Saturday, September 18, 2004

Pathology of an Affliction

I feel like purging. A vomitmous vomitus of words. Bile spewing streams of letters and punctuation. If you choose to not read this effluence, I would hardly hold it against you.

I woke up at 1:11 in the afternoon. I've never been much of a morning person but this still strikes me as an outrageous hour to rejoin the waking world. But it was gray in Berkeley today, summer is ending.

I dressed in blue jeans, a t-shirt, a jacket. Standard issue studentware. I packed my books and left the apartment because I needed to cocoon myself in the soft hum of background civilization. I may not always want to be part of humanity but I certainly want front row seats.

I sat in Cafe Milano for several hours, trying to memorize the steroid pathways of the adrenal cortex and gonads. I can tell you the most basic reason why a man is a man. It's unfortunate we choose to complicate things.

I went to the library in a fruitless search for a book. On the lowest floor of the main stacks in the far back corner of the entire library I kneeled between two shelves of books that move on tracks. I started to get dizzy. I held on to the shelf and look up at the ceiling. Suddenly I pictured myself passing out, saw my body splayed out between the books on AIDS and yellow fever. Who would find me? How long would I lay there unconscious? I decided that the book had probably been taken off the shelf but not checked out and got up to leave. I walked slowly out of the library, still feeling light headed.

I went into Moe's book store. On my way out I felt happy. Like I was floating, whatever had made me light headed in the library was now spreading. My entire body was light. I dug in my pocket for some change to give the polite homeless man. I've given him change before, I know he'll still be on the corner tomorrow, next week and probably next year. He doesn't need change, but I can't give him what he needs so I'll give him my laundry money instead.

I sat at my computer and fell into the same old resentment and hurt as I type out IMs. My tumble into this familiar place is hardly the other person's fault since there are a few very different people who can elicit this in me. Unfortunately I lack median ground. The floating is gone, now I just feel shakey and weak.

My roommate came home, not the one who write a blog. She's going to a party that is prom-themed. She wanted me to go with her but I have noting to wear. I don't even have a skirt. Unless it goes with converse, I don't own it. After she assembles something appropriate out of bits and pieces and I find that I can walk quite well in heels. The overly sweet chemical smell of the nail polish makes me stomach clench.

Five dolla make you holla baby.




1 comment:

Luna said...

Baby, seeing how it was my dress, I want to see that picture up here. ;)