9:07 I sit on my mat at and ponder the other class members. Diary Girl, for instance – why does she bring her journal to a group exercise class? I wonder if she is recording how she feels about the stretch in her calves during downward facing dog, and the deep emotional issues that well up within her as she tries to maintain a neutral spine in plank.
A local accent draws our attention, a voice that is much too awake for 9:09 am. Townie Lady has an expired pass. Yes, it’s so old that it’s no longer legible, but she didn’t know they expire. Can she stay anyway? There is time to buy a one-visit pass before class starts, and it costs three dollars. Townie Lady’s purse is in her car. The Pilates instructor is graceful but firm, and Townie Lady leaves.
9:15 We are all eager to begin deepening our breath and lengthening through our spine when the sleepy peace is again disrupted. Townie Lady scans the full room, imagines a choice spot in the second row, and wedges herself between Good Cook and Diary Girl.
Diary Girl suggests that they might be too close. Townie Lady tells Diary Girl to scoot.
As Diary Girl moves without a word of reply, Townie Lady unrolls a bath towel over her mat. Does she have a sweating problem? Diary girl returns to her journal with new vigor to answer this question.
Filed under: Crazies
While I was home for the weekend, my sister flew into Columbus on her way back from New York. My foolish pretensions to adult city life are all to blame for what happened when Mom and I went to pick her up, because my mom would never have wanted to go to a Jazz and Ribs festival right in the middle of downtown at night. It was beautiful out, and we sat next to the Scioto river and listened to some good and some bad musicians improvise a musical style that we didn’t like to begin with… So it was supposed to be Brazilian jazz, but I could have sworn that half of the time it was two guys with mics, a tambourine and a pop bottle. You are being spared my imitations of them, but if you’re curious about the effect, try shouting “I visit my MAMA, I forget me shamPOO!”, followed by beating perfectly innocent instruments while you make the sound of a UFO landing in a cornfield by breathing into your mic.
This got old.
We decided to explore the food and people-watching options. The crowd was tremendous and spilled across both sides of the river, joined by a bridge that was closed to cars. The lines at the rib stands were roughly proportional to the height of their signs and/or trophy displays. On the other side of the river we saw even more people, even more rib stands, and heard a jazz piano that made us think that the other free concert was the place to be. We started walking across the narrow bridge lined with junk vendors.
Right before we got to the end of the bridge, people started running, shouting and screaming. I looked ahead and the whole crowd at the edge of the bridge seemed to be turning and running in our direction. The crowd bottlenecked on the bridge and we pushed up against the edge and crouched down. “Get out of their way!” “We’re going to get shot!” Two little girls next to us started sobbing and we all bent down and hung onto the chicken wire for a minute… Then it was over, and the event police were all headed to the end of the bridge. It’s hard to say what really happened, it was so fast. Mom says she saw twenty black guys running and heard at least three gun shots, but there was a lot of confusion, and even if she’s right, that kind of thing doesn’t make it into the paper in a place like Columbus.
Then we left for the airport, with my mom on edge at the slightest provocation. (Ok, so it didn’t help that some lady who was trying to cut into the turn lane called her an f***** b****.) I doubt she ever goes back downtown.
Filed under: Crazies
The other day Crazy girl went out, and came back a while later with two huge suitcases that she could barely fit through the door. I don’t know where she has been getting them, but apparently she has been working hard. Last night I walked into a living room lined with enormous suitcases. The one regular sized case looked like a small suitcase toadie hanging out with six suitcase thugs.
Filed under: Crazies
My roommate, the crazy one, has a history of complaining about other people making noise. She called the apartment security about our neighbors upstairs for stomping when none of the rest of us had heard anything. So I can only be entertained by this: last weekend, she started getting her groove on in the living room at four in the morning. I’ve seen her skip. Honestly, the sight brought to mind large hastening fairies, so I really can’t imagine what the dancing must have looked like. The important thing turned out to be how she offended the ears. Our apartment floor became the skin over a drum, and the apartment below us was the sounding chamber. Our neighbors did not appreciate the rhythmic qualities of the performance.
Filed under: Crazies
My craziest roommate, perhaps under the misguided impression that in an apartment with four people she can use all the facilities at any time without actually interacting with people, has a habit of running out of the common room whenever anyone else walks in. It’s hard not to take this personally, but it’s harmless.
I avoid spooking our kitchen bunny when possible, but I was chatting on my cell phone this afternoon towards dinner time and getting hungry. Finally I decided that I was being unreasonably accommodating, and I wandered into the kitchen area with my phone and a defrosted chicken breast. I tentatively scanned the terrain – The Fearful One was at the sink. She didn’t immediately flee. Perhaps she was being brave, perhaps I was blocking her speedy exit. I was impressed with her fortitude, but tried to ignore her so she wouldn’t become self-conscious.
As I talked and put my chicken in the pan, a little herb here, a little garlic there, I saw her moving out of the corner of my eye. I moved quickly. I was almost done in the kitchen when I looked up and saw that she had flanked my left wing and I was now directly in the line of fire. My hostile audible presence, lasting all of two minutes, had threatened her so much that she ran for her clock radio, plugged it in, strategically positioned it on the counter top where I was working, and pointed the blaring radio on me like a machine gun.
