June 24: Nick has family that he met for the first time this weekend, even though they live only an hour away from every member of the family that he does see. Talking to one of his second cousins, she seemed not to understand this either and was saddened by it. She’s a sophomore in high school and it is already her dream to marry into a big, close family that sees each other every holiday.
June 25: Words were beginning to elude him. He would stop halfway through a sentence when he completely forgot the exact word it was that he wanted to say. It was like how kids would tie a dollar bill to the end of a fishing line and yank it away just as he was about to reach it.
June 26: I don’t think spending all day alone is agreeing with me. Today, I made a Rainbow Sherbet float with Sprite and ended up eating three of them.
June 27: I wanted to do the What The Fluff Challenge to Addie. It’s a video prank where people get their dog’s attention and hold up a blanket in between them. They lower it a few times to show their dog they are still there. Then they throw it up into the air and hide behind something, giving the appearance they have vanished as the blanket falls down. Addie didn’t fall for it. She just immediately ran to where I was hiding in the bathroom.
June 28: She was still in the process of learning Spanish. She came in knowing enough that when she overheard them talking shit on another student, she could glare at them across the room and say, “yo escuché eco” and watch the look of panic flash across their faces. She practiced everyday with free apps on her phone and they taught her helpful phrases like “the monkey with no shadow”, “the police found blood on the floor”, and “I am a cat. Do you want money?”. Apps made it difficult to deal with pronunciation. She either didn’t roll her r’s at all or rolled them way to much, which always left her more bilingual students in hysterics. The kids who grew up with Spanish and were slowly learning English over the school year were quick to defend her.
June 29: The couple next door is moving out. Now with the second kid, they just can’t deal with a one-bedroom apartment even though rent control has saved them so much money. With the apartment nearly empty, they let us stop by and see their place. It was like being in an episode of The Twilight Zone. Everything the same, but flipped around.
June 30: A man with slicked back hair and a thick Brooklyn accent pulled Christiana aside. He leaned in close to her and whispered that a friend told him about the guy that was giving her some trouble. He reached into his pants pocket and pulled out a handkerchief. He opened it up to reveal a single tooth. He handed it to her with a quiet smile. “He won’t be bothering you anymore.”
much love,
hedgie
Saturday, June 30, 2018
Saturday, June 23, 2018
YASSSS
June 17: I do believe in soulmates, but my view of it differs from the movies where two people meet and everyone instantly knows that they are meant to get married, have babies, and grow old together. I think soulmates are just those meant to be in your life because they make you want to be the best person you can be. So I also don’t think that it’s necessarily romantic or that you are limited to one. I think family, friends, and pets can be soulmates. A soulmate isn’t an effortless and instant connection. You have to work hard to make a soulmate together.
June 18: Every inch of every social media format is loaded with photos of screaming children confined in cages when they were separated from their parents in a Texas immigration facility. On top of that are the thousands of people commenting that these kids deserve to be treated like animals because that is what they are. Some have even suggested putting them down because it would be more humane. I don’t think I want to be a human being anymore. They are so awful.
June 19: The MC in between rounds of burlesque acts had more fans than any one person should probably own. Most had words printed across them like “YASSSS” and “Daddy”. He also had one that was large enough for him to completely hide behind that he used multiple times to fake a growing erection.
June 20: I’m having so much trouble figuring out who Miles and Irving are in this book. Which is strange, because I don’t have that issue with Olivia or Sabrina. And I didn’t have the problem when I created Maybel and George in the other book. For a few minutes, it makes me feel like an awful writer, but then I remember how so many male writers portray female characters as little more than a set of boobs on legs and then I don’t feel as bad.
June 21: Today was my first day not taking an afternoon nap since school let out. I don’t think I like it.
June 22: I had forgotten how stressful Jenga could be. Slowly wiggling that tiny wooden block back and forth until it finally slipped free, not even aware that I had been holding my breath until I placed it on top of the decrepit tower.
June 23: He looked like the typical American dad in any daytime show. No matter the situation, he choose to wear worn out sneakers, cargo shorts, and oversized shirts that came free from breweries that tended to feature bikini clad women and came in bright colors that were flattering on absolutely no one.
much love,
hedgie
June 18: Every inch of every social media format is loaded with photos of screaming children confined in cages when they were separated from their parents in a Texas immigration facility. On top of that are the thousands of people commenting that these kids deserve to be treated like animals because that is what they are. Some have even suggested putting them down because it would be more humane. I don’t think I want to be a human being anymore. They are so awful.
June 19: The MC in between rounds of burlesque acts had more fans than any one person should probably own. Most had words printed across them like “YASSSS” and “Daddy”. He also had one that was large enough for him to completely hide behind that he used multiple times to fake a growing erection.
June 20: I’m having so much trouble figuring out who Miles and Irving are in this book. Which is strange, because I don’t have that issue with Olivia or Sabrina. And I didn’t have the problem when I created Maybel and George in the other book. For a few minutes, it makes me feel like an awful writer, but then I remember how so many male writers portray female characters as little more than a set of boobs on legs and then I don’t feel as bad.
