Posted June 10th, 2003 by Michelle

I tell you what, something very strange just happened. I wrote a bunch of stuff, hit what I thought was the return button, and everything disappeared. What a lesson in impermanence.

It is 2PM in the afternoon. I’ve been up for two hours, and have accomplished little more than a cup of coffee and a bowl of cereal. I just worked a “quad”- two doubles in a row- and I am spent. And I have to jump in the shower, jump on my bike and get back to work. I slept at the restaurant, on a banquet, between the shifts. You may be asking yourself, why on earth would I do such a thing to myself? And I tell you, regardless of how much I work, I currently have $52.23 in my bank account. Such is my financial life.

The National Guard is gone from the Union Square subway stop. How is it that the powers that be have suddenly decided that we don’t need them anymore? How did they decide in the first place? Do they really think that just because we’ve stopped bombing the shit out of Iraq that suddenly we are no longer creating hate and anger? I just don’t get it. I also can’t describe the feeling of walking past twenty Guardsmen with automatic rifles on my way to the Q train. I always have my bike, and they part like a sea when I make my way down the platform. These kids are younger than me by ten years, and each of them holds a weapon that could kill every person on my subway.

I don’t want to give up on my country. I don’t want to lose hope and run away. But it seems as though that is exactly what I am doing. I look out my window at this 74-degree day, the sun warming the leaves that now block my view of the apartments across the street. And I can’t help but think about… well, so many things. The other day, someone told me that I was the kind of person who needed to stay, to fight, to try to do something about our government. But I feel like I cannot be fully convicted in this fight without a true sense of perspective. And I don’t believe I can achieve this perspective without living somewhere that is antithetical to the U.S. I also, on a selfish note, would rather move to Africa for two years than stay in my current economic trap. I have no life. I am only a server who is too poor to do much but work and think.

I’ve had new thoughts on my birthday. I want books or classes on organic farming. I want help paying my $410 tuition for my French class. I want yoga. I want any clothes that wick. I want new eyeballs. I want books. Oh, yeah, and a wireless cyclocomputer. And a trip to California. And a pony. Yes, yes, I know, it’s ugly to say I want I want I want, but this may be the last birthday I have for two years where I’ll want something other than bug spray. It may well be my last birthday in America for two years. I want a party with rooms full of laughter… ten thousand tons of ice cream…