Hear Me Out

Today, something truly horrific happened in Connecticut. So much pain and sadness has been sown, and so much fear and hate has surfaced and bubbled over. Hearts have been moved, and voices are shouting.

Mostly, I have been inundated with social media messages about gun control. Don’t get me wrong; I am 110% behind that; gun control will vastly decrease the ease with which such atrocities can be committed, but that is only half the story.

Everyone’s hearts are breaking for the innocent victims, the children in particular, but they are not the only ones to be mourned. People need someone or something to blame when tragedy strikes, a vessel for the negative emotions. Sometimes, we forget that the man who committed this crime was that: a man. 

We’re always told to hate the sin, not the sinner, in the Christian faith. That is what it means to walk in the image of God. Yes, this man did something unspeakably evil. Yes, it is perfectly valid to react to that with fear and anger and hate for the action. But the man himself, we ought to love.

So what is the other half of the story, if gun control is only a part? How can we love someone so broken that he would massacre children? We can start by examining something else that is broken in our world: the way we treat those who are mentally ill. Obviously this man was sick. Mentally healthy individuals do not commit mass murder. I don’t pretend to know what precisely in this man’s brain chemistry didn’t add up, but I would be willing to bet he was not receiving adequate treatment for it. So, yes, we do need better gun control, but on the other side, we also need better mental health care. Prevention is not just making it harder for sick people to obtain weapons. Prevention is trying to heal the sick, make it so that they do not feel compelled to use weapons. We’re not all doctors and we’re not all politicians. We don’t all have the power to pass laws and give therapy, but we all have one thing we can use to make this world a better, safer place: Love.

Let’s start loving one another, through and through. Let’s remember that we’re all imperfect people, no matter how hard it is to do so. 

So I Was on the Six Train...

Good stories never start that way, and this story doesn't start well, although it ends brighter than anticipated. This is a story of sexual assault, and fear, and a few very brave, very kind men who helped me out of a terrifying situation. 

I was on the 6 train, headed downtown to the Flute Bar for a friend's concert. My roommate and I were dressed up, a rare occasion for make-up (though we couldn't bring ourselves to travel in heels, so we carried them in our hands) and fancy clothes. A middle schooler gave me a once-over and I was amused. She was sitting, and I was standing, holding the bar over her head.

We were two stops away from our destination when it happened. A burly man, reeking of beer, his eyes rolling around disturbingly in his head, tugged at my sleeve.

"You look so beautiful."

"Uh, thanks!"

"None of the other girls here even compare."

I smiled, flattered, but a little wary. Then he stood up, lurched towards me with his hand out, offering a slurred, incomprehensible version of his full name. Marcello? Mark? Marmaduke? Hard to say. He asked for mine.

"Uh, Lars."

"Where are you from?"

"Uh...here. New York." 

I started to wish I had lied more about my name, given an alias rather than a nickname.

"What's your last name? You're from here?"

My roommate stepped in, trying to deflect attention. "She's from this subway car. The very one." He didn't even react to her.

Then time slowed to a crawl while events escalated. The drunk lurched forward again and kissed me, putting an arm across my back. Instinctively I began to back away, now terrified where I had been only creeped out. His arm held me in place, though. I was shooting panicked looks around the train, from my roommate to other people on the seats, but no one seemed to know what to do. When the drunk realized I was trying to back away, he began whispering threats in my ear.

"I'm an ex-marine, you know. You can't run away from me." He started fumbling in his jacket, and suddenly I was worried he might have a gun; he could certainly over power me, particularly in my current state, literally paralyzed with fear, so scared I couldn't even cry.

At that moment, two men who had been conversing urgently behind me sprang into action. The first, a short but broad-shouldered middle-aged man hustled his way under the drunks arm, pushing me back and breaking the hold, letting me free. At the same time, a tall, lanky man in his late 20s or early 30s began ushering me and my roommate towards the door as the train approached a station.

