Nothingness

Geez it's ridiculous that I even have to remind myself to breath sometimes. You might think I'm exaggerating, but similar to the way I grind my teeth and clench my jaw without noticing, I find myself forgetting to circulate oxygen through my lungs. Why? Oh, because my life is stressful and I have more on my plate than I can handle.

FALSE. My life is amazing and I'll never have more than I can handle unless I bring it on myself (which I think I unconsciously love to do. Sick.)

Today I needed a day of rest and relaxation. I mean that seriously. I think if I don't take some time to do nothing on behalf of my sanity that I might actually blow a fuse, short a circuit, whatever.

So my nothingness is cleaning my room, finishing my book, and turning up my radio full blast (must to the displeasure of my roommates below me. Please, who am I kidding? They love it). Next step: shower.

Spontaneity

Some crazy stuff has sparked some crazy ideas to my brain lately and I feel a sudden urgency to do the most random things in my life.

1. I am reading a book called Stiff by Mary Roach about  cadavers. Call me morbid but I'm completely enthralled. I even read it while I'm eating. Yesterday, granted, it was not such a good idea. Del Taco and embalming kind of didn't settle well together. But now I want to take Anatomy in school before I graduate. Why not?

The book is full of random facts you never knew you wanted to know about dead bodies. The following is my favorite example thus far:
                 
"...when we're alive, we expel that gas. The dead, lacking workable stomach muscles and sphincters and bedmates to annoy, do not. Cannot. So the gas builds up and the belly bloats. I ask Arpad why the gas wouldn't just get forced out eventually. He explains that the small intestine has pretty much collapsed and sealed itself off. Or that there might be "something" blocking its egress. Though he allows, with some prodding, that a little bad air often does, in fact, slip out, and so, as a matter of record, it can be said that dead people fart. It needn't be, but it can."

I carry this book around with me everywhere. I can't put it down and people are starting to think I'm a little weird. It has the dead people feet with the little time of death tag on the cover. A little disarming, I know. Maybe I should switch my major to forensics. Just kidding everyone!! Just kidding!!

2. Last night my friend helped me replace my radiator in my car. When I say "helped" I really mean he did it. Naturally, I now want to go work in a mechanic's shop for a year or so and learn how to fix my own cars. It's not that hard. I need tools though... Just another expense, no big deal. But all you have to do is disconnect and connect the hoses. I got this.

3. A friend of mine told me she used to institute a practice called "Naked Wednesdays" at her house. The girls would come home, lock the doors, close the blinds, and wander around naked. Gutsy.
(omitting illustration on this one)

4. This same friend made a drive to the California coast just a few months ago because she wanted to. By herself. She slept in her car. Awesome. I'm doing it. But to Oregon. The magical land of my childhood. Cannon Beach, here I come.

I want to be able to tell my kids I did some awesome things. Like walking around naked... Yeah, I'd probably omit that from my stories to them if I ever actually worked up the nerve to do it. Which I won't. So omission is unnecessary.

But I actually might find it necessary to omit to my parents that I'm planning on driving to the coast by myself. I just need to. In the words of Kirsten Dunst from Elizabethtown, "To have never taken a single, solitary roadtrip...?" And I want to learn anatomy. I want to fix my own car. I can do this. All of it. Why not? And as my father pointed out, I'll never have more time than I do right now.

...and then I hit the floor

So I was at work doing my job. I am a frequent visitor of that place. But honestly I had just recently returned from a short hiatus that involved a lovely trip to Arizona- that place where it doesn't snow (much, except maybe in Flagstaff). Despite the weather, I was kind of happy to be back seeing as how I am one of those freaky weird people who likes having a routine and thinks that vacation is slightly stressful.

Having missed my coworkers and even a few of my clients, I thought the day was going well. And then it hit me... or rather I hit it... or, even better, my elbow hit it- it being the countertop- and my world went spinning or crashing down, whichever saying you prefer, they're both accurate.

I began to walk back to my computer, feeling a sadly familiar dizzy sensation with each step. With my back turned to my client, I was hoping she hadn't quite noticed my teetering footsteps. As I reached my computer I could convince myself to do nothing except rest my forehead against it. Try as might, I couldn't convince myself to stand erect after I had placed my forehead on the monitor. I couldn't move.

So I told me coworker that I needed him to take the receipt back to the client because I was going to pass out. How did I know this for sure? I'll get to that. He grabbed me by the waist and tried to take me somewhere to sit but I declined. I am stupidly stubborn sometimes. I knew I was going to pass out but I decided to stay standing? Idiot. As he's walking back from delivering the receipt apparently I slumped onto the counter and then my knees gave out as I gracefully swooned into his arms. Honestly, I think he's a lucky guy to have been able to play the Knight in Shining Armor. He said he caught me much more gracefully than I fell... dangit.

