Whenever I ride my bike to the school it is as though the universe has decided to make even that task unbearable. It is a 3.5 mile straight shot from my place to the school on Mass Ave. A straight shot full of unbelievable wind, terrible bike lane conditions, dangerous drivers, miserable tailbone pummeling, and my messenger bag rattling bruises into my spine. After two weeks I can mostly sit on my bike without wincing, in spite of my complete lack of ass, and in spite of the bike lanes resemblance to the strips of skin along the scarred jawlines of acne ridden teens. Also, I discovered that the wind is so bad sometimes that if you stop peddling, no matter how high your gear, or how impressive your velocity, you will slow to a crawl and then a stop.
Sometimes I like to pretend that things that suck are awesome. Like how I pretend that all the small and infuriating challenges I come upon are awesome learning experiences, and well! thank great Zombie Jesus for that horrible inconvenience!! As a result I don't get really frustrated all that often, and when I am completely at the end of my rope I usually smile a lot. And laugh.
This bike ride though, it is not awesome. It sucks.
I had a job interview at an undisclosed location. To avoid sounding slanderous or complainy I will refrain from using their real name here-- though if you were so inclined to look up this place on the web you would find nothing but slanderous complaints. I know this because before I went to the interview that's exactly what I did.
I will call them 'Pulsar, In Great Shape'.. P.I.G.S. This particular particulate universal bit is a 'Judgement Free Zone'. It says so on all their pens (one of which I stole from the place after I had the interview.. hee hee! Judgement free! Pen for me!!) Part of the interview involved the tired, permed, and hair-gelled 20-something informing me that if, during my shift as front-desk-person, I hear anyone doing any unnecessary (or necessary, seems), grunting, I am supposed to say to them that such behavior is prohibited. If they are brazen enough to grunt a second time, their membership is to be be suspended forever and they will then be escorted from the gym. During the second offense, a blinking blue light goes off, a big fuss is made. P.I.G.S. be intolerant of grunters, yo. I level a brown eye at her, taking all this in.
".. grunting?" I ask.
I didn't get the job.
It has been long enough between posts now that I am proud to mention that I have finally found gainful employment. I work at a fancy stationary store and get paid to make mothers day cards and paper flowers-- this activity nestled between arranging stamps unpacking boxes and adjusting many things to visually adhere to my obsessive need for neatness in the workplace. I can't tell if my manager has the capability to be as two-faced and bitchy as he would immediately seem. He appears to like me, and I believe it is only a matter of time before he begins to show his true colors.
Yesterday was 'Leave-the-new-girl-at-the-register-by-herself-during-a-rush' day. I lived through that okay. At the school when I am left to my own devises, at least I can rely on my own resourcefulness to pull myself out of (or closer to) whatever disaster I may be headed towards, In the prepackaged land of computers and retail, I have no such luxury. I can't just make up whatever button will allow me to do a return, or invent a process that will stop a barcode from coming up with nothing no matter how many times I scan it.. grrr..
It is shocking to me that when people know someone is having a hard time they will retreat-- keep their distance and not want to 'be a bother'. My sister just recently read a book about Catherine Lord, a woman who was diagnosed with cancer (she was a bunch of other things, Harvard professor, archivist, artist, etc.. sister wrote a speech for John Lithgow and the president of Harvard to read at the Harvard Arts Medal thing held in her honor.. look her up.. ) and GUESS WHAT!?! When people found out she had cancer there weren't many folks who like.. supported her. People she worked with, people she had known forever just kind of retreated.. didn't want to 'bug' her. Or some bullshit. I like to think that I'm not one of those people-- the ones who wouldn't lend a hand to someone they knew was going through one of the hardest things they could possibly go through.. ever.. In fact, I'd say that I'm the opposite.. more likely to unwittingly, out of concern, try to help out people I'm not all that close to, or really shouldn't.
I met a guy last night who was in recovery of some kind of cancer. I know this because he was wearing his cancer meds in a small vial around his neck- so I asked him what it was.. lucky I didn't go with my first path of inquiry, which was to ask if it was a vial of Billy Bob Thortons blood. He seemed really gentle, really fragile, and really grateful, I wanted to give him a hug. I've been going back and forth about why he may be wearing it around his neck-- seemed a little weird. Of course people are going to ask about it, of course that will give him the opportunity to talk about it, maybe good, maybe bad, maybe a little self indulgent, maybe I should give the guy a break. He's 24, living with cancer. Maybe he enjoys that every time he feels the weight of his little canister, every time someone asks him what's in it, he is reminded that he is going to live.
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