"Don't touch her. Get away from this creep, girl, just go. Don't you put your hands on her. I will fucking punch your face in if I have to, you stay away."

I heard myself yelling "This is my stop!" as though I had just had a friendly encounter with a kind person, then bolted from the train. The drunk tried to follow, but the first man held him back, the second stepping onto the platform to make sure we got into the next car ok. 

I was shaken; my legs were trembling, and my heart was racing. I thought I was one of those girls who could stand up for herself, protect herself from creeps and crazies, but when the moment came, I forgot everything I ever learned about how to handle the situation. The only thought running through my head was "Don't make him mad, don't give him a reason to hurt you," like I somehow owed it to this man to be nice, as though his advances were a consequence of my behavior. I don't like it. I didn't like feeling that way. I never want to feel that way again. I never want to be in that situation again. But instead of feeling completely disgusted, totally disheartened with men, I feel an immense gratitude. The heroes in this story out number the villain. Two total strangers were willing to stick their necks on the line to help a scared girl out of a scary moment. Two people who know nothing about me were brave enough and strong enough to fight a battle I couldn't. In a city where so many blind eyes are turned, how grateful I am that those two were watching.

Dealing With Horrific Things

Sometimes life is hard. Things go wrong — in life and in love and in business and in friendship and in health and in all the other ways life can go wrong. And when things get tough, this is what you should do: Make good art. I’m serious. Husband runs off with a politician? Make good art. Leg crushed and then eaten by mutated boa constrictor? Make good art. IRS on your trail? Make good art. Cat exploded? Make good art. Someone on the Internet thinks what you’re doing is stupid or evil or it’s all been done before? Make good art. Probably things will work out somehow, eventually time will take the sting away, and that doesn’t even matter. Do what only you can do best: Make good art. Make it on the bad days, make it on the good days, too.”

--Neil Gaiman

Coyote

“Please, someone, say something. Anything.”

Silence lingers because

all I can think is

“Keep the jelly donut down”

and the coyote is off-limits.

So Abbie lists the coloring books

she bought for Josh, again,

but I don’t stop her;

I’m too busy thinking about the dead coyote.

It doesn’t matter how loud I yelled

MOM, LOOK, MOM, NO

or how fast she screamed

I’M SORRY SO SORRY SO SORRY

because the oil tanker wasn’t slowing down

so neither could we.

I will not be comfortable in my seat.

In my head I’ve run the physics

over and over in every direction but

the convergence was entirely inevitable.

It happened just how you would expect it to.

On the other side of the median

bronze and sweaty, shining with fear,

the coyote’s heart is pounding and

his legs are pumping through grass

towards an accident I dread for

longer than the impact and

shorter than the aftermath.

Our bumper hits his shoulder

and the whiplash snaps his neck

cutting short the defeated yelp

which morphs into our three frightened cries

when the wheels roll over his body.

They keep talking, too quickly.

I lift my feet off of the car;

wish we could stop and take a walk.

I don’t want the weight of anything

but dirt to push on my soles.

I don’t think it matters what he was running from;

or if he was heading into something

with so much blind determination

it was worth the risk of dying.

Either way I cannot change it,

could not save him.

So we change the light bulb

on the broken left hand turn signal

and pop in a Fred & Ginger flick

to forget about him,

but I will see him again, tonight,

in his best tails and taps,

reminding me that he was important.

Passing for Hipster

When last I spoke of my trials with the publication of my work in the Marymount Manhattan Review, I had just succeeded in having the correct versions published by wearing down the head of the Creative Writing Department/editor of the magazine/my future professor for the last 4 semesters of my undergrad experience. I was feeling pretty grand.

A week prior to the arrival of the magazine, I got another email from Professor Williams. He never gives them subject lines, so they always make me nervous because they could spontaneously yell at me, like an electronic howler. This one, however, was just informing me that there would be a publication party and reading of the magazine the following Sunday evening. He concluded by asking me to read my poems, and I agreed, figuring he had to meet me eventually and it might as well be this semester, before he had any control of my grades. Maybe I could prove to him that I am not a diva or difficult to work with! Maybe I was wrong...

