Serenity Now, Insanity Later

[amarantine-amirite]

A Brief History Of The Time You Broke The Timeline

I have a confession to make: I am a procrastinator. And not one of those procrastinators that says “I go on Facebook like six times a day, I’m such a procrastinator.” I am an honest to God procrastinator.

I will procrastinate everything until the last possible moment. That is probably why I had horrendous grades all through high school. Everything was handed in late because I would grossly underestimate the amount of time that it would take me to do an assignment.

Here’s how I end up procrastinating: the part of my brain that does things that make sense decides that it's time to do something important. The other part of my brain that only cares about two things: easy and fun, has absolutely no sense of the future whatsoever says, “let's read Wikipedia for four hours and make everything stressful”. Four hours later, my brain puts its foot down and says, “That’s enough, it’s time to work now”. 

This really bit me in the ass once, and not in the way you think.

My bedroom desk was buried under open textbooks, empty soda cans, and half-eaten snacks. I sat hunched over the glow of a laptop screen, eyes glazed over. On screen, a half-finished essay titled "The Economic Impact of Color Blindness" flickered.

I navigated away from the word processor and opened a new tab and launched YouTube. I spotted a weird video. It had no thumbnail and was titled How To Travel Through Time.

I clicked play.

The video lights up. An older man in a tweed jacket with frayed cuffs steps into the frame. I recognized him. He speaks with deadly, unblinking seriousness directly into a grainy web-cam. “Uh, hi folks, my name is Dr. Martin Nestle,” he began, “If you are watching this, you’ve stumbled upon the localized resonance frequency. Time travel is real, remarkably cheap, and surprisingly easy.”

I snorted, leaned back, and grabbed a handful of chips. Something about this guy reminds me of Bob Newhart.

The screen cuts to bold, blood-red text flashing over a black screen. The voiceover continued, “Before you construct the flux loop using a microwave magnetron and a standard copper coil, you must memorize one absolute, non-negotiable directive: under no circumstances, and I mean none, are you to attend Stephen Hawking’s party on November 16th, 2012.”

I stopped chewing. The chips hovered halfway to my mouth. “Wait, what happened at the party?” I mumbled. 

“Do not drop in for the champagne. Do not stand in the hallway to peek,” the video continued, “Don’t even look at the flyer. Just turn around.”

I stared at the glowing screen. I completely forgot about my unfinished essay.

Usually, I don’t follow up with anything encountered on a procrastination-induced YouTube spiral. Because, rather ironically, I put it off. The rest of this week was a blur. For reasons I don’t really remember. I followed through on the time machine and ended up at Stephen Hawking’s party. 

Stephen Hawking hosted an after party for a basketball game in November 2012. It took place at a very anachronistic house in the Poconos. I couldn't understand why the party was off-limits. I also didn't know Professor Hawking was a basketball fan, but one thing at a time. 

Relentless, low-grade techno music vibrated through the floorboards. bro-types in backward caps screamed at the TV as they knocked back cheap beers and high-fived wildly off-target.

I stood off to the side, rubbing my temples. Two guys howled in excitement as a third punched a wall. Near the hallway, a visibly inebriated guy casually took a wicked whiz on a decorative potted fern. “It's fine, man!” he slurred, “plants love it!”

I wearily scowled at him. “Are you sure?” I groaned. This guy acting like an idiot just made the migraine thumping behind my eyes so much worse. Then, I ran up the first flight of stairs I could find. I couldn’t take the insanity anymore. 

The muffled techno became slightly less punishing as I reach the second floor. I tried a couple of locked doors before turning a knob that yields. I slipped inside and closed the door behind me.

I inhaled deeply and surveyed the bizarre, dimly lit refuge. A vanity mirror displaying a prominent, silver Mercedes-Benz logo across the top glass adorned the center of the room. Several empty wine glasses rested on the table in front of it. Part of me wants to ask why they didn’t use these instead of the solo cups downstairs, but as I look at them, I realize that those wine glasses would’ve been broken relatively quickly. 

