A Prose Ode to the Subway

Subway, I love you and I despise you.

I love you when I see that one of my fellow riders has brought their ferrets along. Fortunately, they are caged because I hear ferrets are crafty. And who knows, they could be trained by a devious owner to pick-pocket. However, the ferrets of last Sunday evening were a delight to behold. I even saw one lady take a photo of them with her smart phone camera. I think she thought she was being sneaky, but that ridiculous artificial shutter sound went off when she captured the moment. I don't think she even realized it though, because she had headphones in.

Subway, I love you when I see babies eating pancakes in you. And when I see troupes of tourists taking selfies or plotting their next New York City excursion with their noses deep in travel guides. I even love you when your occupants are bold and brazen and act like the rod in the middle of the car is a stripper pole and take sexy pictures of their city sojourn. Even though they are loud and sort of obnoxious, I can appreciate that they are having a good time.

I love you when one of your riders exits, passes by an adjacent car, notices a friend, and runs in to fist bump the friend before continuing to the exit.

I love that a delivery boy for a floral shop had to transport a large, colorful funeral wreath from 68th Street to Bleeker in your cars. I love staring at "Beloved Grandmother" written in purple glitter on the ribbon and remembering that I need to call my grandmother. I also like smelling the flowers.

I love that when I ride you on a Saturday morning you are full of families.

I love you when someone gives up their seat for someone elderly or a pregnant lady.

Actually, subway, I love you a lot. I don't know why I said I despise you.

Except that sometimes I can't observe all these interesting people because my eyes are pressed into the cotton fleece covering someone's spine and I become part of one steaming human clot travelling through the veins of the underground.

That's when I hate you.

On Reading Joan Didion Essays in a Tattoo Parlor

The names of the proprietors of Giant Tattoo, my next-door neighbor, are not Cujo and Bulldog. Those are the names of the movers around the corner. I was confused. But the Giant Tattoo people (whose names I never asked) were gracious about the mistaken identity.

I had not had much interaction with the tattoo parlor in my month of residence; however, I cannot leave my apartment without passing the business, and it has caused me to more frequently entertain the possibility of getting some ink. Actually, a sign in the window reads "HALF PRICED PIERCINGS SATURDAY & SUNDAY." The sign has spawned thoughts of a nose stud. I could do something mildly edgy--yet impermanent--at a discounted rate. But tonight I had an experience with Giant Tattoo that had nothing to do with their typical rendering of service.

This evening you could have found sitting on the stoop of my apartment reading the contemplatively melancholy and fearlessly observant essays of Joan Didion's Slouching Toward Bethlehem. I was locked out and waiting for my roommate to arrive from downtown, about a forty minute commute. I was scarcely a paragraph into Joan's musings on Hawaii when one of the tattoo artists saw me without shelter and invited me to sit inside his establishment.

The bench inside was infinitely more comfortable than the concrete. I attempted to make a bit of friendly conversation: "How's business?" "Are any of you named Cujo or Bulldog?" and "Are you from California?" after seeing sketches of the LA Dodgers' logo and "Long Beach" written in large, ornate letters. Their answers were complete and polite, but conversation did not flourish, so I went back to my new literary love, Joan.

However, inspired by her introspective and keenly self-aware prose, I began to process my time in Giant Tattoo in a writerly manner. (I italicize because it seems so pretentious.) I was not uncomfortable, but certainly out of my element as everyone around me conversed in Spanish and in the style of the shop was one that strongly emphasized a sort of gangster element. In the sketches that covered almost every inch of wall space, hyper-sexualized women with tremendous breasts that were often unsheathed were a prominent subject. I counted 51 busty women. In one of the images, a fit lady laid near a dollar sign. Beneath her was written, "Money before Bitches." I was surrounded by blatantly misogynistic tattoo art, but my hosts were perfect gentlemen and so kind. Here seems like a good place to mention that there were at least two Jesus drawings. There were also a fair number of scary clowns. The appeal of a scary clown tattoo, I will never understand.

I ought to express my gratitude in a neighborly way. Maybe I'll bring the guys a plate of homemade cookies from the next batch I cook up. Maybe I'll get in good with them and manage to get an even deeper discount on the nose piercing that I will actually probably never have the audacity to get.

On Picking Flowers (Really a Meditation on Moving Away)

Last night, I was up the canyon. There were these simple yellow flowers that were blooming, and despite everything I know about not picking wildflowers, I couldn't refrain from gathering a handful of them. It wasn't out of greediness necessarily. I thought to myself, "I can't pick too many because I want future campers to enjoy the bursts of color." However, I wanted to take a little of the prettiness with me.

