Thursday, June 7, 2007

What We Overheard

Ever notice how when you overhear other people talking they inevitably sound like idiots. It's not that I don't sound like an idiot, quite the contrary. It's that we all talk about such mindless, stupid, unimportant things that when you hear other people you're faced with the fact that we don't often have anything to say. Or, if you are talking about something that actually 'matters,' you still sound like a prat. Like you think you're better than somebody else, or smarter, or more self-important.

I do like riding the train. I just wish everybody would just shut up. I have a Fiddle Pulled from the Throat of Sparrow. Can't you see I'm reading here?

I work in a cubby hole. In the mornings I listen to my coworkers bitch when they get here in the morning. About how they got so many emails and how late they had to work the night before and the great coach bag they just bougth and how they want to buy a condo but the prices are just too high and their new ties and their shoes and their exercise regiment and their phone ringing and how great they are etc It goes on for about an hour every day. No wonder they have to work late.

People have stopped trying to have these conversations with me, and to be honest, I don't mind. If I want to talk to somebody, I go to my friend's office or out to the bar and talk to the service staff. They don't rattle on endlessly about themselves or their jobs. Sometimes they talk about sports and I listen and occasionally ask questions because I don't know a lot about sports. Sometimes they ask about the upcoming weekend or previous weekend. We all give short answers. We laugh. Belly laughs. Chuckles. Slap you on the shoulder laughs.

Does all of this make me a snob? Probably, but that's alright. They are also snobs. The kind of snobs that ask you to go to coffee or lunch with them then literally don't talk to you at all. Go out of their way to not respond to you at all. Will literally turn their backs on you.



I have been thinking about poems, mostly. And trying to get together with people who are leaving or people I want to see before I leave. I am missing people I haven't left yet. I am planning my future. I am wondering how other people's priorities become priorities. I am wishing I brought headphones. I have been singing Jefferson Airplane for two days and wishing, lightly, that I was Grace Slick, who is now an 'artist.' I kind of like her work but also wonder if she will ever grow out of Alice in Wonderland and the timekeeping white rabbit. I want to take a nap, have nice dreams of fields, endless fields.

I miss my cat. I miss my cat. I miss my cat.

2 comments:

chelky said...

the other day i was in a coffee shop and this high school girl was talking to a boy (her boyfriend? i don't know) about marriage. she kept saying how by 24 she wanted a career and a family. not because she has to, but because she knows she wants to. i looked around and there was an older woman eating cake and an middle-aged couple reading the paper. and me, drinking coffee and writing a thesis. we all kept looking at each other and laughing silent laughs. laughing at the girl. how silly are we to know what we want in a few years? without pretending to have that knowledge, though, we can't plan anything. that, my friend, is how people make their priorities into priorities. it's silly. now go listen to jefferson airplane and be in the moment. i promise you it's all that matters! *chelka

amber said...

i look forward to reading your food reviews. that should be neat. i like food.