I sank into a large, red beanbag chair and leaned my head back. Right in front of me, I saw dust-covered vintage computers, complete with chunky CRT monitors and beige towers from the late '90s, sitting on a wheeled shelving unit to the side. A cluster of potted palm trees next to the shelf reached toward the ceiling. They looked strangely tropical beside the obsolete tech.

I focused on the oddly soothing display in front of me. The migraine slowly began to subside. My eyelids sank. And then I fell asleep.

I heard some chatter through the vent that woke me up a bit. Some of the partygoers were talking about the world ending. Someone said we shouldn’t worry because they have enough computers to simulate our world after December 21st as if nothing ever happened. 

It woke me up because of how stupid it was. Holy crap, people, get over it, I thought, the world isn’t going to end in 2012. The Mayan calendar ends there because the Spaniards showed up and they got a little busy.

I woke up for real when some idiot crashed their car into the house. I just thought the loud bang was one of those idiots hanging off the garage door and it finally gave out.

People screamed. I heard people storming up the stairs. That car crash wasn't an accident. It was a strategic move for intruders to penetrate a house in the most destructive manner possible. 

The intruders knew someone was in that room upstairs. They broke down the door.

A scuffle ensued. The wheels on the shelving unit got unlocked. The unit became mobile and the computers fell off. One of the boxes got so damaged it had ceased to operate. 

I barely got out with my life. Who cares if the box is damaged, as long as I’m OK. 

Things got worse when I came back to the present. So far, we’ve had three once-in-a-generation economic crashes in a row, natural disasters that defy physics itself, and endless utterly bizarre wars. 

Turns out, the world really was due to end on December 21 and those computers were XP machines that would indeed simulate our world after that dark day. Because of the damaged box, not everybody could have their consciousness uploaded. Unfortunately, some of those individuals were kind of important to the simulation working correctly. 

Having the simulation of post-2012 life work correctly turned out to be crucial to the timeline after that point. If the simulation doesn't work, the timeline doesn't just split. It ends up with a hole. Nobody wants a hole in space time, so they’ve written bits of code to fill in the gaps. What we're seeing are all edge cases that are popping up.

I now understand the warning not to go back to the party. 

[amarantine-amirite]

Confessions of a Bully

I have had problems with Katie ever since the beginning of sophomore year. 

Katie came after me any chance she got. She particularly disapproved of how much time I spent with the boy who I was assigned to pick up homework from if I can’t be in class and voiced her displeasure accordingly. My teachers sat on their hands, hoping we’d work it out on our own. 

I had no idea what the underlying problem was. Today, I finally got an answer. And it came out of nowhere. 

“Isn’t it funny how we’ve ended up,” I said. Immediately after I said that, I lost track of what I was referring to.

"You know," Katie smiled, "I’ve always envied you.”

I couldn’t believe what she was saying. Her, jealous of me? “How?” I asked, "I can't get organized. I lose track of the dumbest shit it’s not even funny. What have I got that you don’t?”

“A bedroom” Katie responded dryly.

“You're kidding, right?” I found it hard to believe that this girl had no bedroom at home.

"No, I'm not," Katie said, "Our neighbor has a camera on his roof that points right into my bedroom. Mom asked him to move it, but he never did."

I frowned, setting my glass down on the counter. "So, did your mom go to the police?"

Katie rolled her eyes, "We did. They didn’t believe us." She rubbed her temples. "So now I have to sleep in the basement until they can brick up my bedroom window."

"And you're on the fold-out?" I asked. I had visions of the kind of pull-out bed that felt less like furniture and more like it belonged in a medieval dungeon.

Katie let out a bitter, humorless laugh. "That's the problem. There is no fold-out couch. I’m sleeping straight on the floor, and my back is absolutely destroyed because of it."

“That's it?” I said. It seemed there was more to the story, but she couldn't tell me. I had a feeling her family was moving away and her parents told her to keep quiet.

Katie stared down at her hands. She nervously pulled at a loose thread on her sweater. “I’m…i’m sorry,” she mumbled.

