So, It's Decided...

I'm going back to NEW YORK!!

The adventures of Wiki & Lotus continue...

(©2009 Lotus B.)

Vacuuming My Dirty Carpet...

Today my superpower is CLEAN SWEEPER!! I have the ability to handle un-finished business...clip loose ends...severe dangling ties.

I 've been holding back some choice words for a few choice people and today in one fell swoop I dispensed with the courtesies and let loose on every one's ignorant ass.

HOLY GOOD INTENTIONS, CLEAN SWEEPER!!!

I kindly told my fat, bacon-hoarding, old room mate that....well she is a fat bacon-hoarding little room mate. I told the other old room mate that not only is she lacking self confidence but she's the biggest poser I've met since high school and she should get used to the reality that she's also excruciatingly boring and useless as a woman and human being. I even told my ex-best friend that her lack of keeping-in-touch ability is no longer cute and that she should grow up and learn to write down a phone number like a big girl.

YES...no one is exempt from my lightning-bolt zingers. PIKAHH!!! Run you, tiny imbecilic minions!!!! I vanish you from my Blackberry and here after from my life.....

Who wants next?

30 Day Notice

Every time I talk to Phil, my future room mate in Brooklyn, I start to get excited all over again. Re-discovering the city through someone else's eyes, since he has never been to New York, is something I really look forward to. More than that, however, it's that sigh of relief I plan to have when everything is really said and done.

When I was a kid and we had to move again; another temporary place until...or somewhere to be "for now", my mother would always describe this perfect moment as motivation. When everything is unpacked and we'd all be sitting down to dinner in a new place. Fresh paint, clean slates, a new neighborhood with sparkling possibilities. That was the moment I'd picture in my mind as I packed up the stupid things kids pack when they can't see past the end of the week and insignificant things hold the greatest value.

I may have grown up quite a bit since then, but I still imagine that moment in my mind to keep me from going insane right now. Just looking forward doesn't' cut it. I have to look far enough not to see the dust storm I've kicked up around myself for the moment. Juuuust far enough to see the other side of it all, between the end of the last chapter and the middle of the next.

YAY SNOW!!

White Tuesday

I was smiling underneath my coat hood tonight.

When I was a kid, I was quite oblivious to the "damage" being done to me. I didn't realize how much it would effect me that we moved so much, that there was upheaval, and disappointment. As children tend to do, I always seemed to filter these things out and store them for the time that would come when I would inevitably be much more aware. What I did notice, was that almost every time my family moved...it rained. Now, as a 24 year old woman...I hate rain. I hate everything about it accept for the sounds it creates on a rooftop.

I left work tonight with one goal in mind. Get home soon. I got on my usual 3 train, but didn't get far before it started slowing down. The loud speaker broke through the silence and informed us at the Chambers Street stop that another train ahead of us was stalled and we would be waiting for a bit. So, I waited. The next stop was the same scenario, and again I waited. Only this time, I realized I could connect to the A and take the 4 home instead of waiting on a stalled line. So I did. After getting off the A and walking through the tunnel to the 4 I arrived just in time to see that the 4 was so full, not even a small child could fit inside it's doors. So it left without me. I waited some more, and this time a 2 showed up. The 2 doesn't go to my neighborhood, but it would get me close enough, so I got on. It was packed, smelly, damp and loud. My frustration seemed to collect in the tips of my fingers and the end of my nose. I was approaching livid. Then I got off of the 2 and crossed the path to take the 4. I waited...

...And waited some more.

Finally the 4 came and took a crap load of angry Brooklynites (?) home. I was steaming by the time I got off at my stop, nearly an hour behind. The cold air started to hit me sooner than usual as I climbed the steps to exit, which meant that the temperature had dropped drastically since I left Manhattan. Then I cam out of the station and onto the street.

I was in a snow globe. Wisps of white cotton was falling heavily on everything around me. The cars were covered, the houses were frosted and the sky was almost completely white. My California ass started swatting the snow away trying to make my way through. But as I walked, and the snow transformed from flakes to drops of water on the sidewalk, my frustration seemed to melt away too. By the time I got to my street I was smiling like a school girl.

In between the moving, the fighting, the disappointment and the let downs...there was snow. Sporadic though the occasion was, on trips to Tahoe or staying with my Great Grandparents in Ohio there were mounds of crunchy snow. The thought occurred to me as I walked through it that my happiest times as a child were spent in snow. I had no bad memories of snow, nothing to feel except unencumbered. And so, sappy as this might sound, I mumbled a thank you before reaching my door stoop.

