Body builder and Tony

To you, tall bearded man with the impossibly toned biceps: I see you're carrying a package. (No, like literally a box you filthy minded cretins.) I would like apologize for being in the way of your reflection as you try to check yourself out instead of me. It's fine. I just watch you repeatedly flex your back instead.

Tony on the other hand was the kind of person who didn't look past you but stared into you. After me trying to ignore yet another boring conversation started by asking me what I'm reading (a book about loneliness- catch a hint), Tony distracted my persistent conversationalist who turns out to know less about the public transit system than he knew about the phonetics of "lonely". I piped up to provide much needed clarification. You want this stop not that one, there should be people that know the busses better there. He explained he was going to an interview to be a bus driver having gotten tired of the trucking business. He talked abou how physically taxing the trucking industry is, how no one should do that for too long. He introduced himself as Tony and I helped him find his stop. He would be the kind of person to remember a body's name if you were a bus regular. Hey Tony, if you're reading this, I hope you got the job.

To the couple holding hands on the train

One tall. Red sweatshirt covering oversized scrubs for you lanky frame. A draw string badge hanging from the front of your shirt indicating a medical profession. Probably a hospital aid, or someone who works in a nursing home. You have two pairs of glasses perched on your head- one occupying the bridge of your nose and the other carefully tossing your hair. Your arm reaches out in a protective way, cutting off the line of sight for curious onlookers from seeing the same thing you have the blessing to look on. Your voice is somewhere between a chortle and a sarcastic aside, thought you don't mean it that way. Your short linear mouth only really moves when you smile, and you do that a lot when you look at your protection.

The other could not be more different from you. Short where was tall, round where was stretched, floral patterns where were neutrals and solids. On a periferial view, even the piercings are reversed- many where were none. I see you both wear matching necklaces, hidden but resting on important skin instead of factory cloth.

The hesitancy is cute. Both leaning in before remembering the public transportation part of this encounter and pulling away. Afraid to cause a disturbance. But I saw the tender removal of a draw string badge and the gentle placing in a pocket. Keeping safe without a name. Anonymous in adoration, knowing private jokes are better than public displays. The look is clear, unmistakeable really. That's what love always looks like.

Meeting Cincinnati

Maybe I have one of those faces. The kind where people just tell you things? It happens more than I can explain and yet my "I'm busy reading the New Yorker face" doesn't seem to keep them at bay. And because of the patriarchy, it's almost always men who feel the need to address me. Thanks patriarchy for making me the ideal conversationalist, it's really charming.

Today I was running errands and using the train to get around. I got to the station, sat down and pulled out a copy of the New Yorker, because I'm a stodgy adult in gym shorts. Without fail, 3 young men walk into the train and sit down behind me. The oldest of whom was likely only 20 though he looked older. The one sitting immediately behind me said, "excuse me ma'am" and struck up an unwanted conversation with me. Something about taking his little brother out for his birthday. He asked if I went to the university- the answer to this is always a little tricky, because technically yes, but also people assume that they are asking if you are an undergraduate, which alas, I am not.
"How long have you gone to school there?"
"About 3 months."
Other member of the group sitting across the aisle, "man, she's gone to school there as long as I've been in jail!"
Well, this took a turn. Seeing my probably confused face he pulls a large ziplock bag from the front of his gym shorts (because this is the first piece of masculine clothing that adheres to the plight of women: no pockets.) Lofting up the bag he says, "I just got out today!"
Me: "Congrats man!"

Small talk continues despite my attempts to return to my magazine. The "little brother" who was sitting behind the man right behind me asked me if I was salty about the Chiefs- I mean, usually? But my care level about sports is pretty low. The man behind me tells me about his uncle who holds some football record that is memorialized on the stadium walls while his little brother talks to the man across the aisle about his recent drug transaction cost. After one stop of awkward conversation, the brothers got off the train leaving me with the man across the aisle.

