, as Lindsey put it.
When I was about four or five and my parents hadn’t split up yet, I remember spending a nonspecific Sunday afternoon in their bedroom. My mother lay on the bed and I was trying on her heels and pouting my lips in the full-length mirror, talking to her about what all Mobin, my imaginary friend, and I had done that day. “Honey,” I remember her saying, “what do you think about having a little brother or sister?”
I froze. Relaxed my lips. I didn’t want one. “I don’t want one at all, Mom.”
I looked back at the mirror as she slowly rolled to the other side. I could see the mattress move up and down erratically for a moment until she stood suddenly and left the room. There was a dark spot on the pillow the looked like a water lily. I heard the click of the bathroom door a few feet away and then the footsteps of my father toward it. A few months later they sat me down to tell me they were not having a baby but rather a divorce. Maybe that’s one of those natural steps, too. If, then.
Years later, I was looking for a few pieces of paper for my book report on Laura Ingalls Wilder and stumbled across what I thought was an empty notebook. It turned out to be an old diary of my mother’s. I’d always had a hard time reading her writing, but my eyes immediately honed in on the word ‘abortion.’ Quickly, I flung the notebook out of my hands and ran into the bathroom, scrubbing them until the skin was raw. I felt guilty, as if I had killed something. Not something that was, per se, but something that could have been. And that seemed even worse. To this day, I can recall the exact slant of the line she drew to cross her ‘t.’ I’ve never brought it up to her. She’s never told me, either.
“You should tell him as soon as possible, Lindsey. Tonight, even.”
She shook her head. “I know,” she said. “It’s just hard.”
“Well, it’s not going to get any easier.”
“Would it anyway?”
I blinked and saw the lined paper and black ink. The mirror and the pillow stain. The heavy pressure of the mattress on both sides as my parents put their hands on my shoulders and said that they Loved Each Other Very Much But Not The Same As They Used To. Would You Like To Spend Weekends With Mommy Or Daddy. Shivered.
“Maybe not.”
In my peripheral vision, I saw shades of orange and red. A woman with a chiseled chin was placing bell peppers and carrots onto the counter.
Lindsey cleared her throat and sighed. “You’ve got a customer.”
“Guess so.”
She wasn’t going to tell Nate that night.
That was the last time she mentioned the baby to me. Eight months later and still unhappy, Lindsey went into labor. Both sides of the family packed into the tiled room to witness the arrival of the fleshy union of two unique genetic codes. There were flowers and balloons and cameras and white smiles. And I wondered if the firmness of baby Madeline, despite her malleable skull, was any indication of the firmness of feelings between her parents. I hoped so, though I would never be able to tell. And maybe they wouldn’t either, even though a baby is a natural step.
Their family photos turned out nicely, although Nate paid extra to get Madeline’s birthmark removed from the prints he sent to his side of the family. He was looking at the camera; she was looking at the baby, grinning and in love. Maybe she could leave him after all.
handicapped stalls, city malls
by |
tags:
age,
jobs,
malls,
retail
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0
comments
As per usual, my shifts begin with a trip to the bathroom. All I can hear while I close my door in the handicapped stall (though I think they should all be handicapped, really, for what normal individual would willingly enter a department store?) are the cries of saggy-diapered toddlers to their equally saggy mothers. "If you're good," they coo, "you can get two cookies for lunch." (I would never give my hypothetical child a cookie, not because I don't love them but because it means two hours of additional activity.) Meanwhile on my porcelain throne, I'm staring at the grout between the tiles and am wondering how, given how dark and permanent it appears, it is so easy to fall beneath it and into the throes of retail. Or just anything, really. And all I do is sit on the toilet, with hands cupping my cheeks and listening to the vague sound of flatulence (suspicions are confirmed in approximately three seconds) of middle-aged women who probably once rolled their eyes at elastic waists, too.
I like the handicapped stall because it's furthest from the sinks, and therefore furthest from people. It has a long counter inside it, too. But I couldn't really tell you why, nor could the legitimately handicapped, I'd imagine. Sometimes when I am seeking an extended vacation from the innumerable joys of clothes-folding and credit-opening, I like to prop myself up on the counter and examine my face after I've finished scoping my more important surroundings. I notice that the things that used to go away once I relaxed my jaw now stay a little longer, and I see what looks like a small boomerang beginning to form atop my eyebrow. I should stop being so expressive, maybe. However, I was unaware that mimicking the dead (lest I forget I work 40 hours a week) called for any semblance of brow arching. Occasionally I am distracted by the sound of excrement dropping into the toilets nearby like slightly overweight children cannon balling into a swimming pool, and realize that for better or for worse, I'm not alone in all of this. Funny it took the sound of shit to know this. Then I hear the flushing and the tap-tap-tapping of impatient feet and decide it's time to get back to work.
