Stumbling
(poster and sticker on wall from art crawl. sticker by Christina b.)
Plot my escape. Eight hours is a long time to spend with your family.
Shannon tells me to have a drink tonight, tells me I have to have one because its part my degree too. I laugh, but we both know its true. I edited a good chunk of her papers, half wrote a handful of assignments, and gave her ideas she would jot down and turn into a project.
I can tell Sean wants to be out with his friends.
I'm at the edge of the driveway
He says, "Where are you going?"
"Out"
"Where are you going?"
"Out," I say and smirk.
"Be careful," he says.
"I might," I say.
On the bus. A bigger girl sits beside me. She apologizes for squishing me, and I tell her I don't mind. I want her to know that I am self-conscious of people sitting next to me on the bus for the same reason. She likes the doodles I am sketching. We chat a bit. When the seat across from me is free, she moves, but I didn't want her to feel like she had to.
We get off downtown. I rip the page of doodles I was drawing out of my notebook, the ones she liked and wrote "you are beautiful" on it. I slipped it in a Dear Girl, zine and gave it to her and said, "I want you to have this, you might like it, its a zine I make."
She said thanks, smiled, and I walked away quickly. Went and did art crawl. Went alone. It was a good art crawl, but lonely. I kept seeing people I vaguely knew, people from school. But the thing is, people go with people to things like this. It's nice, but awkward when you meet up with someone you know from school, work, or the just random day to day things. I talk to them for a few minutes.
Eventually they always say something like, "Are you alone?"
I say, "Yeah, I couldn't get anyone to come with me." I really want to say, "I asked about 5 people to come out with me, and each one of them said no for different reasons, and its kind of really fucking annoying when you don't have the ability to make plans with anyone. That you are only good at making plans for long distances, weeks, days ahead. And when you really want to go out and do something, you don't have anyone to go out with. Not so much "go out" with, but "let's go out and take no prisoners" kind of out with."
It becomes awkward when they say, "Oh I have to go and meet with my friends now," because you caught them when they were alone. They came out with people. I say something like "see you soon," or "have a great time!" and go on my own way.
I know I saw things that I wouldn't have seen if I went with other people, but sometimes thoughts alone don't make good companions.
Act IV
Difference
(singers from thou art art party at art crawl)
Art crawl is pretty much over. I try to decide what I'm going to do.
Do I go home, go out alone, go for a walk, go see music?
Mission is to drink one drink.
I graduated a little bit today too.
Go to the gay bar. It's kind of quiet, kind of early.
I get a drink, but feel too much like the older gay men there.
Sad, a little lonely, a little creepy.
Drinking quietly in the corner, watching people dance.
It's all girls with their gay best friends.
Fucking boring.
It's early, but I feel even more alone there.
Leave a Dear girl, zine in the bathroom.
Think myself out of the bar.
"Come to Che" is a text I get.
I go there, and I see girls tripping up the cobblestone.
My sister always jokes its funny to see drunk girls have trouble walking there.
I tripped, and I was basically sober.
Wait in line, get in.
Hot, loud, and lonely.
I can't find them, which is a joke because its so small.
I think when I do find them, will I even like who they are right now as much as I like them normally?
Leave.
I realize I'm a wanderer, not a stumbler.
There is a big difference that I can't explain.
You're either more one or the other.
Go back to John's apartment.
Sleep on the couch.
I really really want to fucking cut myself.
And I wonder
If its because I feel like a failure of a 20 year old.
I feel a flicker of the future again.
I push her out of my mind.
It's just some fantasy.
Some big fucking joke.
Act V
Reprise
(random theatre building at art crawl)
I wake up on the couch.
Leave.
I feel like I used to feel when I would stay over.
Like I was just some strange girl sleeping on the couch
An intrusion.
The multimedia lab isn't open in the summer.
Go to get the bus.
Call my mother.
She's mad I went out last night.
My cellphone is a little beacon
A direct link that imports anger, rejection and exports my clumsiness and loneliness.
Why do I pay so much a month for something like that?
Yelled at.
"You can't stay at the apartment of two young guys."
There's some illusion of impropriety
Yelled at some more. Hang up. Come home.
Oldest sister Miranda is there.
Carly doesn't want to talk to me.
Mother ignores me.
Put on trial in the kitchen for being out at night, and being vegetarian.
"You're going to mess up your hormones," my nutrition conscious oldest sister says.
"I fix people everyday who are vegetarians."
Everyone thinks I had a great night.
That I went out with people,
Partied it up.
"So really where did you stay over last night? Where did you really go?"
I smile as I say, "John's" and "art crawl".
She doesn't believe me, but there's no big secret.
It's not like I crawled out of some strange woman's bed in Toronto, and had to figure out how I got there, how to get home, and where my bra was.
Curtain Call
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