Today is the second day in a row that I’ve put 4 brand new bobby pins into my pocket, intending to use them in my hair as soon as it’s sort of dry, and after arriving at work found that I only have 3 bobby pins left. I’m not sure where the fourth one goes, I mean it must fall out somewhere, but when? This morning, after realizing that I only had three – AGAIN – I spotted something on the floor of the car in the passenger side, and pounced on it, thinking it was an abandoned bobby pin. But alas, it was a piece of plastic trash. Lucky for me, the person who sat at this desk before me left a SINGLE bobby pin in a cup of paper clips. Victory!
Last weekend I went and saw Sam’s new baby. He’s gorgeous. I held him for over 2 hours and he didn’t cry. Just made sleepy noises. Adorable. Plus he was dressed in a little froggie onesie. Why do babies get all the cute clothes? I want a froggie footsie onesie with sleeves that turn into little mittens. That sounds so comfortable.
Anyone else enraptured with Charlie Sheen’s downward spiral?
Another middle school today. This one all around much better than the last one. I think I’m sort of getting the hang of just NOT being the students’ friend. I like it, in a way. It gives me an outlet. No worrying about making a great first impression, or being charming or funny. Just no-nonsense, sit down, shut up, take out your lang arts book. Love it.
I always notice the one smart, bookish, no-fuss kid. The one who rarely says anything (I’m not talking about the raising-her-hand, I’ve-got-all-the-answers kid). Just the regular kid who is going through middle school.
Last week there was a kid who finished his worksheet, turned it in, put his pencil away, and then pulled out a book and started reading – all silently. Love that kid. Loved him even more when I saw he was reading Stephen King’s Misery. I kind of wanted to say something to him (like, “Have you read it before? Do you love it??”) but he was still near the beginning, and I didn’t want to be a total creeper.
There was a kid this morning who also silently started the worksheet. When I said they could work QUIETLY in pairs, he raised his hand and said, “Do we have to work in pairs?” No, no you don’t – I hated group work also. Much easier to just do it and get it done.
In my sixth/seventh period today there was a kid who looked annoyed/fed up with his classmates’ antics (and there were a lot of them). At one point he said, “Can I talk to you?” and I said, “Yeah, what’s up?” and he said, “Can you make a list of all the names of the kids who were being good?” I guess he could foresee the mediocre report I gave the teacher about that class. Then he said, “I finished the reading questions.”
“Did you finish the worksheet too?” He nodded, face in hands and elbows on desk. “Both sides?” Another nod.
Then he said, “I’m bored.”
All I could say (and no one else was listening, so I felt it was safe) was, “I know you are, I know how you feel. I promise you it will all pay off one day. Don’t let it discourage you.”
He just nodded some more, looking resigned.
Oh, smart kids. Please don’t let the monotony of middle school (or high school, or life) get you down. Eventually you get a chance to stretch out and grow.
And then in college you’ll learn the joys of skipping class. So work it while you’ve got it.
I bet Smart Kid would know better than to put unnecessary quotation marks.
It is a truth universally acknowledged, that a single young man, between the ages of 4 and 14, in possession of a good fortune, must be into singing Justin Beiber songs.
Or so I’ve learned over the last four days, when I have been in a preschool (on Friday) and a middle school (today) and both times have been faced with boys singing “Baby” and “Never Say Never.” This is surprising to me because in my world, Justin Beiber is low on the radar: I don’t really hear his music on the stations I listen to, and I don’t really pay attention to him except when he pops up in front of my face somewhere. In my head he’s like an 8-year-old boy, even though I know in real life he’s like 16 and probably doing all kinds of things with girls (yuck). In my world we don’t really acknowledge Justin Beiber, and we would probably make fun of anyone singing his songs (even though we might get them stuck in our heads sometimes, because they’re adorably catchy, but not in a way that makes them art, or anything).
On Friday this little boy was singing “Baby” while we were walking them over to breakfast, and I thought that was cute. It was a little weird, but I thought, Eh, he’s four years old. The rowdy 12-year-old this morning was a different story – I kind of wanted to ask if it was cool of him to be singing those songs. But whatever.
