Nice People

This was a reassuring story to read on a day when I was mostly convinced that everyone in the world sucks. Makes you believe in humanity again and that small ordinary people can really accomplish extraordinary things.

Ring Around the Potty

Yesterday I was sitting in a meeting with about 35 people who are way more important than I am when suddenly my stomach twisted into the biggest cramp in the history of the universe. I actually doubled-over and grabbed my side, taking deep breaths to calm my tummy and praying that whatever it was would pass: I was sitting in front of the room and would have to walk past everyone to get to the door.

Well, as luck would have it, the scary cramps kept up and I had to leave. So I headed to the ladies' room because, like my mom always said, if you have a stomach ache you should go to the bathroom, regardless of whether or not you have to "go." Sometimes, she said, just sitting there would make you feel better.

So there I was, sitting in the stall waiting for anything to happen, when someone walked in talking on her cell phone. I can deal with that. It's rude, but it's happened before. But then, someone else came in ON HER CELL PHONE! Both women talked the whole time they peed, farted, wiped and flushed. And I had to listen to their conversations.

As I was sitting there in the stall, a hidden observer to all this social rudeness, I wondered at the lack of privacy we have in society anymore. It's bad enough that you have to do your business (which might not always be silent) with nothing but a plastic door separating you from the rest of the room's occupants. Now, you have to listen to phone conversations in all the stalls around you.

Here's a hint, all you pisser/talkers: NO ONE LIKES TO BE THAT PERSON IN THE STALL BESIDE YOU! Have some common decency! Call the person back. Or if you have to use your phone, send a text message. The last thing I want to hear when I'm sitting there trying to do my thing is you talking about all the problems you're having with your boyfriend. That can't wait until you're done? Are you that important? Here's a newsflash. You're not. Get over yourself. How would you feel knowing that someone was taking a dump while they were talking to you? Or pissing like a racehorse. Yeah. It's kind of gross. If I were the person on the other end, I would wash my hands after I got off the phone with you.

Cell phones are great because they allow us to have increased communication with the ones we love. But sometimes it's OK to be a little out-of-touch. One of those sometimes is when you're doing number two in the stall beside me. Believe me, the ones you love don't need to hear *everything* you're up to.

Love

In honor of Valentine's Day (which a friend of mine calls "a holiday created to remind me that I'm totally alone"), I give you what I think might possibly be my second-favorite poem. What does it mean? I'm not so sure. How does it make me feel? Like love, long my elusive nemesis, might be waiting right around the corner, with eyes whose voice is deeper than all roses.


somewhere i have never travelled,gladly beyond
any experience,your eyes have their silence:
in your most frail gesture are things which enclose me,
or which i cannot touch because they are too near

your slightest look easily will unclose me
though i have closed myself as fingers,
you open always petal by petal myself as Spring opens
(touching skilfully,mysteriously)her first rose

or if your wish be to close me,i and
my life will shut very beautifully,suddenly,
as when the heart of this flower imagines
the snow carefully everywhere descending;

nothing which we are to perceive in this world equals
the power of your intense fragility: whose texture
compels me with the colour of its countries,
rendering death and forever with each breathing

(i do not know what it is about you that closes
and opens;only something in me understands
the voice of your eyes is deeper than all roses)
nobody,not even the rain, has such small hands

e.e.cummings

"Better Than Gatsby" Revisited

OK, by popular demand, here's "Better Than Gatsby" updated to reflect my current favorites, goals, etc.


Favorites
Color: Navy Blue
Food: Cheez-Its
Song: This is tough. Right now, “Honky Tonk Badonkadonk.” Of all time? “Born to Run” or “Comfortably Numb” (Pink Floyd)
Music Group: Bruce Springsteen, Sara Evans, Michael Buble
Subject (college course): Newswriting
Teacher: Jim Davidson, Peggy Knapp
Saying: People suck.
TV Show: "Jeopardy," “Love Monkey,” “Grey’s Anatomy”
Movie: Also a tough one. “When Harry Met Sally” or “While You Were Sleeping”

Pet Peeves
1. Inexplicable traffic jams

2. People who lie and suck ass to get what they want--but probably don’t deserve

Worst Fear
1. That 10 years from now it is quite feasible that I could be breaking in kneepads in an Alaskan convent.

