Losing Not Free Things

Last night Bisque's bike was stolen from our third floor balcony. I came home from sketch rehearsal to find him somber and shirtless, missing that mint green zip machine. I loved Bisque's bike. It was hip and cute and accompanied my loved one on the lake shore trail, to music in the park, to Potbelly. It hunkered down in the snow. It was purchased in the desert.

It hurts. It hurts to know something was taken from you. Something with a lot of personal value that is now irrelevant to the thief. It hurts to feel like these things happen. It hurts, or some feeling like it, to recognize this happens all the time in this dumb city. People are jerks, they do not watch out for each other. I get honked at for using the crosswalk designed to be used. We get shoved. People crowd around the el doors, fighting before the cars even stop. Why do we live here? I call the appropriate government office to ask when to buy the appropriate vehicle stickers. I get an answer, I sit on the hot train, walk half a mile, get told I'm in the wrong place.

And I am trying to be empathetic. Before bed Bisque starts, "I'm against the death penalty but..." I laugh because I know what he means. If you steal such a happy seafoam fixit, perhaps you should die. When people steal they think they need something more than you, they have to survive (in some sense of the definition). I should understand at least my life isn't in a place where I must steal to make it all happen. But that hurts too. The amount of times I get asked in one day to help. The shaking change cups and the cardboard signs. The people who launch into their stories while I'm waiting at a red light. That guy who swore he'd pay us back the $25. That guy who tsked at me like I was the rudest person alive for not buying him a new amplifier battery?(!) The woman who stands in the same spot on Belmont asking surprisedly for a dollar, her little play of pretending this is the first time she has ever needed anything. It's not fair that when some quiet skinny man shuffles into Taco Bell Bisque buys him dinner only to come home to a porch rail ripped off.

Sleazy Wednesday

Welcome to the future.
We're all so glad you came.
Attacked me in the laneway--in this town you don't get nowhere unless you're on a bicycle.
So hip and out of touch.
Parked out on a speedway.
Just trying not to move.
It's only getting harder now.
We can engineer a wall that couldn't fall with all this time.
My life in Technicolor, can you check the shutters?
Someone get my mother on the phone--
she oughta know what I'm up to.
Out here in Hollywood you don't need a sweater 'cause the sun feels better in slow motion.

I'll ride the wave back home.

Hit

I was hit by a truck today. On my bicycle. The cliche is true. Time does slow down. One second expands to a million decisions. One minute my biggest concern was wondering if I would have enough down time at work to grade. Next, I see the driver only look one way as he's turning out of the parking lot. I was already in front of his grill. I knew it was about to happen. I screamed with everything I had. My brakes couldn't save me. The vehicle plowed into me. I flew. The tires moved forward, and I thought I was going to die. But, no, it was a lurch from being put in park. A man in construction garb ran around to me asking, "Can I call 9-1-1? I'll call 9-1-1." I had burst into tears. It was as if someone had injected me with a triple shot of espresso. My adrenaline was so high. Busy time of day on a busy street--people stopped traffic, ran from their cars, "I saw what happened!" they yelled. I was partially blind by my nerves. I stood up and all I could think about was how scared I would be if I had hit me. I kept assuring the man I was okay. I was okay. I was really okay. I wanted him to know. I wasn't thinking straight, but I knew I needed to make the man feel like he hadn't done anything wrong. That it was going to be okay.

I wanted to walk. A voice in the back of my head said, "You have to get to school still. You're subbing today. You'll be late." I honed in on that need and started walking. I couldn't stop crying. It was instinctual--surely chemical. My bike chain was screwed up, I walked. I felt like I should call someone, but I knew it would sound much more dramatic between sobs. I put my phone away. I got to the class late, really fine, but still crying. I couldn't stop for about an hour. I held up my bloodied, bike-greased hands and excused myself to the bathroom. I taught. I let them out a little early. I got hit by a truck, you know? I also had two pieces of cheesecake for dinner. I got hit by a truck today. I think it's okay.

