Life in the Middle Lane

I like to surround myself with creative people.

In the past, I would have said that I like to surround myself with creative people because I don’t have a creative bone in my body.

I now know that this is not true. I do stuff.

However, while I accept my creativity, I have to keep it real. My creativity manifests mostly in my thought process, rather than in a physical form. I still can’t draw worth a damn. My paintings are all rather abstract (even when I don’t want them to be). My short stories have minimal plot (they are more like scenes than stories). And while my poems are the bomb (if I do say so myself), they are few and far between. And it has been far, far too long since I wrote anythng worth showing folks.

And that is why I’m hating on poets.

On Monday, I went to a spoken word thing.  I call it a “thing” because it wasn’t a slam or a competition, so I don’t know how to catergorize it. And for you local Triangle peeps, come bless the mic and tell me when so I can come clap for you. (Its every Monday night)

So.

This poetry thing was in Chapel Hill and was a very different experience from the Atlanta and Durham poetry things that I have gone to in the past.

Let me explain.

My Atlanta experience with poetry things has been really gay. Mostly women speaking on how much they love women and all the reasons why they love women and all the ways they love women.

And in Durham, the poetry things are rather militant and political. They talk about revolutions, and overthrowing the government, and smoking weed and embracing diversity.

Monday, the poets were mostly college kids, idealistic, sugary. They lacked the life experience to really talk about anything that makes you wanna holla. Some of the “deepness” seemed forced or contrived. Their pieces didn’t evoke any lasting emotion. There were a couple of times that I may have even snickered and thought, What the hell are they talking about?

But even in the midst of that, there were flashes of brilliance. Some of those kids had skills. They had word play, they had depth, they made me think, they made me listen. They made me jealous.

They had the gift. They were real poets, speaking of experience beyond their time, making me feel some kinda way.

That’s why I hate on poets.

I’m jealous of the way poets see and are in tune with people, situations, circumstances, emotions. Poets tell us how we feel. They tell our stories. Its like they know us (all of us) And then they have the nerve to add rhyme? Yep, I’m hating. ‘Cause I’m jealous.

I remember (in my younger years) when I could sit down with a pen and a notepad and the words would just…flow. And I would surprise myself.

And Monday, as I listened to these kids, I was reminded of my younger self, with my half-boiled, just below the surface emotions that I carried on my sleeve, and I was sad for me.

Young Monica was a poet. She could take a situation, (even an ugly one) flip that ish and make her momma say, where you copy that from? (True story)

Now, I don’t even know what I do. I’m hard. Cynical. Blah. Sometimes I think I’m sleepwalking. And I’m definitely not writing any poetry.

I’ve lost something. I’v ignored my sensitivity. I’ve ignored my humanity. Not is the sense that I don’t care about the world, ’cause I do care. But I look at life at an arm’s length. I don’t let anything get too close.

And its hard to write about emotional sh!t when you keep your emotions all locked up.

Monday, I took notes at the poetry thing. When someone said something that spoke to me, I wrote it down. Don’t know what I’m going to do yet. But I’m going to do something. Dammit.

I couldn’t sleep Monday night. I tossed and turned and wrote poetry in my dreams. Then I got up Tuesday and I couldn’t remember any of it. I would have felt better had I just sat up and let my pen work. *sigh

I gotta strengthen my flabby poetic muscles.

I’m going to keep going to poetry things. I’m going to let the gf give me painting lessons (and writing exercises) and I’m going to shake the dust off my raw emotion and let it out. I’m going to take more opportunities to think poetically.

Because I’m sick of hating on the poets and their ability to twist vocabulary in a way that makes my soul ache.

Sh!t, I used to be able to do the same thing.

This year was the first time I have ever dressed up from Halloween.

Weeks ago my friends and I were talking about how we were going to dress for the occasion. I heard so many sexy this or sexy that– totally not my style.  And since I grew up on Franklin, I’ve been there, saw that in terms of all the skanky chicks. It’s a bit overdone and I’m definitely over it.

But all the sexy talk got me thinking…

How about I take advantage of all the sexiness of my friends and go as a pimp? It sounded like a good idea at the time. I got to be sexy in an understated way. I got to play with wigs. I was fully clothed, thus staying relatively warm.

Unfortunately my Halloween didn’t go as well as planned. Why? I was so hyped about putting together my costume, dressing up, and going out, that by party time I was so sleepy that me, my wig, and my pimp cane could have gone to bed.  And my party partners were also rather tuckered out.

But we persevered!   We didn’t all just call it a night and go to bed.

Was Halloween a success? I don’t know. I tried to force it.  I tried to be a good sport since I put so much effort into making an effort but -in the end – I had to force it. And I probably should have stayed home.

Especially since the police shut down the party as we were walking towards it. At f-ing 1am. Sometimes Chapel Hill sucks.

I cannot wait to live in a place that knows that it wants to be a city and not some pseudo-village bull shit. Most cities would love to have 30,000+ people downtown eating and drinking and celebrating the city.  Not Chapel Hill. It is actively discussing ways to ask all those dollar spending people to take their dollars somewhere else.

Dear Chapel Hill,

Thanks for ruining the last Halloween of my extended childhood. I hate you today.

