I think it's just a teensy bit sad that I'm actually relieved to be using up all sorts of kleenex on allergies, instead of because I'm crying. that's just the slightest bit pathetic, no? and actually, I'm getting over it. I'd like to just - not have cause to bother with them at all now, if that's ok. swell.
so, I'm a dork. in case there was any doubt. new evidence: I'm listening to my Winter Machine cd (again and again and again) and I could cry at how happy I am to have this back. aw, Winter Machine! how I love thee... this is a cd I've been meaning to lend to the doc since I lent him "Little Earthquakes" - and I can't because I can't be without it. even though I could save it to my computer and play it from here in the meantime. I've been without it for months, so that's not good enough. ...also, my Dory icon makes me grin every single time I see it (no seriously) - and last night I actually did watch the entire movie with co-director, director/writer, co-writer commentary. I now know things no one in their right mind would want to know, which are - of course - the only things worth knowing.
today is pretty sedate, but so far it's in a good way. I don't know if I'm a little under the weather, as my sinuses want to insist (but they have sort of unreliable input, seeing as they're always having problems) or if something else is going on (like I'm just exhausted), but I've done lots of sleeping today. sleeping is good. especially sleep gotten after the two to six a.m. nightmare program. without fail, sometime between two and six, I will be terrified, even if the dream doesn't seem to warrant it. meds? insanity? I don't know! mwaa. <--whine ...anyway, naps are my best sleep. so I've been comfy in that regard, and since I don't *think* my mom has anything scheduled tonight after work (the first time all weeks, although Monday and Tuesday both appointments were actually mine), we might do something when she gets home. I'd kind of like that; I stayed in all day yesterday, and it wasn't totally good for me. plus, two inside-days in a row aren't good for me. but maybe a nap first...
you know, sometimes - what with pop-up ads and such - I have no idea what the links in my history are, and yesterday I saw one for nap.edu, and I was like - that's it! I *am* meant to study somewhere! Nap School, here I come! I mean, *seriously* how brilliant would that be? specializing in different types of carpet squares. majoring in cat naps, short naps, long naps, medium naps, morning naps, noontime naps, afternoon naps, evening naps, the effect of location on napping, historical napping, social napping, multicultural concepts and practices around napping, gender and napping, nap psychology, nap biology, and of course nap mathematics. (I did a lot of undergraduate study on that in grade/middle/high school math classes.) how awesome is that? I'm all but ready to apply, but I don't want to be too rash in my decision-making; I've decided to sleep on it.
I so funny. I have blue hair. blue hair and silver-turquoise-green (depending on the light) hair and indigo-violetish hair. I so special.
speaking, only slightly more seriously of school, I left an epic comment in Shannon's notes today regarding my thoughts on further education right now. they're more flexible than I previously suspected. the idea of going to a university is starting to find its way into my potential future again. and I'm liking that. it has a lot to do with that damn shuttle bus. (warning, tangent approaching.) oh, by the way? *waiting* an HOUR for a damn bus because they won't change from break schedule to academic schedule until the end of August - when the building is a twenty minute *walk* from the hall on campus where one waits - is, as my brother would say, rigodddamndiculous. wow, three ds. don't think I've done that before. anyway, I've cut out the red bus - for now - and put in the walk. I'm still going to end up getting there early, for my doctor who's always late. and I'm going to be mangled by the weather equally if I walk in it or wait in a *completely unsheltered* area. without anywhere to sit by the way. one thing I've learned over the past week: sitting on the curb is a really effective way to make yourself feel like trash. and sitting on a curb, in the sun - because you want a place that's dry and because you're (I'm) allergic to grass - watching a good six gold buses go by, while you wait for the red, watching the same damn drivers pass you again and again, seeing a green bus thrown in just to thoroughly screw with your head - is not good for one's mind. it's not good to watch every other damn person catch their happy little every-two-seconds (fifteen minutes, technically - but it's not even that long) gold bus and go about their day. it's kind of like going to the doctor and sitting in a waiting room with no one else in it. and while you sit there, all sorts of other sick people come in and take a seat, and three hours go by and you get to watch all of these people traipse into back rooms with nurses despite the fact that you've been waiting so much longer than any of them. so finally you end up threatening to beat the receptionist with your clipboard of insurance information - only to have her remind you that you turned that in hours ago - at which point you're transferred to psychiatric where you're *still* forced to wait. wait. was I going somewhere with this?
