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insomniac-dot-ink · 5 years ago

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The Long Bus Ride

Genre: supernatural horror

Words: 5.6k

Summary: When her late night bus stops in the middle of a rolling fog cloud Frieda starts to worry. Then she starts seeing words being written in the condensation on her window and she truly gets unnerved.

A group of strangers must now try to get through the night as something seems to be outside.

content warning: body horror

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The bus was mostly empty that evening. That was typical with rising fares and the fact most people would have tried to be home hours ago. It was too early for the late night party crowd and too late for the normal working crowd.

The bus driver was a big guy named Ted, I knew him by his portly size and baby-smooth clean shaven face. He had youthful thick brown hair grown a little long probably for vanity’s sake and a large pot belly that sagged over the shiny tight black belt around his waist.

He always nodded at me when I got on and always stopped for people when they were running to catch the 431. He wasn’t always on time like the other bus driver-- Nory, but he also honked his horn a little less than him too.

I flashed my bus pass at Ted that evening with our usual nod and a lingering achy bitterness settling in my core. Deirdre’s daughter had come to visit again that afternoon and there was always too much nasty energy in the house on those days. I liked to keep things neat, both personally and professionally. I kept my purse organized into tiny pockets and my clothes sorted in bins by season and I never mentioned anything personal at my job.

Everything had its place, but it was harder to be politely indifferent to the household when they were throwing barbed words at each and asking my opinion. It bothered me to have to be anything other than “day nurse Frieda” to them. It blurred our relationship when they turned to me and said “tell my mother she needs to finalize her will” and so on.

Of course, Deirdre should and did need to finalize her will, but expressing that broke far too many boundaries in a messy way.

I was ready to be home an hour ago by the time I walked to the bus stop with the sun already carefully nestled behind the city skyline. The purple of a gloomy summer night was heavy across the horizon and I didn’t even both to check my phone watch. I knew my Friday night was almost already over.

My feet ached as I turned to walk down the aisle of the 431 bus headed to Oakland. My chin was sinking toward my chest like a balloon tug insistently downward by a toddler. An older man sat near the front.

He was a skinny, wiry man with a thick mustache and clothes with spots of what I hoped was motor oil on his patterned button-up and workman pants. He wore heavy boots and watched me with small eyes under enormous eyebrows that could have probably watched me as well for the sheer size of them. He had no bags or anything with him and he sat like there was a drill sergeant ready to bark at him if he so much as slouched a little.

No one else sat in the seats near the front designated for the elderly and pregnant. The seats themselves were blue and yellow with party designs on them like you might see at a tacky bowling alley. It was an older bus that hadn’t even been upgraded to “green” standards yet and rumbled like a thunder storm wherever it went.

In the middle seats was a mother and child. She was a middle-aged black woman with long beaded braids tied back in a ponytail and wore a bright pink shirt and a slouchy pair of comfortable looking jeans. Her daughter looked around 9 or 10 and had her hair pulled back in a tight bun at the top of her head. She wore a hoodie over what looked like leggings and carried a sports bag with her.

The mother was probably picking her up from something like ballet practice. The daughter was leaning on the mom while she absently stroked her head and looked out the window. Something about the easy intimacy of it made me look away quickly.

One seat up and across from the mother and daughter was a gently snoring man. He had a wild beard, knit cap, and fingerless gloves. I could tell by the smell alone that he was homeless and had probably been sleeping on the bus for hours now. However, I had smelled worse and his jacket and jeans weren’t as grungy or disheveled as they could have been.

Two other people sat in the back, but luckily neither of them had claimed the final spot in the corner of the bus near the window. A young woman was one chair ahead of my seat, a short white girl who looked around college age. I wrinkled my nose at her because she was holding a paper cup with what I assumed was coffee and her hands were shaking.

She had on a long skirt with mud splotches at the bottom and a pale blue shirt with a mustard stain on the front. Her long auburn hair was tied back into a ratty knot at the back of her neck. She had on huge glasses dangerously close to the edge of her nose and she was staring out the window with the look of someone trying to count the yellow street lines and failing.

Across from her in the other corner of the bus was a high-school aged looking young man with a huge bag blocking the seat next to him. He was Asian with ink-black hair that he had spiked, and wore all black with dark ripped jeans and a band t-shirt. His ears were covered by silver earrings draped over the lobes like angry criss-crossing Christmas decorations.

He had a tattoo of what appeared to be a wing on his neck and smeared eyeliner around his indifferent gaze. He was wearing small earbuds and listening to something with an audible thrumming base.

I ignored both the messy girl and the punk boy as I took my seat and got out my book for the forty minute ride home. It was another pirate romance story-- which my sister recommended because she assumed she knew my taste. The action scenes were fine, but the actual tension between the main couple was blase at best.

I had to make sure no one sat behind me during my bus rides home though because I didn’t need anyone looking over my shoulder and finding the words “he touched my wet throbbing womanhood.” To say the least, the erotic parts of the novels were not that good either.

It was better than scrolling my phone right then though. I hated work emails more than I hated mud trailed onto the carpet in my house or slow-walkers on the sidewalk.

I peeked out the windows sometimes to get a look at the city as the street lights and building lights and headlights erupted one by one in a pale cascade. We were getting closer to the Oakland Bay bridge and the lights threaded along the beams like spiderwebs of frantic energy all captured and blooming at once. I had an affection for the city despite being trapped there.

I hadn’t actually come to California to be a geriatric nurse again. I already spent ten years working as one in Louisiana when an old college friend had called me up and asked if I wanted to join his startup. It sounded like a fairy tale: join an up and coming tech company and watch as you get boosted past “middle class” into something glamorous and decadent. Kitt knew me and knew I was good with people and offered to let me run the PR department.

Of course, I hadn’t joined for the money or the fact I was that interested in PR. I had been working in a nursing home for almost a decade by then and it had started to wear on me. I liked listening to people, especially people who were made of stories, and the job had originally suited me fine. But there was this… shadow over it all that started to eat at me.

A shadow of loss, of empty words, empty places where a sharp mind used to be, empty reassurances that meant nothing, brief glimpses of grief so intense that it split people in two. That shadow loomed larger and larger the longer I stayed. It chased me as my favorite grandma’s hands started to shake and my favorite patient stopped being able to play piano. I saw it in how some of them stopped meeting my eyes when the months dragged on and their time was coming. I saw in the way they stopped remembering my name or their own.

No. I didn’t want to work as an elderly care nurse any longer.

Of course, I was also 33 and single, and a change sounded good. So I moved all the way across the country, got the smallest apartment I had ever lived in, and dared to be a little bold. I wore brighter colors, spoke out more in meetings, cooked spicier foods, I went on dates with women for the first time.

But all good things come to an end. Most startups don’t make it, no matter how many twitter algorithms you try to “hack.”

I looked out the window and ignored my phone as it buzzed. There were other reasons I didn’t check my phone on the bus as well. Cynthia still wanted to meet now and then-- to see if we could make it work after all. I ignored the buzz.

I was lost to the erotic adventures of a very loud and very incompetent heroine when I heard a soft gasp come from in front of me. I usually had a rule of ignoring everyone else on public transport, but there was something about the sharp surprised sound that made me look up.

We were on the bridge now and it was damp and dark out. I blinked a couple times as I noticed a thick cloud seeming to descend. Fog was all but normal in San Francisco so I decided to go back to reading my book.

A small murmur passed between the daughter and mother in the middle of the bus, “it’s alright…”

I looked up again and the cloud was quickly eating up the view and making the road ahead look shrouded and strange. Cars around us had already turned on their headlights and I could almost feel the bus slowing down as visibility ahead quickly disappeared.

I wrinkled my brow. I didn’t know much about weather, but we usually only saw fog like this in the mornings. I looked to the other side of the road and noticed that I didn’t see any cars coming toward us.

“Look mom,” I heard a small voice say and the little girl was pointing out toward the ocean. I tried to look out the window and make out the sea too, but only saw that same thick white. It was dense and shapeless around us and the bus was slowing down further.

“Where are the lights?” I snapped my head around and the punk kid had taken his earbuds out. His face was even more stony than before and his eyes were narrowed toward where the bridge would be.

I set my jaw as I realized I didn’t see any of the glowing yellow lights that should be at least breaking through parts of the fog. Even worse, I checked ahead of us and behind, I had never known the Oakland bridge to ever be empty.

There were no more cars on either side of us.

I gulped. The bus was almost at a standstill.

“Hey!” The messy college girl holding the coffee called up from the back. “What’s going on?”

“Yeah, what’s the meaning of this? We’ve all got places to be.” The working class man stood up at the front.

Ted the driver didn’t turn around and there was something about his figure that sat wrong.

“Where the fuck are the lights?” The punk kid was standing up now and craning his neck to look outside.

“Excuse me, sir, is there a problem?” The mother had dragged her daughter into her lap and the little girl was looking directly out the window at something with the utmost focus.

I shifted uncomfortably in place and watched the scene unfold. Something cold was trailing down my spine. I liked to keep things neat, and this felt like it was about to pick up my wardrobe and dump it outside onto my muddy lawn.

A couple voices kept demanding to know why we had stopped, and the homeless man somehow kept dozing. “Ooh,” the little girl touched the window and suddenly my eyes were drawn back to my own window.

The fog was dense to the point of nothingness, and beyond the fog seemed to be an even thicker night. I furrowed my brow and drew back into myself. Condensation was gathering on the other side of the window-- the type you might see when your warm breath touches glass.

A thin layer of white was spreading across the window and then I saw what the young girl was “oohing” at.

“Everyone, step back from the windows.” I heard myself saying, reasonably, in as a controlled manner as I could.

Little droplets had now formed on the other side of the glass and the white haze was thick and tangible. That’s not why I jumped back though. A perfectly formed fingerprint was pressed into the condensation there. A clear oval that was dragging down, down, down the window and creating one long, straight line.

There was nothing behind that finger. There was no body or hand or anything attached at all. Only the imprint that was meticulously drawing downward.

“What the fuck?!” The punk kid scrambled back from his window as well.

“What’s going on?” The college student said in a panic as more little finger tips pressed against the glass. Hands, but not hands. My heart squeezed in my chest and a flurry of possibilities went through my head: I was in a coma, I was asleep, I was asleep in a coma. I was dead.

I was dead and hell is a bus ride.

“Ah!” I jerked my head around again and saw the old man in heavy work pants standing by the front with his mouth wide and eyes as round as silver dollars. He was staring at the bus driver in the way one stares at their parents declaring a divorce.

“Ted…” I muttered and forced myself forward. I wrapped my hands around the bus poles with each step and the metal was almost freezing at each touch. I stumbled across the long space.

“Mommy, what is it?” The window next to the little ballerina was absolutely covered in those floating strokes carefully applied by invisible fingers. They were drawing spirals and zig-zags and something that I dearly hoped wasn’t a letter of the alphabet.

I made my way past the sleeping homeless man who still managed not to wake and all the way to the front of the bus where the old man was staring at Ted.

“He’s-He’s--” He stuttered at me and fell back against a metal pole next to the door.

“It’s alright, I’m a nurse.” I took a deep steadying breath. I had seen corpses plenty of times in my life and I knew how to keep myself focused on the tasks in front of me. Ted was slumped over and unmoving.

I reached for his arm first and picked up his limp wrist. I exhaled the second I reached his pulse and felt a faint thrum there. His skin was clammy and far too cold, but he was breathing. “Don’t look at the eyes.” The old man grabbed my shoulder. “Don’t look!”

I was never very good at averting my eyes when facing car crashes or jump scares in horror movies. He had a pulse. I needed to check for head injuries. I glanced at his face. Something was dripping down his cheeks in a steady flow.

I reached and tipped his chin up. I swallowed my scream before it could escape. His eyes were gummed shut with something black and bubbling. It was like tar that held both of his eyelids clamped closed and water was leaking out of the seams.

Droplets beaded down his cheeks and when I let his head fall again it leaked like rain down upon his lap. I stopped myself from heaving at the sight and looked downward. His foot was still on the gas, but we weren’t moving forward.

“Let’s go.” I ushered the old man away from Ted’s body. Something told me we shouldn’t touch it or be too close to it. We retreated back toward the other seats.

“E,” the little girl was tracing a letter in the condensation. Something outside was writing the letter E and then another letter next to it. “N.”

I walked down the center of the bus in a daze and the others looked at me. The disheveled college student stumbled toward us. “Is the driver alright?” I just shook my head and couldn’t find the words to explain that one of us was surely dreaming up a nightmare.

The punk kid was sitting in the center of the back seats clutching his bag to his chest and his earbuds were back in.

“Little girl.” A voice barked. I turned and suddenly I noticed that the homeless man had sat up and his clear blue eyes were darting around the space frantically. “Don’t touch the windows.” His voice was deep and smoke-beaten. “Again, again, again.” He repeated, “Don’t touch. Again.”

I looked back to the shapes being drawn in the window panes.

They were impossibly strange, but no sounds came from the drag of their fingers. In fact, I didn’t pick up any noises from the city at all: no honking, no sirens, no hums of life. I groped for the right words to try to make sense of this.

“Little girl!” The homeless man said sharply and he looked toward the closest window. “Don’t.” “Sheryl…” Her mother warned, but the little girl, Sheryl, kept tracing the letters the Things were drawing.

I watched in a trance, “T.” She said softly. “E.” I was watching the tip of her finger move when I caught the first glimpse.

My whole body froze like a jolt of ice pouring down my spine. Just beyond the invisible hand was a face submerged in the fog-- faint and shifting. It was hard to make out, but two black eyes drooped like runny eggs down it’s sunken cheeks and a mouth grotesquely frozen in a scream took shape for just a moment.

I grabbed for the mother, “everyone!” I found the energy to fill my words with urgency, “get away from the windows!” They all looked to me and I mustered every bit of my authority, “NOW!”

Reluctant shuffling followed. “Wait!” Sheryl protested as her mom picked her up and carried her to the center of the bus. “Wait!” She repeated, “it wasn’t finished.”

The fingers outside became more frantic as we retreated into the center of the bus as far away from the windows as we could get. They clawed and dragged and I could make out more and more faces, some with three fingers and some with seven. Faint outlines of the hands and faces morphed and danced just out in the darkness.

They never stood still or seemed to stop shifting and twisting as if unnaturally alive.

A shudder went through the small group as we huddled together like penguins being accosted by the arctic breeze. The punk boy was the last to reach us as he clung to his huge bag and entered the loose circle we created.

The old man was shifty-eyed and looked the most on edge. I kept an eye on him, as well as the homeless man who was hunched over into himself. “Again,” he muttered to himself. “Again.” The moments after we gathered were long and strained before anyone dared to speak and break the ghastly immense silence. “Something was wrong with the driver,” the old man finally announced as he looked to the fingers, “something is wrong here.” “Very wrong.” The college student echoed.

“Duh,” The pink kid said back with his teeth clenched.

“Perhaps it will be over soon.” I added softly, mostly speaking to myself.

“What’s everyone’s names?” I looked up as the homeless man finally broke himself upright again.

“What? Why?” The old man practically growled.

“Everyone here has got to have a name.” The homeless man’s blue eyes were still frantic and traveling faster than I thought they should back and forth across the space. “Got to have a name.”

“How do we know that will--” “Angela.” The mother spoke up. “And this is Sheryl. Have you seen this before?” She looked to him as if he must often see buses descend into hell before.

“I’m Rick.” He said without hesitating, “Angela, Sheryl,” he pointed to the college student as if to pose a question.

“Laura.” She said softly. Her hands were still shaking, but probably for different reasons now.

“Angela, Sheryl, Laura,” Rick almost sang and then prompted the old man to speak.

“I’m Drew.” The old man said hesitantly after a moment.

“And I’m Frieda.” I added as the punk kid spoke as well.

“I’m Jinu.”

A silence spread and I didnt know what I expected to happen from swapping names with a group of strangers. Sheryl was frowning deeply. She whispered, “We shouldn’t have left where they can see us.”

That made me look back to the people I was stuck with and I opened my mouth to ask Sheryl if she was alright.

Bring

We jumped as one when a sudden and angry sound crackled and shook the space.

Bring, bring

It was like the sound of an old phone back from the 90s. A classic, angry noise that ate up the whole area with its loud buzzing undertone.

Bring!

I felt my pocket and felt something vibrating there.

“It’s our phones…” Jinu said in a hush.