Signed, Monica

I had a really great idea that I was going to write about today, and I will get back to it later this week, but I am so mad right now that I have to vent. NOW!

Chapel Hill Transit and UNC-CH, you are both on my sh*t list today.

My day started off badly this morning with a headache and the memory of yesterday, all the crap that pissed me off and the midnight break-down that I had (complete with emotions and everything, ya’ll! GOSH!)

Got a couple of text messages this morning that made me smile and gave me the energy to roll my semi-depressed self out of bed. I have class today at 12:30, and an appointment with the cable guy at 10, so it was important that I get it moving today so that, in addition to my other problems, I wouldn’t start out the day being late.

So, I get started with my morning process and everything is going great, then I realize that it’s past 10 and the cable guy isn’t at my house. So I call him, leave him a voicemail and tell him that we need to set up a new time because I have to go to class. I’m a little pissed at this point because my gf has already told me that she’s not coming to NC unless I have cable. (and her visits are important to me, hee, hee)

I have a very nutritious brunch of chicken pie and peas (thanks, R!), I remember to take my vitamins and I head out the door. So far, things are ok. I know that at this late hour I won’t be a able to park at my usual park and ride, the FCX, because you have to be there at the crack of f-ing dawn to get a space. And I already have a $50 ticket for creating my own space. *sign.

Yesterday, I learned that the grocery store (Fresh Market ) and the apartment complex (Glen Lennox) that were my primary alternative parking arrangements are towing folks or at least threatening folks with brand new red signs, and I didn’t want to risk that drama. So I drive to a UNC visitor lot that usually lets me park even though I’m clearly a student As I turn into the lot I see the f-ing lot full sign, BUT THE LOT ISN’T FULL. I see several spaces available and at least 3 people paying to get out of the lot. But at this point, my only option is to back out into traffic (there is no room to turn around at the entrance to the lot). I’m more pissed now because this is a major street and leaving this lot in DRIVE requires me to take my life into my own hands. Needless to say, I do not want to back out into relentless on-coming high speed traffic. But I have to, so I just put old girl into reverse and gun it, slap her into drive and gun it. Luckily the hu-ganic Jeep that I cut off slows down in time not to completely ruin my day.

At this point, I’m desperate to park (but not desperate enough to park in the metered slots with no quarters. (That is a guaranteed ticket, and I’m trying to avoid more of those) So I drive AWAY from campus to another park and ride lot (Southern Village). I thought I’d safely find a space there since it’s a bit more out of the way and I thought would have less traffic. Dammit, this lot was almost full, I found a space. YAY! And I saw that the bus was there, so I got out of my car and started walking towards the bus stop. THE BUS PULLS AWAY AND LEAVES!!!!!! I curse a blue streak; scream into the heavens (probably scaring all the kids at a nearby elementary school). I continue walking towards the bus stop to check the schedule, b/c surely another bus is coming soon.

NOT SO. At 11:10 am, the next bus wasn’t due until 12:05. Since my first class starts at 12:30, even if I wanted to, I just don’t have the time to sit and wait. So I get back into my car and start thinking about where I’m going to park.

I decide that I’m going to have to park on a side street and hope that no one A. hits my car or B. has me towed, but first I swing back by the visitor lot to see if they removed the lot full sign. They had, and there was exactly one space available. Thank you, God, for having pity on me. I appreciate it.

Total time spent getting to school today? Roughly 40 minutes and a whole lot of gas. I left my apartment at 10:50 and didn’t get into the School of Government until 11:38. My life is Ri( f-ing)diculous today.

So I’m mad at UNC for having 8 billion students, staff, faculty, hospital personnel, and other assorted individuals on campus on a daily and not a damn place on campus for any of us to park. UNC, I bet you are planning on parking tickets as a revenue source aren’t you, you @ssholes?!?!?!? I hate you. Every day that I must trek to campus is a hassle because parking and riding from bum-f*ck remote location is a pain in my @ss.

More campus parking!!!!!!! Don’t build surface parking lots. Its’ bad for the environment, they take up more space, and there are never enough parking spaces. You could build an enormous 10 story parking deck on the same patch of land and fit 100’s more cars in it. But that makes too much sense and is too much like right. You want me to park illegally and get a parking ticket. I hate you.

Now, Chapel Hill Transit. I hate you, just for today, though. Tomorrow will likely be better for you. I usually enjoy my free bus rides. But how are you going to offer buses to and from park and rides and then only offer them once an hour? I mean, how are every 15, 20, or 30 minutes. When I left the park and ride, there were 2 other cars coming in. Who has the time to wait an hour for the bus? More importantly, if I could, I would kick that bus driver that f-ing left me. I know they saw me. I drove right by him on my way to the parking space.

And another thing. If you guys had printed the full bus schedule, (like you did last year!!) then I would have been more likely to know what f-ing time the Southern Village bus was supposed to come and I would have (maybe) been there earlier.

Now I have to go to my labor markets class that I didn’t do the reading for yesterday because I was too busy crying my eyes out and questioning my relationship. I hope you had a better Monday than I did, and a better Tuesday than I’m having.