Other than (and even including) Beiber, the preschoolers were cute. Here are some stand out moments from the day:
-This little girl (we’ll call her “M”) deciding we were besties, and spending most of the morning cutting out paper hearts for me.
-M holding my hand while walking back from breakfast, and then pointing at this other little girl (who, unfortunately, had flaky skin all over her face and hands, and looked like she needed to be bathed in cortizone-10 or something), and saying
M: Her says bad words.
Me: Does she?
Flaky girl: *looks up at me with big brown eyes* My mommy teaches them to me.
-This super cute little round-faced boy with big nerdy glasses goes, “Everyone says I look like Denzel Washington.” (I’m thinking, “Not likely.”)
Me: What’s your name?
Kid: Denzel.
Me: …Ah.
-All the kids were dancing to some song where you put your beanbag on your head and dance around! on your shoulder and dance around! on your elbow and dance around! etc. And this one kid was sitting at the table all slumpy, and I said, “Don’t you want to dance?” and he said, “I wanted to dance, but this song is driving me CRAZY.” Touché, kid, me too.
-The most memorable thing for me about the day (as of right now) is that they got me SICK. Which I guess I kind of expected, everyone told me it’s a job hazard, whatever. On Saturday my throat started hurting and then it’s kind of devolved from there. I think it’s a sinus thing now. On Sunday morning I used cough syrup to swallow cough pills. I’m hitting this thing hard.
I even ran around with them at recess, playing tag and hide and seek. The next day I questioned whether getting that involved was the right choice: sure it’s good if you’re a babysitter, but should a teacher be playing like that? I’m not sure which way I lean on this. The older teachers didn’t play, but the younger ones seemed more willing. So maybe I’m just right in the middle. A friend of mine (who has a 4-year-old) says playing with kids is always good, because you’re fostering the right things in them, so I should never be concerned about that.
A Typical Middle Schooler (Picture from Paramount)
After my day with the little kids I kept thinking, High school can’t be harder than this. But I forgot to account for middle schoolers, the Grendel of the education system. I was at a middle school today and these are the lessons I learned:
-Middle schoolers are bitches.
-Don’t give them the benefit of the doubt. Just be strict from the very beginning. And through the middle. And then at the end.
-Don’t trust them. They don’t really have to go to the bathroom. They’re just going to wander around for 15 minutes and then come back and claim they had “a problem.”
I have to give them a little break, because in two of the Social Studies classes we watched a video on the Silk Road. It was exactly what you’d expect from an oldschool video that a sub would show; and bonus points on the references to the USSR! I felt bad that they were supposed to take notes, because even I wasn’t sure what I’d write down, but when one of the kids started complaining super loudly I was like, “This is my second time watching it, how do you think I feel?”
The best teacher today was the young Chinese woman who ruled that class with an iron fist. They called her evil; I called her magnificent.
But I figured out why HR said that a lot of subs don’t want to go to the preschool: it’s 7:00-3:00: 8 hours, minus lunch. But I was only at the middle school from 8:30 to 2:30: 6 hours minus lunch! Sweet! Still, middle schoolers suck.
However, I had a really good time both days, and I am making great strides in learning. Just trying to keep track of everything I’m learning. I’m in two high schools this week and then on Friday I get a break (unless I get a call). Life hasn’t been boring lately, that’s for sure.
In Whole Foods the other day I was standing in front of the chocolate section, trying to decide what was the closest to a plain old Kit Kat. (Why only fancy chocolate, Whole Foods? Why only special brands? That’s your major flaw. Sometimes I just want Yoplait or Diet Coke or M’n’Ms.) A woman with flyaway gray hair came up behind me, carrying a reusable grocery bag with a cat on it, and, while selecting fruit leather, said, “Where’s Jam.”
At least that’s what I thought she said. But maybe she was asking for Jim. So I ignored her. Until she looked right at me and said, “Where’s jam. Do you work here?”