Katie swallowed hard. Her shoulders dropped as the defensive wall between us came down. She looked up with glossy eyes. “It’s not just sleeping on the floor,” she began, “It was right after my mom said it. Just came right out and told us my brother was her favorite, and then, like two minutes later, my parents announced we had to pack up and move. Abruptly.”

I watched Katie fight not to cry as she told me, “It was just... too much. Everything fell apart at once, and I didn't know what to do with it. So I took it out on you.”

The pieces finally fell into place. I now know the real reason she bullied me.

After spring break, Katie had indeed moved away. The family drove to Germany. Or at least, they tried to. 

Things were great until they tried to drive across the Arctic sea ice in Nunavut. The car sank about 2000 ft deep, then the water crushed it like an empty coke can. Your average sub can withstand these pressures, but a car can't.

I don’t think she knew what hit her.

@umprompted

[amarantine-amirite]

It’s so hot the shapeshifter is starting to melt

@deepwaterfiction

[amarantine-amirite]

Cool Night

[amarantine-amirite]

Ice-calibur

[amarantine-amirite]

Reach Out

[amarantine-amirite]

Title: Muriel's First Word

Fandom: The Goldbergs

Rating: General Audiences

Warnings: No Warnings Apply

Characters: Erica Goldberg, Adam Goldberg, Barry Goldberg, Geoff Schwartz, Ben "Pop Pop" Goldberg, Muriel Goldberg

Summary: Muriel says her first word

[amarantine-amirite]

It Never Stops

I got sent home from prom due to breaking the dress code. 

Despite a clause in my IEP saying I'm allowed to wear pants to prom provided I wore a tailcoat, I got sent home from prom. 

“No tailcoats at prom,” the petty functionary with the clipboard told me, “moose over there should have told you”

Yes, there was a moose. Earlier in the year, someone accidentally obtained the principal's credit card and purchased a moose head. Said moose head was promptly confiscated and it now sits in the principal's office. It reminded me of that old TV show with the guy from Month Python.

“All the moose outside told me is that it learnt English from a book,” I responded.

He didn’t react. I don’t know if that was because he didn’t understand or he didn't find my joke that funny.

I saw nothing in the prom dress code about tailcoats. But, truth be told, the dress code was both uber-strict and pretty badly translated. I'm pretty sure this dress code is unenforceable. Actually, I think we'd be better off if the moose had written it.

Prom guide lines for an outfit: 

front cannot cut up the middle chest 

a flesh do not touch the other fesh 

canes are forbidden unless a person deformed

arms and legs must be kept inside of dress at all times 

server translate error an accident occurred while researching translate english 

all jwelerly must inside the plan of hand 

do not the dress throw out your back 

The school called my mom to come get me, but she was stuck in a meeting. Instead, her coworker and friend to whom she complains about everything Ginger picked me up.

After she entered the school to sign me out, we were marching out into the cool evening air toward her sedan. She watched me slide into the passenger seat. "You're done early," 

"I got kicked out," I muttered as I stared straight ahead at the dashboard while Ginger pulled out of the school parking lot with one hand on the wheel.

Ginger didn't even flinch. She just adjusted her rearview mirror, her eyes twinkling with a mix of dark amusement and mild exasperation. "OK, what stupid thing did you do that got you kicked out of prom early?"

I leaned back into the leather seat with a heavy sigh. "They didn't like the tailcoat,” I pulled at my lapels, “I mean, it was literally in my IEP that I could wear pants to prom, provided I wore a tailcoat. How was I supposed to know that tailcoats weren't allowed?"

Ginger lectured me like a shellshocked veteran general preparing a raw recruit for war. "Strap in, kiddo," she said, "You're going to be sent home for dressing inappropriately for the rest of your life."

I paused, blinking back at her. "I will?"

"Work is a whole new ballgame," Ginger declared, waving a hand dismissively as if sweeping away every thread of clothing I had ever owned. "No pants allowed. You wear dresses with pantyhose. And you can only wear button-down shirts."

