Little things

Writing time during the end game. The most frustrating of times. I have a hard time writing at home because I don’t have a desk or anything and often times get distracted by people watching The Simpsons or laughing or pretty much everything that is an extreme distracter of school work. Even the tree in the backyard full of baby blackbirds is yelling at me, distracting. Distracting. How many of these guys hit our windows or end up drowned in the plastic blue pool in our backyard?

            So I have this routine of catching the 8 bus and getting some coffee at one of the cafes on 15^th Avenue on Capital Hill and just hunkering down and studying. Today I have to work a swing shift at the shelter which starts at four, which puts me into this anxious, rushed state of mind considering how much time I have to write about meaningful ways to make a difference in just under two weeks, and here, I have about 3 hours before I have to go to work and put another study day behind me.

            I sit rigidly, with my hand rested in my hair, in typical writer’s block frustration, staring at a blank computer screen. Blank word documents can be so incredibly oppressive. The way that I am facing, with my back turned to everyone in the café, and my lack of progress open for everyone on the sidewalk to see makes me even the more irritable. But I try and remember what Natalie Goldberg says. “Finally, there is no perfection. If you want to write, you have to cut through and write. There is no perfect atmosphere, notebook, pen, or desk, so train yourself to be flexible.” Lucas tells me he writes on buses now. A pretty girl passes by and makes eye contact with me and smiles. Okay, so this isn’t all that bad. But I still can’t seem to write anything and I have this crap that I desperately need to drain to paper.

            “Does it always rain here this much?” The fella next to me is politely, and daringly, making small talk with myself, who I imagine appears to be flexing all of the unattractive physical attributes of the stereotypical stuffy Seattleite laboring at his Mac Book, unwilling to communicate with anyone around him, but desperately needing the companionship of fellow coffee patrons without having to actually talk to any of them. –So you have to give him credit there for being brave.

            The question is obviously one that someone asks if they’re not from around here. Rain is something that people from out of town fixate on. I’m not sure if this is because, culturally, rain is as much a Pacific Northwest Icon as lets say the Space Needle, or grunge music, or because it actually does rain here pretty much all of the time, and as he asks me the question, it is in fact, raining outside.

            “Yeah it usually does all year round,” I tell him. “But around this time of the year it’s not that bad because it’s warmer outside. Not like the winter time when it’s really cold and rain seems more miserable than the snow.”

            “I also noticed that people don’t use umbrellas,” he says. The both of us look outside at 15^th avenue at all of the busy people going about there things, not really phased by the drizzle. And I never really noticed the mundane details of where I live, but people aren’t using umbrellas. It turns out the out -of -towner is from Chicago, visiting Seattle for four days on a whim, flying solo, which again, I think, it must have taken some guts to talk to a random person. He is soft spoken and I’m not sure if I’ve caught a subtle Midwest accent on him. We talk for a bit. Small Chat. I’m both relieved and irritated at the change of pace someone randomly talking to me and breaking me out of my routine offers up. Relieved because I need a break from all of this and a human conversation feels nice. Irritated because my time is being wasted and I have so much to do. The irritation is not a reflection of him, but just my frustrations with myself. He tells me he’s been to all of the neighborhoods, and we agree that walking is the best way to see a new city. He finds it curious that Seattle has a larger homeless population than Chicago, and although I’m skeptical of actual numbers, I agree that downtown has a large concentration of homeless folk, and I offer up a haphazard explanation for this. The homeless conversation inevitably leads to crime and he asks me how safe Seattle is, and I tell him that compared to Chicago it’s probably safer but that we have some heavy shit going down. I tell him about the problem with police corruption and how last year or so, a police officer named Ian Burke, gunned down woodcarver John T Williams, and how that pissed off a bunch of people, and put the police on edge for a bit.

            All in all, our conversation only lasted about twenty minutes. I politely signaled that I had to get back to my endless work, but offered to exchange email addresses, as an appropriate way, given the length of time that we’ve known each other, to stay in touch. I also decided to write him out a list with all of the best coffee shops and places to eat on Broadway that he could visit before he left, or as he pointed out, when he comes back again.

            “You really really have to try Pho. It’s this, uh, Vietnamese type soup that is delicious and we eat it around here to get us through the long winters. I’ve made you this map. All of these are on broadway.”