Lucky me, he decides to pick up the conversation, talking about how good it is to be free. He talks openly about his criminal record, doing time in juvenile prison and his recent stint in jail. He introduces himself, says people call him
Cincinnati and references his shirt which is a sports reference about the Bulls I clearly don't understand. He says his time in Ohio was because he was "a shooter." Getting into shoot outs will evidently land you some hard time somewhere. He says his friends call him "Chino" because he has narrow eyes. Frankly, Cincinnati is a much better nick name and not just because it's less racist. He talks about the football scholarship he had, the now famous players he knows, the protective custody that lead him to this desert state. He talks about his, and I quote, "baby mama" who is going to graduate college this year with a degree in bio chemistry. He asks which stop he should get off in town- I know nothing about the lay out of the city other than where I need to go, but he checks the map anyway. He apologizes for the behavior of "his homies" because they don't know how to "talk to a female". If I'm being honest, anyone who refers to women as "females" doesn't know anything either.

We talk about the weather compared to the Midwest. He used to make "ass angels" in the snow in Ohio, but there's no snow here. He says there are two seasons here: "hot and fuck no." Which isn't untrue so far.

I finally get to my stop, he shakes my hand and I get off the train- checking to make sure I'm not being followed.

It's not that it was a bad conversation. It's just not what I have in mind when using public transportation. Of the 5 other men on the train near by, why was I the person who clearly needed to be engaged in conversation. The man sitting on the other side of the aisle from me was reading a text book- didn't he need to be bothered? What about the man who was nearly asleep behind them? This is a constant battle of how to create and demonstrate civility in public ways, working to create a safe public space for women and still being aware that some people are bad people and would follow you around after an interaction like that. It's not that I don't like people (I mean they're not great, but I'm not reclusive) it's that I want to have the chance to choose whether I talk to someone on public transportation or not. Me reading a magazine with headphones in should be enough of a social signal that I would like to be left alone. Errands shouldn't be this taxing.

So men: be better. Know the difference between polite conversation and the "I'm busy reading something interesting" expressions. Remember, a woman riding public transportation by herself is not an invitation to conversation, if she wanted to talk to you, she would.

A word of advice from our sponsors

A few weeks ago (maybe it was last week? Maybe it was yesterday? What is time? All I do is read, sleep and go to class.) a friend of our professor and scholar in her own right came to class for a little impromptu visit. Her dry wit and canny remarks were a pleasant change of pace for the typically heavy theory class. She spoke for a few minutes about her own experience sitting in our seats as first year PhD students trying to tackle the world of academia.

She told a story about sitting in the theory class not having any communication background and wondering what in the world everyone was talking about. So when other people nodded, she nodded too. Some of the words sounded like English and those were comforting, but most of class was like listening to a combination of an unknown language and made up sounds. Fearing that this was going to end her foray into communication, she started looking into other programs on campus. Her background in social work lead her to the PhD in social work across campus, but they wanted an MS for admission. One day in the grad office she started talkin to her fellow cohort members about how confusing and disheartening theory was. She mentioned to them that she wasn't even sure if she was cut out for this program because she was so lost. They looked at her and said, but we nod in class because you do. We have no idea what's going on either. She does stay in Comm in the end and graduates with all kinds of accolades. But her parting words to our class were: "so if you're lost, just keep going I guess." 

It's almost fall break here (days left). Until then, just keep going I guess. 

To the sleeping boy on the train

You seemed so peaceful. Collapsed over your abdomen, caved from the pressure of another day. Relaxed finally. Your forest green sleeves are pushed up to reveal your forearms, the left one curled in your lap included a brightly colored tattoo of a woman. While your eyes were closed, she watched over you, keeping track of the other passengers who stood too close to your sleeping form. You didn't wake when commuters crowded your space. You didn't wake when the train attendant tried to shake you to consciousness. You probably didn't hear her over the din of your headphones or the rattle of the train. She rattled your shoulders, attempted to uncurl your fingers wrapped around your backpack. You were so drowned in sleep that she couldn't bring you back to the surface. She turned to me, checked my ticket, and returned to your side. She called to you across the void, rattled your shoulders again as your eyelids fluttered to the present. Your dug your torn wallet out of your pocket, found the needed ticket stub, and checked your watch. Long past time to get off this train. You blinked hard and waited for the next stop, only to wait and retrace your sleeping steps on the other side of the platform. 

Crystal light

But not like the stuff you put in your water. Ok let me explain. 

Yesterday I met with a professor in the department. We have to write a paper about someone's scholarly trajectory, but at least we picked the person to talk about. 

