Meditation

Meditation

MEDITATION: 4-4-05

current mood: tired

current music: The Midnight Disease

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"What would you think if I went to New York for the summer?" I ask Kelly.

It is roughly 9:45 at night and I'm driving her home from a mutual friend's birthday party. Crystal turned the big 2-1 and we were cordially invited to spend it at her and Heather's place.

Friday I stopped at McDonald's for lunch (a place I loathe, but I was short on cash and was going to be even shorter before the afternoon was through). There I saw an old lady roughly kelly's height, but about a fourth of the build. It was as if the wind made her especially for its own enjoyment. Waiting for her to step outside to blow her away. Forgotten among the clouds and sun. She showed a fellow employer roughly 40 years younger than herself a wound she sustained. Her left thumb had swelled up and bruised a mottled purple shade that one gets when they reach venerability. She brushed it off replying her puppy had ran into her. My heart immediately went out to her. At that age with a young dog. I had to wonder who would take care of the dog once she passes on. Surely the puppy will not go before this kind, fragile woman. I was instantly mad. Furious! How could she work here? Surely the fryers were too much, as would be the drive-through. There's no way she should work in the front, taking orders from obscene customers impatient that their food isn't ready when they walk in the door. How could she work here? Why is she working at all? She should be retired about 5 years ago - not stuck working at a job meant for teenagers or mothers working to gain back their expired teaching degree. How could our world allow such a woman to be wasting away at a job I would assume she didn't pick because she enjoys it and wanted something to do during retirement.
I grabbed my food, not hungry anymore. I smiled my patented flirty smile to the cashier who brought my food. And thus the dance of courtesy ended as I grabbed my napkins and straw before heading out. Rain that was on and off throughout the day started again, and I headed to Fleet Farm for my alignment change.
I grabbed my backpack and food and walked into the automotive center of Fleet Farm - a separate building from the main store, holding a complete garage and gas station. Not surprised by this gas/store combo since it was there as long as I could remember, I couldn't help but think about Walmart and its ever-reaching grasp. "Need an apartment? Come live at Walmart! Need a house? Stop by Target!" oh how much our world is dependent on large, multifunctional collaborations all for the sake of convenience and $1.25 for a bottle of soda or $2.25 for a gallon of gas. God bless the united Businesses of america.
I sat with my backpack between my knees reading the ending chapter of 'The Philosophy of the Matrix Trilogy' which - in good timing - I will finish before I leave that place and before it will be due on the 5th of April. My food laid on the floor in the recycled paper sack which I reach down like a UFO catcher grabbing at a penny-toy inside, well, Walmart. Kelly, the nutritionist, once told me that the most eaten vegetable in the united states is French Fries. Now of course french fries are made from potatoes, but because of the mass quantity, French Fries is in its own category (as it should be considering the salty, hollowed-out grease sticks that lie beside me are no more potato than gummy worms are worms). As it turned out, the bearings needed to be replaced. I figured that since my dad mentioned that earlier in the week. I was there only because he told me to get the alignment fixed and something about the bearings rang true, too. The total came to around $200 and I cried. I recently began suspecting someone or something was dipping into my bank account since it seemed I always have less and less money each time I check it. Not even if I closed my savings and poured it into my checking would satiate the bill. I was and still am the epitome of the poor college student. Disheartened, I paid the $11.00 service fee for them just looking at the vehicle and left. I headed home.
Dad and I rented cellular that night and I finally got to make a smoothie. We both enjoyed it and he even made a few suggestions. Whenever I see that he's trying to make a connection or have us do something together for a bit feels great. Time has become a precious commodity that I'm slowly losing. Long have the days of relaxation and complete dependence gone, where what I had to give was my love and I had all the time in the world. Now time is never enough. We finish the movie, dad liking the movie very much, speaking it in a way that makes me think he will buy it when it comes out on the cheap $10.00 rack at, you guessed it, Walmart. As a decent enough movie as it was, I liked it enough that it was worth renting, but overall I thought it could have been better. I liked the plot and how everything came together, but some of the cinematography and background actors could have been better. Maybe I’m too nit-picky?
I received a call I wished I didn’t. Jim and Kelly were heading over to Nick’s place that night to play video games. I longed to go, but I double-checked myself on why I wanted to go. Jim was going to be there. I was going to hang out with him. Even so, I really wanted to go as any teen-to-20-something would. But alas, the next day I would have to go pick up the camera from the school’s library and drive to the movie. Backtracking, but I thought it’d be worth the drive. I finally said ‘no’ and hung up the phone. I went to bed shortly thereafter.
Saturday I woke up on and off since 5 that morning before settling on 7 am to fully wake up and shower. 9:00 and Dad goes to Grandma’s place to paint a wall. The wall once held a fireplace that was there for as long as I could remember. They don’t use it anymore so my grandmother decided to get rid of it to open the living room some more. That made sense, but a piece of nostalgia is forever lost in the flooded river of time. Of course I get a call from my dad saying to bring a movie over as well as my laptop so she can watch a video about painting. Her computer succumbing to the horror that is the Gateway Service Center. I head over there and stay for a bit. Enough to hear about my dad’s childhood as he and my grandmother debated the height of the wooden-planked, barbed-wire encased tree house that he and his brothers and sister shared. The final verdict was somewhere between 12 to 20 feet high (neither side conceding as is common for my family). From there came the stubborn horse, the cannibal rabbits, the possessed cat, and the cock-of-the-walk rooster that was mean to everyone. Of course there was their share of dogs, too.