I had intended to change after church that Sunday, but some unexpected rain, an absurdly long choir practice, and an impromptu decision to see the school's production of A Midsummer Night's Dream to attain extra credit made that entirely impossible. A friendly old woman shared her umbrella with me at the bus stop, but by the time I got to school, I was basically soaked to the skin. By the end of the play, I was dry from the ankles up, but entirely bedraggled. I was embarrassed. Then I walked into the room where the reading was happening.

I fit right in. The dear friends I brought with me stuck out like sore thumbs, as did my current Creative Writing professor; they were wearing colors entirely too bright, and smiles entirely too wide. The room was swarming with hipsters. Long, dark skirts, baggy sweaters, ripped up boots, greasy hair, and giant crosses adorned all of the women, without exception, and the guys were universally in flannel and torn jeans. In suede boots, a long purple skirt, a sweater sagging from the rain, and my own little gold cross, I looked like a poor attempt at subscribing to their dress code. I slunk into a chair in the back and ate cupcakes with my friends and professor, trying not to laugh at the drama unfolding around me.

Everyone began the reading of their pieces like this: "Hi, my name is [insert name here], and I just want to thank Jerry Williams for all that he has done for me. I would not be the person or the writer that I am today if it were not for his enormous influence in my life. He has made me a better human, and I am indebted to him forever!" Then they read in slow, monotonous voices, full of dramatic pauses and distressed facial expressions. I was of course, second to last, so the tone was well established by the time my name was called.

"Hi, my name is Laura, and this is my poem, Interdit." Then I read it, pausing only where I had written pauses in, and changing my tone with the tone of the words. I read it, you know, like a normal human. When I finished, I started walking back to my seat, but Professor Williams stopped me.

"Aren't you going to read your other piece?"

Frankly, I was homesick, tired, and uncomfortable. I was the only person in the room who hadn't mentioned drugs or dropped the f-bomb, and I was beginning to suspect I only made it into the magazine because I referenced Salinger. I was passing for Hipster, but it wasn't going to last if I read an emotional poem about my family and our house. So I just said, "No, I am not," and went back to my seat. I have never seen Jerry Williams look so confused or unsure of himself. Who was I to refuse him? Who was I to deny him having an enormous influence in all areas of my life? Who was I at all?

I keep running into him in the hallways, and he always does a double take, that same confusion on his face. I have a feeling that I am going to be an entirely new experience for him as a student, and I hope my GPA can handle that.

Can You Spot the Differences?

I just can't...I'm so mad. I'm going to post the altered poems here, along with the name of their "editor": Chelsea Gentile. As I do a line by line comparison, I just get more upset. So, here are her versions...right next to mine.

MINE:

Interdit

When I was born

I imagine you were reading Salinger;

I imagine it was simultaneous:

your teenage angst, my infant struggle.

Your dreams were made of ideas

intellectual prowess academic progression-

I am your interruption.

I am the idea that chases your fingers

around and around in your hair;

I am the voice that spills your coffee,

forming perfect rings on an essay

left over from before my entrance.

I imagine a lot of things.

Remember when we shared an iPod?

By plugging our ears in,

we wired our brains together,

but you weren't allowed to hold my hand.

You could do it now,

If you could reach across

all of these rivers,

if I could stop

burning all of these bridges.

Every time I kissed you

I tried to narrate it in my head:

How did we lead up to this?

What brought your face so close to mine?

Do we leave imagination any room to wiggle?

This is why you stopped kissing

(me).

This puts all the coffee

back into your cup, and

runs a comb through your hair,

slicked back with river water;

This places brick on top of brick,

not a bridge but a wall:

a solid, tangible obstacle.