We sat down in her office and she began to tell me the story of how she came to do communication studies. Weaving in and out of her narrative were these ideas of staying true to who you are, being consistent with what you believe. At the very end of the hour she talked about how from one angle, a crystal has many facets, they each are a little differently shaped, each refracts light a little different direction. This imagery comes from Tracy and Trethewey (2005).  But in her view (and I believe she cited an idea from a dissertation not her own. I wish I remembered her name), a crystal emits its own central light, something from its core. People may perceive that light differently depending on how that shines in their direction, but the core remains unchanged. 

Maybe it's an apt metaphor for the day and the beginning of the school year. There's something innate about you, about me as individual people. Beings in this world of light. The goal then is to know how to maintain that fire, keep the self preservation strong and keep true to your own light. 

Keep your light friends. Let other people deal with how they see it. 

If only the suit fit, Cinderella.

To the man on the train who caught my attention- 

I see you in that suit. Looking elegant in a standard black. I see you sans wedding ring and wonder what the occasion must have been for tall dark and handsome to wander this way on public transportation.  I'll wait until you turn around. 

Your tie is loosened, it is the same one you probably had from high school when your date told you she was wearing a black and white dress to prom. The suit is new, your mother insisted when you went to college that you get one where the sleeves were as long as your still growing arms were. Unfortunately, she didn't account for the shoulders. So it gaps in weird places, it drapes where it shouldn't, and makes you look like you were playing dress up instead of going to that possible interview. You probably should have shaved for that. The part on your right jaw line that doesn't quite grow in makes me wonder if you're 16 and too tall, or 18 and embarrassed. Either way, you're too young to date. 

So good day to you, may you travel smartly in your new suit. There is a tailor at the next stop. 

Sports ball

Yesterday in a strange turn of events, I made the uncharacteristic decision to go to a professional football game. Granted it was a preseason game and the tickets were pretty cheap and I went with 3 other people from the office, but professional football it was! 

We drove to the Arizona Cardinals game against the Denver Broncos, skipping through traffic and giggling about professors and students along the way. Eventually we were close enough to the stadium that we stopped to eat. Where else? But a nearly deserted and yet still fabulous Waffle House. So over breakfast food, we noshed and drank coffee causing an utter disturbance to the staff because there were no other patrons. None the less, it was delicious in the way that you should be ashamed, but really aren't. 

Eventually we made it to the stadium, frolicking in the parking lot briefly, then joining the other extreme sports fans in the nose bleed section. We cheered adamantly about something though none of us were really paying attention to the actual game. At one point we were so adamant in our cheering sportness, the woman sitting in front of us left. She never came back. 

The Cardinals won, though I couldn't come close to giving you a play by play of how that happened. None the less, even boring (or events not particularly aligned with my interests) can be made fun through hanging out with the right crew. Thanks friends for laughing at the sports ball with me. 

The man with the chest hair

This morning as I got on to the tram everything was as usual, pretty quiet. A gentleman sleeping in the back row, a couple of students lugging text books and ostensibly trying to study, a few fellow fiction readers- the usual suspects. That was until a few stops in I noticed a sunglasses-clad man seeming to stare in my direction. I will grant you that they were mirrored so this point is hard to defend; but for the perceived indoors and it not being close to dawn, it sure felt like he was starring. I played it cool, reading until the next stop, casually glancing out the window before letting my gaze brush past him on the way back to my book. The mirrored sunglasses were not what first caught my eye, it was the number of undone buttons exposing a 1970s reprise of chest hair in the most optimistic of senses. Every stop, glance up, brush by, wonder if, return to book. As we approached the second to last stop of my ride I began to wonder if he was infact starring at me and if so how I was going to lose him in the dash from the platform. Stop; and he exits, leaving me behind to wonder. I watched him walk past my window to notice that the chest hair and blue mirrored Oakley's were not the highlight of his outfit. Oh no. It was the fact he was wearing that unbuttoned shirt tucked into not navy dress pants, but navy dress shorts- smartly paired with knee high white socks and brown hiking boots. I smiled to think how I could have missed so much worrying about chest hair and mirrored glasses. 

Happy Friday- a first week recap

Praise be I have survived the first full week of class with little physical, and only minor psychological frustrating! Hallelujah. 

Students: I have 25 students in class, and 23 of them are male. That makes for a strange classroom dynamic. The good news is all of them have been polite and generally responsive, but we shall see how the rest of the semester goes. I'm a little concerned about the two women. Not because they may struggle academically, but because they are so preposterously out numbered. I hope that they find a platform in this class that gives them a confidence boost. 

