How Appropos


You are VALENTINE'S DAY, one of the sappiest days
of the year. *looks down* Eww, stop hugging
me...


What Holiday are You?
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Now then, let me regale you with a tale of man who reeked of cheap spirits and his own urine. This person sat next to me on the bus yesterday afternoon. Of course he sat next to me. The men of Baltimore city (who frequent public transporation) all seem to have gotten the same memo. "If you reek of cheap spirits and your own urine (or someone else's) sit next to Kate Krupnik." It was bad enough that he smelled so awful my eyes started to burn, but then he began to proposition me for "friendship," and to let me know in slurred speech about his career path (he's in school to become a dietician, you know). I got up about two stops before I needed to get off the number 11, bound for G.B.M.C., and at this he took offense. He wanted to know if I was afraid of him or something, and that hey, he had a hell of a lot to offer. Yes, indeed, he could be my friend, and he certainly wanted to talk to me again.

There was a time in my life, not very long ago, when I would have internalized the drunken ramblings of this man without bladder control or access to a shower. I would have decided that something about me must have "called out to him," making him believe that I was well within the realm of his league. It used to depress me when plainly undesirable men would go full-court press to lobby me for a date and those guys in my peer group, with whom I had much in common, went full-court press in their avoidance of me as a date or potential love interest. But yesterday I got off the bus, and though the stench of my suitor remained in my nostrils longer than I would have liked, I made a decision that I would not let this be about me, because it wasn't and it isn't.

After class last night my professor and I were supposed to talk a bit about my paper from last semester, but in his words, he had "failed" me by being unprepared for that discussion. He forgot my paper and the talking points he came up with. So he will, at some point, e-mail me those talking points, and if I have more questions that those points of discussion don't cover, then I am free to talk to him about it further. Between you and me, I know this discussion will never happen. I have no doubt that he will e-mail me, but I also know myself. I won't lobby for more of his attention; I'll just keep enjoying him in a distant sense. I know his comments will suffice, and I am done canvasing and campaigning. This is the year of letting what happens happen. And what doesn't, doesn't.