I’ve often said that illegal adventures are the best but truth be told I’ve never seen a cop give a shit about J-walking. Wearing a blue flower dress, white sunglasses, carrying a pink Asian parcel as I dashed across the street and walking through the tall littered sprinkled grass along a busy road… I must have been an unusual sight. However not all that unusual for this is Columbus.
Hanging in a room each of us doing our own thing. Smoke like mist hovering in the air as music from a cell phone combines with the natural lighting to create an atmosphere of lazy late summer day complete freedom breath of fresh air.
As I sit here I think to myself It’s amazing how many places one can be all at once. In this room, in a chair, lost in thought. Running through my mind, Dancing in their memories. A name on the tip of your tongue, a catch in the throat. I’m thinking I’ll use that in a short story at some point. Copyright 7/6/2013 once this post is posted.
The outside is a swell of heat and a pool of human beings. Push and squeezing through the crowd to find our way back to the corn hole.
Dancing to Come on Eileen singing the lyrics, I can’t say for sure we distracted the boy’s game but I hope so.
Swanky drinking half a pitcher of beer straight from the pitcher.
Last call music stops. The background bouncy tunes are replaced by a sea of voices that spike and slur into a mixture of conflicting noises.
Suddenly the birthday 21 is yelling and I am inside a crowd of people. There are men yelling and I see body’s fly backward. The whole crowd backs up. Cleo and I are drowning in the masses as the birthday 21 is yelling from somewhere within the thick of the throng. Another girl yells and guys yell. People keep telling people to drop it and leave.
What: Thanks to the cat in my lap I now have to lean awkwardly over my keyboard. It kinda hurts my wrist to type but I could never refuse this boy
8:00 I started a shift at the IT labs of Sinclair Community College. I feel silly wearing my purple pig tails but I wore a paper clip in my hair all day a few weeks ago so I really don’t know why I would be bothered. Self conscious Friday I suppose. A large chuck of the spacy universe that is mind was anxious about the meeting for Dayton City Paper at 6. I had really regretted my outfit to the last one and I wanted to make a better impression at this one. I was also worried about having forgotten shorts to wear under my dress which is also an impression I didn’t want to make.
I slept in quite enjoyably then looked out my window to a world of snow.
“It was warm enough to wear a skirt yesterday what the hell Ohio!” I exclaimed to the universe with my fist clenched and raised toward the sky.
Wide eyes and a deep inhale, we breathe in air of Convention. You can smell dusty vintage, plastic of brand new, sweat, perfume, energy drinks and popcorn. The sounds of a thousand voices mingle together to form a static buzz that floats in the air pumping you up with excitement.
We parked further back than the usual lot. Out near the train track it’s an unfamiliar corner of graffiti and trash. (I’d been given two shots back in the kitchen before we even left the house so I had a start before the start.) I took several swigs from my water bottle of death, then we stepped out of the car.
It was around 3 or 4 I believe. It was cold and basically everybody was at Dublin Pub. That was where I wanted to go but this had been Rei’s idea and she said no to the D-pub.
The sky was overcast into a gloomy dark gray. The wind was a bitter breath down the back of your neck. I should have sensed this foreboding but instead I imagined this was what the weather must be like in Europe this week. The parking lot was full of pot holes and broken bottles. Oh Dayton Ohio my home sweet home.
Out on the street it’s cleaner and more familiar. Rei senses a letdown for the night. “Nobody’s out,” she complains. Determined to have some sort of St. Patrick’s Day outing we decided to hang out at Trolley Stop for a few hours until more people appear.
Greencoat was in the ER when we got there. His head was wrapped up in a very silly manner but I couldn’t laugh for the blood on the pillow and sheets was an unnerving reminder of how serious this could have been. He’d gotten a skull fracture and 19 stiches. He seemed more tired than loopy to me. In any case it was scary and weird to see Greencoat, my brother from another mother, in a hospital ER like this.
So we did what you do when someone you are close to is in the hospital. We hung out and talked. We talked about what happened, about family, about books and pets. Rei had snuck in the beer she got Greencoat to show him (Which made for some funny pictures). I had snuck in some cookies but apparently he was on a no restrictions diet so my daring purse smuggling adventure had been completely unnecessary.
So anyway now it’s Sunday and here I sit. I know I need to do all that homework I’ve been putting off. It looms over my head like a evil dark rain cloud. All these things I’d planned on doing throughout the week. All this procrastination has wadded up and rolled like an avalanche onto my one last true day of Spring break. I go back to work and school tomorrow. Back to the stress and consistent demands, back to the daily grind, back to getting up at five in the morning. Part of me wants to put it off for just one more day…