I don't bother reaching towards it.

Your fingers will never

graze the rough red surface,

nor wish it were my face.

But I can put my back against it,

and sneer at all those phonies,

fingers interlocking tightly,

and pretend that

I don't believe in love.

HERS:

When I was born

I imagine you reading Salinger;

I imagine it seemed simultaneous:

your teenage angst, my infant struggle.

Your dreams were made of ideas—

intellectual prowess, academic progression—

and I am your interruption.

I am the idea that chases your fingers

around and around in your hair;

I am the voice that spills your coffee,

forming a perfect ring on an essay

left over from before my arrival.

I imagine a lot of things.

Remember when we shared an iPod

by plugging in together?

We wired our brains,

but you weren't allowed to hold my hand

though you could do so now,

if you could reach across

all these rivers,

if I could stop

burning bridges.

Every time I kissed you

I tried to narrate the act in my head:

How did we lead up to this?

What brought your face so close to mine?

Do we leave imagination any room to wiggle?

This is why you stopped kissing

(me).

Which puts all the coffee

back into your cup and

runs a comb through your hair,

slicks back each strand with river water;

places brick on top of brick,

building not a bridge but a wall:

a solid, tangible obstacle.

I don’t bother reaching for it.

Your fingers will never

graze the rough red surface,

nor wish it were my face.

But I can put my back against the wall

and sneer at all those phonies,

their fingers tightly interlocking,

and pretend

I don't believe in love.

MINE:

SOLD

When I think about that house

I am reminded of a discarded exoskeleton:

the utmost protection and structure,

so easily crushed between my thumb and forefinger.

I imagine some other family

will eat breakfast in that kitchen,

spilling milk across the table

and reminding each other of their manners.

On Sunday nights they will likely

gather in the basement,

chairs placed across that squishy place in the carpet,

to watch old movies, over and over.

Chore days will find a petulant child

crouching over the toilet upstairs

cursing whoever it was who thought

intricate black and white tiling would look good on that floor.

I presume a girl will open those west windows

and let the curtains flutter in the breeze.

She may use the barre for ballet or for displaying her scarves,

But will she ever notice the outlines of where I smeared poetry

onto the mirrors in soft blue wax?

What if the shelves by the fire

are filled with knick-knacks instead of books?

What if the yellow walls are painted white?

What if music never fills the kitchen at Christmas,

and the porch light loses its supernatural glow?

What if I forget what it looked like then,

and all I can see is what it looks like now?

What if, in a moment of carelessness,

I close my hand into a fist

and hear the horrible crunching sound

of old beetle flesh becoming dust?

HERS:

When I think about our old house

I am reminded of a discarded exoskeleton:

the utmost protection and structure

so easily crushed between my thumb and forefinger.

I imagine some other family

will eat breakfast in the kitchen,

spilling milk across the table

and reminding one another of their manners.

On Sunday nights they will likely

gather in the basement,

chairs placed across that squishy place in the carpet,

to watch old movies over and over.

Chore days will find a petulant child

crouching over the toilet upstairs,

cursing whoever thought to intricate

black and white tiling in a bathroom floor.

I presume a girl will open those west windows

and let the curtains flutter in the breeze.

She might use the barre for ballet or for displaying her scarves,

but will she ever notice the remnants of poetry

smeared onto the mirrors with soft blue wax?

What if the shelves by the fire

fill with knick-knacks instead of books?

What if the yellow walls get painted white?

What if music never remakes the kitchen at Christmas

and the porch light loses its supernatural glow?

What if I forget what it looked like then

and remember what it looks like now?

What if, in a moment of carelessness,

I close my hand into a fist

and hear that horrible crunching sound

of beetle husk becoming dust?