I often get the same compulsion when I pass a pretty rosebush or lilac tree. I so badly want to take a flower or two--even when it is in someone's yard. When I was nine, I had an old man yell at me for taking a shiny rock out of his meticulously landscaped lawn. I cried a little bit because I hated getting in any kind of trouble, no matter how insignificant my crime. I dredge up that memory when my hand drifts perilously close towards a very snap-able stem.

I know you are suppose to leave beautiful things in that one place where they belong so other people can enjoy them, but I don't stay in one place. Sometimes you want more than a memory. Even though, inevitably, every flower I have ever picked has died. I guess that is the unavoidable fate of trying to cling to things that are fleeting.

In less than three weeks, I will board a plane to New York City with no return ticket. Moving to the city has been a fantasy of mine probably since I first understood the concept of New York City: 8 million people crammed into 5 burroughs and exponential opportunities in a city where everyone is trying to get by and/or make it big.

Last November, I stood with my friend Jessica in a small park in Brooklyn with a stunning view of the looming skyscrapers of lower Manhattan just days after superstorm Sandy had wreaked her havoc. Jessica and I are kindred fatalistic spirits. As we marveled at the metropolis, Jessica talked about the inevitability of New York City slipping into the sea--becoming the next Atlantis. It is right on the coast and we are in the throes of some major climate upheaval. She concluded that we may be one of the last generations to be able to dwell in the city. Her assessment may have bordered on extreme pessimism, but there was a ring of truth. Nothing is forever.

I have to live in New York City once in my life and not just because it could one day be underwater, although that does add a sense of urgency. Maybe I will love it. Maybe I will hate it. I will miss my mountains and I will miss my familiar haunts, but most of all, I will miss my people--my family and friends. Just last week, I was listening to "Mona Lisas and Mad Hatters" by Elton John in my car and let loose a flood of grateful tears when he sang the line "I thank the Lord for the people I have found." I really feel there are so many people in this world to connect with and love, but it feels so rare and magical to meet people who make hours feel like minutes. People who make you wish you that your body had no physical need for sleep because even though it is 4 a.m. you don't want the conversation to end.

However, nothing lasts forever, and sometimes you have to make do with a memory.

To end, a quote by Charles Bukowski because, man, that guy says some stuff worth thinking about:

“Love is a form of prejudice. You love what you need, you love what makes you feel good, you love what is convenient. How can you say you love one person when there are ten thousand people in the world that you would love more if you ever met them? But you'll never meet them. All right, so we do the best we can. Granted. But we must still realize that love is just the result of a chance encounter. Most people make too much of it. On these grounds a good f*** is not to be entirely scorned. But that's the result of a chance meeting too. You're damned right. Drink up. We'll have another.”

in memory of a most beloved dog

it was may. i had almost completed the seventh grade. my hair was still naturally blonde and i owned many pairs of overalls, when my parents brought home a puppy on a friday night. it was a miniature red dachshund. however, unfortunately for that poor dog's sense of masculinity, my parents realized that they had got the wrong puppy--they'd wanted a girl and ended up with a boy. so after the breeder made a special trip to bring us the sex we wanted, we had two dogs. because after our bonding with the poor emasculated male, we couldn't give him up.

thus, dirk and diva became a permanent fixture of our family, the dachshund duo with the alliterated names. however, on friday, february 15th, diva passed away.

she was a neurotic little bandit, which made her a perfect fit for the scheidler clan. she was smart and wily. she learned to clank the food dishes when she was hungry. she chewed everything she could get her teeth on from blankets to books to coat sleeves (lately, i've been wearing the coat whose sleeve she mangled and thinking about what a little rascal she was.) she would lick your face until your skin fell off, if you'd let her. she loved us all so desperately. they would follow us anywhere. so many times diva waited with dirk as randi, seth or i sat playing inside a friend's house. when i trained for a marathon she and dirk and endeavored to run with me, as fast as their little feet would carry them, and coming home even more exhausted than me (two miles is a lot when your legs are only four inches long.)

it is so cheesy, but there's nothing like the crazily devoted, unconditional love of a dog to make you feel okay. it is insane how many times diva made me feel better about things by curling up with me.

