why i would imagine people sometimes think i’m homeless

Before I dive into this post, I would like to first like to give a shout-out to my Grams, whose birthday is in two days- which I will honor by not using swear words on this blog for as long as I possibly can.  She wrote me a letter last week which warmed my heart and made me miss L.A. a little bit and my family even more.  She’s an extraordinary woman, the Queen of the Sasspots, and I’m proud to be cut from the same cloth:

“Your mom printed out your Iraq/Iroquois and Moveable Bowl stories. I was enchanted and very amused.  You do indeed have a gift, not only in the telling of a tale but you write with a figurative twinkle in your eye at the absurdities of every day experiences.  That said - coming from an admiration of you I do add a HOWEVER…

My dear granddaughter.. the obscenities do spoil the piece, the slang words of the female anatomy as well as the f word make me cringe…their use is never pleasing coming from a woman. 

Onward and upward, a G-rated post about how I am starting to resemble a circus rodent who has fallen on hard times (eh, who am I kidding - this has been going on for a long time):

Exhibit A: Yesterday I was tired and stressed and in dire need of some warm human contact after a long day of classes, the last of which was supposed to start at 7:15pm and last until 9:15 - which I had every intention of attending - but then I decided that for the sake of my mental health it would be in my best interest to go to Bradley’s apartment so we could spoon and watch The Real Housewives of Atlanta.  I arrived at 6pm, remained conscious through one episode of utter hilarity, and then passed out on the couch in his arms - drooling, probably kicking my legs and barking, like a city dog having a dream about chasing a squirrel in a park. 

Bradley, being the sweetest, gentlest lamb of all the lambs in the world - tried to wake me up at 8pm, most likely to check if I was still breathing and not starting to decompose on his couch.  I groaned, half-awake, still in a dream state- wagging my tail and scratching my fleas.  He offered me two slices of pizza.  I obliged, ate the pizza, and fell back asleep. 

I finally wake up around midnight to Bradley asking if I want to sleep over, I say no - even though I’m not one of those people who is particular about where they sleep at night, really, I can sleep anywhere: under a bridge, a chair at Starbucks, the side of the road - ask him if I can borrow a hoodie or something, being that it had probably gotten colder since 6pm when I had last set foot outdoors, which of course he lent me because he is my lamb. 

I start walking from Parmentier, listening to ‘Love in this club,’ bobbing my head and making hand gestures out of the ‘Itsy bitsy spider’ lullaby, singing out loud the words, ‘Lamb, lamb, lamb, Bradley is my little lamb, soft like an infant, a little lamb he is, I want to weave blankets from his laughter and nuzzle in his belly button.  He bathes in morning dew and his touch is an angel’s whisper…Oooh how Bradley you are my littlest lamb.’  I don’t remember the rest of what I made up, but it sounded really creepy because I did it alternating in a baby voice and gangster affectations - somehow coordinating with the rhythm of the r&b opus ‘Love in this club’ - which became louder and louder the more amused with myself I was, until the song was over and I started to crack up.  I turned around - still bent over in laughter - to realize there had been a group of drunk people behind me, presumably for the entire duration of my performance. 

I changed directions and took the long way home so they wouldn’t call the police on me.

Exhibit B: Daily activity and general comportment.  

As I have mentioned before, there is a fine line in my brain between reality and the Rose S. Foran Musical Mystery Experience, which comes out in full force when I have spent prolonged amounts of time by myself, or if I’m so tired that I’m Not Entirely Convinced of my own existence.  I also have all of these elaborate inside jokes with myself, which I sometimes forget and makes for extremely awkward moments especially when I get mad at people for not remembering that Really Funny Thing I Said That One Time - only to realize that the comment in question was made in my head that one time I told all my friends I was too tired to go out and instead drank a half bottle of wine by myself in my apartment and spent the night dancing around in my cat mask, watching drunk people pass by on the street before falling asleep on top of my sheets in my clothes and cat mask. 

Sometimes I also like to think I live inside of a music video, the kind where the lead singer high-fives people passing by in the street and waves at babies and gives those scary looking anarchists with rabid dogs an enthusiastic thumbs up. 

The events of this morning were a montage of all of these elements: I came home from a nice workout in the pool, already looking pretty homeless because I was carrying a duffel bag, wearing my military jacket and dirty-looking jeans being that I haven’t done my laundry in weeks, no makeup and half-dried hair because the hair dryer at the pool stopped working suddenly and I didn’t have any more coins to use the one next to it.  As I exit the metro, I see a woman wearing a sweater that had the words “I love cats” on the back, which was, at that moment, the most hilarious thing I had ever seen in my life, so I start to crack up while I’m waiting to cross the street. 

As I’m crossing the street I see an African man in full African garb, and in the music video in question he would have thought it was equally hilarious, so I go to give him a high five but then reality sets in and I catch myself mid-high five - noticing that he had hurried past me in fear of being accosted by the Crazy Lady - and instead turn it into an awkward half-fist pump as if I was just really into the song on my iPod. 

I realize I am actually really into the song on my iPod, so I walk with more of a spring in my step, which causes me to spill some coffee on my jacket.  I look into my jacket pocket to see if I have any tissues to clean up the coffee, which I normally carry around just because I think it’s hilarious to have crumpled up tissues in my pocket at all times, but instead I find an unfinished packet of crackers from when I took the kids to the park the week before and they gave me the rest to throw away because they weren’t hungry any more. 

I eat the crackers just because I think it’s funny to eat food I find in my pockets - an inside joke I’ve had with myself for a long time.  I laugh out loud.  A man in a suit gives me a strange look and I give him a thumbs up. 

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