Sunday, January 13, 2008

The day that went its own way

I had a good day today, the first truly good one in a while, and certainly the best since Tuesday, which is good, cuz I needed it. There was a reason I didn't want to get out of bed today... it might have been an interesting dream, or it was just that I was so darn comfortable (and resentful that someone had called the REALLY loud phone in the living room this morning). But I got up. My plan was really just to check out the new Touchstone gym in Oakland, boulder for an hour or so to get my money's worth out of this month's membership, then get off the bus on College, check out some of the stores, then go home. When I saw that the sun came out today after all, I figured I had no excuses and got out of bed.

This morning I had cereal for breakfast. I bought this cereal back in September when I first came out here and just hadn't been in the mood to eat it until earlier this week. It's Kellogg's Smart Start, and it held up pretty well on top of the fridge all those months, though the texture of the cereal in its natural state is such that it could go a little stale with no real negative effects.

And then I left. I marched down to the 51 and rode it all the way to GWPW's convenient location on 20th. And then I went the wrong way. I swear the website directs you to turn right, but I'm not dumb enough to undermine my story by actually checking that fact at this point. So I went the wrong way on 20th, but was pretty happy about it, cuz I had my new playlist throwing some new acts at me, and I was enjoying the weather. Then I saw Lake Merritt and figured that I'd better turn around.

As soon as I started heading the right way, I saw a building with a honking big smokestack popping out of the top, and I said "OH. Okay." And within short order, I was there. It's a lot... smaller than I expected. I mean, it's not tiny, and it's not the first time I've been spatially misled by a climbing gym's website, but yeah. Actually, the top-rope area was pretty nice, but the bouldering wall's a little depressing if you're not particularly advanced. Or maybe if you're just not up to a challenge, which I wasn't really today. I tried to do a couple of the easier ones, but for pretty much all of them there just comes a point where you realize that the person who set the problem was at least half a foot taller than me. After a couple leaps of faith that brought me nothing but the fear that I would injure myself on the next one, I sat back to consider my options.

It was at this time that someone came up to me and asked if I went to Cornell. I'd forgotten that I was wearing my Cornell lounge pants, though sometimes that's why I wear things like that, and the Ithaca shirt, and so on. This fellow was an 04 grad who had also taken intro to rock climbing and had just picked up the sport seriously in May. He and his sister had come up from Palo Alto to check out the gym and meet the rest of their family. Long story short, I got a harness and top-roped with them for a while, and by the time I left, it was about 3. I had a really good time! The top-roped routes are long, though even the 5.10bB's are doable for me. But since the, uh, commitment was a bit more than I was used, to, about 3/4 of the way up my mind started wandering and I had to tell myself that obviously I could go the next few feet no matter how tired I was because come on, look at it. I did 3 routes and used my arms a lot, so while they're not very sore, I feel them more than I have in... wow, a really long time. Have we not been working ourselves very hard on Tuesdays? I don't know. But anyways. I decided it was time to go when I was less interested in climbing than I was in eating and I felt kinda weird being this outsider in this big fuzzy family gathering. They were a nice family though! At one point I got very self-conscious as I belayed my new friend, because I was terrified that I'd set up wrong and he'd plummet to his death as his parents, sisters, in-laws, and nieces looked on with their bags of almonds and dried apricots. But that didn't happen! AND the mom offered me dumplings to take home (which i declined).

I went back to the 51 stop and waited just long enough for me to get fed up and pull my book out of my backpack. The bus showed up within the paragraph. A few stops later, this woman got on... and... well, I was sitting sideways in one of the fold-down seats across from the rear door, not even halfway down the length of the bus. She came and parked herself right in front of me. It was a little jarring at first, but not a big deal until I realized that she actually had quite a few better options in terms of location and even seating on this not-very-crowded bus. I'd been considering giving my seat to her when I came to this realization. She didn't seem to physically need to sit down, but she was a bit unwieldy with her backpack between her legs and a big floral spray in one hand. And she was right in front of me, the ribbons from the bouquet were flapping in my face... within the confines of my personal space. It was just extremely disconcerting, more so when the girl next to me got off and there was just me and this woman in this large radius of totally empty space. Then, without warning, she turned and exited the bus. Very sudden. Kind of a relief. Now, this encounter was a lot less colorful than other public transit encounters I've had, but it was one of the first to actually just... irritate me.

I went "shopping" on College, and the only thing I really bought was a Street Spirit from a woman on the street. I went into Jeremys and considered getting a coat. I went into a very cute shop in which the items were just out of my price range... and also sort of useless seeing as how I have no apartment in which to display cute non-functional knick-knacks like felt rocks. I went into a recycled/organic/eco-friendly store which was absolutely adorable. I heard as song I liked, so the girl checked out the playlist for me, and returned that the band was Peter Bjorn & John, ironically. I saw a LOT of stuff I wanted, particularly a particular artist's metalwork, and a lot of the jewelry, and so on... so I decided to store that away for another time.

By this point, my stomach was doing a constant rumble. I'd passed Ici and wandered around the Italian food place and La Mediteranee, but held out... I wanted to get home to eat the other half of my falafel wrap from yesterday. I walked the rest of the way back, and around the last block started wondering if I'd be able to make it. My backpack had started really weighing me down in the first store and my head was... hurting. It still hurts, actually. But I made it, even though I forgot my key, and I ate half of the half of the falafel wrap and showered and felt nice.

And that was my day today. I encountered a lot of nice people, and the sun was out, and I did more than I thought I could do. Hooray!

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