last summer, i let her out of my mom's house to go about her business, and she didn't come back with dirk. i was frantic, calling animal control (they'd caught her before) and fretting over my irresponsibility. half of a day passed, until the couple that had bought the home the dogs had spent the majority of their lives in called. diva had traversed half of payson to go home. she was smart and persistent, and i imagine that she was longing for things to be the way they were before they got complicated and all of us kids grew up and tried to clear our way through the jungles of adulthood.

when diva was just a couple months old, she climbed up on my back while i was laying in bed. suddenly i felt this rather pleasant warmth spread across my back; however, the pleasantness dissipated when i realized the puppy was peeing on me. i high-tailed it to the shower, but ever since then, i have been wary of unexplained warmth--heated seats always get me worried.

oh man, diva. you will be so missed.

on the radio (maybe) and relics of broken marriage

i like to hobnob among the slc elite, and by the slc elite, i mean the nonprofit community. i attended a utah nonprofit networking social this evening, and it was a pretty classy event because they bought fancy crackers, cheese, and wine. (all events can be judged by the caliber of the cheeses they serve.) the event was hosted at krcl, a local, nonprofit radio station. i got to chat with "bad" brad wheeler, the drive-time deejay, and record a little spot in the studio. my bit went exactly like this, "this is roni from neighborhood house and you're listening to 90.9 fm krcl. community connections, music discovery." so, you could here the dulcet tones of my slightly lispy voice between native american tribal chants. (although, krcl plays more than tribal chants--i've heard laura marling played.)

i came home from my networking to find two packages under my doormat.

the greatest of the haul?

 yellow snap-in 45rpm adapters.

i can now play the bag of 45's that were played at my parents' wedding in 1988. for some reason, i find it particularly transcendent to listen to the tunes my parents selected while i was a six-month-old embryo. the songs are artifacts of a different time. a time that i can chalk up to being simpler, although it was surely rife with complexity as two young people prepared themselves to be stewards over the existence of an infant (me.) My mom was my age when she was married. My dad was a tender 19. this is incredibly cheesy to say, but listening to these songs three years after my parents' separation makes them so potent and not in an upsetting way. listening to belinda carlisle belt it and the soundtrack that patrick swayze did his dirty dancing to, makes me feel oddly hopeful and cognizant of all the crazy ups and downs of life. it makes me love life on this tuesday evening and so excited for the potential of the thousands of other evenings that are waiting for me.

i can eat cake off of a tupperware lid IF I WANT!

for those of you who are not aware, i am an adult. it is quite a thrilling realization to come upon.despite my love for sweatshirts printed with kittens and my propensity to eat cake for breakfast, i am no one's ward. anyway, as a surveyed my kingdom--all 450 feet of my studio apartment--i was basking in the insanity that is being a grown-up. not only am i an adult, but i have been a legal adult for more than six years! it seems like i should have something to show for that, like a couple of floor-crawlers with half of my dna, but i don't even have a pet (i can't handle the emotional investment of THAT so let's not even linger over the kid thing.)

so, i haven't found my life necessarily blog worthy. i have lived in the same apartment for 14 months now, worked the same job for 14 months now (well, i guess i did have a sort of promotion), blah, blah, blah. nonetheless, i really like reading everybody's blogs (especially when they get juicily personal), so i suppose i'll dump on you the news of my life.

1) i think i am developing a sinus infection. i do not really know what i sinus infection is, but i have heard of it spoken often. i assume it is like a cold that lingers in the top part of your nose and creates a mild pulsing headache in your temples, since that is what i feel and i am calling it a sinus infection.

2) i almost bought a bike on groundhog's day, but it was a day of thwarted impulses. (if they'd had a purple road bike, i may have been $500 poorer.)

3) i am going to new york city in two weeks to interview for a new york city teaching fellowship. i'm feeling weirdly complacent in salt lake city, like i could live here all of my days and be happy, but i figured there was nothing to lose but a couple hundred dollars by at least showing up for the interview and spending a weekend in the big city.

4) i cut my bangs in the bathroom of work with children's scissors. because I CAN!

5) i am trying to read some dostoevsky to enrich my mind, but it keeps putting me to sleep. so, in short, i am getting dumber, but i feel okay about that.