Honesty

It bothers me when people do not say what they mean. Seriously, when a person says one thing and means something else, it doesn't matter what either is, suddenly the person loses credibility and respect in my eyes. This loss is only increased if one proves in other ways he or she is not thorough or consistent in their dealings with me. What has spurred this? Oh, blogosphere, what indeed.
I received an email today from the magazine publishing my work, asking me to look at the proof and check for errors before sending it to print. They went on to explain that their team had fixed grammar errors, punctuation weirdness, and in some cases, made drastic changes to a poet's work, but they would revert back to the originals upon request. I reviewed my work and WHOA. They changed the verb tenses in the beginning of Interdit, added the word "seemed" in some lines, as though the observations the speaker is making were figments of her imagination. Furthermore, in SOLD, they ADDED AN ENTIRE LINE about the house, calling it "our old house", I guess for those readers who couldn't put those pieces together...whatever. So I emailed them back, politely stating that while their revisions made nice pieces, they were not my voice, nor were they in line with the meaning of the poems, and requested they revert my work back to the originals they had accepted in the first place. Not an hour later I received a reply, stating that they were impressed with my talent, what with me not being in the creative writing program, and they would change the works back, but could they please fix the grammar and capitalization errors?

EXCUSE ME. I proofread the College's Course Catalogue at work and never have I gotten a comma splice question wrong on chompchomp.com, EVER. Furthermore, if they were going to change the poems anyway, they shouldn't have given me the option to restore my work. If they wanted revision, they should have asked me instead of letting student editors alter my work to fit their idea of what the poem should have said. They actually changed the phrase "I imagine it was simultaneous" to "I imagine it seemed simultaneous" and thought that was just fixing up some grammatical issues. Clearly, they did not want my poems the way they are, so why didn't they say so? They made no indication of revision in the acceptance letter!

I allowed them to make their grammar fixes, but asked to see these revisions before the magazine goes to press. This time, I hope they do what they said they would, and do not keep pushing for something else.

How Social Media is Ruining My Higher Education

That title makes it look like this is a post about how I spend all my time on Facebook instead of studying.* In truth, it is a post about how the existence of social media has made applying for scholarships incredibly difficult, for all the wrong reasons. I miss the idea of scholarships being applied for by writing essays about how you learned things, or how you plan to change the world, or how college benefits society, you know, pull-it-out-of-your-butt essays that barely skid under the absurd 500 word limit but sparkle with the brilliance only attained by writers accustomed to cranking out 1400 word chunks on the daily. Now, all you can find are contests where you make a video about how you recycle really well, or make a plan to recycle and follow it, or make a multi-media presentation about copyright law, or write several thousand words about the single most important political issue involved with the 2012 Presidential Election and pray to the Almighty that the judges are on the same end of the political spectrum as yourself. Or, my favorite type of all (dear, faithful 4 blog followers, and random blog stalkers in the Ukraine): the popularity contest. That's right. The existence of Facebook/Twitter/Tumbler/Blogger(uh. yeah.) has made it possible for the following exchange to take place.
Scholarship Coordinator: Gee, thanks, Mr. Money-Haver. It's sure nice of you to offer this large sum of money to college students. What stunt shall we have them perform to compete for it?
Mr. Money-Haver: Let's ask them to write some dumb essay about learning, or how they love the world.
SC: Do you think they'll do it?
MMH: Of course! Kids love that crap! There'll be thousands upon thousands of entries!
SC: Thousands?!?!?!?!?! How ever will we judge them all in a timely manner? This is so difficult!
MMH: Let's narrow the playing field a little, shall we? Pick a top percentage and then judge only those.
SC: How will we ever manage that? That involves some amount of judgement, doesn't it?
MMH: Aw, shucks, you're right! We could always pawn that off onto their peers. Whoever bullies the most people into voting for their work regardless of its quality will obtain the honor of us reading their essay.
SC: Sounds perfect!