Suddenly I was somewhere else entirely, or at least I thought I was. I was dreaming within a fraction of a second. So when I woke up to Ryan standing over me, Richard propping up my feet, and Brendan on the phone saying something about his employee passing out I was caught off guard- as anyone would be. I immediately tried to sit back up. Why I did this I really don't know because that's really not a brilliant idea after fainting. But obviously my faculties were not at their peak.
I love hearing my coworkers tell the story. I turned blue, I was out for fifteen seconds, I wasn't breathing. It sounds terribly dramatic and dangerous. And yet it continues to make me laugh. If I had started seizing or peed my pants I probably wouldn't be so keen to laugh about it. Kevin started laughing because he said I reminded him of the fainting goats. Well that's flattering.

Yep, that's real. Watch it for yourself here.

I really came back to when my boss said something to the paramedics on the phone about an ambulance. I immediately retorted, "I don't need an ambulance!" There are two reasons for my vehement decline of their services. One, I don't like paying for medical expenses and I am stupidly stubborn about seeing doctors. Unbelievable, I know. I'll spend $100 on a pair of jeans but nothing for my health. Two, I knew what had caused my little dizzy spell.

Yes folks, it was my elbow. Because I hit my elbow I blacked out. It's embarrassing, nay, even mortifying. And yet, so ridiculously funny. My friends tried to hit it later that night to see if I'd do it again. First off, nice. As if I'd like to pass out twice in a day. Second, punching my elbow is not going to make me pass out. But how did I know this? Oh, I've done it before. Don't worry, it's normal for people to hit their elbow and pass out maybe once in their lifetime. I'm apparently the only idiot who does it twice though. I called my dad and he just laughed, recalling the incident in high school (imagine waking up to your choir director poised directly above your head) where I'd done it previously. Still, my dad could have shown a little sympathy.

They took me to the doctor the first time and he said it had something to do with a vasovagal response. I included the wikipedia page in case you think I'm making this up. Although it says nothing concerning elbow hitting.

Dear Cafe Rio

Please don't make me throw up in front of my Spanish tutor again.

Thank you.

Oh Here I Am!

Sorry guys. Sorry for taking a little leave-of-absence. Relax, I'm back. In honor of my return to the blogging world I have decided to post a few poems that have gracefully fallen from my lips recently. I was just kidding about the graceful part but you could say they fell in a certain manner I suppose.

This first one comes from a dialogue I tend to have with myself on occasion. Yeah, I talk to myself.

My Heart is Broken
One:
The pain in my chest is more than I can bear-
Oh, why this blasted eternal ache? 
No God, this life is never fair
If my heart only continues to break.

Two:
Wait, what?
Your heart is broken? you must be dead
Your logical fallacies are hurting my head.
A heart cannot be broken, as you say
but after it stops it can rot and decay.
If rot and decay this moment do beset
then I hope, dear one, your mind is cleared of all regrets.
For soon your thoughts will be no more.
Which will spare us who think your whinings a bore.

This second poem came about when my professor asked me to freewrite about the word "death-marked." Naturally I thought of Muppet Treasure Island and began rhyming from there.

 Death-Marked

Upon my brow, I swore there lied

A funny mark thereon that tied

My life to death, quite ominously

Man and woman, both, avoided me.

Don't worry, I know they're weak sauce. I'm taking a poetry writing class in the fall, that should help.

Fashion- Oh How I Love It

Again, it's one of those things I don't like to admit to. When people ask me where I purchased this shirt or that sweater I will tell them, but I won't like it. I feel like a snob. So I usually add something like, "But I bought it at the outlet!" It makes me feel better, what?

I get this warm fuzzy feeling when people tell me I look cute. Sure, I shrug it off like it's nothing, but deep inside I hoard up all of those moments and when I feel particularly scrubbish I take a peek at them to rejuvenate my fashionista spirits. Something so materialistic probably shouldn't make me quite so happy.

But I had one such moment in class the other day. A friend of mine who's not yet an English major but soon will be said, "You have cool color constructions. I like the evolution of that." Yeah buddy. You know who you are. Bless you.

Book Blurred Vision

As if I've been drinking, every word I type is doubled-- like there's a mirror image just underneath every single letter. Have I been drinking? you ask. I reply no. Although I'm sure alcohol is absolutely titillating for some, it really has never called my name.

So what is it exactly that has blurred my vision? Only the few, the proud, and the nerdy can truly know what I'm talking about here. I call it "Book Blurred Vision."

Allow me to backtrack in order to defend myself. My life is careening constantly toward chaos (note the alliteration. Thank you. I hope that last period I typed was really a period and not a comma because I can't tell). I'm exhausted by all of the things I have to do! However, I strangely love it. Snuggly holding me together like my best pair of skinnies, my busy life is actually my best friend. I wouldn't be happy without it.

But I can't always be busy. I'm wearing down. The slight tickle/pain in my throat is a warning of impending doom-- or just a virus, if you prefer me to be non-melodramatic. So today, on this lovely president's day, I did nothing. Nothing, that is, but read a book. Was it for school? Oh no friends. It was a book about werewolves... and it was lovely. It was sad, sweet, tender even. And I enjoyed her writing style and how it changed when she changed the voice as a rhetorical device.

Yes, it was young adult. But for all of you shaking your heads at me, I pose a question: Why would my University bother to require a young adult fiction class if they were worthless? It wouldn't. Therefore, day well spent. I just can't see at the moment. Please excuse any typos.