Errors in Calculation

So, I went skydiving today... With G and her friends. It was pretty fun. I'm pretty sure it's meant to be more exhilarating than I felt it... I don't feel like I really got everything out of it that I could have. Like, I should have been focusing on how amazing it was that the ground was hurtling toward me at an amazing 180 mph, or that I had just jumped out of a moving airplane 15 thousand feet above the ground, or how beautiful everything around me was, or how far I could see.

But instead, I found myself thinking about how incredibly dry my mouth was, and how I couldn't breathe out of my nose because of speed, and how it felt much like I was drowning, what with the not being able to breathe and all. And I thought about how my shirt was hurting my stomach, and how the harness was hurting my left femoral artery, and where my feet were, and where my hands were. I don't feel like I really saw any of it at all.

I was expecting this huge rush, and some life-perspective-altering feeling of goodness, or euphoria, or something. I think I had it built up in my mind as amazing, but then when it actually happened it wasn't what I expected, and I didn't know how to deal with it.

But people talk about how different the second time really is, and how much more of it you experience than in the first time, so maybe when I go with my sisters I'll be better able to focus. My grip of life has been incredibly off lately. I've felt really disconnected all week, and I really don't like that. It makes me feel like a passenger to my life, and that I have no control, and I really don't like that feeling. I also don't like the way it makes me act like her, and how it can be used as a scapegoat for everything she does, and now a lot of the things I do or think about doing I think about how much they seem like things she would do. I disgust me.



Also, I've realized an enormous error in a calculation of mine: every time I get really close to a friend, that person inevitably moves away from me, or at least get separated from me (whatever the etiology may be). Jess N and Jenn A- moved to Sacremento within half a year of each other. Ben K- went to private high school. Michelle G- went to high school across town. Ann C- goes to school in Boston. Mel M- goes to school in SoCal. (Sadie went SoCal for a while. She's back now, but how long will I have her?) And now Beth's family is moving to Washington, and Kristin is thinking about the east coast as well.

Always before when one would move away I would simply reach out to another, trying desperately to not let myself fall. It's only the closest of friends that have ever moved away from me, and those who are not that close never seem to go anywhere, constantly leaving me with a bunch of people I know, and interact fine with, but not entirely comfortable around. As soon as I try to get closer to them, they move. So it makes sense that I should just stop trying to get close to people. I mean, logically, that's the solution, right?

If executing a certain action results in a failure, then logically the way to avoid that failure is to not utilize that action. I just need to stop getting close to people, and then they won't feel compelled to get away from me.

I'm Just a Notch in Your Bedpost, But You're Just a Line in a Song.

Today I was stepping into the street, and looked left to find the front of a very familiar truck with a very familiar blue Santa Cruz auto dealer plate staring back at me.

Erin was walking next to me, and we were going to the Baytree to buy scantrons. We had stepped off the curb in a synchronized movement. There were no cars waiting at or approaching the stop sign in front of us, and the truck was still completely across the intersection. I had one of her ear buds in my ear, and we were listening to something, but I don't remember what it was. I didn't hear it.

In that instant of recognition everything around me evaporated, and I was no longer in control. The only thing I was aware of was that truck coming at me, and fast. For the majority of the moment I was convinced she would not slow, but would continue to claim my physical existence as she had claimed my faith in the ability of humans to treat one another with respect, and loyalty, and an unending kindness. Faith in the idea that people can simply get along, no matter their differences, and if they clash, talk it out.


All I saw in that instant was her, behind the wheel.
All I heard was the roar of the engine.
All I felt was the beating of my heart ceasing.


I don't know that she knew it was me, but I can assume she did. I don't know that I know whoever it was that was sitting in the passenger seat, but I can assume I do. I don't know that she saw that I saw her, but I can assume she did. I don't know that she appreciates that I made no move to indicate recognition. I can assume that it makes no difference to her. If I had waved to her (even the polite half-wave pedestrians give motorists for not killing them) I don't think she would have waved back. I think she probably would have assumed that I wanted to pretend I still know her.

It may have hurt her for me not to give her any recognition. She brought that upon herself. It is possibly (however unlikely) that seeing me today jarred something- dare I say it- human in her, and now she's going to consider what she did to me, and attempt an apology and reconciliation. If that were the case, I don't think I'd want to forgive her, but honestly don't think I'd be able to stop myself.

I don't know that I'm thinking about this way more than I should, or that she's not thinking about it at all, or that she never did, or that it didn't affect her in the slightest.

But I can assume as much.



I don't claim to understand how our world works, or why.
But I sure would like to know who decided to put me in front of her car today.
I would like to know who or what made her not hit me.
And I'd like to know who or what is making me wish she had.