“I don’t work here.”
“Oh. They wear dark colors here.” I was wearing all black, having just run over from tech. (Wearing all black in a not-well-lit intersection also caused me to be almost hit by not one but two cars. But that’s another story.) I didn’t have an answer for her. I guess I could have said, “They also wear green aprons.”
Then I reached for a bar of dark chocolate with candied orange, and she asked, “Is that your normal brand? Chocolove?” I guess she was trying to show we were just friends. Eye roll.
I said “No” politely and then hightailed it for the checkout lane. I think she stayed behind to look over the 2011 “Bohemian Cats” calendar with all the cats doing needlepoint and stuff.
I feel like this happens to me a lot. I am constantly getting asked where things are. Not even, “Do you work here?” Just straight up, “Where’s the conditioner?” When I know where the thing is, I’ll just tell them. This happens at Target, at Trader Joe’s, at Whole Foods. Maybe I just look competent.
Yesterday I did something that I had been putting off all weekend: I went to the gym.
All weekend, I wanted to go to the gym – at least that little part of me that enjoys the endorphins and feeling good afterward did. But the rest of me thought, It’s my last weekend of vacation. I went 7 times already over my break, one more than my goal. I’m tired. I should hang out with Drew while he’s home.
Not to mention, it’s New Year’s weekend (is that a thing?) and all the well-meaning New Year’s gym resolution makers will be flooding my little corner of 24 Hour Fitness. Do I really want to get bumped to a treadmill because all the ellipticals are taken?
So I waited until Monday and then went around noon, when I figured everyone would be at work already. I was still a little anxious about getting in there, but it wasn’t bad at all. I don’t look forward to trying to go after work, but if I can just stick it out for now, everything will probably be back to normal in a month or so, right?
This is the first time ever that I’ve been able to start the new year with such a sense of superiority and satisfaction. I’m not trying to create any new impossible habits or anything. I’m just trying to keep up the habits I’ve been enforcing lately. I like this feeling. I lost twenty pounds over the last year, and that was all in about 6 months of actually trying. So I’m upping the ante a little this year, and shooting for another thirty. (That’s my resolution #4.)
On that note, Drew pulled out a coat he hasn’t worn since New York, and found a receipt in his pocket. It’s from April 2009, deep in our Atkins phase. Disclaimer: the Atkins website does not say that when you do Atkins you can just eat butter and bacon. The official program promotes limiting carbs, and eating lean proteins and vegetables. If you eat the way they say you should, it’s super healthy and nice.
The problem is, no one can live like that forever. Which Drew and I discovered quickly, as you can see, since we started Atkins in March, and by April we had already figured out all the ways to eat Atkins-friendly junk food.
Two packs of salami, garden vegetable cream cheese, Diet Coke, Coke Zero Cherry, and sugar-free chocolate pudding. Yum. This is what I like about weight watchers – not to sound like their commercial or anything, but it is a way of life. I just keep thinking, “Stop dieting, start living.” Good slogan.
I still shudder when I pass the sugar-free candy in Rite-Aid. Ugh.
Outside of my apartment building, in the front (the prime parking area), there are 8 parking spots. If those are full you have to go all the way around the side (which is all of 30 seconds further away). In the prime parking area, one of the spots is twice as long as the other spots – allowing you to park two cars in it. The person who holds this parking spot is guaranteed room for an extra car, plus the assigned parking spot that comes with your rent.
For the past 6 weeks or so, that spot has been held by the same trio of cars. For the first 4 weeks, it was a mini-SUV parked there that never moved, while a silver car that was always unlocked and a pale green car rotated parking behind it. This irked me, as I thought that it was greedy. Also, the fact that they have three cars, all with parking permits, means that there’s no way they live in a 1-bedroom apartment, and all of the apartments in our building (all 6 of them) are 1-bedrooms. Also, I sort of know everyone in our building (5 occupied units and 1 unoccupied) and I’m 98% sure that that trio of cars doesn’t belong to anyone in Bldg K.
