“Right now, at this moment…”
Right now, at this moment, I closed that godforsaken Slack window. I’m sure that whatever they’re paying Kabir, it’s enough for him to figure out his own presentation on his own. Because right now, at this moment, I’m having the time of my life. I’m in a writing class, surrounded by other writers who all have such good ideas. And who, more or less, thirst for words and how to better use them. I haven’t had this much adoration for the mechanics of reading and writing since my 10th grade English class with Mr. Singleton. Several girls were in love him, and handful were probably sleeping with him, but his double chin sexually neutralized him in my eyes, so that I could see him for what was truly valuable- he was a bad ass English teacher. He made good reading and writing accessible. He didn’t go on and on about “Hemmingway, dauuuhling…” with proverbial pipe hanging out of his mouth, the way so many of the other “world- traveled” IB English teachers at Lamar liked to do. In between assigning writing projects like keeping a semester journal, he give us little life nuggets of advice. “Take a road trip, but take it by yourself.” he said one typically hot and humid day. For the socially intoxicated high schoolers, this was mind- blowing. For me, it was someone who, for the first time, gave me hope that there may be other people out there like me. And right now, at this moment, as I remember Blaise talking about dialogue, but also the virtues of just. doing. nothing, I think I’m having a second Mr. Singleton’s English Class experience all over again. I better not let it go to waste this time around.
“What happened was this...”
What happened was this kid kept looking at me. I was waiting for my Almond Dream smoothie (a thick liquid concoction mostly comprised of dates and various almond product) trying to speed- read this week’s booth submissions. It should be noted that I am not capable of speedreading, as I officially have the slowest classification of reading speed and style. Basically, I read as if it’s in real time conversation. I’m actually kind of proud of this, as it gives people a hint of my self- declared genius, constantly imagining a hilarious exaggerated reality in parallel with my own mostly mundane reality. You think I’m looking at this Google doc. Really I’m engaged in hood banter with your avatar, cracking up at your inability to clap back. I digress. This kid wouldn’t stop staring at me, even after I got my Almond Dream. As I slurped on the drink so sweet it was too good to believe it’s all natural, this child would not release his death stare. So I cleared my afternoon’s schedule of tortuous reading this week’s booth submission to accept his obvious challenge of a stare off. There we were. A newborn and an old millennial, staring each other down to the buzz of frozen bananas and chia seeds being blended into submission, locking eyes as people bragging about their juice cleanses sashayed by. Just as my eyes were about to water, the baby’s dad bounced him in his arms, forcing the loser to blink. For the first time in a long time, reality proved to be slightly more fun than my constant need to escape it.
“I knew exactly what I was doing when...”
I knew exactly what I was doing when I let the door close before my apartment mate could catch it as we both walked out of the apartment building. Had she been two seconds closer, it would have made perfect sense for me to stand there and hold the door open for her. But I wasn’t going to be a fool and stand there, waiting for her to grace me with her presence by sashaying through at her own slow pace while my biceps and triceps struggle to keep the big steel door open for her royal highness. I’d seen this girl around before, or rather, I’d heard her. She and her entitled friends at an entitled volume of LOUD were constantly engaged in entitled activities, like smoking pot on weekdays. In fact, as she began going down the stairs behind me, I didn’t understand where she could possibly be walking to. What clubs are open at 8:30am on weekday? What house parties are just gettin’ staarrrtteeeeeeed with their copious amounts of non- academic vocal fry this early on a Tuesday? As I let the door close pretending to figit with my iPhone, I decided that she could be going to send her grandmother a lovely package [as a thank you for rent] or some other most altruistic reason. Who was I to judge? Because you love judging. Why do I love judging? Because it’s fun. It’s more fun to focus on her possibly busted life than it is to confront my own positively busted life. So, I’ll judge less. She can still hold her own doors though.