So I fake flush (because for whatever reason I want people to think that I too just finished my business) and saunter over to the sink, past the scrunchied women splaying their babies' pudgy legs and past the women with hands whose skin resembles a piece of paper that's been through one or three loads of laundry, and then I unfortunately stare at myself again and those growing wrinkles. Babies are crying to my right and I can just feel the heavy sighs of their tired mothers hit the floor in between the flushing and phlegm-hocking of musky women in polyster pants. And in the back of my mind, in the same place that told me to keep moving, there's also a voice that says that while I know that I'm no better and made of no worse, I really, really, am not ready for any of this. Please God, at least not now. Not yet. I'd rather cast aspersions on a line so far away into (and maybe from) my future that I never have to reel them in, or worse, be reeled in by them.
I finish washing my hands and pitch my lightly used towel into the wastebasket and wander like an ant back to my register, knowing that I will inevitably suffer the company of a yellowed man who thinks he's smoother than silk when purchasing his poor wife a neglige made of its cheap and scratchy imitation for $3, and all I can think of are the heavy sighs that reverberated on the tiles and how they probably sound similar to those made at night after the act (albeit brief) is over and she can finally take off that itchy nightgown that resembles a miniature tree skirt. And then I sigh, which probably sounds similar to that one made by an old woman looking at her confetti of pills that she must take each morning with food. But I guess there's no use in sighing, because soon enough I'll be wiping asses and then too-soon enough will be having my own cleaned as well, this time by someone whom I pay to be nurturing. Meanwhile, the voice of the faceless pop star provides a necessary distraction as I step foot on the escalator. It is vague and unobtrusive, making my ascent to reality a little less painful.
I see my coworkers, and the are smiling. Cheryl is full-time and has pepper colored hair. Karen is also full-time and offered me her aspirin the day I faked a sprained ankle to leave work early. She is one of the friendliest people I know, and part of me wishes that she knew I was (and am) full of shit. The act of keeping a smile even after you realize that life can be full of sighs and shit is one on which I need to work, but maybe it's something that comes with adulthood. I can only hope. I guess.
the past few days...
by |
tags:
artisan,
binge eating,
ephedra,
hipster,
sandwich
|
0
comments
1. I realize my sloth has hit its peak when, after thirty minutes of staring at my reflection as it disappears and reappears in the spitty salad of partially digested food in the porcelain toilet, I think to myself, "Maybe with all of the contractions of my abs as they reject all of the fried green tomatoes, lemon meringue pie, and king crab legs that comprised of this evening's gluttony, I've done the caloric equivalent of one hundred stomach crunches?" I’ve got to get out of this mindset, or at least out of my grandmother’s kitchen.
Speaking of, as winter has finished taking its proverbial dump on Louisville these past few days, I've been spending quite a bit of time at my grandmother's house. And, between my bouts of binging, I've wandered around her bathroom and medicine cabinets and can't help but feel as if I've discovered another dimension. Never before have I seen so many combinations of consonants together on a pill bottle. For a moment, I felt like Michael Jackson, though without the vitiligo and that dreadful habit of not lifting my feet as I walk backwards.
Continuing. Longing to be a bit tragic and therefore Winona-esque, I considered popping a pill whose name looked vaguely familiar, however stopped myself after remembering how I hyperventilated at age 12 when I stupidly thought I was going to die after swallowing two of her "dietary supplements" under the notion that they were "diet" pills. Anna Nicole had just died, and when I wasn't practicing the Pythagorean theorem I was thinking about the dangers of Ephedra. Thus, nine years later and some the wiser, I decided I'd rather not puke again by thinking that my grandmother's prescription-strength stool softener was some exotic form of hydrocodone. Instead, I put on some of her bright red lipstick and felt just as glamorous as the next bleach blonde bohemian from LA. Oxy moron? Precisely.
2. In yet another attempt to rouse me from a state of “whatdoesmyfuturehold” anxiety today, someone asked me what the first thing I want to do is when I wake up each morning. That, the person said, is what I should do with my life. It is my “purpose” or “passion,” per se. I immediately thought of my ceramic turquoise bowl filled to the brim with Corn Flakes. Because in reality, all I ever want to do when I wake up (and on most occasions, really) is eat cereal. With that said, it appears that the only avenues to which my “passion” will lead me are failure or trade school. Thus the anxiety continues with the pace and strength of a Roman chariot, but now with milk dribbling down my cheeks.
3. I despise artisan sandwiches. Not the “sandwich” so much (as I think that most anything can only benefit by two additional pieces of bread), but rather the “artisan” aspect. I’ve seen that name slapped on the sides of faux-rustic restaurants all over the suburbs to make things seem, I don’t know, slightly more upscale. Worldly, even. Less Pontiac, more Peugeot. To make one forget, albeit momentarily, that while they are eating something with vaguely European connotations and are thus feeling slightly superior to the Subway customer across the street, that they still are in a strip mall and are wearing sweatpants with elastic ankles. And oh yeah, that their fancy Havarti cheese and aioli sauce add-ons just made their sandwich have more fat than a Big Mac. Whose meat probably comes from the same grain-fed cow yet is at least three dollars cheaper.