“The geese up at the farm laid an egg,”
“Which ones?” my grandma asks as she sits in her chair, not much different than when she had her gastric bypass surgery about a year ago. Even so, that did not stop her from indulging in her favorite snack – popsicles; but not at this time.
“Well I don’t know, I wasn’t there,” retorted my dad to the amusement of all of us, “The female, hopefully.”
“No, I mean the wild ones or the tame ones?”
“The tame ones. There’s also a beaver I saw swimming in the pond doing summersaults and paddling on its back.”
“That’s what I want to show Hannah and Rachel before grandpa…” grandma trails off. Of course I can finish this sentence. She meant before grandpa would get rid of it. Dad’s incredulous at this insinuation I bring to light.
“Well it IS grandpa, “comments grandma in her fiery personality.
By that time I headed out to school to pick up the camera. I went through the entire routine as they checked for each and every item as they marked them off a list of supplies and handed me the bag. I got to the film site a quarter to noon – just about the exact time I told John, the director, when I would be there (albeit he wanted me there ASAP, which I did).
The whole time we got two scenes shot, but they were good. It was just John and April with me behind the camera. April invited me to her birthday party she is holding this coming Friday at her place in Menomonie. Her actual birthday is Saturday, but that is the beginning of four straight days (two weekends) of 12-hour shifts to wrap the movie up. She also pointed out she wanted me to meet with someone to talk about animation. It sounds like this girl is into traditional animation which I have no clue about, but I’ll do my best. April also wondered how she was looking in these shots, complaining about zits and being extremely self-conscious. John told her that even I would agree that she is beautiful, and that’s why he cast her in the main female role.
“Well now I’m getting a big head,” she remarked.
And so am I, I almost say.
I laugh.
Later on that night I call up Jim to see what he’s doing. Dad still was gone at grandma’s place painting the wall. He and Kelly were at his place watching The Incredibles. The movie would be done in 15 minutes and either I would go up there or they would come down to my house. Either way they’d see me in a bit. I took a look around my living room and headed to his place. I talked both of them into going to see Sin City that night since I was in kind of a movie-watching mood as well as wanting to do something since I kind of felt left out from the night before. My movie job comes before most things considering I think of it as an actual job. April may be passionate about apparel design and need time to work on it on Sunday, but my passion is filming and I will work on that when I have to, regardless. On the way to the theater they fill me in with what they did that night and day. John-Paul, Nick, Jim, and Kelly met up with Tom and some of Jim’s buddies from work throughout the day. John and Jim bought pistol paintball guns and when I went to Jim’s place, I saw he DID get a gamecube (despite still owing me $50). They then went to Nick’s Walmart, a GOOD Chinese buffet (Kelly abhors Chinese food and thus I never have any when I go anyplace with her), as well as other places and fooled around. By the time we get to Menomonie all I want is to turn around and go home. We pull up to Kelly’s place so she can take a shower and we see almost everyone else living at her house was leaving. Coincidentally they were also going to catch the 9:25 showing of Sin City. Fun…….. We got our tickets and stood in line for sodas. Before my automatic response to this situation of asking Kelly if she wanted to share a drink, Jim beats me to the punch. I settle for a small drink by myself as the ex-lovers-turned-friends share one of their own. We pile into the theater and sit on the very top row in the far right corner. There was no one in front of us, so the two-seat side in front of us became our foot-rest. Well, theirs, as they got the inner seats leaving me hanging in the aisle. I contort my body so my feet fit, but then my angle became a little weird. It wasn’t uncomfortable by any means, but it still felt awkward having to share the armrest whilst kelly’s feet hung on the back of the chair above mine.
The movie was too long, too much dialogue, and too artsy for my taste, but I know people who loved it. Kelly suggested the really good idea of just going home and crashing instead of staying up that night. Jim and I went back to Glenwood with a brief hiatus in the Taco Bell parking lot to call Tom (“I don’t have money, but Andrew gave me $10.00 for gas. Do you want something to eat?”), and a quick stop for gas. I finish my food at the gas station so I was free to help put hot sauce on Jim’s tacos and wrap them for him while he drove home. Dropped off at my place, I fell onto the couch and woke up the next morning – clocks changed and all.
I putzed the morning away. I tried working on some more material for the book supplement for John-Paul, even calling him and receiving a call back when he saw me on caller i.d. This book is so far just floating with nothing concrete and Nick and I need to meet at least. I thought of going back to the dorms early to work on things and almost made it, too. Dad came home for a bit and we sat around doing nothing (our favorite quality-time activity). SciFi is running a month-long mini-series marathon which means there won’t be anything good for another three weeks. 10.5 was on – something about an earthquake hitting California. I cheered as the earthquake hit and made part of California an island. Dad commented on how that land had to have been someone’s and were they going to be helped because of the destruction of their property. Jim calls saying that Michelle invited him to crystal’s birthday part that late afternoon. I knew about this for a week and thought it best if I didn’t go, considering who was probably going to be there. I left him with the person he least wanted to see and got ready to go back to the dorms. The phone rings again and it is kelly wondering what we all had planned for that afternoon. Her phone is connected through the internet and that was down, otherwise she would have called earlier. Gotta love modern technology. Everything connected through a single medium, causing a total breakdown when one wire gets crossed. I told her about rescuing jim from the clutches of michelle, crystal, heather, and other Glenwood people who might be at that party. Kelly didn’t want to go either, but seeing as how it is for jim’s sake, I was sure she would.