So here's a scenario: A quiet kid who was home schooled for a lot of her elementary school career has never really made friends in high school, and doesn't spend much time on Facebook because she doesn't have many friends. She's got the requisite close pals, because quality means more than quantity for her. She's brilliant, completely genius, and if she can scare together enough money for college, she has the potential to go Ivy League and discover cures for cancer, or rebuild Africa's infrastructure, or fix the United States economy. So, she decides to apply for scholarships. Our friends SC and MMH have totally screwed her over, so when one of them gets diagnosed with liver cancer, he's going to be sad, and not even know why.
Now, down the block lives the most charismatic guy around. He's got like 5,000 Facebook friends because he adds everyone whose name he ever learns, and even just some people who are friends with his friends whom he has never met. He went to several different high schools so his base of acquaintanceship is wide. He's nothing too special, goofed off for all of high school and doesn't have the grades to get any merit-based aid from the state school, nor does he qualify for need-based, but his daddy cut him off for crashing the family car. He applies for the same scholarships, but thanks to his charisma and uncanny network of friends, he manages to get enough popularity votes to make it into the final percentage, and is smart enough to beat out the other charismatic individuals. He'll grow up to be a miserable accountant who misses the glory days of high school football, and very few people will care. They'll all have died from cancer.

So, even though this is entirely fruitless...vote for my essay? Please?

http://www.wyzant.com/scholarships/v2/essay51868-New_York-NY.aspx





*Not that I don't do that too...a lot...

Fear Ode

There is so much time, now,
to explore those watery depths
You've only ever skimmed across.
Not once will you be yanked out,
jarred, pulled onto some other dry place
to patiently wait
for some other set of bones
to cease their waspy rattling.
Finally, in solitude, in peace,
there will only be the quiet lapping
of the reddish sea inside yourself,
as the tide goes in, and out again, unchanged.

Two Nights

Have you ever accidentally gone on a date? I don't recommend it, particularly not when you are new to a city, and therefore must rely on your accidental date's knowledge to prevent getting lost, even though they are making you increasingly uncomfortable. True story. We went to a show on Broadway, and I paid for my ticket which caused him to insist on buying me cake and a cab ride home. What an awkwardly silent cab ride it was. Eventually, I started composing poetry because the cab driver's French phone call was getting too fast for me to understand.

i.
Sometimes-
in the corner of my eyes-
I think you are
Someone else.
Those particular glasses,
The way your voice
pitches when impassioned-
a subtle perfume
of clumsiness and pretension.

ii.
Last night-
it was almost this morning-
I was huddled in a blanket
and he was giggling madly.
Beside me.
I wanted him
(both to stop and to hold)
but I could not reach out.
I would not speak.
Even in sleep
I am afraid.

iii.
Now-
that I am sitting across from you-
I see you have
that same 5 o'clock shadow
speckled by acne,
broken by a sneer.
Your hands are the same shape,
nails trimmed identically.
I am not speaking;
on the inside
I am determined not to give you
a reason to comfort me.
I do not want to feel your hands.

iv.
Later-
crawling from a bumbling taxi-
I understand.
You have two eyes
that can't see everything;
a voice
that knows its birdsong;
an air
that colors your actions;
a cleft chin
that spouts oil and hair;
and ten fingers
that grow strong from listing facts.
You are human.
He is human.
I am lonely.
It is all the same.

Ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-Changes

Remember that time I moved? Yeah, me too. Well guess what? I moved again. Today. Yup. Twice in 10 days. Bringin' back the Nomad Life. I'm here for a good long while, though.

Today's issue? Hurricanes. This one, named Irene, is supposed to be ravaging the city I'm in (Manhattan) as of 40 minutes ago. It has yet to even rain. This is silly. If you're going to be a natural disaster, you ought to at least be on time...Ah well.

There's a hurricane watching party on the 24th floor in a bit. We're going to hope nothing smashes through the windows.

Unresolved Issues With the Animal Kingdom: The Monsanto Link

Every once in a while, I get an additional glimpse into the world of evil that is the deer. Their plans are not always clear to me, and rarely do they give themselves away, but sometimes, I get some insight.