One night, the complex’s security people came around and tagged all the cars without permits, warning them that they would be towed. They do this every so often. The mini SUV and the silver unlocked car were okay, but the pale green car had an orange sticker on the driver’s side window. Delighted, I read the sticker (nosey!). The car had a permit, but the registration was expired!
The next day I noticed that the SUV was gone, and the pale green car was now parked in the front of the spot, reversed in, and pulled all the way up to the fence. No one will spot its expired registration now! That day I burst in the door after work, saying, “The mystery deepens!” I googled the car’s license plate and nothing came up. (I was secretly hoping I would find out that they were villains, and then I wouldn’t have any problems reporting them to the office.)
The pale green car hasn’t moved. The silver car comes and goes. The registration remains expired.
I lay awake at night sometimes (only rarely!) going back and forth: Who cares about these cars? I think. Then I think, They can’t just sit in the Big Spot like that, it’s selfish and not sharing. Then I think, Their registration is expired, that’s against the law. Then I think, What if they’re a poor single mother who is just trying to make enough money to feed their children? Then I think, They have three cars, they can’t be that poor. Then I think, Seriously, I need to get a life. Then Drew says, “Parking can’t rule my life. I can’t live like that.”
Then Molly was supposed to come hang out with me on Friday, but she called and said she didn’t want to drive too far because she hadn’t put her new registration on her car yet. I wondered if that was a sign to Do The Right Thing and leave this pale green car alone.
When I realized the registration scam that was being run, I sternly told Drew I was giving them an ultimatum – if there wasn’t an updated registration by Jan 1, I was tattling. Then I thought, Surely they won’t still be sitting in that spot in 3 weeks. But now chances are looking good that that’s exactly what will be going on.
Right at this second, I’m on the “Who cares?” end of the pendulum swing…but I know that can change. I’m just curious…WWYD?
Update 12/14: Well, thanks for your votes, guys, I’m glad I know I can trust you to tell me the truth.
On that note, Drew got home before me today and he called to tell me the good news. “I’m parked somewhere that will make you very happy.” I shrieked with joy (in the middle of Target) and we gleefully debated whether the pale green car had been towed, without any anonymous note from me. Hence, no bad karma! (Or should I say carma? I couldn’t resist.)
Yesterday, two of my best friends each brought up the same concern: a feeling of failure or being tried and found wanting, compared to other people of our same age and background.
One referred to herself as suffering from the “never enough” syndrome. She suggested that this was the fault of the feminist movement: since now women can “do it all,” now we are required to do it all. (This is actually what Lucinda Coxon’s play Happy Now? is about.)
My other friend just started a chat with me out of nowhere, saying that she needed to get off Facebook because all she could see was high school friends getting engaged and having babies.
They both speculated that maybe Facebook is causing the problems, and maybe the answer is just to stay off of it. (What’s funny is that each of these conversations happened on Facebook. Hm.)
Having two of my best friends bring this up – in the same day, no less – really made me think. After all, who doesn’t Facebook stalk and then envy other people? That’s the great thing about Facebook: the low-key keeping in touch with people. It just means that you get to see every time someone makes good, gets married, has another baby, gets another promotion.
Both friends seemed kind of bleak about it though. Which I get. We’re 26 years old and all three of us feel like we should by all rights have our careers, our relationships, and our lives in order. None of us have managed to go 3 for 3, although none of us is doing too badly. But there are people out there with houses, careers, marriages, kids, dogs, cats, car payments, iPads, vacations, gym memberships, and 14-foot Christmas trees.
They’re not the only friends to ever have this conversation with me, which makes me think that it might be a much more widespread thing (hence the “epidemic”). There’s pressure on us to be amazing, because we’ve been told our whole lives how awesome we are. Then at some point each of us ends up leaving our small pond and realizing that we’re not really the giant fish we thought we were.
I think that one reason that I’m a lot more comfortable with my “ordinary” life, is that during my freshman year of college, I lived in a dorm with a bunch of smart geeks – we’re talking math, physics, computer science, engineering, hella smart geeks. I was one of two English majors in the entire dorm (and the other girl changed majors). So I figured out pretty quick that I wasn’t going to impress everyone anymore.
