Because my last day here at the office is a week from tomorrow and there is still a stack of at least 100 things to do overflowing my desk, shining with the white of printouts and purple and yellow of file folders (like a sunset but not nearly as pretty...yeah...) and because this is a busy job ANYWAY, not only when I'm #1) trying to wrap all my tasks in little bows without loose ends for those after me and #2) hosting THREE conferences in the last two weeks before my departure (that's right, one today and yesterday, one tomorrow, one next week), and since I'm looking like various degrees of this:
Or this, for a pretty blog's sake...
Both images courtesy of google image search for "pulling hair out", by the wayBut.
Since this happened, and since I have five minutes during which that I should probably step away from the pile on my desk before I lose my mind ("put down the hammer"), I thought I would vent a little.
Wait, what?
Charis, of the life-is-wonderful-1001-ways-to-be-happy-blogging-style is about to vent?
Yeah, it happens sometimes.
So here we go.
Each morning, I arrive to the office bright and early at 7:30am (that is, mind you, after an hour of traffic). I park my lovely little blue saturn (which I'm dropping off at the dealer on Saturday, sniff) across the street from campus and make my way to the office, unlocking doors and turning on lights and all that sort of starting-the-day business. I work the next hour and a half away quietly, and at 9:00am, I make the reverse trip back across campus and scoot my car across the street again, to park in 9:00-4:00 street parking. Quite convenient, as I leave the office at 4:00pm.
During my walk to the car at 9 I do things like make phone calls, listen to the parrots overhead making a racket as usual, or contemplate the meaning of life. You know, the usual.
This morning, I decided to call T and check on his day so far. We're both under a lot of stress about the move and accompanying factors, so I thought I would see how he was doing.
He recounted some morning reading (perhaps we'll have a green check blog post tomorrow because of its craziness, more on that at another time), we discussed healthy eating, escape to Canada, and the food industry's corruption as I made my way across a busyish street towards my parked car. After the busyish larger street, I have to cross a small residential street where I only encounter a car actually driving about, roughly, hmmm, I'd say once every two weeks, maybe once every week and a half.
As I diagonally crossed the little avenue towards my car, head bent towards my phone, key chain out and unlocking the car via keyless entry, I was assaulted with a loud, angry blaring horn blast about five feet away from me and over my left shoulder.
Surprised, incensed, and (not gonna lie) a little scared, I turned around to first of all see what the heck was going on, and second of all to express the ridiculousness of blasting a horn at a person two steps away from their car (not to mention yours).
Directly behind me, in a beat up little gray honda or something (I couldn't really tell the color or the make right away, there wasn't much paint left and the horrificalness of the whole spectacle somewhat blinded me) was a sour-faced man, probably about my parents' age, with a badly balding head and a scowl.
As I said sharply "I'm crossing the street!", because clearly he took me as being out for a pleasant stroll, notwithstanding the keys in my hand held up to a car 1.7 feet away from me that I was directly walking to, and because clearly he was the type of person who has the emotion (and perhaps total) maturity of a toddler so that's how you must speak to them, he snapped "blahblahridiculousness your time!" and zoomed off.
I would like to note first of all, that he didn't meet my eyes for more than a split second. It's a little different when the object of your random act of hatred (which is probably one of many) turns around and looks you in the eye, huh? During the rest of his momentary rant his eyes ran around like frightened mice, although his voice sounded slightly more sure of itself. Only slightly. Either way, the lazer beams of Charis' eyes strike again, as a man at least double her age tries to take her down in a staring contest. Bad idea, Sir.
But okay. To be fair, I wasn't exactly scurrying. Considering that what I've roughly translated his gibberish to mean is something like "you're taking your time!" or "quit taking your time!" or something about gathering moments for my own personal use rather than donating them to kind individuals like himself in general, I get it. I was walking diagonally, and not all that quickly. I wasn't strolling, but I certainly would have crossed faster if I had known that there was someone waiting.
However, this brings me to my next point. OBVIOUSLY he had zoomed around the corner like a bat out of the 8th circle of hell, because I never heard a thing until his horn was shouting at me. I would have known he was there by the sound of his clanking and banging engine, surely, if he had done anything other than take the turn at no way near a safe speed and expect to be able to press harder onto the gas pedal on the straightaway of the street immediately after the turn, rather than wait for a pedestrian.
So I apologize that I don't have a psychic ability to spot a lunatic coming towards me from 200 paces. I'll work on it, Sir.
And finally, I think we should have a moment of silence for this poor soul. After my heart returned to its normal beating pace and pattern, I started for a moment to wish for the bad karma to hit him that, a second later, I realized has certainly already hit him, probably did years ago, and that those hits obviously keep coming. A happy person who leads a fulfilled life would not sling hatred like that at someone that could have, in another circumstance, been introduced to him as a friend of his offspring. But let's be honest, his gaze would never have traveled closer to my face than 6.5 inches below it anyway. He's obvious a very respectful and mature person. I'm sure his life totally rocks too. Because of course that type of behavior comes from a stand-up kind of guy who only makes good decisions...
Of course, that is unless he is one of the many Southern California residents who are perfectly nice in person but morph into fire breathing demons when put behind a wheel and on a highway...because that certainly happens.
But that's a post for another day.
Have I mentioned that I cannot wait to leave?
Today's whiteboard quote:
"Begin at once to live and count each day as a separate life."
~Seneca