Last week, my mom, sister and I packed up our belongings and drove across the entire country. Yes. The whole thing. Well, all but Nevada and California, but I feel we've driven that stretch enough times that it counts. Back to the story.

Everything was going swimmingly until we got to the end of Nebraska. Iowa, it turns out, was full of construction, detours, and closed roads. So we spent several days winding our way down rather pleasant country highways through Iowa cornfields and soybean patches. All this pleasant country life seems, well, pleasant from the outside. But I know better. And not in the crazy Deer-and-pigeons-are-evil way that many of my friends frown upon. No, in the well-researched, people-who-are-not-me-believe-this-also-because-it-is-a-fact way. (Not that deer and pigeons aren't evil.) You see, the life of the American farmer kind of sucks because our government favors corporations over the individual, and corporations, as it happens, can be really evil. Don't believe me? Watch Food Inc., stop eating for a week, cry, wail at the injustice, get hungry and try to grow your own food, then return to this blog. Done? Good. Now, back to my Iowa story.

There's a particularly evil corporation, Monsanto, that is doing it's best to monopolize soybeans. As Food Inc. will tell you, there is either corn or soybeans in pretty much everything Americans eat these days. Monsanto copyrighted a gene.Why is that even legal??? Ugh. Anyway. Their soybean crops have to be treated specially- farmers cannot reseed their fields with their own crop-they have to return it to Monsanto and buy new seed. It's expensive and wasteful, and frankly, I think it's wrong. But can you get soybeans without this Monsanto gene?Yes, yes you can. It's difficult, and many have tried. But there's this little snag-if ANY of your beans have the gene, you're out of luck. It's just like having all Monsanto genes.

By this point, you're probably wondering what on earth this has to do with deer, and why I went off on such a tangent. On the Iowa/Missouri border early last Sunday morning, I saw two deer in a soybean field. Eating the crop. You know what that means? They have soybean poop. My brain started working and I realized with a jolt the deer are inadvertently helping Monsanto spread their evil. If a deer eats a Monsanto bean, then goes over to a non-Monsanto field and takes a nice Monsanto-laden crap, Farmer Joe's Pure Unadulterated Field is suddenly tainted by Monsanto impurities and indiscretions. Joe's life is ruined, all thanks to Bambi & Co.

I hate deer. I really do.

Sometimes You Win. Sometimes You Drive Into Retaining Walls.

I usually like driving. Sometimes, I love driving. Today I did not love driving at all. Picking my mom up from work, there was some horrible traffic weirdness. First, this loser cop pulls across three lanes and blocks off an entire city block...for no reason. There was nothing behind him. The other direction of traffic kept going. Then, he stands in front of his squad car, wiggling his fingers the way moms do when their kids are misbehaving. This apparently means "Large truck!! Turn right NOW, but make sure you're not the first car in the lane, so you have to dodge a bunch of others first." Eventually I made the turn, dumb truck aside. Next, construction shuttled me into the LONGEST left-turn queue onto a one-way street I've ever seen. One light cycle, the only thing that got to turn was a bus. Of course, when it is finally my turn, some horrid Subaru decides that because it's a one-way, it's totally ok to make the left turn from behind me. He's lucky I'm a ninja and didn't squash him under Beluga's mighty tires. After turning the trip from my mom's office to the bank which should have been 2 minutes into a 15 minute ordeal, I finally got to the parking lot. Where a giant black pick-up truck lurched suddenly across the lot in front of me from a parking space. They clearly had important things to be doing, and couldn't wait for me to actually park. Once again, it was lucky my foot was ready to ninja that brake. As at last I turned into a parking space, I said to my mom, "These people all just suck. They are awful at driving. AW. FUL." And that, my friends, is when I drove into a retaining wall.

My brake ninja foot deserves a medal. I didn't damage the car. Or the wall.

I hate driving, especially when it's done by other people.