Curious.
My roommate Victor from France tells me that his favorite moment of the night is when he finally takes off his shoes, knowing that he won’t be putting them on again until the sun comes up the next day. He tells me this as he sits on the sofa, feet on the coffee table.
I thought it would be him enjoying the late night snack (potatoes + garlic + onions) he just fried at 1 AM in the morning; perhaps it’s the combination of the two.
The other day I was sluggish getting out of bed. I took my phone out and starting scrolling down the Facebook feed; only my thumb is moving at this point. Up comes a status update from my old neighbor. It’s been over a year since we’ve last spoken.
There she is, just as I remember. This time she looks cheerful in the hospital room, about to go through her first round of chemo.
Wait, what?
~
I didn’t stay in bed for long.
We’d always gotten along, but we lost contact after we moved away. I sent her a message the same day, but it shouldn’t take cancer for one person to reach out to another.
She’ll be okay. But just as she says in her own words, nobody expects to get cancer at 22. (I’m 20 now — when will it be my turn?) How unsettling, that it can happen to any one at any time.
Despite being a legal adult, I’m still dependent on my family for taking care of the taxes — the same way I can be dependent on my family’s medical insurance until age 26 (thanks Obama!).
It’s still socially acceptable as a third-year university student to be dependent on parents or family members for financial support (especially when you’ve entered university straight out of high school). I am lucky. Many don’t have that extra layer of cushioning.
But cushioning or not — after graduation, I’d better get my crap in order.
Start now.
Family Name: _________________
First Name: ___________________
Phone Number: (___) ___-____
Here’s an interesting way to see who you are closest to. When you’re foaming at the mouth, who would you like to know about it first? Easy when you’re a child and can just write down your parents. But what happens when they aren’t around, and the closest friends you’ve made have all gone their separate ways?
Even more fascinating is who would put you on their form.
Hannah wanted some bananas for banana bread, and I told her I had a couple to spare. They were a bit brown though.
The bananas weren’t rotten. They tasted fine earlier in the morning with my oatmeal, and they tasted fine earlier in the afternoon with my peanut butter sandwich, but they were brown and mushy enough for me to think twice about offering them to someone else. Good neighbors don’t give other good neighbors rotten crap, right? Would giving someone else a rotten banana suggest that I’m a rotten person myself? I show her the bananas.
“Oh no, that’s perfect! Thank you.”
Relief. (and now I get fresh banana bread)