On Why Sometimes I Ignore People I Once Knew

Today I walked past someone I used to know. At least, I'm relatively certain I used to know him: if not, he bore an incredibly uncanny resemblance to someone who studied poetry with me five years ago.

When you major in something such as Creative Writing and Poetry during your college years, you learn something in your workshops: there are other people as talented as you. And there are other people far, far more talented than you are. It's a good place to be, really, if you have an ego problem. Because unless you truly are amazing, the ego inevitably deflates more than a little as you help other people with what they wrote and realize Hey, this is far better than anything I've done yet.

Let's face it. Not all talents are created equal.

Anyway. As I walked into work today, this guy I'm pretty sure I once knew was walking in the opposite direction. He looked like...himself...from a distance. But when I got closer to him, I pulled out my cell phone and pretended to check text messages. I didn't want to make eye contact.

I always find it odd and sort of...disappointing...to see how many of my former classmates are living regular lives. Most of us haven't done anything exceptional since we left school. Only a small number of us have published--and that includes the talented ones. I don't know how many of us still try, or how many of us have simply relegated ourselves to living something different than what we imagined for ourselves just a few years ago.

And that's when I realized: I think I do stuff like this because I'm a little disappointed with myself. At what point did I opt to stop doing the brave thing and embrace the practical but not as gutsy thing? And was that decision really as wise as I liked to think it was at the time?

I think it may be time to dust off some dreams.

Flying and Thuds

Anne Shirley: I can't help flying up on the wings of anticipation. It's as glorious as soaring through a sunset . . . almost pays for the thud.
Marilla Cuthbert: Well, maybe it does. But I'd rather walk calmly along and do without both flying and thud.

I have always envied the Marillas of this world--those who are solid, steady, eminently practical, and completely grounded in reality. It's kind of funny to realize this, but for a long time, I thought such people were boring. That they had no imagination. And also, that they had no chance to change.

It only recently occurred to me that many of them spare themselves unnecessary pain by being the way they are.

You're probably wondering what the impetus for this blog post and this new way of thinking is. Well, it's like this: yesterday, I wore some very cute shoes into work. Now, it's important to understand something about women's shoes: as shoes get uglier, they also get exponentially more comfortable and practical; as they get prettier, they become exponentially more uncomfortable and impractical.

Let's be honest here: I'd rather have uncomfortable feet in cute shoes than have solidly comfortable feet in shoes that, it's entirely possible, my grandmother also owns.

The shoes were a necessity yesterday, because I also wore a skirt. (And for those of you who know me and my dislike for skirts--what can I say?--maybe I had a temporary aneurysm?)

Well, as I walked into work yesterday, I found my shoe snagging an uneven piece of pavement. Since the cute shoes are backless, my shoe went one way while the rest of me went the other. The end results were a severely scraped knee (that is already coloring itself into a beautiful bruise), a scraped hand, and a strained shoulder.

All of these injuries--this rather acute 'thud,' if you will--could have been prevented by being more practical. (Also, please let it be duly noted that I was not reading and walking when this incident occurred. Also, please note that if you look at the driveway of the Gold's Gym in Bountiful, you can see bloodstains left by me.)

It seems that, literally and figuratively, the practical are far less likely to fall. This, I think, is a good thing. I envy this.

And yet, though I envy the Marillas of the world . . . I invariably find myself being an Anne. A little flighty sometimes, imaginative, impractical--a person, in short, with her head in the clouds.

Possibly because I'm of the opinion that the sensation of soaring a sunset definitely pays for the thud.

And also because the thuds often make the best stories.