The smallest things, sometimes as small as a 6 degree drop in temperature can make you remember that nothing is all bad.

10 Things That "Urk" Me...

1. Americans who use the phrase "cheers". This doesn't make you sound more worldly...it's just annoying.
2. Fat people who take up two seats on the subway.
3. Overpriced Manhattan food...even McDonald's is more expensive here. Ugh....
4. Kids with no home-training.
5. People who think it's ok to feed their kids ANYTHING.
6. Celebrities who complain about being popular.
7. People who just stand in silence instead of saying, "Excuse me..." (New Yorkers don't do this...)
8. Tourists who ask where a good place to eat in the city is...(wtf?? There are a zillion restaurants, who am I Zagats?)
9. Women who buy fake designer bags...Your not fooling anyone but yourself.
10. Women who don't take the time to do their hair or make-up, but spend $40 on fiberglass nail art.

Living in a "Sucked Orange"

As I made my way through the crowd of a million people yesterday around 5pm, a thought occurred to me. I fucking hate crowds. I thought this was a quality only grumble-pusses like my father have; the hatred for a bizillion people surrounding you at all times. But the sad truth is, while trapped between an increasingly slow moving tourist with a stroller and a woman behind me invading my lung space with a blazing hot cigarette, I could envision what I might do (er...accomplish?) if I had a gun in my hand at the time.

It's not just the people that make this tiny city feel even smaller. It's the whole environment. The sun-blocking skyscrapers that seem to lock in the stale air on days with no wind. The confinement of the subway, and how you can go in with the early evening light on your back and come back out into total night wondering how the day could dissipate so quickly. The transit from cab to bus to train, sitting in cramped spaces shared with coughing strangers while trying to balance an enormous umbrella on your lap.

It's also the difference between the wide open space of California or Texas. How one can look outside their window and see an uninterrupted horizon before them. How one's eyes can float over miles and take in land, trees and water in one vast scape. It's what I miss most when I look outside my office window only to see brick, cement and a mess of floating cars below.

There are times (though increasingly less, maybe it's the weather) when this used to comfort me. Instead of bars, the closeness of New York felt more like insulation. Like my padding from the outside world. I could retreat to the underworld of the subway and find myself somewhere on the other side of the city, somewhere besides my hollowed apartment in Bed Stuy. I undoubtedly have learned skills that you just don't learn in places like San Francisco. Like how to zone out some of the most disturbing noises (the screech of an approaching train, the rumble of the subway beneath the sidewalk, the police sirens that pass down 34th street every 5 minutes...)

I live in a city (Brooklyn) of about 6 million people. 6 million people in a city about as big as my home town in California, Oakland; population 400,000. I think that in places like New York one can easily loose themselves, but if they don't it says a lot about them. I've come across so many people here striving to become something other than who they really are. Hiding behind the rush and the atmosphere of New York, muddling their voices in cliches and becoming empty posers. When I first got here I marveled at those who were nothing like the people I knew from home. Now I just miss the kindness of a stranger saying, "excuse me" when they bump into you on the street.

I Gotta Get Out of My Head- I've Lived Here For Too Long

I'm pulling myself out of this disgustingly over-ridden rut I've been in once and for all. I booked my plane ticket to go see D last night, and requested my time off to be with him for Christmas. I have so much to look forward to, that it's making me turn into a little blob of goo. Just waiting for time to pass, the faster the better. But instead of living IN tomorrow instead of FOR tomorrow, it's time I just plain snapped out of it. There are TAGS in my closet. TAGS!!! Unworn clothes, UN-ROCKED outfits beckoning for me to grab them, do something fun with my insanely short hair, rock some Vegas eyeshadow and hit the streets with my partner in crime. Well, break out the hot pink nail polish, cause I'm gonna shake my ass tonight. I plan on throwing back more than a few shots and then booking it home no earlier than 1am. The destination at large is the NJV (Not Just Vintage) fashion event tonight honoring the black men of Brooklyn. I have no idea why they are honoring them, other than the fact that, yes, Brooklyn has some of the most disgustingly hot black men I've ever encountered, but I'm always up for a fashion event. Keep an eye out on FUXfashion for the details, and the pics.