EDIT: After to waking up to concerned texts I want to say I AM TOTALLY FINE. I have some scratches and bruises, but I really am fine! I actually had a pretty good day. I was let out of work early and baked and saw some friends and had a rehearsal. I even got my bike in decent working condition at the school co-op for free.

The Ataris: March 16, 2012

Yucca Tap Room is a d-i-v-e. I arrived alone--the curse of liking a crappy at best pop-punk band that hit its stride in 2003. I scooted right up to the front and planted myself by the mic.

Kris didn't start setting up until midnight. It was hot. I stood with my arms crossed, but I was inadvertently in the middle of a group of friends. Two super husky girls and two nice guys. One nice guy chatted with me. I was uninterested in making friends, but I couldn't walk away since I had to save my spot. This guy ended up asking me out and gave me his number. This doesn't really happen anymore, and I complain about it: "Remember when guys used to just ask you out at random?!" But, I will not call him. "He doesn't know anything about me. It's too random." Cake--eating it too--something something something.

The Ataris opened with "In This Diary"--highly surprising. And then BOOM EXPLOSION OF CRAZY. I had been to bonkers punk shows in high school, but I always stood far far away. The other times I've seen The Ataris, there was bopping, but not bop-ping. This time? I was shoved, beat, knocked--all before the first chorus. The crowd was insane and moshing like mad. The husky girls were being shoved against the speakers. I understood their husk. Survival!


Kris.

Things that happened:

-As I got ping-ponged around, I noticed a solid hand on my back. I followed it back to a large Mexican woman who looked at me with maternal love. "That's me!" she yelled. "I'm okay!" I yelled as the crowd jostled me. She shook her head. Her arm served as a wall around the hooligans for the first three songs. I was willing to get swept away, but she pulled me close. Said "NO!" to a scrappy little kid with gauges trying to worm his way front.
-When the major crowd-surfing started during "Your Boyfriend Sucks," I got knocked into the middle of the pit and almost fell backwards, but I grabbed the hand of some guy, and he covered me in a bear hug and pulled me sideways. I felt like he had dove from a lifeguard stand to pull me out of the undertow. All these people, holding each other, but then pushing. Like some real drama, but it was self-created. Is that how all problems are. We must rely on one another to save us from the catastrophes we've made for ourselves.
-I felt safe on the side by "Takeoffs and Landings," but, no. Out of nowhere, some guy shoved me right into a moving crowd and I fell the ground. I was about to be tramped when three guys rushed to pick me up. The Mustafa wildebeest scene, people. It occurs to me how absolutely lucky I am to be a girl. People will save me. I did not have to worry about saving anyone else. Unfair, but true.
-It was an all-star setlist, which was kind of a bummer. i wanted some older weird stuff, but the crowd was happy. By the end, I was safely in the very back patch of folks who weren't even singing along. I jumped up and down to "San Dimas." It was over.
-In the bathroom, I checked-in. I was covered in sweat, an earring had been ripped out, my headband long gone, hair everywhere.
-I left and breathed deep in the fresh air. I biked the three miles home unable to hear a darn thing.

Stay who you are. Stay who you are.

Coincidence, Convo, Computer

On my bike path from home to school.

1. "Bloodshot" came up on my iPod while I was biking in this sunset last week. It was too coincidental NOT to take a photo.

2. This morning--

CHELLE: I have an apple juice problem. I love it so much. If I had my way, I'd be hooked up to an apple juice IV at all times.
ME: You wouldn't even be able to taste it.
CHELLE: I'd be fine just knowing it was running through my veins.

3. My computer is having some malfunction junctions, which is annoying. But, then, I think about all the things that make my computer tick, and how many of them are tiny and plastic and WHOA all the stuff my computer actually does for being a machine I can just carry around and how I schlep it all over tarnation in the sun on my back and I'm like, "How does it still work at all?"

It's just so high, and I'm so tired.
Come on look up at the bloodshot sky--
the clouds are all on fire.

October 31st, 2002 (Are We Havin' Fun Yet?)

