some conversation/no contemplation/hit the road
“My poor baby,” laughed Somayya last night, “you need sleep.”
This was after we had walked halfway across campus from the library at almost midnight and climbed four flights of stairs at the parking garage only to find the entire level empty, with nary a car in sight. I stared in alarm. “Oh shit shit shit,” said the voice in my head. Or maybe I did say it out loud, I don’t remember. Don’t be surprised if I did.
“Umm, Yazzo…?” said Somayya quizzically.
“I could swear I parked my car here,” I said, struggling not to panic.
She was on her cell phone with D at the time. “Hold on, I’ll call you back,” she said abruptly. “We gotta find Yazzo’s car.” I was tempted to laugh at that, regardless of my increasing alarm. She hung up and turned to me. “You sure it’s not over at the Life Sciences Addition?”
“No! I parked it right here this morning, dammit. I could swear…” I trailed off, looked around the empty level once more, and said sheepishly, “Uhh, you know what, maybe that was yesterday morning…”
So then we had to walk, no, trek, all the way over to the parking lot at the other end of campus. That was such fun. All bitterness and sarcasm aside, though, the stars were absolutely gorgeous. And I think I’ve finally figured out how to find the Big Dipper.
The days are all trickling together into one never-ending blur. Now that I’ve gotten two midterms out of the way this week, I have a paper due today, and another midterm exam; tomorrow I have a presentation to make, and another paper due. I need to renew next year’s application for one of my internships, and at least do something to contribute towards my second internship, and revise my cover letter and resume and send them out for this job I’ve found that seems absolutely perfect for me, if only I can overcome my laziness. It’s the week from hell, can you tell? Actually, scratch that—I cannot even begin to contemplate what hell on earth must be like, much less imagine the sheer horror of hell in the Afterlife. I’m blessed far more than I deserve. It’s just that I’m currently so overwhelmed and exhausted that I found myself telling numerous people to “have a beautiful weekend!” yesterday, which was only Wednesday, for goodness sake.
I think I keep doing this simply because so far my focus all week has been on driving out to Berkeley on Friday to spend some quality time with the birthday girl. Two days back at school, and I already need to get away. This past weekend’s three days of the MSA-West Conference at Cal spoiled me—I’m tired, as usual, of my college town and the bland flatness of the general Sacramento area; I need the hills, curves, and diversity of Berkeley the town. It’s my birthplace, though I’ve never lived there. That should explain it all.
I also need some crazy stories. The funniest thing to happen this week was when an acquaintance asked my friend F, “Is Yasmine half-Black?” I suppose her negative response wasn’t enough for him, which is why he asked Somayya last night, “You sure Yasmine isn’t 1/8th or 1/16th Black?” I find that highly amusing. I don’t even look Black—skin tone, features, or otherwise. My skin tone is lightish like my father’s—not pale but slightly tanned, several shades lighter than my mother’s—but I would think I appear quite obviously Pakistani. Yet I find myself consistently mistaken for Italian, Palestinian, or Kashmiri. I’m not quite sure where Black fits in though. Still, going along with Phathima‘s advice, I’ve decided to view this as versatility rather than symptoms of an identity crisis on my part.
Random: Favorite new album these days is Maroon 5‘s Songs About Jane. Great road trip music. I’m speaking from personal experience, of course, and I’m not even talking about my commute to/from school.
In other news, I’m suffering from lack of free time these days yet still seem to have the past three weeks worth of weblog entries floating around in my head—disjointed thoughts, half-formulated sentences, scrupulously-recalled snippets from conversations in passing, strings of words carefully placed next to one another and readjusted daily as I’m walking, driving, lying in bed half-asleep. Whether it is a blessing or a curse, I don’t know, that once I deliberately fashion such phrases and sentences I consider it wasteful to not use them, and so they remain, stubbornly refusing to leave, taking up valuable and much-needed space in my brain, until I write or type them out, constantly rearranging them into a precise order.
This is why, starting next week, you may find weblog updates with startling regularity. Until then, be patient, bear with me, have beautiful days, be at peace.
Stay tuned.