Cooler than You: Stupid Things I Say and Do

Well, in an odd flux of things, January has started out as a bad month.  I do mean bad.  Oddly, it is usually February that gets puts on notice.  This year January is setting a very bad precedent for what is to come.  In the past three weeks bad news has been spilling out of the water tap.  An abbreviated view is: one friend had a blood clot in her brain and all that that entails, one lost her mother, one's grandfather has brain cancer, one lost her father, and one husband of a college roommate lost his legs to an IED.  I'm certain I forgot something in there . . . but you get the drift.  News of death and dying is easier to respond to because we maneuver it our entire lives.  In contrast, when an old friend says her husband has lost his legs you are left dumb founded and speechless.  You don't know what to say.  You are left feeling helpless.  You don't know what to do.  Do you send flowers? Do you send food?  Do you s...

Thursday . . . a day filled with intense drama television of the Bones, CSI, Grey's Anatomy , and Private Practice kind.  And, of course, The Big Bang Theory .  I'll save you the my ruckus humor of laughing out loud at TBBT.  Instead, how about we revisit my fucked up karma. Way back when the sun was hot and bright (July, I think) I ran into a former something-or-the-other on the LIE.  I was filling out paperwork at Old Westbury and heading back into my beloved 'hood.  Well, he was sitting with his now wife in his shiny car, and as we paused next to one another he clutched his chest while his eyes bugged out at me.  My mouth came open, and I felt my heart stop for a moment . . . maybe more.  He sped away, and I can only imagine what the conversation was as he tried to explain his response to his Mrs.  Me . . . I'm single.  I didn't have to explain it to anyone but me. Well . . . Now that we are deep into the season of snow, about six mo...

Man, sometimes life just keeps on kicking. Today, after battling roads of snow and rain, I made it to my training for a new course...on the way home I stopped for oil and air in a tire. Then...then I find out I need brakes. The hits just keep on coming. So, the mechanic is being kind--as he's seen me get gas here weekly--and not charging labor. Still, 300+ on brakes is a bill I can ill afford these days. Payday isn't for a month so I'll be sweating it far more than I am comfortable with. Crap. It always gets me that just when the wrinkles start to unfold, life calms, something stops you (or in this case me) in your tracks. I teach more than a full time load, yet adjunct pay keeps me at about a third of a full time salary. Paying the rent and other bills is usually doable, but brakes are another expense to test you. In an economy like this mechanics will always have jobs because a car without brakes is like a writer without a pen. Okay, a car is more lethal than a car...but ...

As I sit on a semi-crowded subway car (crowded depends on what kind of New Yorker you are: the die-hard, new transplant, or wannabe vis-a-vie the tourist), the woman on the right scratches bingo lotto tickets in hopes of striking gold. The woman on the left takes an unseemly amount of photos of herself wearing a child's hat. I, stuck very literally in the middle, feel the effects of finals grade deadlines, days of grading, and the post semester exhaustion setting into my weary ladden academic bones. I think back to late August and the jokes of my new superpower being Syllabitch, as I cranked out five different syllabi. The first days of class, getting to know the atmosphere of the two campuses I teach at, memories of New York flooding me at every turn, the thrill of autumn, and the joys of my job. I wore heels every stinkin' day until late October when I did something unkind to my knee. I sported a big, scary assed brace, fought the gimp look, and begged my doctor for a smaller...

It's been two months since I could wear my sweet, sexy heels. They've missed me, and I've missed them. They impatiently stared at me, with forlorn looks of dismay. They thought I had eschewed them for the well worn trainers of 10Ks and 1/2 marathons. Tonight I took my favorite Nine Wests on the town, to American Trash in Manhattan. Being sans brace for two weeks has been wonderful, but a nice night in my favorite heels is even better. Did we dance? No. Did we climb subway stairs and walk the grimy and well worn lighted streets of Manhattan? YES! Did we drink too much at a one of the only dive/working class/biker bars on the Upper West Side? Hells yes. Did we get free shots from the bar keep, drink Jack and Coke to raised eyes, and play wing girl while the gal pal had a drunkard hit on her in epic proportions? Oh yea. Did we do this after the Physical Therapist said I should take it easier? Perhaps. Are we waiting for the N train back to Astoria? Yes, yes indeed. I...

Venturing out during the Christmas, anywhere in the States, take a certain level of intestinal fortitude, hootspa, and resilience. Aw, hell, who am I kidding? I should've packed bourbon in my Coach. I ventured into Soho for some yarn, for those implied Christmas gifts, and along Broadway touristy shoppers, NY shoppers, and street vendors jostled me along. At many points there was no air between me and the next soul. Along NY streets noticing odd smells is not unusual, but noticing body odor is something else. About two weeks ago The Times, I believe, had an article about hipsters not showering on the regular basis. More so, these happenin' chumps don't use deodorant either. Well folks, I am no-so-proud to tell you that these fools are not urban legend. The streets, impressed with Christmas shoppers and people in various levels of batshit crazy, oozed of roasted chestnuts, evergreen sprigs, and the stinky, stinky hispter. These fools make my nose hairs curl, my face contort...

Well...much like I don't introduce my future break-ups to people in my life, I do not discuss the dynamics of my dates until after they've gone down the crapper. For nearly a month I was doing the pre-dating tango with a guy. Not shagging, but just talking. It was nice, novel, and sweet. Then, then one night I had the infamous butterfly on my face. After a month of shameless flirting, he saw the rash and asked "What's on your face?" Me: "A Lupus rash." He asked what that is, and I told him an autoimmune disease that in laymen's terms means my body thinks I'm allergic to me. I chuckled and reminded him that he can't catch it. That was right before Halloween. What did he do? He slinkered away, just like they always do. After all of these years you'd think I'd be used to it. You'd think I'd have an invincible thick skin. For the most part I do, but that doesn't mean it doesn't still piss me off. Sigh. Another one bites...