Classes: holy readings batman. For those of you considering PhD school, get your reading caps on. I finished the second full book assigned to me yesterday. I'm also taking 9 hours (3 classes) so it might be a little bit of an exaggeration in some experiences, but also whoa. Classes themselves are interesting, seem to be really good people. But there are for sure moments that I clamp my hands over my ears to stop my head from spinning. I have a feeling this is only going to be a more frequent reaction. Hopefully my brain will acclimate and be less dizzy moving forward. 

Alarmingly, we had a cool front come through. Let me explain. The temperature dropped about 5-10 degrees and I honestly thought it was much improved from yesterday. Now the high today was 97 degrees. My Midwestern roots are cowering from the oppressive heat. This can't be real life that 97 is cool. And sure by comparison, but not actually cool. I'm still sweating more than normal. 

With any luck, it will indeed start to cool down. To like a real amount where an average human could wear pants and not instantly regret this decision. 

Let's talk about pants

Today was the first real full day of school lifeness. Typically, I prefer to wear skirts or dresses because 1) it's hella hot and skirts make sense, and 2) the correct but maybe less professional term "ass sweat" is a thing and do I need I explain that skirts have a breeze function? 

Here's the skippy. Just because you there's a pseudo cooling action happening, does not eliminate the actual ass sweat part of the equation. So skirts just make you feel the sweat more. For example, I have to walk about 10 ish minutes from the class I TA to the class I teach. Remember, THIS IS ARIZONA. That effectively translates to glisten droplets everywhere. Also, this skirt is lined. So hello unmoveable sweat glued second skin. There's nothing like walking drip glistening into a classroom where you are in charge of 23 men and 2 women. You know they won't get too close- because you smell. 

Which brings me to the piece of advice that I'm trying to follow: it doesn't matter how ashamed you are, carry deodorant. The people sitting near you will thank you. That curtesy does not quite extend to the public transit commute. This morning the body odor count was 3. #blessed. 

But really the worst thing that happened on public transportation today was the man wearing all black: shorts, t-shirt with some kind of red rebel lettering, black athletic socks, and brown hiking boots. Come on friend, try better. 

I'm sure I will have other updates later this week. In the mean time, go watch a documentary, learn something. We watched Chuck Norris vs Communism in class today. Worth it.

The Case of the Stolen Trailer

It's been exactly two weeks since my family and I were on the way down to this southern destination. I had happily spent the night with a dear friend and her family while my parents and subsequently all of my stuff loaded into a trailer were located at a hotel in Albuquerque just off the highway.

Let me back up. When packing all of my things to move out of my apartment in Kansas, we had decided to cram it all into a 12-foot Uhaul trailer. So in went the heavy furniture. My bed with box springs, headboard, frame, couch, kitchen table and chairs, book shelves, night stand, end table, dresser, chest of drawers, mirrors, basically everything you could use in a one bedroom apartment. My dad had found this 10 foot bookshelf for my new place and so that went along one wall with each of the 9 shelves stuffed with things from boxes of kitchen staples, bottles of wine, empty suitcases, small assorted boxes that would fit in the narrow space, briefcase functional purse bag (what do women call those? Oh yeah, practical and fashionable), totes filled with hangers, you get the picture. The couch went along the other wall, then the dismantled bed and bedroom furniture got squeezed between the two and smaller moveable pieces got piled or stacked on top of that. All of these diligently packed cardboard boxes which included everything from toiletries, glasses (like the ones I see through), contacts, jewelry boxes, framed art (some of which were gifts), boxes of letters I had received over the last two years in Kansas (I'm an excellent pen pal), hand made quilts, some suitcases including professional wear, sweaters, t-shirts, jeans, and last but certainly not least, all of my academic materials. Yes, that includes all of my notes from my master's degree including my thesis research, readings, and any professorial feedback all lovingly packed away in boxes to be piled in the trailer. To give you a visual description, this trailer was full, floor to ceiling, right to left, and any space besides. To have let a small animal loose in there would have doomed the poor thing to death by asphyxiation- not crushed by moving articles. There wasn't a lot of space to move, there also wasn't a lot of air.

