Centaur @ MindSay

evil hast a name, it be advia centaur immunoassay system!

beware this name for it too shall put thee into the mouth of madness and thus grind thy soul beneath its fowl unability to complete daily cleaning.

seriously i have tried and failed over 10 times to make it do its daily cleaning. each time, a different error. i swear these things have a sensor that detects when lab workers want to go home and it makes the instrument cease to work properly until it is the normal time for them to leave. then it works smoothly and blinks all innocently at my swearing or i so hope will happen. the working, not the blinking since it has no eyes and that would be really really weird.

yesterday the hospital computer system crashed. of course as always i was on the chemistry ER bench so i didn't get to eat dinner until 910pm and i had to pee the whole damm time the thing was out. lets just say that made for some frantic running when it started working again and i could leave.

ok it still doesnt' work, shame on it. if only it didn't make a sound worse than a baby crying when it failed.

I just got back from Gastonia and visiting my friend Josh.  It was the first time I've ever really driven that far by myself.  I would say driving three hours to get there was tedious, but it wasn't.  I flew on those roads.  Thinking.  At times, grinning, when I thought of someone I knew. I was amazed by stretches of radiant flowers, red and magenta, that passed by my window and with their dashes of color, passed the hours, too.  The roads' shoulders were furred with hypnotic poppies and emblazoned daisies (the latter of which, the same goldenrod color of the single, continuous line that stretches onward on the roadside, forever).  Hy-star-ia, the saffron yellow dollops chaotically scattered amid the frocked purple snapdragons, like stars plastered among the gargantuan plum-sky.  This let-loose matches the free anarchic spatter of "I love you" graffitied across an overpass.  Unbridle me, I say.  Going far, far away.  Singing my rebel anthems as a girl on the wing.  It's at times like these that I realize my walls really have been permanently shattered.  Freedom was also streaked across a concrete bridge.  People think things like these don't really matter.  They do, I insist. I take them as little signals and continue on the twisting, turning roads.  Please, try not to miss them!  It's the little tokens that show.

* * *

Josh's parents are about the nicest people I've ever met.  When I finally turned haphazardly into the small court, I staggered out with the paranoid fear that I'd waltz up to the front door, only to be greeted by an unfamiliar face wondering what I was doing at their house.  Fortunately, this fear did not come true.  His sister and I have the same name, which is strange, because I've never really met anyone else named Kelsey.  She and I had the same favorite kind of apple.  And our middle names both started with A.  Josh showed me some of his drawings, a lot of which I had not seen before.  Some were like rough outlines of a feeling--lines, some color, a word or two that could be grasped in different ways.  Like an inkblot.  I saw an archer in it.  Shooting an arrow where it may fall.  It reminds me of a poem I once wrote:

Sagittarius

I seek seclusion from

the hegemony of

the everyday,

the ceaseless pull

of supercilious, walling,

suffocating, galling

duties. Just wanting

a balsamic autonomy.

Something just to savor,

not to chew.

I forsake the wanton

push that ransacks

the seconds on the clock.

I think myself sagacious

but I am no sage;

my will is ramshackle

against the presage

of time’s crawl.

I beseech the nothingness,

“What is it all?

  What is it all?”

I want to shoot an arrow

just to see where it falls.

This resilience, this rebellion against the mundane--that's what's been missing since I've been home.  I've been so uninspired, but it takes something jarring, out of my normal bounds, on highways way beyond where I've been, to get my mind flowing.  This outpouring, galloping spirit that takes to the roads and flies--I'm convinced that I must be part horse somewhere, inside.  A mental centaur, surging forward, stars as guides. Fatalistic, come what may, luck.   Bursting forth, bucking everything that's been holding me back, cloying me.  I can't wait to get back to Chapel Hill.  It's emboldened me.  A few entries back, before the beginning of this year I dared, "Watch me blossom." And I did.  I'm an opening bud in the golden sunrays--no wonder at my newfound fascination with flowers. And when I was driving back today, I couldn't help but think, What a beautiful day this is! God has given me this, using the voices of boys on the wing.  Humangelus.  Miracles manifest in the simplest of simple, and bliss just takes some listening to find. 

I remember the last day I was in Chapel Hill.  I was waiting for the bus.  Oddly, I had also just left Josh too.  But I digress.  I was waiting for the bus, pensively, when I eyed a corpulent girl sitting on the bricks near me.  She seemed to be muttering to herself.  Now, I'm going to be honest and say that I thought to myself, This girl is weird.  One of those people that gives you the crazy eyes and keeps wondering if the bus can take them to Baltimore.  She must have seen my straying eye because suddenly a spry, "Hello!" greeted my ear and she got up and came over to me.  I stood to meet her.  "How are you doing?" she inquired zealously. 

"I'm fine," I replied offhandedly, not thinking.  But then...I did something different. I thought.  I wasn't fine.  I felt the tug of my heart as I knew I was going to leave the next day, missing everything and everyone I'd grown to love.  "Actually," I piped up, looking off absently at a cloud skimming the horizon, "I'm kind of sad because I have to go home tomorrow."

"Why?" she blurted innocently. 

"End of semester...you know," I said slowly, wondering at her obliviousness.

She stood for a moment, just looking at me with eyes of iridescent blue.  Bright eyes.  Then she smiled.  “You know, you’re never alone,” she said.  “Every day, even right now Jesus is standing right beside you.”  She continued to look at me with that glitterglow, soft, blue-eyed smile.  Slowly I looked back.  And for some reason, I did not think this was strange in the slightest.

"You know, I’m glad there are people like you who still say things like that,” I replied. “You don’t get to hear that often enough.”

“Oh, I’m sorry, I know that might be weird,” she started bashfully.

“No, no,” I assured. 

She beamed.  And then went on.  “Well, you know, God feels every single thing you’re feeling.  He doesn’t want you to be sad.  He wants you to be happy.  I know.” She looked up fleetingly at the sky and her grin spread wider.  Then she hopped onto the brick and tottered a little, her body springing happily as she repeated, “I know.  He’s made me very happy.” She came back to my side.  “Everything’s going to be fine,” she piped, innocent eyes shining.  “Just remember He’s there—”

The bus came. “I’m sorry…I…” I stuttered as I took a half-step toward the open bus-door.  She sidled along, still talking. “I’m sorry.  I have to go.”  She stopped suddenly as if realizing for the first time it was there.  “Oh, that’s fine!” she chirped.  “Bye,” I said with a smile. “Bye!” she exclaimed, waving.  And when the bus pulled away, she was twirling and dancing next to the sign, as if invisible robes sashayed behind her. Another girl on the wing.