June 21: Today was my first day not taking an afternoon nap since school let out. I don’t think I like it.
June 22: I had forgotten how stressful Jenga could be. Slowly wiggling that tiny wooden block back and forth until it finally slipped free, not even aware that I had been holding my breath until I placed it on top of the decrepit tower.
June 23: He looked like the typical American dad in any daytime show. No matter the situation, he choose to wear worn out sneakers, cargo shorts, and oversized shirts that came free from breweries that tended to feature bikini clad women and came in bright colors that were flattering on absolutely no one.
much love,
hedgie
Saturday, June 16, 2018
this is why everyone thinks you're a serial killer
June 9: He had a mouth that had no defined lines for where his lips began, it was like he had scrubbed them clean away with the rough side of a dish sponge until his mouth was raw and tinged red.
June 10: Whenever a San Francisco team wins a championship, the city erupts into chaos. Her phone updates her with stories of people climbing Muni buses and setting them on fire. But she was always at a distance from them, just making out the bangs of illegal fireworks and the deep thrum of a helicopter patrolling while she tried to remember what sports season it even was.
June 11: Almost every adult in her family worked in education while she was growing up. Over summers, they would take road trips and give each one a theme as they traced the California coast. One road trip, they visited every lighthouse they could drive to. On another, they visited haunted houses. One summer, they took up train spotting. She grew up thinking that was how jobs worked. They all had summers off, but you could choose to have a different summer job if money was tight. Discovering that most jobs went year-round was the most disappointing realization of her adult life.
June 12: It’s only the first week of summer break and I have already lost track of what day it is.
June 13: Information from the true crime fact bank in the back of her mind came up three times at dinner. While looking out at the water, it was suggested that this would be a good place to dump a body. She disagreed, thinking that there were deeper and more remote bodies of water for that. She also knew the answer when asked if pigs could really eat their way through an entire corpse. The pigs could potentially do it, they have the ability to eat bones, the question was more dependent on if you found a group of pigs willing to do it. Then she was able to rattle off the addresses of nearby murders.
“See, this is why everyone thinks you are a serial killer.”
June 14: The windows to the place were blocked out with posters of dancing women. It was made to look like the women were dancing behind frosted glass, so the rounder parts of them were black and in sharp focus while the less interesting parts of their bodies were blurry and fading away. She supposed it was meant to look sexy and suggestive, but to her, it just made the place look haunted.
June 15: At the Exploratorium, you can make a bubble wall. There is a giant rig filled with bubble bath solution where if you pull gently on a rope, you can lift a giant rectangle of rainbow film. The whole thing would be about five feet tall and five feet wide if my kids could control themselves at all. When they watch one kids pull the string, they pop it before it even gets a foot tall. Then when it is their turn, they don’t foresee that the other kids will do the same exact thing. They get so mad when their own bubble is popped that after three trips here with kids, I have to pull them away after five minutes or they might murder each other.
June 16: In Sideways Stories From Wayside School, there was a chapter about a girl who ate a scoop of ice cream everyday for lunch. She soon grows tired of every flavor of ice cream that there is and quickly loses her will to live. Her teacher decides to make ice cream flavors for every student in the class. It is what they taste when they aren’t eating anything, so students can only notice flavors that aren’t their own.
Every time I eat Rainbow Sherbet, I would mix it until the pink, orange, and green blended together into a pale tan color and pretend it was Todd flavor ice cream. Mixing it together always took forever and left my hand cramped especially when I was given one of those white plastic spoons that would bend nearly in half when the ice cream was still frozen solid.
much love,
hedgie
June 10: Whenever a San Francisco team wins a championship, the city erupts into chaos. Her phone updates her with stories of people climbing Muni buses and setting them on fire. But she was always at a distance from them, just making out the bangs of illegal fireworks and the deep thrum of a helicopter patrolling while she tried to remember what sports season it even was.
June 11: Almost every adult in her family worked in education while she was growing up. Over summers, they would take road trips and give each one a theme as they traced the California coast. One road trip, they visited every lighthouse they could drive to. On another, they visited haunted houses. One summer, they took up train spotting. She grew up thinking that was how jobs worked. They all had summers off, but you could choose to have a different summer job if money was tight. Discovering that most jobs went year-round was the most disappointing realization of her adult life.
June 12: It’s only the first week of summer break and I have already lost track of what day it is.
June 13: Information from the true crime fact bank in the back of her mind came up three times at dinner. While looking out at the water, it was suggested that this would be a good place to dump a body. She disagreed, thinking that there were deeper and more remote bodies of water for that. She also knew the answer when asked if pigs could really eat their way through an entire corpse. The pigs could potentially do it, they have the ability to eat bones, the question was more dependent on if you found a group of pigs willing to do it. Then she was able to rattle off the addresses of nearby murders.
“See, this is why everyone thinks you are a serial killer.”
June 14: The windows to the place were blocked out with posters of dancing women. It was made to look like the women were dancing behind frosted glass, so the rounder parts of them were black and in sharp focus while the less interesting parts of their bodies were blurry and fading away. She supposed it was meant to look sexy and suggestive, but to her, it just made the place look haunted.