We shut and locked the back of the trailer, with anything that didn't fit in there either in the back of my dad's pick up truck, or in the trunk/backseat of my car. For comparison sake, those things were mostly books (remember how I'm an academic by nature and pedigree), kitchen stuff like bowls, plates, mixers, cleaning supplies, some clothes, one end table, and electronics. Off we set, and little did I know, it would be the last I ever saw of the things wedged behind the padlocked door.

That was Friday. We made it to Oklahoma that night, then Saturday stopped in Albuquerque for the night. Sunday morning I woke up and joined my parents for breakfast. I sat in the little breakfast nook that hotels have these days sipping coffee and finishing off a bagel, mom across from me, dad putting things together for the last leg of the trip. Mom's phone started to ring, she answered, "What?! What do you mean it's gone?"

My stomach dropped. Just fell out of the bottom of my torso and hit the tiled floor under my chair. Black coffee now bitter.

Scurrying and frantic questions ensue, to the hotel staff, to the impatient cell phone, to the various corners of my skull. Stealing my nerves, I got up too, and walked out to the parking lot to see my dad's once heroic looking truck sitting naked of any Herculean feats of towing strength, all signs of a trailer gone. Completely lifted off the hitch, and nothing but an awkwardly parked vehicle beside.

"Some trip, huh fam?"

In his honest efforts, dad had backed the trailer up against the wall of the dumpster location so as any potential thieves couldn't open the doors of the trailer. Presumably, the pressure on the hitch from the trailer tires against the curb would make it difficult to wiggle it off the hitch or move anything else until morning. Sometimes our best efforts often come undone by ill-devices.

Within thirty minutes or so, the police arrived and soon a report of an abandoned trailer came through the radio. We followed the police officers to the described location.

There she was. Sprawled open and nothing left of the studious packing except for the 10-foot bookshelf and a crumpled piece of wrapping paper. Hollow, breathable, light.

Police report filed, a woman through a window in a nearby house mentioned that this was the second or third time a Uhaul had been abandoned on this road-ironically half a block from a Uhaul center. Of the two police cars present and 3-4 officers, I think each of them apologized to me, citing rampant heroin problems in the city, a recent uptick of theft by hotels, and a moral sadness that no one deserves this.

Unable to put much into words, I walked across the street to sit on a bench at the park there. No one to blame. At least no one I knew. Slowly recounting the things in the boxes I vaguely remembered stuffing into the trailer. I had labeled them, but couldn't read what they said now. I didn't have the energy or the heart to hold a grudge against the city as a whole. After all seeing my friend and her family had been absurdly good for my psyche. I couldn't harbor aggression at the police response, they recovered the trailer, but a few hours was not going to magically track my possessions as they scattered to the mountain winds.

One officer approached me on my solitary bench, "I'm really sorry about this miss. Is there anything I can do?" "Got any recommendations for sleeping bags?" Call it a defense mechanism if you want, but the options were laugh or cry and in my personal opinion, anything before 9 is too early to cry. With the report already on file, there was nothing left to do but hitch the much lighter trailer back to the truck and leave the sadly disappointing city.

For the next 7 or so hours, I mentally paged through the things that I had watched sealed behind those trailer doors roughly 40 hours before. The furniture I could live without, floors aren't super comfortable, but passable for a while. Then I got to the sentimental things.

The t-shirt quilt made of choir shirts.
The camera and memory card that contained my last images of college performances and last moments in Kansas. Not to mention the pictures I took on my Minnesotan road trip a few weeks prior.
The postcards friends had sent me from around the world.
The diamond earrings my dad had given me for graduation I had never worn.

That's when the tears fell. Facing some portion of Hwy-40, probably staring at the slowly changing landscape and the outline of a haunted trailer up ahead, I sobbed. I'm not a pretty crier to begin with, but this was the kind of convulsing, snotty sobs that end up wiped on sleeves and backs of hands. It doesn't get more poetically dramatic than driving on an unfamiliar road, following a hollowed out hope, and snotting on to my forearm. Some Indy film is going to recreate this moment and make waves at Sundance.