It's fall. No, the colors aren't here in the desert, but the feel is. Genuinely. It's cool at night. I bike, and the wind carries me the faintest traces of burning, of cinnamon. I'm wearing flannel right now. I fell asleep in a puddle of candy corn last night.

I'm reminded of one of my favorite Halloweens. As a freshman in high school, October was a transition. I was getting close with friends from theatre and speech, but my middle school clique still caroused in the hallway during Honors Block breaks. For the holiday, a group of us--all factioned off into cultures of the musical, marching band, track, and underage drinking--came together to visit one of the best haunted houses in Chicago.

After our various practices/rehearsals, we piled into the grey Lumina, and my dad drove us downtown to an abandoned prison turned spooky. We all read our biology textbooks feverishly and wiggled in our seats singing Nickelback. (It was a different time.) We screamed our lungs out in the house and fell asleep on the ride home.


Middle school friends: Peppermint, Fran, SMG, Me. I know that at least Peppermint was part of October 31st, 2002.

Falling Into My Lap

Our kitchen--observe the evidence of Boy Roomie's homemade ale brewing on the stove and counter and sink. Notice the covered banana bread.

Today things fell into my lap. I think it's karma from a donation I made to a Save the Arizona National Parks campaign against my better judgement this morning. I was walking just off campus when I got stopped by a volunteer, and one thing led to another, and suddenly I was dishing out fifteen bucks to save beautiful places I may never visit.

I felt guilt tumbling in my stomach--silly donation or right choice? Then, as if on cue, a girl offered me a free chocolate cookie outside an ice cream sandwich shop. Free Thing #1! Then--

2. An advertising exec stopped me and asked if I would answer some questions about hockey for a short video. Apparently, a big name hockey star interviewed me, and I gave really stupid answers to all his questions (I think the ad was about how little people know about hockey in AZ). Anyway, they liked my footage so much, they gave me six free tickets to a game. Swanky lookin' seats too.
3. A beautiful, dark, and cool September night for bikin'.
4. Upon arriving home, I was completely enveloped in cinnamon. Girl roomie had her beuff over, and they had just pulled banana bread out of the oven. Who do you think got the first slice? Moi. We unwound to MTV, and I was just about to hit the hay when the other four ladies of my sketch comedy group called me up.
5. Cut to a certified girls night complete with Mean Girls playing in the background as we talked about boys.
6. Chelle baked those Pillsbury sugar cookies with pictures on them--back to school variety. Which I ate.
7. Kale works at Starbucks and, thus, had a huge bag of leftover scones, muffins, danish, oh my! Which I ate.
8. Arriving home in the wee hours of morning, I said, "Thanks, moon," because she was so big and so bright.

NOTE: I wrote this last night, but decided not to post it as I was falling asleep at the keyboard. Good call, Alice--it was littered with little sidebars like, "but idont needany" and "dad foam theeeeeee."

Everything's beautiful,
everything's a holiday,
the day you live without it.

By the Bike

Friday night I was at Lazz's frat house. Before dinner a few of his bros started playing bocce ball in the front yard. This simple description sounds a lot more dignified than it was. In short, the bocce balls would bounce around tree roots, roll between a billion cigarette butts, and land with a tinkle of broken beer bottles.

At one point, someone threw the white ball and one of the guys couldn't see it. He asked, "Is it by the bike?" (There was a bike propped up against a tree) and someone said, "Yeah"--a complete lie. The dude chucked his ball towards the bike, completely missing the mark. Everyone laughed. And then Lazz joked, "Well it was by the bike. Cosmically."

How could something be so funny based on objects being far apart when universally, the bike and the ball and the boccee players are all on top of each other.

On Saturday Lazz asked me the magic question:

"Wanna go to Pancake City?
As in the restaurant--
not the city."



And we ate pancakes bigger than our faces! And mine had peanut butter and chocolate chips in them! And life was sweet! We are what we eat, we said. I am this pancake. You are that coffee. Cosmically, everything is by the bike!

But I am the stuff of happy endings
Though mostly bluff, belief suspending