I got to Menomonie and dropped off my stuff at my dorm room. I debated on whether or not to take my camera that I borrowed back at that time, but decided against it. I wasn’t parked in a parking spot and the likelihood of a meter-maid coming by and giving me a way to enjoy my day was high. I picked up kelly and we stopped at the ever popular Walmart to pick up booze after we stopped at Dairy Queen for a blizzard. Cherries and Strawberries, we are chocolate lovers.
It seems like the farthest a Glenwood person gets is roughly an hour’s drive in any direction. Crystal and Heather got about a half-hour’s drive away. Seems like anyone I know lives in a half-hour to an hour’s drive from Glenwood. We show up and immediately see two people that kelly wouldn’t want to see: Sarah and Des. These two have caused her much grief in the past through their secretive motive of leaving “The House” and leaving kelly. Very immature, but what are you going to do? They wanted their privacy together. Of course they leave right away once kelly gets there, but I’m not complaining. They are nice, but very elusive to the point of brushing people off unintentionally.
The party was fine, but I kept on feeling depressed as the night wore on. Crystal graduated with me and heather’s a year younger than me. Both are married and have at least one child. They are married to brothers. Crystal came from a bad background saying she will do something with her life to prove her family wrong. She has great spirit and yet I sat there as she commented on having been drinking since noon, holding her second child. The bonfire we all were gathered around was between the house of the brother’s parents and the trailer I’m guessing the families shared. All this in an unincorporated town a half-hour from anywhere. I wished her better. I wished both of the women better. But life isn’t wishes. Life is some clinic telling heather that she is too fat when anyone skinnier than her would have complications during birthing. Life is having two kids before you’re 21 living in Podunk. Life is leaving the party at 10:15 at night and getting back to Menomonie at 10:45 when the camera was said to be due at 10:00.
I walked to the library after finding a parking spot. I took the high road instead of the usual low-road. Less backtracking. I passed a lit porch in which a ‘goodnight’ took place between a man and his girlfriend. Again the Danse du Courtoisie takes place and pleasantries that make the world go round are exchanged between me and the man on a cigarette break. Seems like everyone smokes these days; april, Cassie with a bit of weed every now and then, crystal, michelle, heather, their husbands (sometimes with weed, but never with meth anymore. Not since crystal married him), and this guy. And despite the scrimping and saving of crystal and WIll, they hadn't budgeted cigarettes into their life, wanting - nay, NEEDING - the $20 they gave michelle to watch their kids for cigarettes. Cancer Stick, Ash-try mouth, a relief from stress, Daily Habits. I drop off the camera and “The Philosophy of the Matrix Trilogy.” In a hedonistic manner, the woman, my age, informs me that a battery is missing and I will go get it now and return it before they close at midnight. I go to my dorm room a block away and drop off my backpack, emptying the contents around my room trying to find the battery. Of course I don’t find it. That would be too easy, not to mention the fact that I don’t have my Stout ID on me. The one I need to enter past 11:00 when they close the side doors, or what I need to eat something other than the soup I have in my room, or what I need to get into the gym for my weight-lifting class tomorrow. No, that would be too easy. I walk back to my van to check that. Nope not in there. I return to the library with another library book I grabbed on my way out of my dorm room. The guy on the porch is gone. A runner runs around the corner, opting to take the well-worn short-cut path that saves 10 feet off of his route. Something’s ironically funny about that and I smile inwardly. I drop off the book and inform them of my lack of battery. She seems nicer this time. Probably satisfied the gnawing hunger of overdues and late-fees as only a sadistic librarian can have. I get back to my dorm room using the front door. Of course I try the side door I used when I first got to the dorm and left for my van and of course it was locked. Side doors are too easy. I call John and have him keep an eye out for the missing battery. It could be at home, also, but I don't want to call my dad at midnight.
Thoughts of me being a rock, a backbone of my friends and family pass through my mind. How it is ironic that those who turn to me turn to an absent-minded fellow who can’t even remember where he placed a battery the day before. Why is it that my sister turns to me in her self-destructing attitude to say she doesn’t trust her husband of 11 months? Why is it I have to be the glue that holds the movie cast and crew together when thoughts and double-thoughts run through people’s minds with assumption? How come I, the most introverted, inward person of anyone I know (yet can be outlandish in my own right) turn to the most public person who tells everything that has happened to him to anyone around him? Who does the backbone lean upon? Why did I have to choose him? Immature narcissism, I think.
We eventually leave and thoughts of the next few days and months float through my head.
Tuesday there is no classes because of advisement day. I am the perfect example of how NOT to schedule classes (due to bad advice) and of course my professor is the strictest of the 3 in my major (because having the other two would be too easy, you know).
Thursday and Friday are band tour in which I still have to pack for. I still have to tell some teachers, my Weight-training teacher especially. So much for the 5 pastel drawings for Thursday for Drawing 2. So much for my 3 days of absences without repercussion. And that Friday night is april’s party. Will I meet someone? Probably. Will I MEET someone, probably not. It all depends on how I act, as kelly pointed out on our ride back.
Family weekend in 3 weekends from now. Finals after that. May brings Erin’s graduation as well as other things I cannot remember (besides birthdays again. Why do we even have those?). The summer, well, I don’t know. Jim wants me to be around and help him re/build an engine in his garage.

