Feeling Minnesota

I was riding the bus to my sisters yesterday (which, honestly was a whole story in and of itself), I noticed an out-of-state license plate. It made me so jealous.

I wish I was in Minnesota only temporarily--just for kicks-- instead of loathing almost every second of the god forsaken weather.

I'm also jealous that driving around Minneapolis is probably at least somewhat exciting for them. New buildings and street names can go a long ways when you've been stuck in one city for a year, or your whole life.

I'm not only jealous, though, I'm morbidly curious. What propels you to Minnesota in December? Death, marriage, shopping?

It's not that I hate Minnesota, I just don't see why anyone would come here in December if they didn't have to.

True Life: I Have Embarrassing Parents

The premise deepens as a something-teen girl hates her father for being a clown--showing up to parties with fifteen jesters, throwing confections at her and her unbearably banal friends.

Honestly, who could complain about that? What more could you want out of life than to have clowns randomly show up, and pie ya? I could rant something unoriginal here about my generations lost sense of adventure, being glued to their iPods and MySpace and such, but why bother?

I crave a life of surprises, unexpected and perhaps unmerited merriment.

Absurd, balls out, fun.

1 Hour Later Edit:

The next True Life show featured a girl complaining about moving to New Zealand.

Who are these people?

Auckland

And let's not forget where Lord of the Rings was flmed

(snow)

Something I remembered:

When we were going from my dads funeral to the burial, we were listening to KQRSs a-z library, which was something he always did. We're driving through the snowstorm on the way to the cemetery, and "Spirit In The Sky" comes on. If you don't know it, you should, it's a great song.

On the way home from the burial, we turn on KQ again, and it is Stairway To Heaven.

What a coincidence.

To, From

To the Girl With the Chain from her Nose to her Ear:

Thank you for being the only one to say "Bless You" when I sneezed and thank you for not being offended when I asked if it was purely out of reflex or if you actually wished me well being.

When you got on the bus and saw me without my iPod you thought I was one of the few young people left in the world who wasn't addicted to musical solitude. I only didn't have it because I forgot it and lamented it the entire ride.

When the bus couldnt stop for the red light in the first snow of the year we shared a quiet gratitude that the bus didn't spin out of control.


As you exited the bus by way of the stairs, you paused and gave me one more smile.

And that was that. It wasn't much but it was a missed opportunity.

A Case of Mild Realism

There were tears (sort of, I held back, didn't want to catch anything people felt like throwing). I can't remember the last time I felt so overwhelmed with positive emotion. Party in the streets like the Twins just swept the division.

Positive Positive Positive

That's what I think is going on here. I don't completely trust Obama. He makes me feel good and he makes me believe him and that worries me. He is, after all, still a major party President. The fact that I can buy into his messages of hope and change so easily concerns me.

Either way, there is a positive thing going on right now, and I can't deny, debate or negate it.

The Little Girl Who Lives Above Me and Dannee

We hear this little girl day in and day out, stomping around, yelling to her mami, and generally behaving the way a six or seven year old would. After hearing her piercing cries for the better part of an hour, we can’t help but start to wonder what she is like, what her room is like…

We know for a fact she must be cramped; there are double the amount of people living up there as there are on our half of the whole, and it’s tight down here already. I imagine she shares her room with an adult couple—staying just slightly out of the way, perhaps in the corner with a Dora the Explorer doll, or more likely, a portable play station. I imagine when they want to make love, they shoo her into another room with a perfectly reasonable seeming excuse. “Papi needs to cut mami’s toe nails; if it sounds like she’s hurt, it’s only because she doesn’t cut them enough!”
Danny says she’s the princess of the house and is the only one with her own room; toys everywhere, books and single pieces of paper strewn around carelessly (she knows where everything is).

There’s a tiny bike in the driveway, which must be hers but never moves. Danny found the chains rusty.

One thing we do know is that she has a little brother; two, three tops. It’s often impossible to tell who is screaming—children’s’ lungs can do surprising things--but she likes being an older sister, and pretends her brother is her live doll. She spends most of her time with him while madre cooks, cleans, then takes a break from cooking, cleaning. She is not the kind of child constantly asking “what is there to do? Soy Abburido!” She’s also not the kind of child who worships television; Dora is the only show she really watches, but occasionally she gets sucked into the banal celebrity dance shows her mami and papi take guilty pleasure in (she’s too young to understand it, but loves to watch the dresses fly around).

But her absolute favorite activity—above and beyond anything else; bath time. Her Barbie dolls become mermaids, the bath faucet a waterfall. The yellowed, once white walls of the tub are limestone cliffs for Barbie to jump off romantically into Ken.

I wonder what a seven-ish year olds idea of romance is.

------------------------------------------


One day we see mama bringing a basket of laundry to the car, little imaginative-child-above-us in tow, and she’s whining. She doesn’t want to go to the laundry mat. (No one wants to go to the laundry mat.) She’s crying, pulling on mami’s hand, pouting, being very difficult. Danny and I sit on the steps, out of sight; smoking our cancerous Parliaments, silently rejoicing that we haven’t been pregnant, don’t have a baby.

Suddenly we don’t like the little girl.

All that noise upstairs is her stomping her little feet, being a brat, whining about her mom wanting her to be organized—only so life can be easier on everyone.

The Barbies in the tub become a nuisance, nothing but a pointy annoyance.

As it turns out the stomping upstairs is nothing but our little girl throwing fits; dropping onto all fours and pounding them in tandem. The reverie is all but gone, and now all we can do is pound the broom stick against the ceiling in protest…