My phone was ringing. And I knew we were being hailed.

Bring, bring, bring

I felt sick.

Laura was the first to dig out her phone from her bright yellow purse and hold it in her hands.

Bring, bring

The iphone vibrated and almost shook its way out of her hands. It’s screen was completely black and something, something was making it ring. “What’s,” I couldn’t contain the question any longer. “What’s causing this?” No one answered me. Drew took out his phone next, a first generation android it looked like with a cracked screen that was just as black as the last one. Slowly, everyone except for Rick, extracted our phones and watched as they made the same cry together over and over again: bring, bring, bring, bring, bring.

I stared into the shiny black surface of mine. It was perfectly smooth and almost… too dark. A dark I had never seen before and reflected nothing back. It felt like it was eating the light up.

“Maybe,” Laura spoke up. “Maybe we could call the police.”

“It’s a little late for that honey.” Angela said with a forlorn sigh.

“Why are they ringing?” I asked dumbly.

“We shouldn’t answer.” Jinu growled and tossed his phone all the way to the other side of the bus.

Rick nodded, “Do. Not. Answer.” “But…” I frowned deeply. “We can’t stay here.” “We can’t answer either.” Rick said in his same husky, withered tone. Drew nodded and threw his phone away, I followed suit mostly to stop looking at the shiny blackness of the screen. Angela seemed to almost break hers as she chucked it away as well, and Laura was the last one. She gripped it tightly and looked up.

“What do you think those are?” She finally voiced our fears and looked back to the fingers and morphed faces. “Are they… are they what’s calling us?” I shrugged, “does it matter?” I glared, “we can’t risk it. Throw it away.” “What happened to the driver?” Laura whispered and I just shook my head. She threw her phone away.

We all looked at each other carefully, and then we waited.

--------

Time ticked by with an anonymous meaningless face. On some level I think most of us expected to wake up soon, or for the sun to rise or to have God yelled “pranked!” from somewhere up in the sky. At least, that’s what I was waiting for.

The bus was still, just as cold and faceless as before, immobile as it had ever been. Alone in the middle of the bridge and alone in no place at all. I had a switch knife I carried around that I now held in my clenched fists and the world stood still.

Empty, except for the constant, unending sound of the phones: bring, bring, bring. They chorused and buzzed on the other side of the bus as we huddled in the center. It was endless. People did what they could to distract themselves from their impossible voices.

Jinu put his headphones back in and turned them all the way up. Laura covered her ears with both hands and rocked back and forth in a ball. Rick gazed unseeingly up at the ceiling with a deep frown on his face. Drew was drawing something on his palm as if doing math equations on his skin.

I distracted myself by talking to the mother and daughter. “You want to be a prima ballerina when you grow up?” I asked softly as I watched Sheryl’s small face. Angela was still stroking her daughter’s head and holding her close as the minutes ticked by.

Bring, bring

“I want to dance in The Swan Lake,” she said factually. “I’m not good enough yet, but I will be.” I beamed. “I believe you.”

Bring, bring

“What do you do?” Angela asked and there was something forced about it.

“Nurse.” I said simply. “Though I came here for an app startup of all things.”

“Oh?”

Bring, bring, bring I wasn’t usually one for idle-chit-chat, but a damp coldness was working its way through my chest. I had already noticed that Laura was shivering fiercely.

“Yeah, we were going to change the world or something he said,” I rolled my eyes, “but it didn’t turn out that way of course.”

“What kind of app was it?” Sheryl was still looking to her window, but she seemed present enough.

“Oh, a ride sharing one. It was supposed to be a public minded service called ‘Democracy Bus.’ It was meant to help people get to the polls on voting days for free or get to civil rally's or debate parties,” I shook my head. “It never got off the ground.” Angela opened her mouth to respond, but seemed to be drained of some force within her.

Bring, bring

“That settles it.” Drew stood up with a hardened look on his face. “If I run I might make it to the other side of the bridge in a few minutes.” He nodded, “we were more than halfway to the other side by the time we stopped.”

We openly stared at the old man. Jinu took his headphones out, and Laura uncurled herself. Rick kept looking at the ceiling.

Bring, bring, bring

My mouth became a hard line, “We don’t want to let any of those things in here…” I whispered.

Drew dusted himself off, “I only need someone to pull the door open for a second. And beside,” his lips curled up, “we can’t exactly stay here and starve.” My skin prickled and I didn’t mention the fact I hadn’t felt hungry since the moment we stopped. I hadn’t felt thirsty either, or anything at all. Just cold. And damp.

“We’re not going out there.” Angela hissed first. “It’s too much of a risk.” She held her daughter tighter to her.

“Does anyone else have any ideas then?” Drew seethed. We were quiet.

Bring, bring

“Maybe we should answer one.” Laura said again, “just to see what happens.” She cocked her head to the side, “maybe they’ll let us go.”

“That sounds like an even worse idea than his.” Jinu said flatly.

“Don’t. Answer. The. Phones.” Rick finally joined the conversation and haltingly declared.

“Why not?” Drew narrowed his eyes icily, “What do you know?” Rick looked back up to the ceiling and set his jaw. Drew took a menacing step toward him, “What does he know?!”

“Oh,” Sheryl pointed, “Look. They’re trying again... E.” I looked up just in time to see the fingers all in one motion write the letter “E” over and over again on each window. I swallowed thickly. “We should all cover our eyes.” I announced, “We need to wait this out.”

Bring, bring, bring! Drew shook his head. “We just gotta open the door for a moment. I’ll go get help.” Angela looked like she was ready to pounce on him. “I told you! It’s too risky, there’s children aboard.”

“A child who keeps trying to communicate with them!”

The fingers were now writing “N” over and over again on every surface of the windows that there were. “N” She read softly.

“Guys,” I repeated and my voice rose, “I think we should cover our eyes.” “T,” Sheryl muttered and I dove for her first.

“Cover your eyes!” I screeched and slapped a hand over her gaze so that she couldn’t read it anymore.

Bring, bring!

“This is crazy!” Jinu started stumbling backward away from the group.

“Don’t leave us!” I reached for him as well.

“No!” Rick shouted, “I told you not to!”

I turned just on time to see Laura crawling toward her phone. She pressed on the screen with one finger and brought it to her face, “hello?” “E.” Sheryl said as my fingers slipped and the whole world came crashing down around us.

“Get back! Get away from her!” Rick pushed the three of us he could reach toward the back of the bus. Jinu let out a wordless scream and Drew reached for Laura.

“Young lady?” Laura’s face was completely contorted as she stood up. Her mouth opened in a grotesque snarl as her jaw jutted out awkwardly to the side. Her eyes were lifeless and started to leak drips of water down her cheeks.

She moved all at once-- like strings were unevenly tied to her knees. She took one jerky, tin step forward and then another.

“Drew,” I hissed and reached for him. “Get back.” “She’s so young,” he muttered. “She’s so young. Can you hear me?” The water was running down Laura’s cheeks like a faucet now and I couldn’t look away as her eyes sunk into their sockets. The white disappeared first into some unseen blackness. I pulled Drew back with all my physical strength and Laura took another step forward.

Could we fight her? Could we fight these things?

I took my knife out and slashed the air in front of us as she took her unpleasant, rigid steps forward. Her eyes had all but sunken into her head and her hanging mouth was now dripping water that smelled of something like mold and damp earth.

“Stay back,” I hissed and slashed the air again. “I’ll kill you.” To my surprise she turned. She faced one of the windows, the one that Sheryl has been sitting at only hours before back in the sunlight world. She touched the glass tentatively and the fingers repeated their last letter over and over again. Sheryl said a final ringing letter, “R.” ENTER.

I hugged myself and held my breath, bracing for the worst.

The windows did not break open though and the distorted faces did not slither inward. Laura got up onto the seat and started pressing into the window. Her eyes were completely gone and her ears and mouth and eyes were all steadily running over with streams of water.

It was wrong. It was hard to watch as she hands pressed gradually through the glass in an impossible manner.

It was a slow and painful process as she joined the mist. Hands grabbed her and pulled at her, her hair came loose and fell down her shoulders, and one of the people beside me started sobbing.

“It’s taking her…”

Someone started humming, Jinu I think. It was a sad and reluctant song that carried soberingly through the space. He hummed a funeral march just as she was tugged through the window and off into the white expanse with no name.

Our phones stopped ringing all at once and the fog began to lift as if in a dream. The next procession was mechanical and done in complete silence. We picked up our cracked phones and returned to our seats.

I didn’t know what compelled us, but I knew it had to be done. I knew we had to return to our exact same spots.

I took my seat at the back of the bus with my head bowed downward and Jinu sat across from me with his eyes focused on the skyline. Angela and Sheryl sat close and fixed in place. Rick went back to sleep. Drew sat closest to the driver and watched Ted sit up again.

Lights appeared beside us. Sounds of cars and bikers and voices reappeared. Headlights blinked on the other side of the road. Ted started the engine again. And we drove.

The bus rumbled onward through the beautiful dark night and city.

The only sign that we had ever been trapped in some place beyond here was the fact that my face was wet with tears and that there was an empty seat in front of me. I couldn’t remember her name though.

I looked down at my phone and I had 127 missed calls from “UNKNOWN” and a very brief text message from the same number. All it read was “again” and “enter.”

I closed my eyes and figured maybe it was time to move back home.

#writeblr #horror #writers on tumblr #supernatural #short story #original story #my work #creepy story #cw: body horror

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renified · 5 years ago

Text

Weird shit that is happened to me, part 2

-I think I met a Druid. I have a horse, and we used to roam the neighborhood at my old house - which included a inactive gravel pit and surrounding forest. One day we are following one of the old logging roads through the forest and come across a clearing. As a side note, my horse is an Arabian, and can be quite spooky at times. As we come to the middle of the clearing I see a man standing jusr outside of the clearing wearing a long brown cloak, and is holding onto a staff with a crystal sphere on the top of it. If that’s not weird enough, he had just appeared - we didn’t hear any footsteps through the underbrush, nothing. My horse didn’t even seem to see him. He didn’t react at all which made me uneasy. So I politely said hi, to which the man smiled and nodded at me and we carried on. When I looked over my shoulder he had vanished.

-I have been stalked by a cougar and her 2 young cubs for the duration of my 2 hour hike up a mountain.

-While walking downtown with a friend there was a homeless man dragging his shopping cart down the middle of the sidewalk. We parted to go around him when he suddenly stops and I kid you not, roars at us and then yells “you may have more tattoos than me but I am scarier than you!”...no one asked sir.

-When I was in Rome I of course went to the colluseum like everyone else, except when I got down to the stage level, despite it being warm and sunny out, I broke out in chills and goosebumps and there was a voice in my head saying “get out get out get out”

-The place I used to work at had a back room that backed onto the underground tunnels that run under the downtown part of the city. The place gave me the creeps as it was, but when the light was turned on, another would turn on at the end of the tunnel, despite there never being any actual wiring or lights down there.

-I am constantly followed by crows and ravens.

-Also, this happens to my mom as well, and ususally on the same day if we are not together: if someone we loved passes away we are visited by a bird of some kind a few days after. This has included a hawk that followed us very closely our entire ride, and eagle that almost clipped me with its wings while riding, a mourning dove, and a chickadee that got into my house to scold me and then calmly wait to be let out 3 times after my grandma died.

-I am completely invisible to waiting staff at restaurants if I am with 2 or more people. I have to get people to remind the waiters that I am there because they never see or hear me...Despite having tattoos and purple hair.

-I have been told by a random man that my hair reminded him of a thundercloud. I had rainbow bangs at the time...

-Once found buried marbles and teeth in the backyard of my old house, and then experienced extreme déjà vu and felt compelled to go sit on the rope swing. When I did a gust of wind came out of no where and pushed me forward

-My first boyfriend purposely tried to get us lost in the middle of nowhere in the woods so we would have to spend the night and have sex (with no tent or supplies, but good thing he remembered the condoms!) I said fuck that and found the way back in less than an hour

-Same said bf told me that if he ever left me he would kill himself

-Another time with the same bf we were walking down a dirt road behind his house and a utility van went by without anyone driving it

-Another guy tried to court me, but cockblocked himself due to his religion. Said “we could never date unless I converted to his religion so I would be allowed into his heaven” then tried to ask me over late at night on msn when that was still a thing cause his parents weren’t home. When I said no, he invited some other random girl over. He comes back online an hour later and asks “whats you’re biggest regret?” When I said I didn’t know he goes “losing my virginity” when I’m like what the fuck, he explains that he invited a girl over to have anal sex because it “didn’t count.” I quickly was like ok if THAT’s why you wanted me over we are good forever and stopped talking to him. He is referred to as Anal for Jesus Guy now.

-Anal for Jesus also got expelled from our high school for sending nudes to a girl and ran off campus and the cops had to go find him.

-He also called me an evil temptress because I wouldn’t sleep with him

-I am a tattoo artist, and people can be weird or gross. Or both. This one guy looks at me half way through and says “you’re lucky you’re a girl. It doesnt show when you get turned on from the pain.”

-Had a guy come in asking if we would be willing to tattoo a name on his penis. We said no. He comes back a week later to ask if we would reconsider. We again said no.

-There was a guy that was ultimately banned from the shop and was nicknamed Seizure Guy because he would always tell you that he had medication in his back pocket if he started seizing. He was also so unhygienic that anything he got done got severely infected.

-I have an extremely intuitive client that essentially reads my fortune for me each time.

-I have been given jewellery, crystals, bones, books, canned tuna, and baked goods as tips.

-Because of my hair it gets a lot of attention and have had many people ask if I know their friend who also has purple hair. Yes. We meet on tuesdays.

-My inner compass is strong enough that I can pass as a local in foreign cities and get asked for directions multiple times...which results in confusion when I can’t help them or don’t understand the language

There’s probably more, will add when I think of it

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dontdietwd · 4 years ago

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Day 178

Twenty-eight weeks pregnant. Almost five months since the world ended. Thirty-seven days since we lost the house. Three and a half months without the group. Without Daryl.

It was not all bad. We had good moments. Each one had kept their own car and we could carry a lot of things with us, things that made us safe and comfortable. We had weapons, food, water, and we got good in finding shelter. Basements were our spot of choice and we could stay in a place for about a week until all resources from said place were gone or if we were overrun. Our little four-way group, just like it had been when it was just Michonne, Andrea and I, worked great together. The three of them kept on looking at me for the most important decisions, but most part of time we all thought like one, sometimes we didn’t even need to speak.

Merle was… Adapting. And incredibly more capable of adapting I would have ever thought he was. Not being on drugs or even drinking anymore had changed him. Well, of course, he was still Merle. Hot headed, foul mouthed, surely an asshole. On the first few days he came on to Andrea and Michonne like a thirsty man at the sight of water, but was slowly letting it go, respecting them more. But one thing he did from the first day on the road as protect. Merle was like our body guard, not that we needed it too much since the three of us were more than capable of fighting, but he took upon himself that this was his role, he would protect and defend us. This I had always known about Merle. Even when he was a bad person, he’d always had my back, had always protected me. The man was loyal to a fault. It was a Dixon thing. I would never forget how at the simple sight of me Merle had turned his back to the bandits he’d been working for, given up on a big, thriving community with all the comforts that came with it, and walked away with us to live the perils of homelessness in the apocalypse, all to be near me again. Not that I understood it completely. I didn’t really know why he was such a loyal friend to me. Not that I was complaining, of course. Having him around was good, he was even able to make me laugh and was showing the good parts of his personality.

He also made me feel somehow closer to Daryl and, incredibly, made me keep the positivity that one day we’d find him. My hopes went down many, many times, to the point I could give up and just accept Daryl was in the past, but Merle would have it. He was certain we’d still find him, just like he’d been certain he would one day find me and his brother. Merle had always though he’d find us together, at the same time, and not separately, but still. He believed it for real and made me keep faith as well.

That day we had been driven away from the bank we’d been holed up in for nearly a week by a small heard and the fact that the place was stinking so bad it was getting hard to breathe in, so we were on the road again. We had taken to drive only two cars and tow the others with ropes as a form of saving gas but still having all the cars.

It was a dirt side road, much like where our previous house had been, and there was an untrimmed, overgrown long hedge that went on for like fifty or sixty yards until there was a wide opening at a corner. I slowed down to a stop, looking at it. Seconds later, Andrea stopped her car by our side and I could see she and Michonne were also observing the same thing I was.

