Wear better clothes.

I'm going to start this post with the conclusion, just so there's no confusion on it: I am absolutely a non-fan of confrontation.  Yes, I like being able to yell my head off and voice my opinions, provided that there are minimal repercussions (i.e. I won't see them again, or they'll yell back, but that'll be the end of it... etc.), but, when that is not an option, I entirely shy away from it.  Just the thought of confronting such a situation gets my heart rate up.  Especially when I realize that my shirt is see-through.

Earlier this evening, I tried my hand shopping at a bigger store than the one I went to when I still lived on KNU's campus.  The mission was a success - I got both my pantry and fridge stocked - but it took three times longer than usual, and I still didn't end up with the fancy trash bags I'm supposed to use.  I may just haul my trash back to KNU and let them handle it... or take my garbage out in the middle of the night.  But, the point of this paragraph is not to debate the morality of ignoring cultural norms when the culture makes it impossible to find the supplies to participate in said norms.  The point of this paragraph is to express how exhausted I was when I finally made it home after my errands.  It was quite a day - TESOL, then a trip to City Hall to turn in my Change of Address, then an attempt at finding a new bus route to school using the 1 Bus (which is a great deal closer to my apartment than the faithful 14) - no dice, btw - , then the E-Mart trip, putting me home around 8:30.  I took care of the rabbit, started some chores, and finally sat down to dinner at (prepare to be horrified) 11:30.  Somewhere in the middle of this, I changed into a pair of pajama shorts and an undershirt that my friend who used to live here, Tori, left me.

It was around the time that I peeked out my front door to investigate the sounds of English coming from the hallway that I realized my shirt was very much see-through.  Great.  Glad I chose to wear a cute bra today.  So, I talked to what turned out to be some other friends of mine for a bit, and then went back to bustling about the apartment, promptly forgetting the encounter.

That is, until I had to run upstairs to Kris' apartment to fix something with our shared internet.  He's not there right now, so I knew that wouldn't be an issue.  What I wasn't expecting was to find Kris' neighbor, sulking in the stairwell, smoking his cigarette.

So, I came flying up the stairs, two at a time, until I saw him.  I stopped, teetering on the edge of the top step.  He stopped, one arm folded across his chest, the cigarette perched against his lip, as if he had been about to take a long drag.  We made eye contact, and, in that second, I thought about the amount of time Kris has spent trying to catch this guy in the act of smoking in the hallway (right underneath the no smoking sign, mind you).  I thought of Kris' determination to drive him out, bleaching the hallway, convinced that the smell would be too intense for him to stay.  I thought of the mad dashes outside in the middle of conversations at just a wiff of smoke.  I thought of all these things, then broke eye contact and ran away, slamming Kris' door behind me.  It would have put some of Carrie Bradshaw's antics to shame.

And, true to form, I left Kris a note, explaining what had happened and apologizing for my lack of filling his shoes.

Confrontational situations: 2
Confrontations: 0

I don't know whether to label this as a win or a fail.  So, I'm also not going to confront that, and label this one a wail... or a fin... or a whale fin.  Yeah, that's it.  A whale fin.

May your day consist of whole creatures and not just their appendages.

<3,
Anne

Remembering to be Dead

Recently, a good friend of mine and I have been up, talking late into the night about everything from coffee to the ugliest scars on our hearts.  Maybe it's been a little irresponsible of us, as we're supposed to be adults now, going to our 9-5's (okay, 8:30-4:30 on his part, 9:30-4:30 on mine [for now], but you get the idea), and not staying up until 3am every night, but, as I'm trying to teach The Girls, sometimes, what society tells you to do isn't the most right option.  Let me explain why I think that is for this specific case.

I don't know if you've ever stayed up past the point of the second wind, past the point of delirium, all the way until the point of utter openness, but I'm going to work from the assumption that you haven't, as my high school English teachers taught me to do on my essays, so scroll on down if you already know what I'm talking about.  Everyone else, this is for you.  Anymore, my friend shows up around 8:30 or 9:30 at night, and, usually, neither of us have eaten (because we both apparently picked up European eating habits during our stints in Germany), so I'll start making some food; he'll generally start cleaning.  Neither of these tasks require too much brain power, so it really lends itself to opening a conversation.  So we talk.  And we eat.  And we laugh.  Maybe we'll watch a movie.  Maybe he'll help answer some of my questions about TESOL.  Then, one of us will do something that's not funny at all, but it will get the other one (okay... me) laughing uncontrollably, which will get the other laughing uncontrollably,  until we're both laying on the floor, staring at the ceiling, contemplating how to get the dust out of my overhead light.

Unavoidably, at this point, something will sneak up out of nowhere - this force I can't explain - and one of us will say, "Can I ask you a weird question?"  And then the openness has arrived.  So, the other will say, "Sure," and the conversation proceeds as if we're not baring our souls to each other, telling the other things that we're not even sure we've told ourselves yet.  Our most recent encounter with this stage has left my mind reeling for the past couple of days.  I've churned it over and over, knowing that he's Biblically correct, but unable to get any kind of firm grip on the topic, because, as our eyes met, and the word "Sure" tumbled over my lips, he asked me,

"Do you think you're beautiful?"

I didn't even need to hesitate, since I'd actually just been thinking of the answer, as I recalled my reflection in the elevator mirror from earlier that day.

"No; not at all."

"I thought so.  It shows in the way you relate to everyone around you.  I'm sure it won't mean much, coming from me, but I want you to know, I think you're a beautiful person."

I was stunned.  Absolutely stunned.  There was so much to contemplate there in the possible literal meanings of the phrase that it really just took me this long to make linguistic sense of it all.  But, as I listened to Matt Maher's Empty and Beautiful album tonight (the title track, specifically), it all seemed to click into place.  I could handle admitting that the areas of G-d in me are beautiful.  This is no problem for me to say.  What else would they be?  As I returned to these thoughts, while wrapping down for the night, the opening lines to the song caught me:

My past won't stop haunting me.
In this prison there's a fight between
Who I am and who I used to be.

And then I remembered:  For me, it's very much who I USED TO BE.  Because, like I've said, If not for G-d, I am dead.  It follows that those things within me that are separate from G-d must be dead.  All that is in me and makes me must be held extremely close to G-d, and, being that close, it cannot fail to reflect Him.  Just look at the story of Moses on Mount Sinai.  Therefore, I MUST be beautiful.

I'm not sure how this conclusion does much for me, other than clearing my head of one more lie that I've been sucked into, but I feel secure in knowing it, which seems like a good enough reason for me.  There are a lot of implications that I could go into about it, but, at this point, it is 2:06am, and I have my first TESOL presentation tomorrow, so I really should get some sleep.

Remember to be dead, my friends.