I let out a dry, disbelieving laugh. "Well, speaking as someone with full-out gazongas, I can tell you for a fact that button-down shirts don't work on this build, so I won't wear them."

Ginger slammed her hands on the steering wheel. "But anything else is unprofessional," she barked.

I pointed at my chest. "It’s even more unprofessional if you look like you're one sudden sneeze away from popping completely out of your outfit," I rebutted.

Ginger didn't even flinch. "And heels. You get in trouble if you don't wear heels. Oh, and no underpants unless it's a thong, because God fucking forbid you have a visible panty line."

"That is just a testament to how utterly garbage the fabric quality is in clothes these days," I shook my head, "Besides, what if you have an actual medical reason to wear flats?"

Ginger didn't respond. She transitioned away from being corporate to getting upset. “it goes beyond clothes, too,” she shouted, “Makeup must be worn at work, and there are consequences if it’s smudged.”

Immediately, I remembered when I first heard that story. It sounded like it was someone who heavily relied on other people to cover her expenses, and I have to wear makeup to work, and it has to be an expensive brand because I’ll get written up or fired if it’s smudged definitely sounds like the kind of excuse a person might make if they’ve been caught asking other people to pay for her makeup and people are questioning why it can’t be a drugstore brand. It’s also the kind of excuse that falls apart when you poke at it. How would work enforce a rule like that? 

“You can't wear jewelry that isn't plain silver or gold,” Ginger continued. She had a horrified look on her face that reminded me of the cat just after it sneezes. “It's why wedding rings are so contentious. It’s like they’re trying to tell us married women aren’t allowed to work here!” 

“What about pearls?” I asked. I’ve seen Mom go into work with pearl earrings. I don’t remember her saying that they objected, but I do know that the people at work pick on her very badly. Maybe that’s why.

Again, Ginger didn’t register what I had said. She continued to scream at me about dress standards at work. “And you're supposed to be all dressed, all the fucking time! I show up to a breakfast meeting during a conference in my pajamas. The minute we got back, my boss said he was concerned for my reputation and he showed me a photo someone captured of me!”

I chucked. “I think that means don't wear pajamas to a breakfast meeting and he meant professional reputation.” 

“Believe me, if he saw a male colleague in an equivalent outfit at breakfast, it would've ended very differently,” Ginger barked with a sinister grin. She blew through the intersection without slowing down to turn. “Hell, I'm constantly yelled at for poor posture because my purse is too heavy. Men don’t have to deal with this. Men don't carry purses so they don't have posture problems. Men suck!”

“Actually, it’s kind of a meme at this point, but the guys on the Utah Jazz all have Birkins.” I giggled, “Hey, maybe you could get a Utah Jazz edition Birkin?”

“The hell I will!” she screamed as she meandered on the edge of the turning lane, then cutting across multiple lanes of traffic perpendicularly before making a right angle turn. “Those twats and their purses just made it impossible for me to play the feminist card with regards to my back pain. Nothing’s more manly than a basketball player!”

“Forget I asked,” I sighed. 

Ginger continued to rant as she played in-and-out perpendicular to traffic. “Like I could afford anything new. I can’t even afford to wash my clothes so I dry clean everything and the chemicals interact with this medication I take to not sweat because deodorant is useless!”

I was going to ask her how dry cleaning is cheaper than laundry, but the deodorant thing reminded me of this conversation I had with the folks from Summer Fridays. Their rep at Sephora said their deodorant had magnesium hydroxide, a strong base, but it was actually calcium carbonate, a weak base that doesn’t even dissolve in water. It did nothing to combat the dead buffalo funk under my arms

“same with menstrual products,” Ginger continued, “I have to take birth control because that would mean soaking through period products within 30 minutes, and…”

“30 minutes before it saturates?” I interrupted. “That's a lot.” 

This was the first thing she said that didn’t sound like just your everyday enshittification, but an undiagnosed medical problem. “Have you been tested for any problems with your reproductive and/or endocrine system?” 