            He thanks me kindly in this genuine, soft, awkward way and leaves, but has to come back because he forgot his umbrella. We say our goodbyes twice.

            I can’t stand the café I’m at and leave soon after, but I still have an hour before I have to be at the shelter, so embarrassingly, I end up at another café closer to work, buying a sparkling water, because I have to use the bathroom, and in Seattle most all of the bathrooms need a code to access, usually only given to patrons.

            I’ve banished my bulky mac book, and pull out my notebook, as a last resort, to make up for some lost time, and hopefully write down some of the bones, so the day isn’t completely lost. For some reason this reminds me of a gunslinger in a movie, toting a bunch of high caliber weapons, than running out of ammo and pulling a tiny pistol out of his sock, in a vain attempt to fend of aggressors. It seems to be working. Maybe the day isn’t completely lost:

…After all, this has been a personal thing. Initially I had hoped to write a “publishable” essay about how “ordinary” people could live more environmentally conscious lives, but I soon realized that I can’t tell people how to live their lives, without understanding first, how I live mine.

***

            Sometimes –again, here comes the word oppressive– sometimes, I get this overwhelming feeling of hopelessness. The feeling is very oppressive. Maybe it is something you get when you’re in your twenties. Maybe it’s a feeling you maintain throughout your whole life, and you have to place meaning in the oppressive void. Maybe the feeling is stronger when you don’t believe in god, or there is no hope of redemption, or any of that stuff. Maybe the feeling is made worse, when you’re made to think that there is something wrong with this oppressive feeling of hopelessness and having to pretend that everything is okay, just heightens your sense of disparity. Maybe feeling hopeless is just a part of life. I think that the older you get, or at a certain junction in your life, you really have to sit down with the reality that your time is very short here. I mean really short. Part of you is like, “oh hell, what’s the point, this whole dying thing just serves as a greater affirmation of the whole school thing. You do all this hard work and in the end what do you really get? What is the difference?” Of course, of course this is all a matter of perspective. There is the other part of you, the part that older folk may say, “Yeah, you see. That kid is really growing up.” The part of you that sees the challenge in the whole thing. The monumental challenge of figuring out what truly resonates in your life. Relationships with people. Creating meaning. Making a difference.

            I am reminded of Stephanie Madison, a mother from last quarter, one of my favorite people, someone who wouldn't say anything about her self unless you were to ask her. She turned out to be an amazing person! Over the course of two quarters we found so much out about her, how much struggle she has been through and what issues she is outspoken on. Luckily we got the opportunity to read her essay about what it means to make a difference. She talks about her struggle with MS, and right off the get go she says, "I first want to acknowledge we can all make a difference in someone's life with the little things that we do and how we choose to act everyday. Stopping to let someone to pull out into traffic, helping an elderly women to her car, paying a few dollars for someone who is a little short at the checkout line..." Stephanie goes on to say that these little things are not enough, that we can't just consider these personal actions, we have to look at the forest and not just the trees. We were all wrapped up in this metaphor. When it comes down to it however, these things count. It's amazing how much they count really.

               Later that week I got a message in my inbox. A letter from Dean, the guy that I had met, and had sparked up a random conversation with, allowing myself to thaw and just talk to someone: 

Hey Gavin, it's Dean!

I'm the one you chatted with at the coffee shop this past Monday.

I got back to Chicago Tuesday afternoon.

It's in the 80's here today with full sun. Gross! I know it's probably cool

and raining out by you. Sigh.

Thanks again for taking the time to answer my questions and for all

the suggestions.

I wasn't able to try Pho Cyclone this time around but definitely will

on my next visit.

I enjoyed my time in Seattle. Very much so but at times it was quite

lonely not knowing anyone. You helped bridge that gap and now I feel

a bit more connected there so thanks for that!

Remember, if you visit Chicago let me know and I can return the favor

by being your tour guide.

Thanks again for everything and keep in touch.

You rock! -Dean

         Sometimes it is the little things we do in life. The atitude that we take. The decision to wake up and say, 'yeah so there are some pretty fucked up things in the world, and maybe the train we're all on together can't be stopped, but the least that we can do, is take a chance. So we can say that we actually tried, that we actually did something.