June 15: At the Exploratorium, you can make a bubble wall. There is a giant rig filled with bubble bath solution where if you pull gently on a rope, you can lift a giant rectangle of rainbow film. The whole thing would be about five feet tall and five feet wide if my kids could control themselves at all. When they watch one kids pull the string, they pop it before it even gets a foot tall. Then when it is their turn, they don’t foresee that the other kids will do the same exact thing. They get so mad when their own bubble is popped that after three trips here with kids, I have to pull them away after five minutes or they might murder each other.
June 16: In Sideways Stories From Wayside School, there was a chapter about a girl who ate a scoop of ice cream everyday for lunch. She soon grows tired of every flavor of ice cream that there is and quickly loses her will to live. Her teacher decides to make ice cream flavors for every student in the class. It is what they taste when they aren’t eating anything, so students can only notice flavors that aren’t their own.
Every time I eat Rainbow Sherbet, I would mix it until the pink, orange, and green blended together into a pale tan color and pretend it was Todd flavor ice cream. Mixing it together always took forever and left my hand cramped especially when I was given one of those white plastic spoons that would bend nearly in half when the ice cream was still frozen solid.
much love,
hedgie
Friday, June 8, 2018
voting and twerking
June 1: All the Mission Graduates employees get volunteered for the Fun Run to draw marks on the kids’ arms as they run laps. Those that run more than ten laps receive a popsicle. It’s not so bad with the younger grades, but the older grades don’t slow down at all. They either tackle us or force us to chase a little bit after them.
June 2: Despite the locked gate, people keep hopping the gate to get onto the school’s campus. The first time this week was when Janessa’s dad jumped over so when he was late for pickup. The second time, it was a man who was being chased by the police after stealing and crashing a car.
June 3: The man who introduced “Battling Bulter” at the silent film festival got stuck in a tangent of comparing some of the famous silent stars.
“Why do we have to compare Keaton and Chaplin? They’re both wonderful.”
Me, alone in the crowd: Boo!
June 4: After years of monitoring the yard during recess and being hit directly in the face with a soccer ball multiple times, I duck every time a quick moving shadow shoots past me, the ways fish retreat to hidden caves when a bird’s shadow passes overhead.
June 5: The school is one of the registered voting polls, but unlike most of the schools that get set up for voting, we don’t have spare room for the booths to be set up. This forces people to come in and try to make their choices while standing in the middle of a cafeteria swarming with children spilling milk everywhere and twerking.
June 6: The kids have started a new drawing challenge where they select three random markers each and then all draw the same item. I have been gifted pink, blue, and orange drawings of pineapples as well and a red, green, and brown drawing of me surfing in the ocean and yelling for help because of an approaching tsunami.
June 7: A helicopter flying overhead prevented me from walking home when I was done putting away my supplies. There was a shooting across the street that killed one person and sent two to the hospital. The school was put on a lock down. We all sat in the bungalow and hoped that Shanah and the twins were all inside.
June 8: Because I won’t be at work for two months over summer, I have to send in a resignation letter to the front office today and then receive and accept a new job offer tomorrow. No one really understands why I have to do this, but they keep making jokes about me suddenly quitting and how one day I will some crawling back to them.
much love,
hedgie
June 2: Despite the locked gate, people keep hopping the gate to get onto the school’s campus. The first time this week was when Janessa’s dad jumped over so when he was late for pickup. The second time, it was a man who was being chased by the police after stealing and crashing a car.
June 3: The man who introduced “Battling Bulter” at the silent film festival got stuck in a tangent of comparing some of the famous silent stars.
“Why do we have to compare Keaton and Chaplin? They’re both wonderful.”
Me, alone in the crowd: Boo!
June 4: After years of monitoring the yard during recess and being hit directly in the face with a soccer ball multiple times, I duck every time a quick moving shadow shoots past me, the ways fish retreat to hidden caves when a bird’s shadow passes overhead.
June 5: The school is one of the registered voting polls, but unlike most of the schools that get set up for voting, we don’t have spare room for the booths to be set up. This forces people to come in and try to make their choices while standing in the middle of a cafeteria swarming with children spilling milk everywhere and twerking.
June 6: The kids have started a new drawing challenge where they select three random markers each and then all draw the same item. I have been gifted pink, blue, and orange drawings of pineapples as well and a red, green, and brown drawing of me surfing in the ocean and yelling for help because of an approaching tsunami.
June 7: A helicopter flying overhead prevented me from walking home when I was done putting away my supplies. There was a shooting across the street that killed one person and sent two to the hospital. The school was put on a lock down. We all sat in the bungalow and hoped that Shanah and the twins were all inside.
June 8: Because I won’t be at work for two months over summer, I have to send in a resignation letter to the front office today and then receive and accept a new job offer tomorrow. No one really understands why I have to do this, but they keep making jokes about me suddenly quitting and how one day I will some crawling back to them.
much love,
hedgie
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