Ginger glowered at me. "Choose your next words very carefully.”

“I'm just saying, if you soak through period products that quickly, it’s usually a warning sign but there’s something going wrong with your hormones.”

Ginger pulled into the bus lane. I thought she was going to do a U-turn in the middle of the road, but she drove on the wrong side of the road to access the plaza across the street. She backed up in a v-shape before parking the car half on the curb. “Out. Now!” she barked.

I got out of the car. She drove away.

I don't remember how I got home after that. I remember calling Mom again, I remember the appliance store, but not how I got home.

@thomaskeen

[amarantine-amirite]

[amarantine-amirite]

Big Mouth

[amarantine-amirite]

Pool Queue

This mishap with the ankle is the latest in a line of injuries tied to renovating the house. I’m doing this reno by myself, so I'm getting tired faster, leading to more injuries.

I’ve fallen off a ladder. I’ve fallen down the stairs. I’ve dropped stuff on my feet. I’ve cut myself several times, many of which I had to cauterize with a soldering iron. I’ve gotten stuck in a window. I've gotten stuck in a banister. Most recently, I’ve fallen through the floor and totaled my ankle. 

One of the reasons that swimming is so good for rehabilitating injuries is because it serves as resistance training, but without putting weight on anything. Perfect to help your body build back better. 

Today doesn’t look promising. There’s a line. I don't know how long the line is. I don't see a sign. Nobody appears to be doing anything to manage the crowd pressure.

It doesn’t feel like just the volume of traffic. I can't see what the hell the hold up is, but I’m almost positive it’s those people who have poolside picnics despite signs telling people not to bring food onto the pool deck. Among other things, that rule is a tool to modulate the flow of people in and out of the enclosure. If those idiots clog up the pool deck, the pool staff can’t let people into the pool to swim. The crowd backs up as a result. 

I limped up to the front desk to see what the hold-up was. A woman with a ponytail and wearing a tube dress glared at me and snapped her fingers . “You just cut the line,” she yelled.

I didn't engage with her because I figured she just wanted an excuse to snap at someone. And it may have looked like I cut, but I wanted to ask how long the wait time was before I got in. 

There's a strategy here. I know my frustration tolerance is bad. I know I go from 0 to 60 because I’m at 59 all the time. There's only so much a person can tolerate before they pop. I’m gathering more information to make a go/no-go decision. That's not frustration tolerance, that's frustration management.   

The woman with the ponytail and tube dress pushed in front of me. “You have to wait in line,” she shouted right in my ear.

“I'm not waiting in a long line with a bad ankle!” I shouted at the crowd.

“Why can’t you just go to physio like a normal person?” a lady with a pram asked.

“I can't go to a physiotherapist with another injury from this reno,” I whined. The last time I grenaded my ankle, the physiotherapist asked me a bunch of questions about if she should call social services. “They'll think it's a cover story for my parents abusing me and Children’s Aid is going to be involved somehow.”

The woman with the ponytail and the tube dress folded her arms. "Yeah, keep up the autism,” she sneered, “see what happens, you little bitch." 

I put my hand on my hips and leaned forward. “Or what?”

“I'm calling the cops!” the woman blurted.

“You're bluffing,” I chuckled. 

She indeed made a call to the cops…into her hip flask. Everyone glared at me now. “Leave,” demanded the person at the front desk.

Mom picked me up. A heavy silence filled the car. She glared at the bumper of the car ahead as if she wanted to set it on fire with her mind. And there I am, worn-out, anxious, staring straight ahead. I don’t know where this is going to come from, but it will hurt. 

“Look at this,” Mom snapped. She grabbed her phone out of the center console and threw it at my thighs, “Just look at it!” 

I looked at the phone and saw a LinkedIn post. The post contained a high-energy photo of a group of women wearing neon sashes and plastic tiaras at the pool. Some did shots, another drank an entire bottle of wine. Synergy doesn't stop when the clock strikes five! Celebrating Fiona’s last night of freedom with the legal team!