But the fact of the matter, really, (and this is something that bothers me even more than elastic-ankled sweatpants) is that artisans weren’t even classy back in their heyday. They were plebeians. Not even artists, these were the people who weaved ugly straw baskets and shared their meager meals with their family that consisted of dying mules. The ones for whom, if bitten by a snake while on the Oregon Trail, you would not slow your pace. An artist is to an artisan as a sculptor is to an expert Chinese finger trap maker. You’d never put a finger trap on layaway, so why pay more for an equally subpar sandwich?
4. And finally, according to an anonymous tipster, I write like a vague, shitty hipster. And to that I say thanks. As one who regularly trips over her ankles, along with having a past filled with recesses spent alone in the computer lab, both upper and lower braces, as well as spending years thinking that the pedestrian crossing sign (re: PED XING) was pronounced "zing" and not "crossing," I have never really felt hip in my life (let alone like a hipster), despite the time in Statistics class when my teacher docked points for my use of the Helvetica font in my final presentation. But really, thanks for taking the time out of your busy day to read my stuff.
retail hell: a reflection
by |
tags:
hell,
misery,
retail,
the abyss
|
1 comments
1. I can see now why most people who work full-time are alcoholics. Actually, why most people are alcoholics in general. I find that the more time you spend with and around others, the more likely it is you will one day suffer from cirrhosis. This is my second 9-hour shift in a row and already I find my wine bottle to be not quite big enough to swallow my bitterness and erase the pig-colored hue from my swollen feet. Maybe I'll just start drinking cheap vodka from a water bottle while on the clock and then save the rest of the wine for when I'm home. A drunken stupor is much better than somber sobriety while working in a department store.
2. If I were president or future dictator, I would enforce a strict curfew for teens as well as the elderly. You're 80 and can't hear. Why in the hell are you at a department store on a Friday night? Go home and swallow some pills and fall asleep to M*A*S*H* or something. Jesus. And girls, get more creative. It's the weekend and you're milling over cheap ruched jeggings with your boyfriend? Don't blame him if he cheats.
3. As a lowly peon, my only pleasure while on the job comes from disappearing into the dressing rooms or bathrooms for five minute intervals. I do this twice every hour, so if I work six hours or more, it shaves off approximately one hour of work. That helps me get by, as well as giving or not giving the spare coupons I have in the drawer upon my sole discretion. If I don't like the way you breathe, I'm sorry, we're all out. Try downstairs. Other times, I like to be extremely helpful. It's usually a ratio of 4:1.
2. If I were president or future dictator, I would enforce a strict curfew for teens as well as the elderly. You're 80 and can't hear. Why in the hell are you at a department store on a Friday night? Go home and swallow some pills and fall asleep to M*A*S*H* or something. Jesus. And girls, get more creative. It's the weekend and you're milling over cheap ruched jeggings with your boyfriend? Don't blame him if he cheats.
3. As a lowly peon, my only pleasure while on the job comes from disappearing into the dressing rooms or bathrooms for five minute intervals. I do this twice every hour, so if I work six hours or more, it shaves off approximately one hour of work. That helps me get by, as well as giving or not giving the spare coupons I have in the drawer upon my sole discretion. If I don't like the way you breathe, I'm sorry, we're all out. Try downstairs. Other times, I like to be extremely helpful. It's usually a ratio of 4:1.
my blue heaven, re: old
by |
tags:
beluga whales,
endings,
frank sinatra
|
0
comments
"Whippoorwills call, evenin' is nigh
Hurry to my Blue Heaven
Turn to the right, there's a little white light
Will lead you to my Blue Heaven
We're happy in my Blue Heaven
We're happy in my Blue Heaven!"
Hurry to my Blue Heaven
Turn to the right, there's a little white light
Will lead you to my Blue Heaven
We're happy in my Blue Heaven
We're happy in my Blue Heaven!"
these walls are plaster ghosts
missing marrow
missing marrow
some frames and furniture have been extracted like tumors
so all that lingers is the bitter taste of evaporated milk on my tongue
and i wobble weak and weightless with pale, petrified limbs
at night, in this strange single bed
i dream of dying beluga whales fading into the bottom of the ocean
small white pearls sinking into the dark depths of a liquid heaven
falling like snowflakes onto an underwater cemetery of silt, sunken ships, and fallen kings
where death is not what's below but rather all around
being forgotten, yet still they seem to smile
sometimes i wonder if they are even heard when they hit the floor
or if they just land silently like unknown soldiers
you have gone and i have lost my home
it and i have faded away to a skeletal foundation
with organs labeled and lumped into cardboard boxes
set to ship tomorrow morning
alone, i feel trapped inside the bowels of a hollow corpse
abandoned in the empty belly of a dead beluga whale
yet still i smile while drowning softly, silently, and surely until i hit the ground
of my blue heaven
filled with silt, sunken ships, and fallen sea kings
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