the unremarkable day

the unremarkable day

i had quite the unremarkable day today

the sky was white, but the air was warm

and i was in that zone between early and late to the bus.

work was work.

a journalist called me without one decent idea -

but she did take my suggestions.

the story ideas appealed to my boss,

who i ended up talking to for an hour and a half after 5.

my roommates were unwinding when i got home, and they helped me cook

an excess of kale.

it was a monday, by the way

so i went to yoga, and we have a really talkative sub right now

she came up to me while i was in happy baby

and grabbed my biceps.

she says, in a tedtalk she watched,

someone somewhere said something along the lines of

it is rare for a woman to have both beauty and power,

and that i should watch out.

a stranger on the walk home stopped me to ask if i had a great class

holding my yoga mat i said, yes, i did thanks

and i kept walking.

a man clutching noisy toddlers on each hand

joked, 'y'all actin like you had a drink!'

as i walked into the corner store.

i forgot my money

but the cashier taught me how to use apple wallet

and i spent a moment reveling in that.

my roommates were already on the couch

sitting, texting, waiting for me

to start the next episode of bachelor in paradise when i got home.

today netted out at zero.

there were no lows, no highs,

no losses or wins

nothing extraordinary to me or anyone else.

just an unremarkable day,

for once

chloe wise

'literally me' series

im reading michelle tea's 'how to grow up,' a memoir about her evolution from punk to published writer which i actually purchased (used on amazon for $5) after reading a review that it is like getting advice from an older sister you never had. where would i be if i took this advice? probably writing a memoir. probably a published writer. probably a bit more grown up. it's been hard to put down, for every page i turn is another life lesson i could experience from the comfort of standing on the bus on my way home from work. i'm not sure a paragraph has ever resonated with me more:

"when it's hard for you to grow up--because you're poor and can't afford the trinkets and milestones of adulthood, or you're gay and the mating rites of passage don't seem to apply to you, or you are sensitive to the world's injustices and decided long ago that if being a grown-up means being an asshole you'll carry out your days in Neverland with the rest of the Lost Children, thank you very much--when adulthood seems somehow off-limits to you, growing up takes time. you have to want it, and then you have to make a lot of changes. some changes you make consciously and some without knowing it, and some changes get made for you. it's so much work i forgot i was even engaged in it; it just became life."

now, my best ideas take the form of abstract images or metaphors that sink into my pysche and stand in for what the thing really is. most recently, growing up makes me picture michaelangelo chiseling down david's supple boy body, making him a man. by removing, by paring down, you sophisticate. it's like the idea that boxes breed creativity, because nothing is more motivating than being stuck in a box. we thrive on limitations; it's what reveals our inner strength. and in a world full of choice--where surviving is the easy part, and choosing is what's hard--we don't have enough limitations to want to break free of any of them. maybe growing up is creating your own.

i havent bought cheese from the store in almost a year. with that comes a renewed interest in the phrase "anything is possible." if i can chisel something out of my life that i used to eat for breakfast, lunch, dinner (and second dinner), then what else am i capable of? what dairy-free opportunity awaits in my midst? when you remove one of your top priorities in life, what will move up in its place?

we are looking at david's defining features - his tight torso. his puckered-in stomach, his toned arms - and are thinking about him beating goliath.

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