“What ya think’s inside?” Merle asked by my side.

“Let’s find out,” and I moved with the car again until we parked in front of the opening.

Inside we could see it was a paved street that elongated into the area, trees all around it and two or three houses barely visible, one of them pretty close to the opening. It was very quiet. The four of us came out of the cars, all thinking the same. We would do the same thing we’d been doing for so long: check, clear, loot, and if it was good, stay for as long it was possible.

It was a huge square shaped area, streets on two sides with the gateless opening right on the corner, and dense woods on the other two sides. It took us a while to round it all and make sure it was all closed – it wasn’t, really, there was a small metal fence gate on the back that led to the woods, weed overgrown nearly covering it all, rusted and locked tight. Getting back to the opening, we slowly and silently made our way in.

Before we could reach the first house, though – it was a mobile home styled house, we could see now, walkers came out of the trees and from around the house itself. Many of them. Refusing to shoot because of the noise, we dealt with over a ten of them before getting to the minuscule house porch. More were coming when Merle busted the door opened, no time to check for sound or look through the windows this time, and we entered. There were two more inside, which Andrea and Michonne killed off as Merle and I dragged a couch to secure the door with its ruined lock. Walkers outside tried to get in, loud groans and nails scratching the wooden door.

Still silently, we checked the house and found it was clear. It was a tiny one-bedroom trailer, fully furnished, with just the one door as a way in. I was already opening the kitchen cabinets trying to find anything useful and it was all there, like someone had been living there before the world ended and left without packing anything. There were bags of chips and pasta and cans of soup, meat and sauces. In the bedroom Andrea found a dresser filled with men’s clothes.

Merle was already sitting on the couch, groaning at his aching legs, when we all gathered there, the walkers outside still trying to get to us. Right by the door there was a table and booth and a window above it. Sliding into the booth and taking my knife out, I opened at the window a crack and hit the knife there on the windowsill to get their attention off the door. Using the crack, I started stabbing their heads, making them drop one by one. Michonne quietly approached and gestured me to let her do it after around ten minutes I’d been doing it, and kept on going. The number of walkers increased, their own kind attracting the attention of others, and then dropped again until no more were heard around the house. Outside, there was a pile of dead, fetid corpses.

“Let’s get the cars in,” I told them, the first word I’d spoken in hours.

We had to skip over the walkers’ bodies to get out of the trailer and then went back outside to get the cars. The noise of the engines attracted more of them.

“Son of a bitch, motherfuckers just keep comin’!”

“We’ll do the same again,” I said from his side in the car. “Go further, to the next house.”

The second house was a little larger than the first, and it looked a bit more well taken care of. The owner was still inside, a chubby little old lady who might have been a cute grandma once. It was not hard putting her down. This house was a two-bedroom, cozy little home with flowery curtains on the kitchen window and what had been daisies now dry in a vase.

Right across the street there was the largest of the three houses, painted in olive with white windows and a more spacious porch. This house was the next one we’d go in, but it was probably going to be the last one because it was going to get dark soon. We crossed the street on a quick run and tested the door before busting it open and found it unlocked. Al usual, Merle went in first and froze right there, the three of us hovering around his shoulders.

“Move Merle!” Michonne told him as we eyed the walkers that were coming close to our backs.

Instead, Merle put his arms up, his knifed stump in the air as he said, “No need to shoot, man.”

Fuck.

Looking around him, I saw there was a man inside, a .12 shotgun pointed right at Merle’s chest.

“Incoming!” Andrea warned us and I had to turn away from the living man threat to deal with the dead ones. Still under the man’s aim, Merle didn’t move to help us, but he did step away from the threshold and back onto the porch. We were lucky there weren’t many of them on this tide. Finishing the last one, I ran back to Merle and rounded him as I dropped my bush axe and stood in front of him.

“Fuck you doin’?” Merle reacted.

“Hey, we mean no harm!” I told the man who looked from Merle to me. He looked like he was trying to be firm but his eyes betrayed him. He was scared as hell. “We’re just looking for a safe place, same as everyone else! We’ll just go,” and I nudged Merle with my back to his chest to make him take a step back, which he did.

“Will?”

Okay, what? It was a female voice, weak and sounding real old, coming from the inside of the house. The man, Will, turned his head nervously to look at the direction it came from and them back at us.

“D’you have company, dear?” she spoke again.

“No, Ma!” Will said nervously. “Was just someone at the wrong house. They’ll be goin’ away now!”

“Oh, okay. I just made lemonade, if they want some!”

“Go!” Will ordered.

“You got a group?” I asked him.

“Sam, let’s just go!” Michonne whispered from behind me.

“No group, but this is our house and you’re not welcome!”

“It’s just you in this place?”

“That I know of.”

“We ain’t a threat, Will,” I told him, trying to sound calm, my hands still in the air. “Were just looking for a safe place. We might stay in one of the other houses for the night, if you don’t mind.”

“How can I be sure you ain’t a threat?” he asked and his voice shook a little.

“You got an elder here, man,” Merle answered instead of me. “Wouldn’t harm an old lady.”

His shotgun went down just a little as he said, “Just stay away from my house!”

“We will!” I assured him and told the others over my shoulder, “Go on guys, let’s go back across the street.”

Behind me I felt them move backwards, Merle’s chest not touching my back now, and I saw as Will licked his dry lips nervously.

“You got any food?” he asked.

“Not much, but I can spare you some if you’re hungry,” I told him. “But only if you stop pointing that gun on us.”

He looked to his side into the house again and back at us nervously before doing so. We were still outside.

“She’s 97,” he told us. “She ain’t got a clue what’s happenin’.”

“I understand, Will. My name is Sam, this is Merle,” he looked at Merle who was hovering over my shoulders. “Andrea and Michonne. We really don’t mean any harm, okay?”

He nodded nervously, swallowing hard.

“She didn’t really make a lemonade, ya know.”

“Thought so,” I tried smiling at him, but my heart was still accelerated. “It’s just the two of you?”

“No, my sister’s out there, went looking for food. We wanted to go in the other houses but there’s always dead people inside. Can’t get bit and leave Ma alone.”

“Okay, just make sure your sister doesn’t shoot us when she comes back home?” I asked him and he nodded. “We’ll get you some cans, alright?”

“Ya sure ‘bout that, darlin’?” Merle asked me. “Man just had a fuckin’ shotgun pointed at my chest a minute ago.”

“Yeah, and we tried to break into his house. You’d do the same.”

“Ya sure ya can spare?” Will asked and eyed my stomach. “I see ya need it.”

“Wouldn’t give it away if we couldn’t spare it.”

I did give him some, we’d found a good amount in the first house and had all that we’d been carrying with us in the cars. We were good. We didn’t get to see his old mother then, we just went back to the house across the street and stayed there. Sun went down and we arranged a quick dinner – there was still gas in the gas canister outside, so we could warm the food up and boil the water that came out of the faucet. It was a clear water but you never know. After eating we make sleeping and lookout arrangements.

Merle wouldn’t take his eyes off the window and the house across the street. We could see the light of oil lamps in there and shadows inside. Once I could see three of them, which meant the sister had come back without us seeing it. Maybe the house had a back door. They didn’t get out or did anything else, though, but I could see Merle was worried and if I knew him well, he wouldn’t be leaving that window any time soon.

The house went silent and we lit a few candles to be able to see anything. I stood by Merle, looking out as well. There were crickets and cicadas singing outside and it reminded me of the quarry camp, the tents, and Daryl. As if on cue, the baby moved and I rested my hand on my stomach and I saw Merle look down at it quickly before looking out again.

I thought of when we were on the road and stopped at a gas station, right after we left Savannah. Daryl and Merle were bickering and I heard Merle tell Daryl not to hit on me and I hadn’t wanted to hear it that time, but now thinking of it I knew Merle didn’t approve the idea then. That’s why I hadn’t told him yet. He’d get mad at Daryl for doing what he told him not to do. For some reason… But I wanted to tell him, he deserved to know, especially if we were gonna find Daryl sometime in the future. I didn’t want it to be a surprise to Merle when I jumped on Daryl right in front of him.

“Hey,” I said quietly and Merle looked at me. I pointed at my stomach where my boy was moving quite energetically. Merle didn’t understand, so I reached out for his hand and pulled it so he’d feel it. His eyes went wide when the baby jumped under his palm. He’d never felt it before. “This baby? That’s your nephew,” I whispered. “Daryl may not have made it, but he wanted it. And I wanted it to be his too, so it is. That’s your nephew.”

His look was unreadable, expressionless, but his large, calloused hand still rested there. The baby stopped after a few seconds and I let his hand go and he withdrew it, but still looked at me.

“I know you told him not to,” I moved on. “But we did get together. For a whole four days before that fuckin’ night. And it was real. It was that real thing people talk about and I never believed I’d find.”

Merle looked out the window again, thoughtful. “Thought so,” he told me. “The way you talk ‘bout ‘im…”

“I love him, Merle,” I told him firmly yet gently.

He nodded and was silent for a long moment until he finally said “Told him not to come onto ya.”

“I know. Just don’t know why.”

“’Cause we Dixon’s no good,” he said bitterly ad looked sideways at me. “Known that my whole life. Thought ya could do better.”

“That’s not true, Merle. Fuck do you mean, no good? You two have been rocks in my life since that fuckin’ night at my place. Having my back, protecting me, being my friends, my family. Even before when you were a sonofabitch all the time, you were my friend.”

“Even when I tried to get you ta drink?”

His voice was so bitter when he said that, that I knew he’d been thinking about that night. He felt guilty, ashamed for what he’d done. And he should, it had been a shitty move.

“You did wrong then, Merle, but ya different now. A sober Merle’s a whole different person. I guess you just didn’t know that ‘cause you’d been drunk and stoned for too long.”

“Got told that ma whole fuckin’ life,” his voice sounded like a low thunder. “Old Will Dixon?” he said taking an unconscious look at the house across the street where the other Will lived. “Always sayin’ we were just like’im.”

“Yeah, I know all about the old Dixon,” I said angrily. “What he did to Daryl… And to you, getting you two to believe you were pieces ‘o shit like he was. He just wanted his boys not to be better than him and you both believed it. You even kept telling Daryl those things yourself, ‘cause you believed‘em,” and then I turned fully to Merle, arms crossed. “Well, ya know what? Old Dixon had no fuckin’ idea what he was on about. He didn’t know his sons the way I do now. Ya good enough, Merle. You good enough to be my family and Daryl’s good enough to be my man.”

I don’t think nobody had ever said good things to Merle before. I don’t think anybody had had his back. Nobody had been kind to him and that’s why he got fucked up like he still was, believed himself a piece of shit and therefore acted like it.

He was silent for a long time and I let the moment stretch. He was thinking hard.

“We had a sister, ya know?” he finally said.

“I know. Georgia.”

He nodded, “Meningitis,” he told me. “She was seven, just one year older than Daryl, I was fifteen. Ya reminded me o’ her,” I nodded, wordless. He’d called me Georgia up on the roof in Atlanta. “If that baby there’s my nephew…” he looked at me. “That means ya my sister.”

My eyes filled up with tears. That was it, this was my brother. I had a family. I had two sisters who were sleeping right now, and now I had a brother as well.

“Not that ya takin’ Georgia’s place,” Merle felt the need to say. “No replacing that little angel.”

I laughed tearfully, “I know that. And ya know, you my brother, Merle, but Daryl?” I shook my head slowly. “Daryl ain’t my brother!”

He laughed too saying “Don’t make this gross!”

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swirlyrobe · 4 years ago

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Jul 28, 2015

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after that i ended up in a special ed school and thats when i started listening to rap with dipset and stealing yugioh cards for money and robitussin to get high. when i was 16 i only had a couple good friends and everybody else just avoided me caus they were scared i was going to fight them and one of them steve (who’s 3 years younger than me) had me meet his (at the time) ex gf one day and i ended up getting my thing sucked>.> yea for the first time and then we planned to lose our virginity the next week. she brought her friend and we had a threesome tho my drugs caught up with me because i was on probation for beating somebody up on the bus and i kept getting dirty urines for weed so i went to rehab a couple weeks after

i never really had gfs in highschool other than that, there was only 5 girls in my special ed school, i was friends with most of them but they used me for drugs. i went to community college right after highschool and made friends rapping tho immediately got involved in a small crime ring of stealing video games from stores, selling them to gamestop to make a couple hundred daily as well as smoking a lot more weed (while still on probation for another assault) that didnt catch up with me yet tho when i was 19 this girl sabrina added me on facebook and i really liked her, ended up meeting her at the mall it was a really sweet date(we had fun getting physical😄) she wasn’t like everybody else because she didnt try to be normal. i had court coming up though i ended up smoking pcp for the first time and had a psychotic break where i thought this girl was her (who wasnt) and got arrested for unlawful restraint (i thought she was bugging out and i didnt want to leave until i knew what was wrong). i went to jail and got released to rehab again.

when i got out of rehab i went to outpatient rehab (i was 20 now) and met a woman heather who was 33. we dated and she bought a ring for me 3 months after to propose which i accepted because i was desperate and i thought i loved her though she asked if i was attracted to her and i honestly said only her face and not her body so she broke up with me. after that i started smoking again until i started talking to this girl Haley who lived the city over from me, she said she wanted a brother yet i really started liking her when we talked. this is when i really started realizing i liked younger girls and she ended up admitting she had a bf months after and lied to both of us. (i made a lot of songs about her😔😪){&2020 update about haley: we moved on with our lives and had never met though I talked to her a little on Facebook this year and, thankfully I wasn't as enamored and clingy😪}

there's a couple dozen other girls i dated/talked to between that and then there was bella who heard my music on an old social site called PHEED and i thought she was beautiful so i told her that and we talked. she lived in texas but we had intense convos she was really smart, beautiful, funny and we swore we would be together though i had to go to rehab again(this time inpatient in New London where, I lived in a sober house & got a job after) because i violated probation yet i wanted to test if she’d stay with me so i didnt tell her i went. about 4 months later when i was getting out of rehab i talked to her again and she acted like everything was alright and she had moved to NY as well as gotten a license and really had her life together. she said she loved me and was gonna drive to see me in new london so, I waited an hour for her to come until I talked to her and she said because I "played" her she was playing me so, not coming 😢😞(this was in 2014)

So in 2015 I was clean about a year so, I applied & got accepted for McNally Smith college of music (to major in audio production) in st Paul Minnesota where I Was clean for months until (for some reason I forgot but, probably running around fast) I got kicked out of my weightlifting gym out there so I was upset and, found some people @ a park near downtown st Paul smoking weed which I got in on and, ten weeks later I saw someone with dreads buying a dutch in a bodega so, I asked if he knew where to get weed and: It turned out he was a dealer so I ended up buying lot's of weed and trading for studio time for him to record but, I got caught smoking sometimes in my dorm & because I got in arguments with students and staff at college so, they warned me if I got in ANY fight in or, outside of school I would be expelled & I DID get expelled; probably because of the fight where I sent that guy who hit my head with a brick to the hospital (which drew a LOT of attention and PROBABLY was on the news)

Though they said it was because I got in too many arguments and, smoked too much weed in my dorm...