ih. probably not...
oh, right. so I prefer the walks. but the campus did impress some interesting points upon me while I did my waiting. for one, it's really pretty. and I'm already learning my way around - the names and locations of buildings, etc - because I'm learning the stops and- obviously- the two coincide. so, I suppose it's become evident to me that college/university wouldn't have to be this smack-me-in-the-face all-at-once sort of deal. which is of course what people like the doctor have been telling me all along, but I can see now some of the steps in between, and that's helpful. I'm just beginning to picture myself in college with who I am as fire and motivation, instead of something that would constantly conflict with the bullshitting academic system. I'm starting to look at these building and these little people walking around them and realize that inside are just classrooms, and books, and things I've done before - but this time, actually, truly important. because if I decide to do this, I'll be doing it to certify I can make as much good change in the world as possible. I'll be doing it based on the feverish beliefs bred by my life experience, something that a lot of students don't have. and as I'm constantly re-realizing - when I desire to do something, I do it. I may be scared out of my wits, but I will learn how to do it. and school is a hell of a lot less scary than some of the other things I've done. on top of which, it won't be what it was. anyway, it's just something I've been thinking about. so many times, people have come to me with the idea of taking classes somewhere, and I've always resisted it- first, because I'm not ready - but secondly because I have this idea that if you go on a community college track you can't get off of it, onto a university track. and now I'm thinking I could take classes at better schools than I've considered in the past. I could even attend a school and transfer out if I decided I wanted to say, live in Wisconsin, or go to a more liberal school... the point is, everyone has *told me this*... everyone has said that I can put what I believe on a back-burner long enough to - say - take the ACT, in order to get into a school to obtain a degree if I think that degree will ultimately help me act out of what I believe. but it wasn't right for me to do that when people were telling me so. now, I could do it. now, I can imagine going through the steps of preparation, getting the number, getting over the number, moving onto learning. I don't think it's impossible for me to go to school without a) being broken or b) constantly banging heads against a severely faulted system. I have this confidence now, where not only do I trust that I could get through it, I trust that if I want to do it - it won't be an issue of simply "getting through." it will be good. difficult, obviously. but good.
that's not to say I've made a decision, of course. this is me, after all. right now, I'm learning how to ride the buses. yeay, buses! whee! (not so much.)
although, there is this one guy, who I've seen twice now (once when I first rode the line with my mom, and again on my most recent return-trip) who makes the bus really enjoyable. he's "older" - but not seriously older - he seems to be like a professor or something. I have no idea if he actually is, or if he's retired, or if he's married to a professor, or if he's none of the above, but he has a sort of eccentric-excited-professor-vibe going... when I first saw him on the bus, he was engaged in the liveliest of chats with the person sitting on the other side of the aisle; I just assumed they were together. now, I really doubt that. this man will strike up a conversation and, during the course of it, win over *anyone* who happens to be on the receiving end. he's just delightful, I swear. whatever day it was... Tuesday? that I learned it was faster to walk, I'd spent some time waiting at the campus before coming to that conclusion, and I'd watched all the people who walked by without even looking at me, and the people who obviously ignored me, and the people who - despite also waiting at the stop - didn't come anywhere near me. I was watching everyone, and I was starting to get pissed at them. why does *no one* on this campus have hair a color you can't be born with? why is everyone dressed in the same stupid conservative midwestern way? what is up with this? why will no one smile at me or say hi when I smile and or say hi to them? it pissed me off. and at one point, my own cousin walked right past me, but we don't fault him for that because he didn't realize it was I, (grammar is so weird sometimes) and I didn't realize it was he, until just after that. and he did come back later to say hi and talk to me. it was sort of a weird conversation, as I always feel like he's maintaining a distance, and I don't