… with sugar. Damn those addictive additives.
So a lot’s been going on in my mind the past week, a lot of contemplating about the meaning of life, and whether or not I should pursue the single life for a while and become a merchant marine, and also thinking about if I’m living to my current potential or just wasting time (my spare time, that is. Need to get a jump on learning spanish).
Yesterday I went out to the canyons for a service project and shoveled noxious weeds, and I got to thinking how maybe I should go back to school and get a degree in something like agriculture or biology or forestry. Because nature is ridiculously fascinating. And I’m realizing more than ever how useless an English degree is, as far as, you know, real-life skills. What if in the next twenty years we have an environmental meltdown and we have to drastically change our lifestyles, become more like a third world country, and things like literature become just a pasttime but not a way to make a living?
So yesterday I fell down some concrete steps, and I have about 15 bruises now. So embarrassing. I mean it was just like two steps. And that wasn’t even work-related. I hope I survive the summer.
Speaking of work I need to take some pictures of the handicap-accessible community garden we’ve been working on. It’s almost done and looks pretty spiffy. It’s been really good working with this crew, next week we’re going to do some surveying at a campsite in Ogden (and we’ll be camping). Hanging out with people who have disabilities has been kind of a new experience for me. Ron has M.S. and he’s in a wheelchair, and Jordan has this weird thing I don’t know the name of but he can’t walk either, and then Quintin is blind, and they can do so many things on their own it’s just like, wow. Quintin makes clicky noises like a bat and he can tell by the reverberation where the walls are, etc.
The other day I was driving Ron and Jordan in the van and Ron’s wheelchair is usually strapped in to the floor but he hadn’t this time and was only using a seat belt, and when I went up the hill he fell backwards and I looked over and his neck was just bent against the backseat and I gasped and pulled over even though he was trying to be all tough about it and saying “it’s okay, keep driving.”
He was fine, and we all had a good laugh about it, especially since Jordan is such a joker, but it freaked me out a little. It’s almost the same feeling as being with kids — you feel like they need constant supervision just in case something happens.
Anyway it was a good week. Weekend was fun too, my friend let me borrow her bike and the four of us went on a bike adventure around town. Bike adventures are the best (minus the sore bottom)! I remember last summer I had my bike out in Indiana and with the exception of a few trips with my neighbor, for the most part I adventured alone, but it’s a lot better with friends.
Well, guess I wasn’t quite alone last summer, because I was with Gary (my bike, R.I.P.)