So I moved back with my grandma later in 2015 where I was until she kicked me out for smoking weed and k2 so, I was homeless In which I slept under a blanket near the library and, behind a church in hamden until, the church let me live in their garage when it became winter so I stayed there until early 2016 where, I moved to a spot in Hamden off the bike trail in the woods where I started with a one person tent until I stole a 8 person tent from Walmart and, uused a shopping cart to carry a bed my friend gave away down the bike trail to my spot and late I stole a propane heater plus propane powered stove so I stole an empty propane can outside of krauzers and I kept paying $20 to get it filled at The car wash up the street so I used it to cook ramen and, oatmeal on my stove and power my heater in the winter and I finally got clean in August 2016 while STILL homeless then completed a course to get into CTWORKS which helped me get nice used suits and an interview g for the job I got at Chipotle in December 2016 while, still homeless 😪 I told them I still lived at my grandmas and took showers at my friend's house until I got a la fitness membership with my first paycheck which was actually through the woods near my tent so, I took showers there EVERY morning & worked out there in addition to, at my tent where I still had a barbell set from my grandmas and, then in the spring of 2017 I applied to and, got a landscaping job I saw on the ctworks job search online so I woke up at 5am EVERY morning with a battery powered alarm clock I stole from Walmart and, caught the first Whitney bus that went downtown at 5:30 and, then I took the next train around 5:45 to go to milford where, the landscaping base is so I ran there when I got to Milford around 6am to get there on time by 6:30-45

So I worked there while I was still homeless and, I got approved for shelter plus Care which some people That lived in the woods near me told me about and, I got my apartment with 2 jobs off the post road behind dunkin donuts in West Haven so, I took The bus up the post road to get to BOTH jobs until, I saw a moped for sale from east haven on Craigslist for$200 in mid spring of 2017 which, I rode to my jobs on until, I got a drivers permit (coincidentally on the day I heard my grandma was dying so, I Went to her house and Watched her die 😥

Then I took drivers ed classes;

Then I started getting driving lessons in late spring 2017 until I learned to drive in a couple months so, I took the drivers test in summer 2017 and, then took motorcycle classes at north haven gateway (where I ran into my dr's receptionist Alexandra ai had a crush on (who I even had written and recorded a song about) then, my mom helped me get my 250 ninja from new Haven power sports so: I drove that to my jobs until my crash on August 6th 2019 which, I don't remember but, I woke up at the residential physical rehab hospital Gaylord where : I leave weekly what happened was I hit an suv on mg way to work, had a right brain stroke & broken pelvic also my left side was paralyzed and got contractures (where my left arm, fingers and left got really curled up and difficult to straighten so I'm still working on walking again 😥

(I'm getting botox injections to help my left side straighten and , I'm able to my left leg and arm though, they're really bent and my fingers are too bent for me to move, use,or, hold anything😪

So now I am living at my aunts waiting to get another apartment through my insurance agency while, I still get votox every 2 months unrtil I hopefully gain control and use of my left side😪 &, the ability to walk again...

I went from being REAL STRONG to, being weak (though I'm ljfting more with my right arm with a dumbbell then I used to!)

Either way: I'm a survivor!

💪🏽😁👍🏼

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jdmainman123 · 3 years ago

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#Report it happened guys I was close enough to the beach? I could smell your dead daughter's underwear in the road? And then I saw it the Versace house

Soon as they kick me out of this airport I think we got another favor what is it Maine lock the airport and then lock the libraries?

You know what I hope your dead son gets his face kicked in for doing his favors tell that b**** he has it coming there's black hair whites and a fat ass that ruin the family why are all the black hair white sons angry fat skin and it's part of the region it really sets testament to the construction workers in Los Angeles 3/4 they're f****** anger reminds me of that black skin grandma or that black skin girl? And I do have our statement here that fat black hair white son's attitude is the one that killed the family the one that ruined the family

It's like hanging out with a little blacks can go a little black skin boy every time I see his fat ass black hair anyways I'm distracted

I saw the Versace house? Soon as I get my ass kicked out of this airport I'm not intentionally doing it there's their hyping up favors for other cities but good news is I'm out of snow so Utah it worked I didn't know there was no homeless man in snow? I thought climate strike suggested by New York was a statement to me and I'm allowed to come into any City and shut off the snow maker and force these crackers outside to see any of them bleeding those are the ones to kill

So I'm headed on to the other side to do a favor cuz main shut down you know main doesn't even have a beach just because it's Maine it doesn't mean it's florida? And I'm not standing for me owning every floor of the beach cuz 3/4 put a bad taste in her mouth and it ruined the beaches for everyone your white skin satellite maker? Was very angry that his daughter died in a pool drowning in a pool of her own blood

We knew that was the statement the little boy was in a pool and lost his underwear and never put him back on got out of the pool slipped cracked his head open died in another pool of his own blood

So for this f****** guy to have been correct the Black skin Man and the white skin man holding their word solid to me they don't want their boys and girls on the beach by building a 3/4 facility to take the beats out of the question those little girls love nothing but sunlight in a bikini lines? And then you send them all to my sight to be Black ops and never have their p**** sucked again? You're a worse father than a bigger city and I want you to know that you piece of s***

I can't believe it was true all this black skin family needed was a white skin man that hated water? And it's not my fault his daughter driving the pool here we go again the NEX statement I know you guys were here cuz the Mia pow flags on insisted it wasn't a beach it was a pool that you guys took arms up against and a misstatement has to be your little son in the pool underwear came flying off and he died in the pool of his own blood

I can't believe it was true if you guys took aim at at my beach over a f****** pool? What about those little plastic pools we put in the front yard for the babies to hang out in and shower and put under a little bikinis and get tan lines? What's next satellite make sure you're going to hate sunlight you piece of s***

I can't believe it was true a white skin satellite maker in a black skin satellite maker took aim in arms up against a pool Beach water YOU GUYS NEED TO LIGHTEN UP JUST BECAUSE I'M FROM THE COOLEST CITY IN THE WORLD WHERE MY BIKINI TAN LINES AND

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beautyindisguise00 · 4 years ago

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Are you one of those people that LOVE to hug others?

Thursday October 1 2020 @2:53pm

1. When was the last time someone saw you naked? last weekend. my boyfriend

2. If you could bring someone back from the dead and spend an hour with them, who would it be and what would you do/say? my grandma. i’d ask her how she felt about how things are going with the big three family now

3. What is the greatest loss you’ve endured? my grandma

4. How would you describe your current mood? calm and relaxed

5. When was the last time you did something you were embarrassed by? crying myself to sleep last night. ugh, im so sensitive sometimes.

6. What was the last thing you lied about? i dont remember. haha

7. Where is your favorite place to have sex? still have my v-card,but the bed. haha

8. What is your earliest memory? getting lost at a sports tournament. haha

9. Do you ever drink or get high alone? i drink by myself, but not to get drunk

10. What type of a drunk are you? very chatty and giddy

11. What song (or a few songs, whatever) means a lot to you and why? there’s a lot.

12. When was the last time you revealed your feelings for someone? Were they accepted or rejected? last weekend to a guy friend, Luke last weekend to my boyfriend a few weeks ago to my best friend, Angela all where of different feelings, but thankfully they were all very accepting

13. What was the reason behind your last visit to the hospital? visiting a friend who was in a motorcycle accident

14. How do you tend to deal with a breakup? i haven’t been through a bad breakup and i hope i wont ever, but if i ever do. i’d probably cry myself to sleep each night and go through the motions through the day. i’d stay off social media until i’m ready to show my ex what he’s lost

15. What is the “worst” drug you’ve done? Are there any you will never try, or any you want to try? i’ve never done drugs

16. What is something you’ve done that you truly regret? forgetting to log out of my facebook messenger on my mom’s phone....

17. What does it mean to you to be a good person? Do you feel you are a good person? someone’s who’s kind. goes out of their way to help others. and many more. i can be a good person, but im not always

18. What is your philosophy on life/how do you generally choose to live or conduct yourself? enjoy life. be kind to others. bring glory to God

19. Do you view animals as being just as important as people? Why or why not? animals should be treated with care and kindness.

20. When was the last time you were up all night and why? my boyfriend and i were out with his family

21. What is the worst thing you’ve done to yourself? What is the worst thing someone else has done to you? not love myself like i should be. form options about me without getting to know me

22. What is the most personal thing you’re willing to reveal? depends on who you are

23. What made you stop talking to the last person you cut out of your life? we just grew apart. neither one of us put effort in the friendship anymore

24. Is there a situation or person you haven’t been able to get over/forgive? not anymore, i’ve learned and moved on

25. Who was the last person to yell at you? Did you yell back? i havent been yelled at in a while.

26. Where did your last injury come from? no major injuries lately. the last one i can recall was when one of my kiddos rammed into my toes and my toe nail chipped off

27. What are some kinks or turn-ons you have, if any? uhhhh, neck kisses, dirty talk, nip play. hahahaha

28. What are you like during arguments? stubborn. haha. and i try to be right all the time.

29. What is the worst thing you have said to another person? they’re a b

30. Where do you like to be kissed? lips and neck

31. What is more difficult for you, looking into someones eyes when you are telling someone how you feel, or looking into someones eyes when they are telling you how they feel? the first one

32. Think of the last time you were REALLY angry. WHY were you angry? Do you still feel the same way? i was tired, sleep deprived, had a migraine from drinking too much. so i got upset at my boyfriend, but at least i knew not to say anything i’d regret to him. we talked about it the day after and we’re all good now.

33. You are on a flight from Honolulu to Chicago non-stop. There is a fire in the back of the plane. You have enough time to make ONE phone call. Who do you call? What do you tell them? if i wasnt already with my mom, then my mom. i’d tell her i love her and everyone else. i would want to hear her voice before i go.

34. You are at the doctor’s office and he has just informed you that you have approximately one month to live. Do you tell anyone/everyone you are going to die? What do you do with your remaining days? Would you be afraid? i’d tell those who are important to me first and spend as much time as i could with them.at first, i’d be afraid, but i know where i’m going so i’d just miss everyone more than anything

35. You can have one of the following two things. Which do you choose? Why? i dont see the choices

36. You are walking down the street on your way to work. There is a dog drowning in the canal on the side of the street. Your boss has told you if you are late even once more, you are fired. Do you take the time to save the dogs life? Why or Why not? i can’t see my boss saying that to me, but i’d do my best to save that dog

37. Would you rather be hurt by the one you trust the most or the one you love the most? well, essentially, they’re the same people so I’d end up getting hurt by both

38. Your best friend confesses that he/she has feelings for you more than just friendship. He/she is falling in love with you. What do you (or did you) do/say? my best friend is my boyfriend. haha

39. Think of the last person who you know that died. You have the chance to give them 1 hour of life back, but you have to give up one year of yours. Do you do it? Why or Why not? yes. I’d do that for my boyfriend so he’d be able to send one more hour with his grandpa

40. Are you the kind of friend that you would want to have as a friend? yes. haha

41. Does love = sex? not for everyone

42.Your boss tells your coworker that they have to let them go because of work shortage, and they are the newest employee. You have been there much longer. Your coworker has a family to support and no other means of income. Do you go to your boss and offer to leave the company? Why or Why not? honestly no. I also have financial things to take care of my own. I would very horrible, but i just can’t

43.When was the last time you told someone HONESTLY how you felt regardless of how difficult it was for you to say? Who was it? What did you have to tell the person? just shared my intimacy life with a guy friend on a long road trip. nothing too bad, but i dont really talk about stuff that personal to me. haha

44. What would be (or what was) harder for you to tell a member of the opposite sex, you love them or that you do not love them back? that i didn’t love them back or more so the feeling was not mutual

45. What do you think would be the hardest thing for you to give up? Why would it be hard to lose? my love for people. you can’t tell me to stop loving someone

46. Excluding romantic love, when was the last time you told someone you loved them. Who were they to you? my kiddos at work

47. If there was one moment and one time in the last month what would you change and why? honestly, i cant think of anything. not saying this last month was perfect, but it wasnt too bad

48.Imagine it is a dark night, you are alone, it is raining outside, you hear someone walking around outside your window. WHO do you wish was there with you? uhh, a wwe fighter. haha jk probably my boyfriend

49. Would you give a homeless person CPR if they were dying? Why or Why not? yes. i’d always to try save a life

50.You are holding onto your grandmother’s hand and the hand of a newborn that you do not know as they hang over the edge of a cliff. You have to let one go to save the other. Who do you let fall to their death? What was your rationale for making the decision? neither one of my grandmas are here

51. Are you old fashioned? in some ways

52. When was the last time you were nice to someone and did NOT expect anything in return for it? work. haha

53.Which would you choose, true love with a guarantee of a broken heart, or never loved at all? Why? how it is true love when there’s a broken heart?

54.If you could do anything or wish anything, what would it be? being able to travel anywhere and anytime

55. What was the last thing you ate? a chocolate chip muffin

56. What kind of guys are you usually attracted to? guys who are kind to others, athletic, and hott. haha. honest truth

57. What’s the stupidest thing that’s happened to you that ended a friendship? they drunk way to much and got on my nerves

58. What’s the longest amount of time you’ve had sex at a time? vcard stil here but when my boyfriend comes to visit, we get intimate about 2-3 time a day. hahahaha morning, mid day, and night. lol

59. What reality shows do you watch? not much. sometimes KUWTK here and there 60. Post a video of yourself here: no thank you

61. Where do you work? at a daycare

62. Have you ever gone up to a car thinking it was yours and tried to get in it? no i always check the plates

63. Where do you buy most of your clothes? tj maxx

64. If you were very intelligent and had the capability to have any profession, what would you like to be? teacher. haha

65. What’s your most irrational fear? use to be dolls. ahaha

66. How many radio stations do you listen to? i have about five saved on my car, but i dont really listen to the radio often. i usually just listen to my own music

67. What kind of music do they have? today’s top hits and Christian

68. Would you rather go to Greece or Hawaii? hawaii!!

69. Musicals: Yay or Nay? depends some yes some i’d pass

70. What are the next concerts you’ll be going to? i dont have any planned right now

71. What was the last conversation you had with your best friend about? the meeting we had

72. Are you one of those people that LOVE to hug others? nah, depends on the person but a quick hug is okay if we’re not that close, but if we are then sure, hug on!

#beautyindisguise00 #q&a #gettoknowme

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messysuitcaseblog · 6 years ago

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Why We’re in Vermont for the Summer

I thought I’d take a step back and explain why we are suddenly blogging from Vermont instead of Mexico.

Our Vermont History

Friends who knew us when we lived in Mamaroneck, NY (1998-2008) know that during that time, we bought a couple of vacation rental houses in Vermont. We wanted a rural place to escape from the hustle bustle of the NY metro area, and we loved New England, where I lived for much of my childhood.

VT House #1: The Lake House

The first house we bought was meant to be our retirement home, and we nicknamed it “The Lake House.” It’s a six-bedroom chalet nestled on a wooded three-quarters of an acre across the street from 200-acre Lake Rescue, where we keep a dock with boats. The kids and I would escape for half of every summer to decompress in the Green Mountains, go swimming and boating, hike nearby trails, sit around a fire pit making s’mores and singing camp songs, gaze at stars and explore Vermont. We had a Zodiac boat with a motor and used to go tubing. Bob came up for vacation a couple of weeks each summer, and otherwise took Amtrak from NY every Friday for a weekend visit. During the winter, we came up on occasional weekends and some school breaks to ski nearby Okemo. I would XC ski on Lake Rescue.

As soon as the contract was signed on The Lake House, we found ourselves in the vacation rental business, because it came with winter seasonal renters, and that was our plan for paying for it.

VT House #2: The Brook House

We bought the second house, which we call “The Brook House,” a couple of years later because the real estate market was booming, and it seemed like a good investment. The Brook House is a 120-year-old, five-bedroom former chicken coop that backs to a creek and Tiny Pond Recreation Area, 400 acres of state forest that no one seems to know exists. Echo Lake is less than a quarter-mile away. The yard is big and there’s a little country store across the street.

We dubbed it “The College Fund.” Alas, that real estate “boom” turned out to be a bubble when the market tanked. The region is only now recovering, so we still own both houses, though the Brook is on the market. One rental home is quite enough to manage from a distance!

Two Houses Filled With Love

The houses, especially the Lake House, are an integral part of our family story, especially since we moved to Colorado in the middle of the kids’ childhoods, so this region served as an anchor for their lives. We filled the houses with people we loved whenever we could. Family – grandpa and grandmas, aunts and uncles, siblings and cousins – and friends came up to the lake for summer vacations, year after year, creating so many dear memories.

Our friend Marie Laguerre brought her twins Omar and Kayla to attend Farm & Wilderness Barn Day Camp (eight miles up the road, and extraordinary) with my kids, and lived in the house for two weeks with us. I remember Omie would eat nothing but ramen noodles. Marya and Mickey Carter did the same with kids Spencer the bed at the Brook House (and I was so proud of myself for adding plastic covers to the mattresses that summer before their arrival), is now a brilliant athlete attending Harvard!

Cousin Jeanine Troisi came and learned to ski one year; another summer she ran a hilly 5K race along Echo Lake not long after giving up smoking. I was so proud of her! My brother Mike, sister-in-law Paula and their three kids visited; we rode bikes together around the lake with the smallest kids in kiddie seats. My nephew Jake and I kayaked into the middle of the lake to watch the Perseids Meteor Shower. Our friend Valerie Rasmussen, who has since passed away, came to hike and waterfall jump one summer, and to ski one winter.