2. Calling people on the phone.

3. Failure

(The first two are actually still the same. I don’t know if that’s sad or not.)

Future Plans
I’m old enough now to know that most of the time, things just don’t turn out like you had planned. I did go to college and grad school, but not for literature or international relations. I haven’t been married (sniff…nobody loves me) and I haven’t built a house, although I have the computer. I’d like to have kids and I still want a dog to name George. And I still want to buy the old academy in my hometown, but now I want to convert it into a really nice home. I even have the renovation mapped out in my mind. And the West Virginian man turned out to be both the greatest and worst things to ever happen to me. But that’s a different post.

Most Embarrassing Moment
http://suezpeace.blogspot.com/2005/01/funny-story.html#comments


Most Memorable Thing About College
Kiltie Band and all the people I met who still call me “friend.”

Things You'd Like To Forget
You know who you are

Where Will You Be in 10 Years
Here’s what I had anticipated: “Hopefully I'll be done with my master's and, who knows, my Ph.D. Depending on what I do, I could either be teaching or working for the government. I could be married with a dog that I will hug and squeeze and call George. I hope to have my driver's license by then and my own place to live. Mainly, I'm not speculating. I'm gonna take life as it comes.”

OK, let’s evaluate:

1. In the last semester of work on the master’s.
2. No Ph.D. Was I crazy when I was 18???
3. Not teaching or working for the government. But I’m working, so that’s good.
4. Not married.
5. No dog.
6. I do have the driver’s license.
7. I do have my own place to live.
8. I have been taking life as it comes.

Four out of eight isn’t too bad. Now what do the next 10 years hold? I don’t know. I think I’m just going to take life as if comes.

(Some highlights I hope for include a boyfriend, possibly marriage, a dog, a baby, buying a house, not being freaked out by gray hair, starting a book, publishing that book and one day not living hand-to-mouth.)

HERE WE GO!!!!

Woo hoo! Way to go Steelers!

One question: What happens to the "Here We Go" song now that we've "got that one for the thumb?" Could it finally be time for a new fight song? I'll bet every single employee at Dick's Sporting Goods, which looped the song all day long, hopes so.

Belly Dancing

Some things, like belly dancing or anything else that requires you to rotate your hips in a circle while also moving your feet, are better done in the comfort of your own home. With the curtains drawn. And very few lights on.

Floor-to-ceiling mirrors and a room full of strangers make the experience just a little bit horrifying. I have rhythm, but I'm scarily mechanical and rigid, like a Susie Salsa Robot. And that HUGE mirror just kept reminding me how little coordination I have.

Calling All V'Day Fanatics and Haters

Hello loyal readers!

I'm taking a journalism class this semester, and my first story pitch is due tomorrow at noon. I've been kicking around a few ideas, but I think I finally found something fun that I could do a nice job on.

People hate Valentine's Day. I know, because I'm one of them. You always see these stories in the media about people who rebel against the date, reject love, despise yet another holiday manufactured by Hallmark.

I thought I'd try to bust out of the model a little bit and aim for a story about people who actually LIKE Valentine's Day, who have had a particularly memorable one when something went right. People who go beyond the commercial nature of the holiday and take advantage of the opportunity to remind someone how much they're loved. It doesn't even have to be their boyfriend or significant other--a lady at work is a widow, but she told me about how she tries to buy her kids something each year to remind them that she loves them.

So, you folks out there--V'day naysayers and champions alike--let me know your take on Valentine's Day. Give me an example of a particularly memorable Valentine's Day and why it stuck with you.

My friend Amy and I always write to each other on Valentine's Day, recalling the time we sat and waited for the bus to go to the mall when we were in college. I remember looking at her and saying, "It's Valentine's Day. And I'm waiting for the bus." It's since become our creedo, and possibly one of the better Valentine's Day I've had because I was with my best friend.

So what's your story? Either "comment" and tell me, or send it via email if you know me.

Does anyone like this idea?