One look at that picture explained the massive line. “I think I see the problem,” I said. I felt relieved that my actions didn’t trigger Mom’s anger. 

Mom’s voice trembled with rage. “The problem is that bitch is a menace to society!” she snarled, “You don’t dump me with all the work, telling me it’s all hands on deck so you can party!” She flew through the red light like a character in Grand Theft Auto. “Goddamn!”

I zoomed in on something floating in the water. I couldn’t tell what it was. Then I saw the wrapper in the woman’s hand. Just a Milky Way. 

Now I know what caused the hold up. This individual had Caddyshacked the pool so she could have it quiet for their bachelorette party.

I knew this wasn’t a normal line. 

@strayplots

[amarantine-amirite]

[amarantine-amirite]

The Deepest Plunge

It’s official. Neda’s losing it

Truth be told, we knew something was wrong with Neda for a while. I mean, yeah, there was a pattern of somewhat unhinged behavior, but nothing that we could say with any certainty would presage something much more serious.

Last year, Neda had a group project. She got stuck doing all the work, but not for the reason you think. Two people died, and the third was arrested in connection with the deaths. Since the bodies of the other two people were discovered in the Idaho section of Yellowstone National Park, the judicial system couldn't assemble a jury. Instead, they handed the case to an AI trained on Twitter data. Even though Miguel did nothing wrong, the AI threw the book at him. 

Neda got stuck doing the work on her own. She got the deliverable done by the deadline, if only just. The best grade teacher could give her was C- because the point of this assignment was to work in groups, which you didn’t do. How could she do the work in a group if two members of the group were no longer alive and the third was serving a life sentence? 

Needless to say, Neda wasn't really the same after that. I don't know if the searing betrayal of doing all that work and only getting a C- or if the workload itself broke her brain, but she came out of that group assignment a little bit stranger. 

This afternoon, I was a fly on the wall for a very interesting discussion the principal had with her. Neda had come to school with messy rainbow eyeshadow all over her eyelids and plastic wrap around her forehead. Her hair was a nightmare, all matted and bunched up into an updo to hide just how bad it got. She sat there with her arms crossed, either nonchalant or oblivious. 

Principal Vance sat at a heavy oak desk. He rubbed the bridge of his nose. “Do you know why you're here, Neda?”

“Honestly?” a genuinely baffled Neda blinked, “No. I was just doing my homework.”

Principal Vance slid a disciplinary report across the desk. “According to Mrs. Fredericks, you spent the entirety of third-period study hall sticking your tongue out.”

“It helps me focus,” she replied, “It’s a habit.”

Principal Vance didn’t buy it. “Neda,” he pointed at the documents, “I have reports here from both students and staff who claim they felt threatened by it.”

Neda lets out a dry, incredulous laugh. “Threatened? threatened is a bit of a stretch. A bridge too far, frankly,” she chuckled, “And why should I get detention for a facial expression?”

Somewhere, they decided that blackmail was the solution to this problem. Principal Vance leaned back in his chair and said, “Neda, your classmates told us about this notebook of yours.” 

My first thought was, is Jennifer back in town? A while back, she wrote an entire diary with a pen pal, "Jennifer". Neda was Jennifer. She wrote letters to herself and responded as another person. Now that I mention it, that should have been the first clue that the group project from hell broke her brain.

Principal Vance read the stuff aloud. None of this had anything to do with Jennifer. It was something that was both funny and gross.

She had three pages detailing a view of Jupiter that's home to lighter-than-air man o’war-like creatures that look like toadstools and fart as they move through the air. The farts of the atmospheric man o’war smelled terrible, but none of the ground dwellers care because it’s so cold that everybody has a head cold year round. Sometimes, somebody on the ground sneezes so hard they shoot out an extra pair of legs out their nose and walk away. 

I quietly burst out laughing. No, not Jupiter. Try Uranus for that.

Now, Neda was probably subconsciously thinking about either the Mr Men books, that Carl Sagan thing about life on gas giants, and maybe the very first instance of Pepe LePew. We don't know how, but she managed to map giant fart loading to anything even remotely related to gasbag-like life. 