My dear friends Mary and Sam Wiley brought live lobsters from Newport, RI, and we watched lawbstah races on the front deck of the Lake House before enjoying scrumptious steamed lobsters. I think of her whenever I see those lobster pots, which we still have, just waiting for her next visit. Mary came back another year and used the Brook House as a base while visiting colleges with her son Henry. Or was it Frank? I remember Lex’s stuffed lamb Buggya Guy disappeared during that visit, somewhere between going to car to leave for the Killington Adventure Zone to enjoy the alpine slide and arriving at the mountain. Forever a mystery.

(Above - Hiking the Vista Trail at Echo Lake. Below, the view from the top!)

My cousin Loraine Carapellucci and husband Dave Handley brought their three daughters for a week, and our kids really bonded. I remember we had a merry time on the rope swing of Discovery Island, in the middle of Lake Rescue, giving kids Olympic scores for “poses” before they dropped into the water. Alas, that swing is gone now; the tree from which it hung was brought down in the Great Flood of 2012.

We even hosted a Dominican-American girl from the Bronx named Clarissa Delgado through the Fresh Air Fund, to give her her first nature experience. I remember watching stars with Clarissa, a phenomenal sight for a girl accustomed to bright street lights and no view of the starry sky, and teaching her how to fish. In fact, it seems I spent countless summer hours putting worms on hooks and extricating fish from the same hooks over and over as I taught countless munchkins how to fish off the dock. I failed hopelessly to learn to fly fish, however, despite efforts summer after summer from my friend Eddie Eagan, who was director of the local Chamber of Commerce and taught flyfishing on the side.

I loved running around the lakes, and often woke up early to kayak on the misty lake, alone on 200 acres of calm water save for a couple of loons.

(Misty morning on Lake Rescue)

So many thousands of wonderful memories! When we moved to Colorado in early 2009, we were saddened to realize our Vermont summers were abruptly over. We took a financial hit from the recession that took years to recover from, and couldn’t afford to fly the family across the country. So the houses became vacation rental businesses that I managed from afar, and Bob and I would go back every couple of years to make improvements and do work on them.

We sort of forgot that the Lake House was originally supposed to be our home.

Reconnecting with Vermont

But this past November, we went up and stayed in the Brook House for five weeks after Bob retired. We took Bob’s mom and sister Beth, and it snowed a good two or three feet during our stay. Bob and I spent an hour every morning in the hot tub on the back deck sipping mimosas and enjoying the sound of the creek while snowflakes gently played with our hair and ice from 13-degree mornings formed little spikes on his beard. My brother Phil, wife Rose and son Philip came for Thanksgiving, and 2.0 (pronounced 2-point-oh, as we like to call Philip the 2nd) sat in the same highchair my kids had sat in as he dropped his pieces of stuffing on the rug. My niece Catherine and her daughter Audrey also came for a few days, and Aud built a snowman in the yard.

And suddenly we remembered that these weren’t just vacation rentals. They were our homes! And even though we had left Colorado behind for the traveling life and sort of felt homeless, we weren’t!

Part-Time VT Residents

So we have decided that we will live in Vermont during the summers. The houses give our kids a place to come to from college that feels like home. They can get summer jobs. They can visit their favorite ice cream place (the Ludlow Coffee Company, formerly Scoops) and eat at their favorite pizza joint (Goodman’s American Pie). They can feel anchored.

(Seward’s in nearby Rutland is another favorite ice cream joint.)

We are working hard, though. Because we are trying to sell the Brook House, Bob and I are spending long hours making improvements – painting the house and some doors, pulling up a rug and refinishing a floor, planting grass and landscaping, buying furniture, and hiring and overseeing workmen. But we’re also going for long bike rides on scenic Route 100, a refreshing opportunity after the challenge of riding in Mexico. We’re hiking the Long/Appalachian Trail, enjoying our favorite ice cream places, trying to visit every bar in the Okemo Valley. We’re running and doing yoga and lifting weights, and hanging out on the Tyson Store chatting with neighbors.

Come October, we will head back south of the border and explore Mexico for the next 9 months. But when Lex gets done with their first year at Champlain College in May, we’ll return to the Green Mountain State and move back into The Lake House for the summer. (Hopefully, the Brook House will be sold and college paid for with the proceeds!)

I relish the opportunity to enjoy the region and explore the Green Mountain State more, without the burden of juggling full-time work, as I did when my kids were young. I look forward to connecting to the community and making friends. And I urge our family and friends to come visit! Because the Lake House has in fact turned into our summer retirement home. And we want to build more memories!

#vermont #ludlowvt #okemo #okemovalley #lakehouse #brookhouse #family #retirement

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the-record-columns · 6 years ago

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May 1, 2019: Columns

Children and food revisited...

By KEN WELBORN

Record Publisher

This past weekend, as you all know, was MerleFest time.

Well, for me, the very best part of the weekend was getting to see and visit with my children — my daughter, Jordan, son, Sam, his wife, Mary Ellen, their daughter, Carter Grace, and my youngest daughter, Cary — who have always enjoyed the event. I make sure to adjust my schedule so I can be with them as much as possible.

I especially enjoy any time we can have a meal together.

One of those meals was last Sunday’s lunch with Cary, and her boyfriend, John McLean, who were both in from Wilmington. For whatever reason, I didn’t have a huge appetite, and there was some food left on my plate.

This being unusual for me, Cary made a comment about it, to which I replied, “…but I ate all the money stuff.”

Cary smiled, remembering that expression from childhood and reminded me of a story.

Some time ago I wrote a piece about children and restaurants, and, for lack of a better way to put it, wasting food.

One part concerned trips I used to take to Myrtle Beach with my children and our favorite eatery called Steer's, where the feature was a 50-foot all you can eat food bar. My admonition to the kids was to stick to the last four feet of the bar where the crab legs and shrimp resided, reminding them in no uncertain terms that I could find Jell-O and macaroni and cheese at home—for far less than $20 a head (and this was years ago).

I would also mention to them how many times my daddy, The Preacher reminded me to not “...let your eyes get bigger than your stomach,” when I was a kid, because I would surely clean my plate before leaving the table.

Well, that column must have been read by many folks with kids, because it sure seemed to resonate with many—all with their own story. Several people saw me out to eat and asked me if I had eaten all the “money stuff” on my plate, a reference to my way of making sure if something got left on the plate, at least it wasn't the steak or shrimp or—well, you get the idea.

Another thing that reminded me a bit of myself was told to me by several parents who said they would make it clear to their children they were at the beach with sand and surf, and that the hotel's swimming pool was virtually off limits.

One guy said he told them “There is a swimming pool at the YMCA and the Country Club and several other places at home. No ocean, however.”

I always loved any opportunity to play in the sand and hauled enough shovels and hoes to the coast to build a sand castle realtors would envy. As the day wound down, we would all often stand on the balcony and watch the inevitable destruction of our work by the tide, vowing to beat it the next day.

In general it was a fun column to write and a fun one to talk about. My favorite conversation was on a Saturday at what was then Woodhaven Restaurant on D Street in North Wilkesboro. There was a couple there I would see virtually every Saturday morning, and, when I sat down we began to talk about the column.

The lady spoke about babysitting her grandchildren and how their eyes sometimes did get bigger than their stomach, but, being a grandma, I got the feeling she was pretty easy on them. I got particularly amused when she said she sat down to eat with them and one of the boys wouldn't eat a bite—claiming he had a blister in his lip. I told her that kid should be glad he was with grandma; if my Pa had been there, the blister might have been on my bottom.

But the most memorable story came from her husband. We had talked back and forth about everything from our parents dealing with hard times, to children just being children. As our conversation was ending, he told how his own mother dealt with the not cleaning ones plate issue. His mother cooked on a wood stove and, like most women of her day, was a wonderful cook. A kid being a kid, however, sometimes he didn't want to eat everything he had put on his plate.

This was apparently no big deal to his mother—she would take his plate without a word, carefully placing it in the warming closet atop the wood stove—and faithfully bring it back out at the next meal. That's right, he finished that meal before he got the next one.

Way to go, momma!

Another wonderful lesson learned.

O (possum), baby!

By HEATHER DEAN

Record Reporter

They say everything happens for a reason.

There have been times we read about extraordinary events happened, and people being spared injury, or worse, because they couldn’t find their car keys or overslept etcetera, which made them late, and in turn they avoided being involved in an accident.

Well, I’ve never been in that situation that I know of — at least, I’ve never been spared the diatribe of a less than happy boss at my tardiness. But I digress.

During MerleFest, I help run the VFW Post 1142 campground office. Saturday night I was to attend a birthday party of a friend after my shift was over at 8 p.m. I left later than expected, since the Saturday night dance at the Post was well underway, and I was still selling ice and taking pictures of dancers to put in this weeks edition of The Record. I made promises to Commander Blackburn and Christy Sherwood — who was gracious enough to work the raffle table while her husband drove the shuttle bus — that I would be back to take pictures of the raffle drawing winner at 10 p.m.

Well, about 20 minutes later, after missing the exit I was to turn on, then traversing down a back road because I was miffed at myself for missing said exit and was just too stubborn to get back on the highway, I found myself in the middle of the road, after dark, with two baby opossums, tails wrapped around my fingers, and heading down into a drainage ditch to find another that I could hear crying, but couldn’t see. I know what you’re thinking. “Heather! Really??”

Really.

So what had happened was….

I saw an opossum coming into the road from the field, and just knew the car in front of me was going to hit it. In fact, they swerved to hit it on purpose. I was far enough behind them to see the atrocity, and then panic when I saw the asphalt come alive. Or at least it seemed to. There were babies all over the place. I put on my flashers, stopped the car and started scooping up babies by the tail. Sadly, three of them were killed on impact with the mother. One was in the middle of the road, one was going back into the field, and one had rolled into the steep ditch on the other side of the road.

No, I don’t have any idea how to raise baby opossums. No, I didn’t stop to think about calling the vet first, and no, I was not thinking about how I was going to transport them in my car. After all, babies in the road is an emergency, I can deal with the rest later.

As it happened, I had my VFW Campground tote bag in the passengers seat, and with thee baby opossums now in hand, I slung the contents out in a frenzy (I still can’t find my favorite ChapStick) and gently deposited the babes into it.

I walked into the party with the bag clutched at my side, hoping someone would give me a pointer how to keep them alive until the morning.

I sent messages to vet techs, and made a Facebook post. Almost immediately my friends came to my rescue on social media.

As it happens, the birthday boy and his wife knew a lady who was involved with those who recue opossums. They called and she was there within the hour. And I was glad to recognize her too, because I wasn’t just letting this precious cargo go home with just anyone. Besides, they had gotten cozy in the tote bag that I now had tucked under my shirt to keep the wee marsupials warm. Meanwhile, I had texted Christy and told her of the situation, and asked if she would be kind enough to take pictures of the raffle winners, as I was otherwise engaged.

I got sad looking at their sweet little faces, wondering what would have happened if I hadn’t been there when I was. And even sadder still, knowing that they are so misunderstood that people want to run over them on purpose. They eat ticks, which carry Lyme disease, so that makes them keepers in my book.

Here are some links to read about these amazing- and smart- animals.

www.littlethings.com/possum-facts/

www.caryinstitute.org/discover-ecology/podcasts/why-you-should-brake-opossums

https://www.care2.com/greenliving/10-reasons-to-love-opossums.html

Trading territory for terror

By EARL COX

Special to The Record

In the United States the term “settlement” generally refers to an agreement, an arrangement, a resolution or an understanding of one sort or another. In Israel, the word “settlement” means something quite different and is a hot button for those who are anti-Israel.

By definition, “settlements” are civilian communities inhabited by Israeli citizens who are mostly Jewish. When the liberal, anti-Israel media presents a story about one of these areas, they intentionally create the image of a “settlement” as being an illegal encampment on land owned by the Palestinians. This causes the uninformed to believe that Israel stole land belonging to the Palestinians. Now let’s look at the true facts in a nutshell.

An excerpt from The Declaration of the Establishment of the State of Israel says, “The land of Israel is the birthplace of the Jewish people. Here their spiritual, religious and political identity were shaped, and it was here where they created cultural values of national and universal significance and gave to the world the eternal Book of Books.”

Throughout the Diaspora (Jewish exile from the land of Israel), Jews maintained physical, cultural and religious ties to the land. They kept their faith and never ceased to pray and hope for their return to their national homeland which was deeded to them by God Himself. Following the horrors of World War II and Hitler’s concentration camps where millions of Jews were tortured and murdered, the problem of Jewish homelessness became a matter of urgency. On November 29, 1947, the United Nations General Assembly passed a resolution calling for the establishment of a Jewish state in the land of Israel and proclaimed it irrevocable.

On the very day Israel became a nation on May 14, 1948, this tiny, fledgling country with no organized army and very few weapons was attacked by five surrounding and well-armed Arab nations. The fighting continued into 1949. Although at a great disadvantage, Israel was not defeated. Armistice lines were drawn up between Israel, Egypt, Lebanon, Transjordan and Syria. These armistice lines held up until 1967 when Israel was again attacked by Egypt, Jordan and Syria. The outcome of this war significantly changed the map of most of the Middle East and served as the catalyst for the geopolitical issues which we read about almost every day. Israel’s attackers had well-trained armies and ample stockpiles of munitions and hardware. During this fighting which became known as the Six Day War, Israel learned that Egypt was planning a major air offensive. The IDF (Israel Defense Force) launched a preemptive air strike which crushed the air forces of Egypt and her allies. Israel then launched a successful ground operation which resulted in the capture of the West Bank and East Jerusalem from Jordan, the Golan Heights from Syria and the Sinai Peninsula and Gaza strip from Egypt.

In a war Israel fought in self-defense which resulted in the capture of land from her hostile Arab neighbors, Israel began to rightfully and lawfully establish villages, towns and cities. These communities are located in the areas many of us know as Judea and Samaria or the West Bank and Gaza strip. But Israelis are not newcomers to this land. For thousands of years Jewish “settlements” and communities have flourished in these areas. The Jews made the deserts bloom.

Today the world is pointing an accusing finger at Israel claiming that the “settlements” are illegal. Legal opinion states that a country acting in self-defense may seize and occupy territory when necessary to protect itself and its citizens. Should the occupying power elect to withdraw, it has every right to require assurance that it will not be harassed or attacked again from that territory.

Time and time again Israel has held out the olive branch to the Palestinians and her other Arab neighbors only to have it rejected and trampled upon. Israel has a right to defensible borders, and this is why the issue of “settlements” is so important. In 2005 Israel’s then Prime Minister Ariel Sharon unilaterally withdrew from Gaza hoping for peace, but peace never came. What Israel received, and continues to receive, from Hamas and the Palestinians in Gaza, is more rocket attacks and more terrorism. In other words, Israel traded territory for terror. By Israel giving up Gaza, terrorists did not stop terrorizing they only moved their bases of operation closer to Israel’s population centers.

Soon the people of North Carolina will have an opportunity to hear personally from the mayor of Ma’ale Adumim which is a suburb of Israel’s capital, Jerusalem. This beautiful and peaceful city is located less than three miles from Jerusalem’s city limits. Ma’ale Adumim was established in 1975 by 23 families on a hilltop 1500 feet above sea level overlooking the Judean Desert. Today this “settlement” is a thriving municipality and the largest Jewish city within the “territories.” Ma’ale Adumim is vital to Israel’s security and is a place where Jews and Palestinians work side by side in peace and harmony.

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metawitches · 6 years ago

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Recaps of The OA Part 1 can be found HERE.

Welcome back, kids! Are we all ready to ride along with The OA as she questions the nature of reality and causes chaos in the world around her? Part 2 continues where Part 1 left off, with no time jump, though the extended opening segment introduces viewers to the new character Karim Washington, so it takes a while to find out what happened to the OA. Most of the rest of the original cast returns in some capacity.

While part 1 explored the interior of the mind, with themes of reality vs fantasy, the darkness inside, free will, captivity and willing sacrifice, Part 2 expands those themes, taking the dreams, visions and stories of Part 1 and turning them into an interdimensional reality where the boundaries between the dream world, the real world, and other worlds barely exist. It’s not quite as mind-bending as Part 1, but it’s still fun, with new ideas to ponder.

Let’s start with a quick video recap of Part 1, courtesy of Yiğit Sarı:

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Recap

Angel of Death begins with the caption “7 hours 46 minutes earlier”, which refers to the time of Prairie’s shooting.