6) the guy who invented the etch-a-sketch passed away on February 1, 2013. i may need to buy myself an etch-a-sketch to honor andre casagne's memory.

that is all the news i am willing to share in blog form. thank you for your patronage.

the worst weeks are the best weeks

oy vey. mamma mia. ay coron. oh, man. it feels like the last 14-days have been a lifetime, because it seems i have experienced a lifetime's worth of emotion. likely, i am being hyperbolic; i don't think i have really fit a whole life's worth of feeling into a fortnight, but it has been intense. would you like to have an abbreviated list form of what i am talking about? (although, in the interest of full-disclosure, most of this happened in the last 10 days, but i really wanted to use the word fortnight.)

• i attended my three-year old niece's dance recital and basically fought back a barrage of tears threatening to break through the dam of my tear ducts the entire time. "childhood! families! the sweet sense of accomplishment in working hard at something and sharing it with an audience! alas, my own fleeting youth!"  i only cry publicly when watching Titanic or My Girl (okay, and basically any movie tailored for emtional manipulation).
• my car was stolen. out of the lighted underground garage at my apartment building. (it had been broken into the week prior. literally, broken into. the delinquents broke the quarter window on the passenger's side door, and rummaged through my stuff, mainly dirty laundry,but they did take my driver's license, which was stupidly sitting in a cup holder and some headphones and possibly, a spare key, which would explain the grand theft auto.)
•  slept in the house i have called home since my adolescence one last time before ownership transferred to a new couple. the block i spent the majority of the last decade on is now mainly inhabited by retirees. in my head, and sometimes aloud, i call it "old row." with love.
• my baby sister turned 20! she really used to be my baby sister, but as we age at the same rate the relative distance between our years keeps shrinking and makes it feel like she is aging even faster. and also makes her my best friend.
• when driving said baby sister home from work in a car my mother had lent to us poor carless souls the dratted prius stopped in downtown salt lake and because we were not adept at managing its complex machinery. we spent forever merely sitting at the stoplight waving at people to pass us because we couldn't even figure out how to get it into neutral while it was malfunctioning.
• my car was found! but the tires and radio were not. this made the task of recovering it quite an ordeal. however, i found a cup of evidence that the culprits unwisely left, and unfazed by the grossness sifted through it until i discovered a McDonald's receipt with a time stamp. do you want to know the psychological profile of someone who orders a steak, egg and cheese bagel and ICE in their orange juice? a hardened criminal. i've already called up mcdonald's to get some tape but haven't had a chance to go to the police with the evidence yet. (i got all crazy about solving this matter vigilante-justice style, but that was because i had done the whole batman watching thing. (extra parenthetical side note: does anyone think the dark knight rises contained an implicitly anti-occupy message? i could see how it could be read that way, but i plead political innocence on its behalf. but i once heard a sociologist say "nothing is innocent."))
• i went to a mumford and sons concert with baby sister in honor of her birthday, but lost the tickets. after a laborious search through all the trash in my car, we decided to hope to be offered a chance to plead our case. as we walked through hoping to find a ticket-taker with a listening ear, we realized we had walked passed the ticket-takers and were in the venue. no harm, no foul, eh? also, i gave (by proxy) mumford and sons an embroidered pillow i had made. i trusted one of the less beloved touring bands to get it to the headliners who had taken refuge somewhere away from the crowds (and they did and said winnie thought it was awesome). tickets were found behind glove box the next morning.
• my dear friend eliza turned 23. we relived the exploits we engaged in on her 21st year. new tradition?
• bought a new battery for the motor scooter i intend to sell, any interested buyers here? ran into a long-lost friend at the battery store who gave me his personal discount (after my car debacle came up).
• sold off my childhood, yard sale style. with my dad's relocation, the cache of crap/physical memories that our family of five had accumulated over the past 24 years had nowhere to go. good-bye books. good bye toys. good bye freezer, even though we were never close. however, we donated most of the proceeds to the Michael J. Fox Foundation for Parkinson's Research (I am running the NYC marathon for them, if you don't recall. for more details, or to donate, click here:  http://www2.michaeljfox.org/site/TR/Sponsored/TeamFox?px=1012705&pg=personal&fr_id=1210 ) 
• i actually started to let people know about my Michael J. fox Foundation fundraising effort and a dear friend i met last summer and haven't seen in a year made a very generous donation. i was moved that she cared about me and the effort. 

the best weeks are the worst weeks because with the bad you know how to measure and cherish the good. every kind deed has felt immeasurably kinder in light of feeling so vulnerable. i have felt this before during difficult time. i think when things are hard you learn how to love people better and how to accept their help and affection with grace and gratitude. if i were poetic i would try to write things in profound moving words. but all you get is this recap of the madness and some ideas in prose.