(This is the part where I tell the story about the guy in college who, while telling me about his plans to get his physics PhD in the next couple years, said to me, “You’re not smart enough to get a PhD in physics…I mean, I’m sure you’re smart in English or whatever.” We did not end up dating. It may have had something to do with that conversation.)
So I’m not having to learn, post-college, that I’m not a unique and perfect extraordinary snowflake. I figured that out already, and I know how to own it and be happy even if I’m not rich or famous. I think all my friends who are learning that now are having a harder time with it.
The funny thing is that I have a pretty healthy level of self-esteem. I know I’m pretty cool, and I know that if we hadn’t gone to New York for 3 years, I could have set up a career for myself in California by this time. But the time out there, and my adventures and experiences, were totally worth it to me. I also would rather spend the extra years scraping it together now, while I’m still only 26, than be trotting along in my mid-30s and have everything suddenly swept out from under me.
Both my girlfriends are the same way. They’ve each had kind of a bumpy time since college, with graduate schools and moves and relocations and other graduate programs. Give us a few years and we’ll all have things figured out…or at least more figured out than they are now.
In the meantime, I told each of them, maybe staying off Facebook is a good idea if it’s bothering you so much. But what’s even more fun (and doesn’t require limiting your social networking) is just to practice making fun of other people instead of envying them. Hey, I too stalk other people’s pictures and feel jealous of how pretty they look or how nice their vacation was or how big their new house is. But the percentage of people I envy is only, like, 25. The other 75% of people on Facebook is just begging to be mocked.
Where I work there’s a series of volunteer front-desk greeters (they might not actually be volunteers, but in my head they’re the people who made it through the volunteer usher boot camp and this is their reward). Weeks ago as I was leaving work, I happened to glance at the computer screen that one of these women was using, and I couldn’t help but notice she was on the Yelp page for the Make Out Room, which is a club in the Mission. I found this hysterical.
This week I just happened to glance at the screen again…and she’s now on a website listing sex offenders. I know it might not be a funny story…but that’s still kinda funny, right?
Earlier this week I applied to a bunch of craigslist ads for companies looking for SAT tutors. I had a phone interview with one of them on Wednesday, and then went in Friday morning to meet them and take math and verbal quizzes. I was feeling pretty good about it, overall, so when I got a phone call Friday afternoon from an undefined 415 number, I went ahead and answered it. It was from a different tutoring company, whose name will be changed. This is that phone call. (It begins with him mispronouncing my name, me correcting him, then him mispronouncing it again.)
Him: Hi, I’m calling from SAT Prep*, you applied to be a tutor with us, and I was wondering if you’re still interested?
Me: Yes, I am.
Him: Oh…kay… So we usually do a phone interview before bringing people in. Would this be an okay time for a phone interview?
Me: Sure.
Him: Okay. Um, so, what are you doing right now?
Me: Well, I’m working at the SF Opera, in the marketing department, but it’s just temporary and so I’m looking for…(etc.)
Him: Okay. So…I don’t have this in front of me…um, I turned my computer off because I’m about to go to a meeting…but, whatever**…so, what’s your tutoring experience?
Me: I tutored for four years in high school, and…(etc.)
Him: Okay. Um, can you hang on a sec?
Me: Sure.
Him: (Fumbling noises and a clank. He comes back.) So, we don’t actually do in-person interviews. So, um…do you have any questions for me?
Me: No, I don’t think so.
Him: Okay, well, someone will be in touch with you.
Me: Okay, thanks.
Him: Bye.
**This is the point in the conversation where I checked out, and just started looking at Facebook, because I had just had a great experience with another company, and this guy was clearly not invested in this “phone interview.” Maybe he didn’t expect me to pick up the phone. “But, whatever.”
The whole thing took about four minutes. I wonder if I’ll hear back from them.
The Cameraphone Diaries 