Neda also managed to write a pretty graphic passage about being trapped in a room with disembodied asscheeks that can’t stop shitting, but she's got a diving mask, lifejacket, a helmet made of a melon rind, and rubber gloves and boots, so it's OK. And then she taunts the asscheeks and triggers a doom loop of explosive shitting.

I have no idea where this came from. My best guess is that it's related to this old joke. The joke goes like this: So there’s a farmer that has a pig and the pig has got volcanic level diarrhea. It’s bad enough that the farmer actually has to put a cork in the pig’s butt. Time goes on, the pressure builds up, and they need to remove the cork. Nobody’s brave enough to remove the cork, so the farmer trains a monkey. Everybody vacates, the monkey removes the cork from the pig, and once the cork is out, the pig goes back to having explosive diarrhea, and the end of the story is that the monkey’s running around trying to put the cork back in.

“I have no idea what this is,” said Vance, “and why would you feel this was necessary to write this down in your diary?”

Neda didn't give him the answer he hoped for. “You know when you shit on the couch and forget to wipe?” she quipped, “funny story, actually”

Principal Vance shook his head. “I can assure you it isn't,” he hissed, “If we see your tongue in study hall one more time, this notebook goes online.”

She then yelled at him and stormed away, shouting profanities as she left. 

It went online the next day. We all laughed our asses off at it. It became known as The Total Eclipse Of The Fart. 

We haven’t heard from her since, but apparently she's become a pariah at school. Enough that she stopped coming to class. 

A month later, someone said they saw a disheveled teen with red hair shove two people off an escalator. I hope that’s not, but I have a very strange feeling that it was her.

[amarantine-amirite]

Track Listing:

Catch U On The Flipside

Open Season

Cumbersome

[amarantine-amirite]

Staying Put

[amarantine-amirite]

this forest will deconstruct you

@deepwaterfiction

[amarantine-amirite]

Not Just A Name

“So, Adelle, what brings you to try out for the bowling tournament?” the person at the front desk asked me as I checked in.

“My inability to wait,” I chuckled.

That wasn’t an exaggeration. While waiting for mom to get off the phone in the grocery store, I heard two teachers from my school talking about a tryout for an upcoming bowling tournament. It sounded interesting and once they were finished talking, I asked one of the teachers about when and where. She said signups were closed.

A day later, the other teacher told me two people dropped out after being hospitalized with norovirus. Without hesitation, I signed up to do the tryout.    

That brings me today. A lady with long blonde hair and Memphis print leggings walked up. She passed me a packet and pointed to the computer lab. “Here, take this and go to the computer lab,” she said, “Name at the top, sign the bottom, print the results of the multiple-choice test, bring the materials to me when you’re finished.”

I just thought it'd be the tryout, I didn't think they'd give me a written assessment.

I sat down at the computer. “The multiple choice thing is computerized,” she began, “but first, you’ll need to create an account on this thing here to get a token for MFA.”

I had a terrible time with the MFA. I had no trouble making the account, but when I tried to use the token, I would get 80% of the way through signing in and then the computer would crash.

The evaluator came back to the computer lab. “ Have you started the test?” she asked.

I had been hanging on by a thread, but now I was starting to snap. “No,” I snipped, “I can’t log in.”

The evaluator tipped her head to one side and put her right hand on her hip. “Do you mean you don’t want to?” she faked a smile.

“No, I can’t,” I shook my head, “I think the MFA is defective.”

“It can’t be,” she said in disbelief. 

“Do you want to have a look?” Even though I said that with the hope she'd actually believe me, I got a faint, possibly delusional glimmer of hope that she'd be able to fix the problem. 

The evaluator poked away at the computer. She didn't look like she was really typing. “I think I see the problem,” she said. 

“You do?” I asked. If she knew what was happening, maybe she could help me fix it.

“It's your email.”

Now, I had a tough time buying that explanation. I've heard of school software not liking an email before, but that's because the kid tried to use their personal email, not their school email. I've never heard of school software rejecting an institutional email before.