know him well enough (now - we were closer as kids) to know if he's really standoffish or if that's just a vibe I should ignore until he's comfortable with me. anyway, he was cool; he didn't make fun of me when I told him I was practicing riding the damn bus. although he did keep offering to give me a ride, which - while nice - obviously defeats the purpose of my outing. I didn't really understand that. and when he first walked up to me, he said, "Mary?" and I said, "Seb! It *is* you..." and we did the whole well-what-do-you-know laugh. He told me that he thought he saw me when he was driving by, but seeing as I have blue hair (only the streaks at this point, mind you) he assumed I must be some art student. now this, as you may have guessed, did not make me happy. granted, I wasn't angry at Seb, and hey, I'm happy looking "like an art student" - I know what that translates to here, and I'm happy with the fact that I look a great deal more like who I am as the days go by. however. why - just because my hair is dyed - do I have to be an art student? that's such common thinking here! and I was fighting inside myself to imagine some of the people who looked so unbearably "normal" really being awesome potential-friends... and all sorts of freaky-geeky-dorky people hanging out inside and behind buildings where they couldn't be seen. as if there was this massive collection of people with rainbow hair just on the other side of the brick. not to say that I can only be friends with people who have the so-called "art student" look... but that's just the sort of thinking with which I'm struggling. when I had my hair cut? the entire salon, *especially* the stylists (with the exception of Stephen, who really is extraordinarily cool, especially on a day when he and I are not both struggling with our anxiety issues) looked at me - and at Stephen - with total shock and lack of understanding. as my mom said later, "What is their deal? They're not Great Clips!" I didn't understand it either. they pretend to be all high-falootin' and in the end, none of them have been outside St. Louis. someone said to one of these disturbed-citizens that he/she must not have been to New York, and he/she said yes, that was true. When I brought it up later, my mom was like, "not even close. not even *mentally* visited New York," which is exactly what I'd been planning to say. I'm constantly amazed by how shocking the slightest act on my part can be to other people. jaws drop when I mention that (up until this point) I cut my own hair. as if I'm an exception to nature. intriguing but potentially dangerous. dangerous but potentially intriguing. it's fucking HAIR!
oh, good, I once again had no idea where I was going, but I can smoothly segue back here. so. after having this experience on campus (I hadn't yet had the salon fun) I got on the bus to go 'home', and there he was again - aisle seat just behind the driver, same as before. I greeted the driver, and he and the driver greeted me. he said, "I like your hair!" with this huge grin, and I said, "Thank you!" with a grin back. and as I walked the aisle, he turned to keep my eye. "I really like it," he said. "It's different!" ...and while I would later mumble in my head about how it shouldn't seem so different, at the moment I was just pleased. when I sat down, he caught my eye again, and I smiled at him, and he just started LAUGHING... just really laughing, and I laughed with him... and you know what? I started to wonder what was up with this guy, why he was so friendly, whether or not he was stable. and then I felt someone smack my brain (lightly, but enough to get the point across) and say, "are you listening to yourself? you've been whining all day that there's no one who's interested in connecting for even a moment, and here is this wonderful man who's just being friendly, just being personable - and you assume there's something wrong with his head." I immediately dismissed it then. because honestly, I'm safe on that bus. I know that. (mostly.) and the last thing I want is to not talk to the people who are actually *like me* in this aspect because they might be crazy... how sad is it, that even being that way, I tend toward the assumption that they're nuts?
anyway, when I got off the bus, he said, "Goodbye, Blue," and I said goodbye with another grin. I thought about telling him it'd be all blue the next day, but I was caught up in ambling off the bus. two other woman got off at my stop, and I walked just a few steps with one of them, we were both smiling because of this man, and I told her to have a good night, and turned my corner. it was so cool. something is seriously happening on a shuttle bus when you're sorry to see your stop. I hope to see him again, and what's more, I hope the opposite seat is open. I'd happily have a conversation as Blue any time...
~me