In fact, it's so dramatic, I had to laugh. Look at this plot twist in cinema scope. It's ridiculous, and uncomfortable, and there has to be something worth learning from this moment. Sure, it is only stuff. Some of it more poignant than others, but it's got to be more of a crippling blow to my ego or at least an assault on my pocket book than anything else. And besides, there's always the hope that all of my academic products would be prized by heartless thieves. Maybe instead of a life of crime, they would turn to interlibrary loan and APA nuance. It's probably a pipedream, but in some sad sick way it makes me smile. Almost everything in there was going to be replaceable. Not all of it, clearly, but I would still move into a new apartment with my 10-foot bookshelf that even thieves didn't think worthy of stealing, and whatever was left in the back of the truck, and my car.

Recovering and settling into an already strange place hasn't been a cake walk, but it's getting better. The cohort is fun, and amused by my dry commentary about the trailer. Friends have poured in support and the pen pal pipeline is up and running again.

Plus, once I figure it all out, I'll have a really great stand up shtick about Uhaul's slogan "America's Moving Adventure."

Moving south: the youngest of the snowbirds

Yesterday I had the remarkable favor to meet two fellow travelers who have transitioned from the Minnesotan northern snow-packed life to this melted canyon. Let's call them Suzanne and Steven though those are not their real names. As I was headed to the mailbox, a woman in the parking lot exclaimed- are you the girl with the Minnesota school sticker?! Yes. Tis I. Shortly find out that they are both from Minnesota, and have moved here only recently. In a quaint sort of way, you would never match the two intuitively as a pair, but in their interactions I catch glimpses of the adorable gnarled couple that will reminisce at family gatherings and flirt with each other long past the days of senior discounts. They owned an art gallery in Texas for a while and are quickly filling me in on all of the music and arty things that happen in the area. From symphony concerts to gallery openings, these must be the people to know. We spoke for maybe 10-15 minutes about how we were going to laud over the heads of our still residential snowbound friends our good weather fortune in December. They live a floor above me but on the other side of the building. 

Some part of me finds solace in knowing that there is a common vernacular between a group of people that isn't academically rooted. As in I can talk to Suzanne and Steven about the Twin Cities as "the cities" and not have to explain myself. Or use geographic locators about that town that everyone gets pulled over in on 169, or even the charming lilt of a "oh you betcha" that seems to evaporate in this desert heat. It could be the climate here. In Minnesota you stay together for warmth, talking or remarking about the icicles on your eyelashes. Here, no one sits next to you on the rail if they don't have to, not because your bulky coats physically forbid it, but because the body heat of strangers exacerbates the already too sweaty atmosphere. Maybe it's simply comforting to know that in a place so new, that similarities extend beyond the pedagogy and research. That neighbors can be more that academic resources. They might lend you a cup of sugar, make fun of the palm trees, or comfortably speak to your roots without having to explain a hot dish. 

Can I have your number?

I thought about preemptively titling this post with a number after it, but that seemed over zealous. I'll simply count the times someone asks for my number on the light rail separately. 

Meet Ross. Unnaturally angelic blonde curly hair, cut too short to pass as a cherub, but I'm sure his mother thought he was darling. We spoke of parties, of school, of party schools, and a friend of his who moved close to my home town. Thankfully, and good for you Ross, he was not creepy, merely conversational. And when leaving the train he asked for my number but didn't balk when I passed on the question. We wished each other luck, and went our separate ways. If Ross over here sets the standard of light rail pick ups, then at least I won't be excessively creeped out all the time. 

"Dry heat" is an institutionalized lie

I suppose the first post on this blog should be about what in the world is going on and why. All you really need to know is that I've moved across country to get a PhD in communication studies in this sweltering state of Arizona. In this process everyone I've ever talked to about moving here said the following words: "oh well it's a dry heat." 

Oh yeah? Tell me more about how you like to lie to people. As someone with naturally curly hair, it's still humid here. Trust me. 

As the kind and apprehensive couple in Bed Bath and Beyond told messy week as we collectively stared out at the torrential downpour, "well it's monsoon season." The casual monsoon season no one bothered to mention. So everyone who has ever mentioned to you this vague "dry heat" concept, regard them with skepticism as they have now been outed as liars. 

I have made it a goal in beginning this haphazard journey to blog several times a week mostly on my way to or from the office whitest riding public transit. I should also relay in detail how I had most of my belongings stolen while moving here, the mess of an apartment, and probably my teaching adventures too. So let's hang out on the interwebs and I'll tell all the stories that are too real to be made up. Fiction isn't this strange.