After a While, You Forget to be Complete

I am not a very lucky person, but my God if this day didn't just turn that on its head. Maybe it's Great Britain. Maybe it's the brisk Norwich air. But whatever it was that was making me feel like shit the last couple of days isn't from here, doesn't belong here and is hopefully gone forever. Background is needed here. I have yet to write in this travelogue(-blog?) because on my first night here, I accidentally trashed my computer - soaked it in liquid. It shorted out, it fried (an ammendmment should be put on my "not lucky" proclamation as I managed to break my computer the very same day I purchased five hundred pounds of accidental damage insurance on it - caching!) I was feeling lost, alone. I was equal parts self-loathing and self-pitying. I kept on a brave face. On top of being a damn yankee, I didn't want to appear to be a whiny, baby bitch. If I were a melodramatic person here is where I would loudly declare, "Kelsey McLane saved my very life!" I don't have a single furnishing in this room - no pictures, trinkets or anything of nostalgic value, save for Kelsey's Ipod. And what an Ipod it is! It is the Willy Wonka chocolate factory of ipods. Everywhere you turn, there is something more spectacular and enlightening than all that came before could possibly prepare you for. I took refuge in this Ipod. There was the astounding ferry ride video in which Kelsey's car seems to float above tumultuous waters, carving a Moses-inspired path into the sea. There was The Royal Tenenbaums for those hours when all I needed was the whispering of sweet oddities into my ear by facsimiles for Salinger characters. There was the massive and inspired Citizen Kane playlist to wile away the hours. I was still toiling in my self-inflicted turmoil, but this ipod was the equivalent of a giant hug from everyone I love.

But it only got worse - today my bathroom flooded after I took a short, five-minute shower. The water began to spill out and pool on my carpet. I didn't have time to do anything about it as my registration appointment was looming. I rushed off, dissapointed, upset. In registration, I then discovered that I was signed up for two classes in the same time slot -- and there was nothing I could do about it. I paused for a "WHAT THE FUCK?!" moment. But then it all became too much. I was exhausted, dejected. I needed to pass out. I needed human contact - the familiar kind. I called my dad. I had an inane question that took a while to ask. I made it longer. It was a technical question, about computers. I usually grow tired of my father's ranting and gushing quickly, but in this moment, more than any other, I saw how much love was in it, how truly genuine my father's emotions were and how this was the best and only way he knew to express them. He eventually handed the phone to my mother and after all that build-up, I completely broke down. I started recounting my simple, fixable problems and couldn't hold on. Me crying (or showing much emotion at all) is a biannual thing at best (biannual, in this case, meaning once every two years) and my mother hadn't been in audience for such an occurance since I was eight or nine and realized in the middle of the night that God didn't exist. I've spent the last five or six years of my life trying to convince my mom to suppress her motherly urges as I was an "adult." But sometimes you just need to let a mom be a mom.

I hung up and curled up and let it wash over me - the full weight of all that had occured. And then I drank a BOOST that was provided in my student survival kit. BAM. Life in a can, I swear to you. I walked to the bus stop with a shopping list - comforter, pillows, plates, utensils, furnishings. I was meant to take the bus to a giant Costco-like superstore at the end of the line. When the bus came, I got on, got my ticket punched, sat and listened to moody music, acted moody, glared moodily. I was still having a pretty crappy day. I was just energized, so I could put real oomph into my moping.

On my way to the end of the line, the bus stopped in the city centre, which was hustling, bustling and full of life. The bus drained and I followed the life. There were stores of every shape and size. It was a simple adventure of massive importance. The city centre is like Diagon Alley without all that superfluous magic. Twists and turns, brick corridors, buildings that look old and buildings that are trying to look old. There are two Tescos, a department store called "The Department Store" and the familiar signs for Subway and Pizza Hut. If Kelsey liked showtunes I would have put on "Nowadays" from Chicago. I walked and walked and walked. I don't think the Britons (sp?) quite knew how to take the thick, toothy grin that kept spreading, receding, expanding and settling. Things suddenly opened up. I barely got anything - paper plates, plastic forks, deodorant - but it all seemed worth it.

If this comes across as anticlimactic, I apologize. There was nothing to it but being there. When I was done, my years of practice with LA public transit told me to cross the street and grab the same numbered bus back to the school -- but the 35 didn't pick up there. The 25 didn't either. I was confused, but not perturbed. I just went looking for the stop. I must have curled two or three miles in, out and around the city centre, but there was no frustration. The endorphines built up a perfect high. There was finally an outlet for my desire for adventure. I started walking in the direction I assumed the campus was in. I was bound to find a bus stop eventually, and if I didn't, the 5-7 mile walk home (or deeper into the city, as dusk approached, if I picked the wrong direction) would be some story. Now here's where the luck of the first sentence creeps in. I am not the guy who finds that bus stop. I am the guy who gets horribly lost, winds up in a bad neighborhood, and suffers the tragic cold open of a CSI episode. But there it was - a little podunk 25 bus stop - and only after a mile and a half or so of walking. The bus rolls along five minutes later and I go to the top floor and sit at the very front, and it is as though I am floating above the raucous scene below, carving a Moses-inspired path through the wrong side of the road. I got off the bus too early, mastaking one side of the enormous campus for the other. I walked another mile and when I got to my room, the water had receded and it all didn't seem as large and impossible as it did before. And I suddenly had a huge window that looked out on a million things that were all brand new. And now that I'm finishing this post (handwriting, I'll type it when I get the computer. UPDATE: typing, on the computer, that I've received) and think of rest for my limp cheeks and sore feet, I know that everything is as it should be.