“It’s a school email,” I asked, “what’s wrong with it?”

Then the evaluator said something ridiculous. “It has an inappropriate number in it.”

While I am aware that sometimes, numbers can have a potentially unsavoury connotation, if it turns up in a school email, it shouldn't be a problem. “No, it doesn’t,” I blurted out, “I’m positive it’s randomly generated because, hey, you’d be surprised how many kids are named A Lawson here”

She wasn't convinced. “If your email address has an inappropriate number and you need to explain yourself when you use it, why are you still using it?”

I stood up. “I find it utterly bizarre to assume something in an institutional email address referred to something inappropriate,” I responded, “If it really was inappropriate, they would pull the number from circulation.”

The evaluator started to get snippy. “OK, just do the essay question.”

Now, the essay question was surprisingly easy: what was the worst mistake you ever made in your life? I wrote something to the tune of it’s impossible to say because what seems like a big mistake at first is really the universe saving us from something really bad. 

I finished writing and handed it in. The evaluator pushed it back with a ruler. “We can't take this.”

“What the hell is wrong now?” I whined. 

The evaluator pointed at the paper. “Adelle, how is your handwriting this shitty?” she hissed.

I folded my arms, “Not everyone cares more about aesthetics than the actual meaning of the words.”  

“Is this even in English? I seriously can't tell what alphabet this is” 

My handwriting is actually pretty decent…if I'm writing on the left. If I use my right, it's a bit scraggly. I'm ambidextrous, but for reasons I don’t understand, writing on the left is easier for me. “You know what,” I replied, “you can either have me write with my right or write legibly, not both.”

The evaluator began to panic, and then completely lost her temper. “You get starry eyed and when reality doesn’t pan out, you panic and lose your temper! You don’t think things through, you don’t stand for us, you’re insane!”

“Calm down”

She didn't calm down. She grabbed my arms, dragged me down the hall, and locked me in a supply closet.

This isn’t like a teen movie where the bully locks someone in a supply closet. Movies overcomplicate the problem by relying heavily on picking the lock. First, I knocked the hinges out of the door. Then, I pulled the door out of the frame. See, stuff like this is what I'm talking about when I talk about lateral thinking that isn't bound by social signaling. I can't think of anybody else that would try this.

I didn’t put the door back together after I left. I think I even lost one of the pins that goes in the hinge. I didn’t care. I was out.

I got out, but I missed the tryout. Mom was there, and she was not happy with me. “Miss Thorne told me everything,” she barked, “I know your autism makes it hard to intuit things from the social aether, but this is serious!”

I couldn’t tell what she meant. Did she mean my reaction to things not going snip-snap the way I expect them to? Or losing the hinge for the door? Forgetting to put the door back after I broke out? Pissing the person off to the point where they felt the need to lock me in a closet?

She then told me something that didn't sound real. “Adelle, you don’t understand, but that bowling tournament that you signed up for was only for kids with the top 10% grades in gym class, not for anyone who wanted to do it”

I had a ton of trouble believing that. “OK, but what about the teacher who told me about the empty spots?” I asked, “she teaches history”

“Yes, but she heads up the cheer team,” Mom fired back, “Even still, she had to get special permission from the principal to oversee tryouts because she isn’t a gym teacher but is next in line when the existing teacher retires.”

“That isn't what they told me,” I grumbled, “they said I couldn’t do the tryout because signups were closed.” 

“Are you sure?” Mom interrogated, “You heard of this at the grocery store, and you know how much trouble you have hearing there.”

“I'm positive,” I said, “No one told me it was restricted to the top students in each gym class, nor was that made clear at registration.”

Mom shook her head. “I don’t know what to say.” 

Needless to say, I got suspended for four months. My parents were not pleased. They remained upset even after it turned out the “bowling tournament” the kids signed up for was actually a protest and said protest rapidly spiralled out of control. And I am never writing an essay to try out for a bowling tournament ever again.

@writersisland