Pounding on a door can be heard, and a figure can be seen skateboarding at high speed on a rural road. The figure is lit from behind, as if a car is following closely with its headlights on. The skater passes a tall blonde woman wearing a red dress who’s standing off to the side of the road. It’s The OA. The skateboarder loses his balance and flies off the road, spinning through the air, out of control.

Private Investigator Karim Washington wakes up from the dream to answer the pounding on the door of his houseboat. It’s an elderly Vietnamese woman, who wants to hire him to find her missing granddaughter. He tries to send her to the police, but she refuses, because her granddaughter, Michelle, is invisible.

Karim doesn’t understand what she means, so he asks a friend to interpret. By invisible, the grandmother means they are homeless immigrants. The family was living in Michigan. Michelle’s father disappeared, and might have died. Her family was evicted and ended up in a shelter.

The literal meaning of saying Michelle is “invisible” is that the government has no official documentation for her, since she’s an illegal immigrant. In other words, she’s invisible to the government, and needs to remain that way, so the whole family doesn’t get deported.

But Part 1 also used the term “invisible self” frequently. It was the title of the final episode. Does Mrs. Vu also mean that Michelle has an exceptionally strong invisible self? Does she sense psychic sensitivity in Karim?

Michelle has been sending her Grandma money. She came to San Francisco because the money is better there. She was communicating with Mrs Vu frequently and sending money up until 2 weeks ago, then she just stopped. He grandmother came to search for her.

Karim asks to look at the texts, but they are in Vietnamese, so he can’t understand them.

We normally know Michelle Vu as Buck.

Mrs Vu shows them a photo of Michelle playing drums and says she’s a great drummer. Then she asks if Karim will look for her granddaughter. Karim asks if she has any money. She shows him that she has $31,000 in an Ether account, a form of cryptocurrency, like Bitcoin, but not as safe or established. Michelle sent the money just before she vanished.

Karim tells Mrs Vu that most underage girls who have been missing for more than 72 hours are either never found or found dead. Mrs Vu looks deep into Karim’s eyes and tells him to look for Michelle.

Karim starts by having an associate check police, morgue and hospital records while he and Mrs Vu take the train to visit the family Michelle was staying with.

Bao and Denise greet Mrs Vu warmly, while their your son Donald stands quietly off to the side. Karim asks Mrs Vu to wait outside. She refuses at first, but leaves when he threatens to drop her case. He keeps her phone and tells her he knows her English is better than she tells people.

Denise and Bao tell Karim that Michelle was quiet, shy and helpful. They took her in because the church asked them to. She wasn’t the type to sell her body or get into trouble. She gave them $50 twice to help cover her expenses.

Karim asks Bao to translate Michelle’s texts. They are what you’d expect, telling Mrs Vu that she wants to come home, that she’s trying to be strong, and that she’s trying to raise money so they can have a home again.

When Karim is done, he makes arrangements for Mrs Vu to sleep at Bao and Denise’s apartment, telling her he’ll call when he has more information. He stops to buy some M&Ms, then shares them with Donald when the boy walks by the store.

He asks what Donald wanted to tell him. Donald takes his hand and leads him to a big green house that’s a few blocks away. The mansion is abandoned, so Donald leads him inside and upstairs, then points at a set of double closet doors.

Karim opens the doors, and discovers Michelle has built a nest inside, with bedding on the floor, and drawings all over the ceiling.

The drawings are of math equations, religious and spiritual symbols, scientific and geometric patterns, and other figures. There is a labyrinth, and there are other shapes with repeating circles.

For a moment, Karim’s eye is reflected back at him by something in the wall, under the rose poster, as if another version of Karim is watching through the wall.

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Donald tells Karim that Michelle wasn’t doing bad things. She was making her money from playing phone games. She was making thousands of dollars from the game, but the game doesn’t have a name, so you don’t talk about it.

It’s the Voldemort of games.

Karim finds Michelle’s phone hidden in a niche in the wall, behind a poster of a red rose. The house has a stained glass red rose window in the attic.

Donald puts the code into Michelle’s phone and shows him the game. Green lines forming successive rectangles move within the screen, like doors toward the viewer, or the infinite line of doors that would appear when two mirrors were held up to each other.

As a screencap, you can see that there is something else attached to the rectangles. Are they trying to escape or trying to go through the doors?

Suddenly, a guy jumps Karim and Donald, then grabs Michelle’s phone. He’s filthy and emaciated. Once he picks up the phone and gets into the game, he begins ranting,”I’ve solved them myself. I’ve solved everything. My brain can hold all the brains. My thoughts can dry water. I’ve seen a million versions of myself… [Karim tries to help him.] These are mine. I did this.”

When Karim tries to rest a comforting hand on Liam’s shoulder, Liam panics and jumps out of a window, which had been covered by crumbling, old shutters. He lies on the sidewalk, bleeding from a head wound. Karim sends Donald to school, with the promise that he’ll visit Bao and Denise again later, and he’ll definitely find Michelle.

While the paramedics prepare Liam for transport to the hospital, the cops harass question Karim. He’s been harassed questioned by these cops before, and every word he says is viewed as arrogant backtalk, no matter how innocuous. It’s clear that the police aren’t going to be of any more help than they have been so far, whether it’s investigating Liam’s jump and what goes on in the house or finding Michelle. Plus, they take Michelle’s phone into evidence.

Karim draws a quick sketch of the game on his phone to show to others when he asks around. His next stop is a warehouse of computer nerds doing black market work. A deaf security guard explains that the game really doesn’t have a name, but the kids call it Q Symphony and the players are called Q-kids. He confirms that the players make money from the game, then tells Karim he can find Q-kids at a house called Big Blue.

We’ve had red and green color references, but the only blue references I’ve caught are the sky. Now the blue references are about to start, with a giant blue tarp covering the front of what looks like a crack house, but is actually a gamer house, full of kids so absorbed in games, they’re physically wasting away.

Instead of looking to the sky or other people to dream, these kids look to their screens. They don’t even look up or at each other the see if they recognize Michelle, a gamer like themselves. There is no loyalty among gamers.

Big Blue: Question the Answers

Karim and his trusty orange car.

Come back in a few episodes and reexamine the wire sculpture.

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Karim wanders through Big Blue, asking if anyone’s seen Michelle. No one has. In one crowded room, a kid sends Michelle’s photo to the rest of the kids in the room, who shake their heads “no” without looking up.

One guy does try to stop Karim, as he enters a room with handmade wire sculptures. Karim insists on entering, since he’s not a gamer. In fact, Karim hates games. The woman in the room, Fola (played by Zendaya), corrects him.

Fola: “It’s not a game. It’s a puzzle. A game is one side against another. There’s a winner and a loser. Puzzles don’t have losers.”

Karim: “Well, you lose if you don’t solve it.”

Fola: “No, you’re stuck if you don’t solve it. The designer wants the player to figure it out. It’s not a war. It’s a mystery.”

Karim, gesturing to the wire sculptures: “You built this?”

Fola: “We did, yeah.”

He pulls out the photo of Michelle, and explains to Fola that he’s looking for a girl who Made $31k playing Q Symphony. She immediately knows who he’s talking about, and tells him Michelle stopped coming to the house about 2 weeks ago- about the same time she stopped contacting Mrs Vu.

Fola: “Symphony doesn’t like people working together, and after a while, she did not need us.”

Fola doesn’t know where Michelle is, because Michelle surpassed her in the puzzle. Karim tells her he’s desperate to find the other girl. She explains that Karim will have to follow in Michelle’s footsteps, and “at a certain point, the game goes IRL- in real life.”

She takes him to a set of tall outdoor steps, decorated with a mosaic on the baseboards.

Fola: “The early levels on the phone are just about weeding people out. It’s really about getting here.”

Karim: “And that’s why Michelle came to San Francisco.”

Fola: “It’s why we all come.”

Karim: “How much can you make playing Symphony?”

Fola: “Well, there are five levels. Level one, it’s $50. Level two, 500. Level three, 5,000.”

Karim: “How many people do that?”

Fola: “Not many.”

Karim: “You?” Fola nods her head. “And they really pay?”

Fola: “Yeah, yeah, in ether. They want people to keep playing.”

Karim: “Why?”

Fola: “Level four is $50,000. I don’t know anyone who’s made it that far except for maybe Michelle. Level five is a million. Here. [Hands Karim back his phone.] Now that I’ve gotten you to this level, solve it.”

The first task is the solve the riddle “Above the sea, below the stars,” using a five letter word. The game turns Karim’s camera on and encourages him to view the world through the augmented reality it’s creating.

Karim tries “birds” then “plane”. Both are incorrect. Fola mentions that you only get three tries at the answer, then you have to wait a week before you try again. He realizes he needs to be more specific and gives the flight number of a particular flight he can see in the sky right now.

Possibly that serves to ground the player in this space-time?

He’s given the next clue: Three wise, man. To be solved with a six letter word.

Fola says that now he knows how good it can feel to solve the puzzle.

Fola: “Ultimately, a puzzle is a conversation between the player and the maker. The puzzlemaker is teaching you a new language. How to escape the limits of your own thinking, and see things you didn’t know were there.”

Karim: “Sounds like God.”

Fola: “Except it’s real.”

Fola tells us that this season, the game and puzzle makers will take the place of the gods and goddesses, like Khatoun, who guided the characters in Part 1. She assumes all puzzlemakers have a benign, selfless goal in mind for the player, and by extension, assumes that all gods and Goddesses do, too. Part 1 proved her wrong in that assumption.

Karim, on the other hand, always assumes the worst of everyone. He accuses Fola of helping him only so that she can advance in the game. She replies that she wants him to fall in love with the process.

Karim shows her a photo of Liam on the sidewalk after he jumped, and asks if that’s the way she wants him to fall in love. Fola replies somewhat coldly, saying that Liam was always unstable. If people climb mountains, some will fall. Something would have happened to Liam sooner or later.

The chance to find out what’s at the top of Puzzle Mountain is work the risk. She thinks Michelle won the game and her previous life doesn’t matter to her anymore, that’s why she hasn’t been heard from. They agree that only the people who’ve finished the game and the person who built it know what happens to the winners.

Pierre Ruskin sits in an expensive looking greenhouse restaurant and speaks with his fiance, Nina, on the phone. He speaks in English, she speaks Russian. Nina feels Pierre has betrayed her because of something that happened in a house. Pierre assumes that the woman who informed Nina has sent her photos or a video.

Nina asks how many were in the house and what he did with them. She says she can’t unsee the things she saw in that house. Pierre tells her to come to the restaurant, she’s still his partner in all things. Nina agrees to meet him, but she tells him that she’s not his partner anymore and she doesn’t want him near the house.

The scene shifts from the restaurant to a dock, where Nina Azarova is waiting to catch a ferry. When she turns her head, we realize it’s the OA, but not the OA. This is a different reality from the one the OA was born in. Nina hangs up and removes the ring from her ring finger as she walks toward the ferry.

As the ferry crosses San Francisco Bay, Nina looks back toward Alcatraz Prison and the Golden Gate Bridge. She hums the melody that Prairie frequently played on her violin, and fidgets with her keychain, which is decorated with a realistic looking blue eyeball.

Does she need to remember that she’s being watched? Or to keep her eyes open and notice everything?

Nina continues looking out toward the back of the boat, when she’s suddenly gripped by intense chest pain and collapses. She thinks she’s been shot, but a bystander tells her it’s a heart attack.

32:30 minutes into the episode, we transition to the ambulance which is taking Prairie Johnson, aka The OA, to the hospital, after she was shot in the chest during a school shooting 2 YEARS ago. Just in case you thought this was Nina/Prairie/OA’s story, you have now been informed that, in fact, she’s just a small cog in the machine.

I hope a few of you were smarter than me and fast forwarded to this moment, then went back later to watch the first half hour.

Prairie wills herself toward the light that is Homer, while Steve chases the ambulance, begging to go with her. Prairie flatlines, and a glowing light takes her spirit from this dimension.

Prairie: “They said it would be like jumping into an invisible current that just carries you away.”

There’s that word, “invisible” again.

Prairie gasps into consciousness in Nina’s body, her ears ringing intensely. She asks the paramedics where she is, they tell her San Francisco. Then Prairie has some unPrairie-like reactions and becomes upset because her hands and feet have nail polish on when she didn’t before.

The woman who was held captive and on camera in front of her captor for 7 years, who jumped dimensions on purpose, would be more clever than that in this situation.

Prairie wakes up some time later in a hospital bed. A nurse shows up within moments to test her sanity. She answers the questions correctly, except Joe Biden is president in this dimension, not Barack Obama, and she goes by Nina. The nurse lets her look at herself in a small mirror, and she realizes that her face looks like her, but not quite the same. She finally catches on that she must have jumped.

Prairie notices an orderly lurking nearby with a dose of a sedative for her. The nurse assures her that it’s just to calm her, but OA still has the same issues with doctors and medical care- namely, she gets panic attacks. The nurse won’t budge on the sedative, insisting it’s standard procedure for patients like OA, which I assume means patients who aren’t calm, cooperative and dignified at every moment.

The nurse tries to force the shot on OA, so OA tries to move away from her, then to run. The nurse calls out that she has a combative patient, a 5150. OA isn’t violent, just trying to avoid an unnecessary, unwanted medication, but she’s held in place by two huge orderlies and given the shot.

With that, we go to the opening credits, 38 minutes into the episode. Karim’s dream from the opening was 7 hours and 46 minutes before Prairie jumped into Nina. There’s still 30 minutes left in the episode.

It’s evening, and Karim plays basketball in the neighborhood with a bunch of computer types, so he can work them for information about the game. They immediately figure that it’s a recruitment tool. One woman, Tess, suggests that it could be about crowdsourcing a problem. She thinks sounds like something Pierre Ruskin would do.

She tells him that with his first company, Ruskin didn’t hire anyone. “Just posted a prize on some obscure message board. Five grand for the best low-cost carbon panel. Overnight, 200 people working for him, without a soul on the payroll.” She knows about this because, “I won the five grand for the best panel, and his name was on the check.”

Karim thanks her for the information. She says if he wants to thank her, to forget her name. She dribbles the basketball into the night.

Karim is on the phone before she’s out of sight, calling his associate for Pierre Ruskin’s address.

Piere Ruskin is trying to visit Nina/Prairie, his partner in all things, who isn’t easily swayed by spoiled men in any of her incarnations. The nurses fawn over Pierre, but Prairie declines his visit. He doesn’t take the news well, and trashes the waiting room. No one forces a sedative on him or puts him on a locked ward.

Next in line is Prairie’s newly assigned case worker, Melody, who has good and bad news. Prairie asks to hear the bad news first. Melody checked into Homer’s whereabouts for Prairie. There aren’t any in St Louis but she discovered there’s a psychiatrist in the Bay area with his name.

The good news is that Prairie’s other contact is waiting to speak with her on the computer- Prairie’s adoptive mother from her original dimension, Nancy Johnson. In this dimension, the Johnsons never adopted Prairie, so Nancy doesn’t recognize her and doesn’t know how to help her. She does answer Prairie’s questions, even when they get uncomfortably personal.

Prairie realizes that she never went to live with her Aunt Zoya in this reality, so Nancy and Abel adopted the baby boy they’d originally planned to in Prairie’s world. Prairie thanks Nancy for everything she did for her as a mother, even though it’s not the right Nancy. This Nancy seems to be feeling a connection to Prairie, just as her adoptive mother felt an immediate connection, but they aren’t allowed to continue talking.

When Prairie hangs up, Melody reveals that she now has very bad news. Prairie has been put on a 14 day psych hold. Prairie can’t bear the thought of another 14 days in that hospital, and insists she’s confused, not crazy. Melody explains they need to do this because Prairie threatened the nurse, but Prairie can go stay at a private clinic and it will be like a spa vacation. Prairie has no choice but to agree.

Melody’s bad news when she arrived to see Prairie was that Homer isn’t in St Louis. Then Prairie rebuffs Pierre Ruskin, he gets angry, and five minutes later, Melody has the hard news that Prairie’s on a 14 day psych hold. And, oh yeah, someone has pulled some strings to get her into a particular private clinic, Treasure Island. I guarantee that someone was Pierre Ruskin, who wants to hold her hostage until she cooperates with his control again.

Melody takes Prairie to Nina’s penthouse apartment to pick up a few things before they go to Treasure Island. Prairie can’t get her key to work, but the doorman, Al, is very kind and helpful. The penthouse is gorgeous. Prairie is overwhelmed that she’ll get to live there eventually.

