Saturday Indoors

My roommate emerged yesterday and asked, "There is a water war, have you heard?" Naturally being that I am in the Middle East surrounded by war-zones and water shortages, I assumed that "water war" was somehow related to my recent use of the sink and something to do with water rights control. In fact, he meant, "water fight." Annually there are a lot of things in this funny city, like a "white night" where everything is open all night, and a "water war" in a downtown fountain.

I passed on both. I packed up my room yesterday, for maybe the 10th time, probably more than that, this year. That room caused headaches and allergies like I have never known, all that dust in thick layers over everything from a nearby construction site. I moved and a friend helped relocate me. I navigated the feelings of others, found someone eating and watching TV in my new room, ignored it, deposited bags and went to dinner.

Dinner here is family times ten. I cry when I see people I love here, because the hours and spaces in-between are often voids, loveless, scary even. I am reading Dance Dance Dance by Haruki Murakami, which may not be helping with this drifting floating feeling.

My neck is off. I am in between settled and unsettled. I have three weekends to go, 8 or so classes to teach, and 16 to take. I miss something, like deeply American, and I can't quite put my finger on it. I have flashbacks to places I didn't know I cared about, like Bradley Road in Bethesda or Koreatown, L.A.. Something is birthing in me, but there is only one person, someone way upstairs, who has any idea what that will be. In the meantime, Edward Scissorhands and World Cup soccer are today's saving grace.