“Why would you go to New York?” Kelly counteracts.
“John has that film festival there and I may see what he’s doing this summer. Maybe tag along.”
“It would be weird without you, you know?” This comes from the lady who is moving out of The House in may to live back with her parent in Rice Lake - about an hour and half from Glenwood. Wierd without me? Wierd without her.
“Yeah.”
“But it would be a great experience.”
“Yeah. I'm such a small town guy, you know?”
"That you are."
I pause, “Yeah, I liked working at the plastics factory last summer, but I cannot be content with that. I mean I can say ‘well this is a good paying job and it’s simple to do. I can do this. But it is not my passion, not what I want to do.”
“Then you’d better get a good job.” I don’t know if she’s joking or not.
“I may get a summer job on campus. You know, cleaning dorm rooms and stuff.”
“Well you’d better get your stuff in soon, like now.”
“Yeah, I know. There are signs up in the hallways in the dorm…. You know, honestly I don’t want to work this summer. Flash is royally kicking my ass and if I’m going to take Interface Design next semester, I need all the experience I can with that. That and Maya. I would love to just sit and spend my waking moments working on that program, figuring it all out. Maybe take summer classes.”
“Yeah, but you can’t do that.”
I think of my monetary expenses, the van, the single room next year. “Yeah.”

Happy Fucking Birthday

(concluded at 1:28 am)

p.s. I apologize for the length of this but I started writing and couldn't really stop.