Nina has a canary like the one OA swallowed in Part 1, and an aquarium, reminiscent of the one Homer found in his vision. OA examines Nina’s photos and realizes that her father and Nina were together until he was an old man. Melody tells her he died recently (shot in the bathtub). Then OA realizes that Nina wasn’t on the bus in Russia when it went off the bridge, so she didn’t go blind.

Melody reminds Prairie that they need to gather clothes and supplies for the clinic, so they look in Nina’s bedroom. Her closet is locked with a keypad and password that Prairie doesn’t know. Her clothing seems too formal for a clinic.

Karim has Pierre’s house staked out, and listens to an interview with one of his top executives, Bert Gabel. The interviewer says that the Wall Street Journal called Pierre “the prophet of the valley.” When asked how Pierre is able to accurately predict the next big thing, Bert says that Pierre knows where to listen and how to listen to the world, which is whispering its intentions all the time. Pierre hears things in a way that isn’t possible for most of us.

Karim gets a call back from his associate who does the research for him. She’s looked into the kids who are potentially playing the game and disappearing. We only hear Karim’s side of the conversation, which is cryptic.

Karim: “What did you find?… How many of them? Nationwide?… Those five kids in the Bay Area…. What do you mean f–ked up? All playing the game?… Yeah, but how many have a prior history of mental illness?… Yeah, so we don’t know it’s the game cracking them up… Yeah, cause there are like thousands of kids playing… High-strung, spectrum-y math types. How many would crack up anyway?”

He hangs up when someone leaves Rushkin’s house, and he follows them.

It sounds like she found some evidence that the game is messing kids up, but it’s hard to prove, given the types of kids who become obsessed with games and the societal prejudices against them. There were 5 kids in the San Francisco area that she took particular note of, but that’s all we know about them.

Now let’s take a scenic ride to Treasure Island. Two beefy orderlies escort Prairie inside. Her case worker isn’t invited in, which seems strange.

I think Karim’s soundtrack just went to Stranger Things for a second. That can’t be good.

He’s followed the car to a hidden, underground business called Curi. Michelle drew a picture of the sign in her closet, so Karim definitely wants to get inside. When a cleaning van passes behind him, Karim purposely backs into it. Once both drivers are out of their cars, Karim makes a deal to join the cleaning crew inside Curi for the night.

Once inside, the Stranger Things rhythm returns off and on, so we know we’re in big trouble here. Karim finds computer monitors with sheep and trees as the screen saver. In another room, technicians analyze audio recordings for key words.

He spots a young woman being escorted downstairs and through a set of doors, but the doors lock before he reaches them. They have a keypad exactly like the one on Nina’s closet, leaving no doubt that Ruskin is involved in both instances.

Karim peeks through a window into the room and sees exposed air ducts in the ceiling. He climbs a utility ladder to reach the ducts, then crawls through the ducts, in another callback to Homer’s vision. There is an ambient red glow throughout this sequence.

Karim finds an opening in the duct so he can spy on the room below. A dozen or so women are either sleeping or speaking into microphones, recording their dreams. There are other people in the room with them, monitoring them closely.

Prairie makes a diagram on the wall of her room in the clinic, illustrating the similarities and differences between her life and Nina’s. Nina got to live in Paris with Papa and go to college, while Prairie was a blind orphan adopted by an abusive family who made her think she was crazy, then she was kidnapped, held hostage and tortured for 7 years.

Getting on that bus really was a huge mistake.

Footsteps approach the door. Prairie sits down and waits to see who it will be.

You can tell he’s a different person because of the beard.

It’s Homer!!! It’s Dr Roberts, the psychiatrist from this dimension with Homer’s name and face, but not his memories. He’s a third year resident at the clinic. The universe has played yet another cruel joke on the OA, and Homer has no idea who she is. She gasps out his name, shocking him, until he decides she read it on his name tag and instructs her to call him Dr Roberts.

They proceed to have a confusing, if brilliant, little walk and talk, in which everyone but Homer tries to figure out if they’re dreaming.

The rooms and halls are all institutional and white. Homer helps OA up, and they briefly stumble over who wants to be called what. Then, he begins his standard new patient speech as he brings her to meet the director of the clinic. As they walk by the other patients’ rooms, one by one, OA sees every single one of Hap’s other captives- Renata, Rachel, and Scott. They look as shocked to see her as she is to see them. They all seem sure they’ve entered a nightmare again.

Homer’s speech- you’ll appreciate it later:

“I’m taking you to meet the director. No, no, no. [Makes Prairie stop pawing him.] He’s a remarkable man. I’ve been studying under him for my entire residency. I first read his book back in med school. It’s actually the reason that I chose psychiatry. It’s okay. He’s had tremendous success with his patients. There’s really no one like him in the field. You’re in good hands. I’d like you to meet the head of the clinic- Dr Hunter Percy.

Hap turns around and says, “Hi.” He excuses Homer.

We’re all gonna die.

The Angel of Death has arrived.

Once they’re alone, Hap moves closer to OA. “It is you, isn’t it? Hello, Prairie.”

Prairie lunges at him.

Commentary

Karim said he hates games, but he seemed to enjoy the word game Fola gave him that was part of Q Symphony. I think what he hates are lies and manipulations, the games people play between each other in their “real” lives.

I quoted Fola’s entire description of the game levels and pay off because I have a strong feeling that the game is connected to the type of dimension hopping the OA was teaching the boys and Betty. If so, then that would suggest there are five levels involved with dimension-hopping. We are given a few clues: the game designer wants people to win but to do it on their own,without collaboration; and few make it to level five, but they receive a large cash payout when they do.

Are these the levels between heaven and h–l? Levels signifying travel expertise and ease or the number of possible lifetime jumps? Do they signify the steps toward self-actualization/finding the ideal self and an ideal dimension? It has to be significant that the person who has a counterpart that’s involved with dimensional travel, who has practiced the movements, is one of the few to get the farthest.

OA is held prisoner and labeled mentally ill, again, after replacing a wealthy woman who should have been able to buy and lawyer her way out of that situation. Where were Nina’s Russian mobster attorneys? How can Hap and an upstart like Ruskin outmaneuver her old money? Surely her father left her set up with protection.

The kid in Big Blue who asks everyone if they’ve seen Michelle initially asks Karim if he’s the plumber. It’s an odd question, since they’re obviously squatting. Do squatters call in plumbers?

That could be a veiled reference to Homer’s vision, where the bathrooms were flooding. It could also have something to do with the game.

Liam said, “My brain can hold all the brains. My thoughts can dry water. I’ve seen a million versions of myself.”

My thoughts can dry water.- Is he the plumber? Before he lost it, could he control the invisible current one uses when dimension hopping, drying the flow to leave the current and enter a dimension?

My brain can hold all the brains.- Multiple personalities? Or multiple minds from multiple dimensions?

I’ve seen a million versions of myself.- If we assume Liam’s condition has something to do with the game, then something at a point higher than Fola has reached, either level 4 or 5 or both, appears to open the mind to the vastness of the alternate dimensions. Liam says he’s seen a million versions of himself, and his brain can hold them all. Did he touch all of those dimensions and now those minds have all jumped into him? Was he just driven crazy by the thought of so many versions of himself? Was he taken to millions of dimensions using time dilation, then returned? What happened to Michelle, and the others?

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Images courtesy of Netflix.

The OA Part 2 Episode 1: Angel of Death Recap Recaps of The OA Part 1 can be found HERE. Welcome back, kids! Are we all ready to ride along with The OA as she questions the nature of reality and causes chaos in the world around her?

#alternate realities #Angel of Death #Brit Marling #Emory Cohen #Jason Isaacs #Kingsley Ben-Adir #metacrone #recaps #review #science fiction #speculative fiction #The OA #Zal Batmanglij #Zendaya

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brett-buckner-the-dirt · 7 years ago

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It was an argument that belonged in Toys ‘r’ Us in 1986.

My Dear Ol’ Dad and I were arguing over toys. However, calling it an argument implies that one or both parties were speaking. Instead Dad sat in his recliner and groaned while I stomped around his living room, stuffing old He-Man action figures back into a box nearly as tall as my 10-year-old daughter, mumbling how “freakin’ stupid” this all was.

Meanwhile, Jellybean sat awkwardly quiet on the couch, trying not to laugh as two adults acted like children.

The reason it happened is a story of obsession repackaged as nostalgia.

o o o

Jellybean and I love a road trip. We make music playlists. We download episodes of Lore, our favorite podcast. She agonizes over which of her Squishies to take (speaking of obsessions: but that’s another column), and the movies she’ll end up not watching.

Dad lives in the literal woods outside of Milledgeville, Ga. It takes us about two hours to get there. We hang out with my 94-year-old Granny. Her mind and memory are steadily slipping into darkness, but seeing us seems to brighten her day a bit. My step-mom (seems weird for a 43-year-old man to use the term “step-mom”) cooks a huge meal – most of which we thankfully take home for leftovers. Dad and I talk sports, the weather, and his eternal effort to cut acres of grass in June with a push mower without dropping dead of heatstroke.

Dad’s house is also where my old toys live.

To be clear, these toys no longer belong to me. They belong to Dad. He saved them, or rescued them, rather. For whom and why is a bit of a mystery, but he has done these things, and I’m grateful for the effort.

Most of the time.

An original Star Wars poster

Jellybean surrounded by my old toys.

o o o

There’s a fine separating a hoarder from a collector.

I, like my father before me, consider myself a collector because the things I covet have real world value. Unlike those sad bastards you see on AMC who refuse to throw away dot-matrix printers or open salsa from the Reagan administration, the stuff we keep can be sold on reputable web sites like Ebay to grown children as equally odd and enthusiastic as our selves.

The internet, in addition to amateur porn making it seem like every housewife in the world is a secret sex freak, has legitimized collecting. If you own it, you can bet there’s someone out in the nooks and crannies of cyberspace willing to pay you for it … not that Dad nor I would do that. Thus we own things most find silly and hold on to it for decades because, “I’ll be really valuable one day.”

That’s what I’d like on my gravestone – “It’ll be valuable one day.” Maybe that’ll make Jellybean think twice before dumping all my cool stuff off at Goodwill.

So, if hoarding is placing an irrational, emotional attachment on crap, then collection is putting irrational, emotional attachment on crap of relative value.

Dad has been grade A collector since before I was born. My Dear Sweet Mother shares tales of Dad in cut-off jeans digging around the dump for antique bottles. Over the years he’s given me some of these very bottles. I love stuff with a story behind it.

Dad isn’t exactly an outlier in the family.

Both Mom and her mom were collectors – mostly animals. At one point, grandmother could have been the Noah of miniature animals. She was raising miniature horses and miniature goats. There was also a Vietnamese pot-bellied pig and Chinese pug named Mr. Wong. Granted, these animals weren’t technically miniature, but they were small and round, so they fit under the umbrella.

Grandma with Georgia Girl, 1990

My Dear Sweet Mother provides safehaven by fostering homeless dogs and feeding some of the saddest stray cats the world’s ever seen, not to mention that her own two yippee dogs eat better than she (or I) do.

I’m a sucker for dogs, but I don’t trust cats. I feel like they’re all plotting against me. Plus, they’re arrogant, hateful and unwelcoming of love. Cats don’t care about you. That’s why I never understood the whole lonely old cat lady cliche. If you’re lonely – get a dog. If you’re a sociopath – get a cat.

My collecting has gone through stages. There were comic books, then CDs (at one point, I had about 3,000). Mostly, I collect books (especially Stephen King hardbacks) and juvenile-looking pop-culture or favorite-rock-band referencing T-shirts.

Pretty proud of my Stephen King bookshelf

Then there’s the toys.

I don’t scour thrift stores and flea markets for old toys, like I do for books (or vinyl). Rather, I save my old toys … or, more to the point, I save the old toys that Dad chooses to give to me for birthdays and Christmas.

And this brings us to the crux of what will go down as the most absurdly passive-aggressive argument in the history of father/son relationships.

o o o

I wanted to take some of my old toys home for my grandson – AKA Bam-Bam – to play with. The thought of sharing my old toys was a kind of grown-up wish fulfillment.

Dad was cool with this … to a point.

What he couldn’t say out loud, and I didn’t understand was that he liked having my old toys around (and by “around” I mean in a huge box in the back of closet) because they reminded him of me when I was a kid.

Yep … that’s a Donny Osmond doll.

Who doesn’t love the Lone Ranger

Damn, I loved Godzilla

Taking them away was like removing those memories, and Dad didn’t like that. But rather than verbalize this, we acted like two spoiled kids throwing a temper tantrum in the K-Mart toy aisle because our mom said we could have either the G.I. Joe action figure with Kung-Fu grip, or the He-Man action figure with battle armor, but not both.

That’s right: my father and I were in a standoff over G.I. Joe and He-Man.

It started after lunch. I was dividing the box into piles of “Keep” and “Put Back.” Given the disturbing number of leg-less Beast Man toys and at least three Skeletors that been snapped at the waist. All laid out, the ruins looked like a full-color shot from Gettysburg (had North and South battled an alien race jacked up on steroids).

And while we’re on the subject: why are He-Man figures so terribly bow-legged. Those poor souls should’ve been fitted with Forrest Gump braces before shipping ‘em out.

Anyway …

The Put Back pile dwarfed the Keep pile, but I could feel Dad’s eyes on me. He wasn’t happy. Jellybean, on the other hand, was having a blast naming random Mortal Combat, Dungeons & Dragons and Go-bot figures – “Tough Guy,” “Mr. Magic,” “Scooter,” and “Jason.”

Finally, Dad broke the growing silence and tension with, “So how many are you planning on taking?”

“I don’t know, Dad,” I answered, spitting that last word out like the petulant child I was devolving into. “I haven’t decided.”

But the spell was broken. The fun of revisiting my childhood was spoiled. I was pissed. It was time to go home. Like any child, I muttered things under my breath that I was too cowardly to say out loud (a habit I had as an actual child) and slammed all the toys back into the box. I even snatched some out of the hands of an awkwardly dumbstruck Jellybean.

Jellybean was still giving hugs and waving goodbye as I stomped out to the car.

Before slamming the car door, I shouted, “Hope you had a happy birthday, Dad” with all the venom I could muster, sounding like Brad Hamilton pounding on the bathroom door after getting fired from All American Burger. (“Hope you had a hell of piss, Arnold!”).

My temper tantrum was played out by the time Jellybean and I hit the highway, but I was still trying to make sense of what had just happened. That’s when my wonderfully pragmatic daughter spoke up:

“Well, daddy, I see your side. But I also see Papa Don’s side. You wanted to give those toys to Jase, but he doesn’t really know Jase, so he wanted to keep them because they make him think of you as a kid. You’re all grown up now and don’t really play with toys – at least not as much – and he kinda has a hard time letting go of that.

“He wants you to have them, but he also wants to keep them.”

Well. Crap. I turn the car around.

I met Dad on the porch and like men uncomfortable with expressing their feelings, we communicated mostly through grunts, head nods, shoulder shrugs, and more hand gestures than a third base coach being attacked by killer bees. We agreed, finally, that the whole thing was a silly misunderstanding.

Two days later a priority mail package arrived at my door stuffed with He-Man action figures. By the next weekend, Bam-Bam was bashing and battling all over the house like just another blonde-headed kid did once upon a time at his father’s house.

Watching him play made me happy, and I know it would’ve made Dad happy, too.

Bam-Bam and Buzz-Off

A boy and his toys

Two grown men arguing over toys It was an argument that belonged in Toys ‘r’ Us in 1986. My Dear Ol’ Dad and I were arguing over toys.

#fathersandsons #He-Man #kids #squishies

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excusetheconfusion · 7 years ago

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The homeless days.

