29 May 2008

peeling oranges, part 1

It all started with peeling oranges.

there was something about the smell of navel oranges from across a crowded cafeteria. that initial burst of juicy scent, full of citric acid and musty freshness, grabbed Katrina every time. it smelled like Christmas to her, when she and her brother would always find a plump navel orange in the bottom of their stockings. some old tradition her mother kept; she wasn’t sure where it came from or how long they’d been practicing it, or what significance it was supposed to hold. but anytime she walked into a cafeteria and anyone had an orange, she instantly knew, and she had to remind herself that it was not acceptable to find the person in possession of the elusive fruit and ask for a slice.

it wasn’t even that she liked Christmas, so much.

the lounge in the biology building was almost big enough to be considered a cafeteria. especially at lunchtime, when it was full of so many people that you couldn’t always see your friend waving from the other side of the room. and somebody always had a fresh orange when Katrina was there for lunch, and she was determined to figure out who.

it didn’t take long. he wasn’t the sort of person you expected to find in the biology building, she thought. he had long, dark hair, and he wore a trenchcoat for most of the year. she probably would have given him a wide berth in the halls of her high school, for fear of the Columbine-like tragedy that she’d been raised to expect and deter, where possible. she never would have picked on him—never would have spoken to him, in fact, largely for fear of saying the wrong thing. she hoped that now that he was in college, he might be a bit more stable. of course, that required the assumption that he had been unstable in high school, and even to make that assumption was unfair, and—she’d better stop before her politically correct imagination ran away with her.

but the thing that caught her attention more than any other attribute of this seemingly incongruous citizen of the biology lounge was that his fingernails were, without a doubt, longer than her own. Katrina wasn’t one of those girls who went out for a manicure on a regular basis, had never had fake nails and didn’t plan to, but she didn’t bite her nails either. they looked neat; all were a uniform length, and she clipped them before they started to bother her. but this boy—assuming he was trying to look like a boy, which she knew she had no real right to assume, but did anyway—let his nails grow until they broke, or so it appeared. one more reason why he didn’t look like he belonged in the biology building—didn’t they ever get in the way during labs?—but they were perfect for peeling oranges.

25 May 2008

note:

finally got internet at the apartment this morning. hopefully that will make posts somewhat more regular again. (assuming that i have anything interesting to write anytime soon.)

EDIT: summer colors! i'm still deciding if i like them.

22 May 2008

magnetic poetry 9

we laugh why get high but believe summer will be happy without it
green grass grows in the sun and we do too
dream light this apartment


(i knew i'd forgotten something last week!)
(written in a spiral on the freezer door.)

19 May 2008

an open letter...

...to the Catholic high school boys i walked past on the sidewalk this morning, one of whom started rapping about smokin' a blunt outside St Paul's Cathedral and then a long piece that included many iterations of the word "bitch":

i know you weren't talking about me.

you will never be able to attract the attention of any woman who is truly worth it. i hope you live a long, lonely life full of meaningless sex and empty relationships.

16 May 2008

recent writings:

1. a very long Raven-esque poem, written mostly to play with meter and rhyme and to get the content out of the way of my other writing. may or may not be posted, in whole or in part.

2. a short sketch about orange-peeling in a cafeteria. may be developed into a short story, if plot occurs to me. will probably be posted, at least in part, at some point in the future.

3. pieces of a song. it's still not long enough, but it's longer than it was when i started. it needs or a chorus, or a bridge, or something. and another verse or two.

4. stream-of-consciousness journal entry, facilitated by a computer keyboard. not to be posted.

i feel like there should be more than this, but i also feel like it's rather a lot, especially since it's all happened in the last few days. this not having internet business is reducing my blog posts for the month of May. apologies to anyone who might be bothered.

09 May 2008

note:

moved to a new apartment, no internet at home yet. haven't forgotten about this.

01 May 2008

an open letter to my parents:

i hope you don't think i'm in a rush to get the rest of my things out of this house because i don't like you and don't want to come home anymore....i also hope you don't think that you are the reason i rarely come back to this town.

i kind of hope you will redo my room sooner rather than later, because coming back to this place is like opening a door into my past, and it's a past i'd rather be done with. that's why i seem so over-eager to move the rest of my things, even though, as you keep reminding me, i don't know where i'll end up in a few years--or even next year.

i couldn't tell you why i'm still trying to visit people from high school. i hope i find a sufficient answer for myself tomorrow.