After rekindling an old friendship from a 7 year hiatus, I've been inspired/influenced to write an experience story. Usually my blogs are just stoner ramblings about my feelings and thoughts but today it'll be more of a recap kind of deal. If you've kept up with my blogs, you know about the 'bad' ex, you know about my dad dying, you know how I sold the house that I hated...this picks up right after I sold the house. After living in the small town of Houston, Missouri from 2010 to 2013, I sold my first house. Really, sold my dead dad's house. Before that, I had lived with my dad on the Gulf Coast. We went through Katrina, lost everything over and over again. So material things hadn't meant much since 2005. We had our mobile home, then another, then a FEMA camper, then a FEMA cottage, then another camper. We didn't really move, all these homes were on the same piece of property, but hurricanes kept taking them. One day, after my dad had gotten his back pay from SSI and some other government things that he had been owed, he typed in cheap properties, and Houston, Missouri popped up. We moved summer of 2010. It was my first time having a real house, I thought it was going to be great. I hated leaving my friends, and I didn't care for the town too much, but it was a real solid house. Not even a year later, my dad was killed. I ended up pulling the plug while my dad was in a coma, basically brain dead. Bar fight gone wrong. I finished the job that a 23 year old, Caleb Buckner couldn't.(feel free to search Midtown, Licking Missouri Barfight, October 8th 2011, Victim Rickie Murray) After that, the boyfriend at the time, who was 20 seemed pretty mature considering I was 16. So here I am 16, no family, a house, 2 vehicles, in a town where the only people I knew were my dad's bar friends, and my boyfriend's family. I was a good kid. Good grades, good intentions, polite, soft spoken, the worst thing I did at the time was smoke a little pot. Which what 16 year old hadn't done that? Well, my family in Louisiana tried to get me to come home but, I knew better apparently. My family let me make my own choices, which looking back on now was stupid. I was 16, they should have made me come home and have a normal life. But they didn't and that's when I began my journey alone. My boyfriends grandparents adopted me. They gave me a room in their home, and treated me like their own. They went to my drama club plays, they helped me with cash when I needed it. They loved me just like I loved them. I called them grandma and grandpa and things were fine aside from the fact that their grandson was incredibly abusive. But where else could I go? We ended up moving into my dad's house 6 months later. So, I'm 17, a senior in high school with a 21 year old living with me. It got worse once we were really alone. It was about a 2 year long process of getting dad's house back from the government. I had a plan to leave Shad, but I had to bide my time. The day I found out the house was out of probate and was able to be sold, I packed up all his stuff and had it sitting on the front concrete porch. The day he moved out was also the day that The guy who ended up being my kids dad and I would sleep together. It was a hasty thing that happened at a very vunerable time. But we ended up in love and dating soon after. He was a hippie soul, and introduced me to many of the things I cherish and while heartedly believe now. I had wanted to be homeless since I met this guy called Homeless Dave at a party in Mountain Grove, Missouri. I envied him. I always wanted to just sneak away from my ex in the middle of the night and just walk and keep walking. I figured I'd do it one day, but I didn't know how soon it would actually be. My new boyfriend and his friend's family had a plan to go to Colorado. So I said fuck it, and that I'd go too. I didn't know these people from Adam. They move in with me, and I instantly regreted it. I didn't have a kid at the time, and I never thought I would have one because I didn't like fucking kids. Well, this whole thing was turning into a shit show. Long story short, their plan was for me to financially support everyone with the new money from selling the house. Which wasn't going to happen. So, I have to be the worst person in the world and say no to a family, because all it would do is bring me down. It was hard. I still feel guilty, but the gift of being in the present (future) is that they are still in the same boat. Divorced. Had more kids, in jail, on drugs, etc. No matter what I would have done back then, it wouldn't have changed their future. So I go to Colorado, alone...minus my dog and cat. I gave away everything I owned. I took clothes, pictures, and an open mind. And kitty litter and dog food. I make the trip totally alone, 19 years old, first time free, and totally in love. So, the plan was to go to Boulder and be homeless. But I had a home, I had family, I had people who cared about me. So I wasn't homeless, I was houseless. And I wanted to be. At this time, the big flood in Boulder had just happened, so there were not only regular homeless, but there were displaced victims of a natural disaster there too. And I say homeless because it is the PC thing to say. Hobo is insulting apparently. And I mean that with all the sarcasm. I stayed at the park in Boulder, right by the library. The mix of people were rich Boulder college kids, retirees, teens who left home just because, 20 something year old stoners, drugies, or 40 something year olds who were kicked out of the crazy homes back in the day. Some people lived in tents, motel rooms, cars, storage units. Even if some of them had money, they still lived like that. I met a ton of real people. I mean, as far as they knew, I didn't have anymore or less than they did. I didn't tell a whole lot of people that I just sold a home. I didn't want to get robbed or anything. Turns out, it ended up happening. The deadbeat husband with the family that I bailed on, well he stayed in Colorado being a bum while his family was in Missouri. I let him sleep in my car from time to time. In my car, had my dad's jewelry. Gold necklace, a few gold rings... He stole them and hocked them. He stole my cell phone, and a set of tires and rims that I left in Missouri. All for nothing too, if he had stolen my things and bettered his life with it, then I don't care. Rob me fucking blind,if you are going to fix your life. That's a sacrifice I'll take. But he didn't, and he took the last of my dad's things that I had. So there I was in Colorado and the only soul I knew was the guy who I had just started dating a couple weeks ago. He got a job with relief clean up from the flood. So I was just chilling. I had my pug, Rosie on a leash and my cat, Jan in a kitty fabric carrier. I had my back pack with water, snacks, and my recreational tools with me. I would just walk around and take naps in the grass. I'd sit by a creek. Go walk down town. I was just free. It was pretty safe for the most part. I have to say, the worst thing that happened was on one of my first days there. I saw some nerds playing MTG at a table, which was a card game I was familiar with. I join them and before I could even say anything a guy sits by me. He uses my body as a wind shield, leans down and pulls out foil and a straw. I'm in disbelief. Then he exhaled and said, 'It's just meth'. Then he walked away. Shortly after, I left the nerd table to hang out with some other homeless. Another funny story. So, I have my dog Rosie, who was an unbelievably disgusting animal. Nasty mucus filled eyes, a long dry shark skin tongue, that usually had poop stuck to it, because she literally ate shit. So with that horrifing backstory, I would walk around with Rosie and people would ask to take pictures with her. I let about 10 people take them for free. I decided to start charging. I was homeless, so I may as well hustle. This huge black guy with a briefcase come up to me, asks to take a picture of her, and I was like 'what cool thing do you have to trade'? This mother fucker opens up his brief case, that is full of buds of weed, and he throws a handful on the ground. Well that was enough of a payment for me. Never saw him again. Once it got to be October, it was getting pretty cold in Colorado. So we got an apartment in Westminster. Which ended up being the hood. And ya know, we still kept our homeless friends. We would go visit them in the park, or they would come and stay the night. We kept in contact the whole time in Colorado. Those people were 100. And those are the people who most see I'm the sides of the road and look down on them. Honestly most of those people had more money in their pockets then most 40 hour a week workers. I'd say the experience in a whole was humbling. Not just for me but for perspective on other people. I've showered in a homeless shelter. I've ate food from a soup kitchen. I had strangers give me socks and hot dogs, they took time out of their day to give me some comfort. It was a toughening thing too, knowing that I don't need anything or anyone and I'm good. I have it handled. I denied help when I felt like it. Because I knew I had the means if I wanted. I was pretty ghetto at times. I mean, I took sink showers in grocery store bathrooms for shits sake. I highly recommend doing something crazy like this at least one time. The only thing stopping you is you. It is as easy as waking up and giving everything away. Just walking away from everything you know. Right when it is scariest, that's when you jump. Who knows, you may jump into a shit storm, and walk away with less than what you came in with. You may ruin your relationship and be miserable. You may meet the love of your life. You may get pregnant and have the most beautiful baby. Your life may take a complete 180. But wouldn't you rather know what happens? I don't know how anyone could just wonder about these things...jump. It's the best choice I've ever made.

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suximaxini-blog · 8 years ago

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The Tiring Day 1 – LOST IN SEOUL

I planned on writing about our -my sister, Nadya, and I- trip to South Korea since we were back from February. It was merely us two, in a strange nation where we barely talk in our mother tongue (except for the time we spent with one of our friend, whom being very nice as our local tour guide and treated us with delicious food). But, I got very lazy to write. Haha, so me.

So, we went there unexpectedly. One day, my sister asked my mom whether she can go to Seoul, my mom was in the happy and easy going mood to be that easy to agree. Like, seriously…we booked our ticket, made our visa (I needed to go twice since I did not complete something the first time, totally forgot what was it), booked our hostel…mom only gave accommodation expenses, so besides that, it was our money. For 4 days and 3 nights, our budget was so tight that we cannot afford to enter any restaurant since we were too afraid of the price. HAHAHA. Therefore, we were so grateful of our friend who had treated us delicious courses.

Suddenly tonight, after a hectic Eid day, I spent my leisure time watching one of my favorite TV Program; it is Japanese one called “Why Did You Come to Japan”. It usually broadcasts you some tourists’ stories who visit Japan for some special purposes. One time, they recorded a story of Seba-chan who visited Japan to explore their Ramen, as he spent about 3 months to eat ramen in Japan. First, he used his bike to cut the transport expenses. However, by the time goes, it is hard to maintain its function, I guess, so Seba-chan continued his journey by hitching some random strangers, who happened to know him already throughout the program. Or the story about the Sasebo guy, an Australian man whose main visit to Japan was only to eat Sasebo Burger. The mayor of Sasebo city even making him a special t-shirt with its mascot and make sure he can eat any Sasebo burger for free.

Tonight’s story was about two brother in their first time visiting Tokyo and the older one happened to lost his wallet. His younger only has a debit card but it cannot be withdrawn. They looked so lost and pale. THERE! I saw the resemblance of me and Nadya with that story. HAHAHA. Just the two of us, where we needed (desperately needed) to work together to make the rest of our stay pleasant for both of us. First thing when we arrived in the airport, we thought, or I thought, we still have plenty of time to wait for our luggage after the immigration.

I checked on the screen, to where should we go to get out baggage. I was so sure regarding our gate and told my sister that we need to wait. We called our parents to notify them that we have safely landed. After waiting for approx. 10 mins, I got bored and asked my sister to wash our face and put on a little make up just to lighten up the face (we just woke up and face was definitely inhumane).

We, or I as the eldest, was so clueless…I sensed something was not right when I saw no one from our flight in front of the moving belt (whatever you call it). Hehehehe, we went to the wrong side. I did not panic because I saw my sister was already in the mode. We walked back and forth to ask someone. We asked several people but nobody can answer us. I was so confident regarding the information I have to find our luggage. I had all the details, but nobody was actually helping. Was it too early? Is 9am-ish early to you? I take note that the airport crew are not that capable of using English language and not (really) helpful. I even asked several times to lost and found counter. Nah, nothing.

Lucky for us, we found our luggage just being thrown outside the belt. The, supposed to be, right belt since long time ago. Just like that. Abandoned. THANK GOD! They were saved.

After that, we followed the itinerary we made and proceeded to ask the direction to buy the temporary SIM card and bus ticket. At the bus counter, the lady who was in charge told me that rather than buying only the bus ticket, I could buy T-money and got a discount for bus fare, also made it easier for us to use public transportation. It cost us, 100.000 Won for 2 cards. Right choice! Buy T-money everyone, at the airport, to make it simpler.

We departed for Anguk. And it was safe until we got off the bus. But, since it is my experience that you read, we lost again. My sense of direction IS BAD. We went back and forth with our luggage and the problem was not that the humidity came from heat; it was the cold we could not bear. I asked several people again with the simple, “Jogiyo? Heoksi, Yellow Brick arayo? Yellow Brick Hostel eodisoyo?”. So sorry, my mind was cloudy and I cannot think of whether it was polite enough. Nadya then took the initiative to ask a grandpa with broken English and showed him the website with picture and address, HE WAS SO NICE, he did not hesitate to take us there. To the front of the hostel, where we need to walk through an alley. We thanked him a lot by bowing with our might, if it was not for him; I supposed we would spend our time just going back and forth with no end.

We stayed at the Yellow Brick Hostel 1. We booked through Traveloka and chose the hostel because its rating and comments, they even served breakfast (sadly, although we paid for it, we’d rather buy onigiri for breakfast because we were always in hurry) and A ROOFTOP! Yep, rooftop was also the reason, although, once again, we went there only twice, the arrival and departure, and you will hardly see mountain. I recommend you this hostel because for the price they give an excellent service in a very good location. It is very easy to reach by subway, like super easy, after I get to know the area. HA!

On the first day, we arrived by Friday actually, I booked a flower arrangement course at Florinn, a flower shop I found in IG. Jenny ssaem, the owner, was a petite young lady whom very passionate with her job. It was very nice of her to guide to her flower shop nearby Ewha University…the uni I once dreamt about. Then again, we were lost, HA! I was just not accustomed to the blocks. We rode a bus, based on what Jenny ssaem and google maps suggested. We found the nearest bus stop and hopped the bus. You know the google maps give several suggestions right? Well, we could have taken the subway, but Nadya was afraid since we saw no station within our sight. Shortly, we rode the wrong direction. We should have taken the other direction with the same bus number and struggling to find the place when we arrived. Nadya was so patient to keep up with the clumsy me. HAHAHA, thank you adek!

I would tell you in details regarding the course later on. Since this post is about ‘LOST’.

We went shopping around Ewha before decided to try subway, aimed for Hongdae. Hongdae (Hongik Daehak) station in Friday night is super packed with people. After a short walk, we wanted to conclude and have a good sleep for tomorrow’s agenda. It was 8-9 pm ish when we took a bus, one we were sure was the correct one. We followed what the google maps said and arrived at, the supposed to be nearest bus stop from our hostel.

I was so confident with my maps, we even dropped by a Nature Republic store to buy wet tissues. We walked and walked and walked and walked, back and forth again…then I was scared to say that maps decieved me. I tried to calm Nadya and changed it into Waze. It was already 10 pm-ish. Food stalls were crowded with people chattering and drinking. I started to panic too, however, it was not the main concern, as we just wish to go to bed. I tried to set my mind straight and followed Waze. BUT! As you know, Waze gives you alleys suggestion, where it directed us to a dark and quiet neighborhood. Nadya was trying hard to object but I insisted that was the way to reach our hostel. I knew it well, she nearly cried, since it was her first time experience abroad to have a vacation and I gave her a bad situation.

Merely with her clumsy sister, she lost. I wanted to cry for different reason, I blamed my self for putting my sister in the situation. In the end, Waze could not give us the direction too, or it could, but we were afraid to follow since homeless men are drunk already.

My phone was nearly died even after an emergency charging. We found a small shop in an alley. Nadya asked me to stop by. I was planning to ask direction since maps could not help me. It was around -5 celcius and we could not think clearly, all we wished was only to reach the bed and tucked ourselves inside the warm blanket.

The owner was an old couple. The grandma greeted us with worries. She cannot speak English, my Korean is limited as I told her that I needed to call the hostel, if only they can pick us up, or at least giving the right direction. She said, seeing two freezing girls asking for help is so pitiful that she agreed to even talk to them! However, nobody was answering our call. Then I asked her to draw us a direction to reach our hostel, she was not sure and asked her husband about it. The husband, I guess, he did not really like us because he raised his tone and giving the body language of letting us be after mumbling the direction.

The grandma, was an angel sent to us, she was really kind. Despite her husband disagreement, she drew as the easy map, repeated the key store and even took us to the main road. Nadya and I bowed to show our gratitude and even kept the paper she gave to us. The map was so clear, we could easily found our hostel. Well, after several asking again, since Nadya was so scared we would lost again, so she wanted to make sure, we took the right direction.

We finally arrived in our room at 11 pm-ish. The first thing to do, CRYING! We cried and hugged each other as we were so afraid that we would make a headline about being lost here. HAHAHA, then the next thing I do, tell Nadya not to call our parents at the moment, since it could make them worry, we’d better keep it for ourselves, at least until we got home.

Hehehehehehe

The experience, nonetheless, did not make me give up. I even wanted to explore more, to avoid getting lost again. At least, not to our hostel.

((To be continued))

#seoul #korea #sister #trip #lost #2017

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swirlyrobe · 4 years ago

Text

Jul 28, 2015

Details:

I got kicked out of middle school for almost throwing a chair at someone because I got jealous when I saw the girl I liked kiss some guy so,

Though they said it was because I got in too many arguments and, smoked too much weed in my dorm...

Then I took drivers ed classes;

(I'm getting botox injections to help my left side straighten and , I'm able to my left leg and arm though, they're really bent and my fingers are too bent for me to move, use,or, hold anything😪

I went from being REAL STRONG to, being weak (though I'm ljfting more with my right arm with a dumbbell then I used to!)

Either way: I'm a survivor!

💪🏽😁👍🏼

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