hcs
04-19-2004, 02:40 PM
4/19/04 9:30
So today I got to do what I had hitherto only dreamed of doing. I had very often had the thought before, and I wonder if the only reason I acted on it now is because of the medication I am now taking for depression. Might it have channeled my desire to stay home into action?
This morning I woke up within ten minutes of the expected arrival of the bus. This is not unusual for me, and more often than not I make it. Today, though, I decided to actually sit down and have breakfast, 3 bowls of Golden Crisp. I usually don't have breakfast at all, and why on this particular morning I decided to is beyond me. I also asked my brother for some batteries for my MP3/CD player, which I recently bought to replace my previous one which was left under the chair in my Western Civilization class with American Beauty in it and subsequently stolen. My brother would agree only if I let him borrow my standard CD player, a 6 year old Sony Discman, and I capitulated, though I had to fumble about my room to find it, and then show him how to put the batteries in correctly. I also had to quickly take my medication, which too far longer than usual because for whatever reason I just wasn't swallowing the pills correctly. Of course by this time about 11 minutes had passed and when I finally went out to the bus stop I knew I was too late. I waited a half hour or so, just in case, enough time to see my brother leave on his own bus to a different high school.
So I stood there thinking: Great, I've missed the bus again. Though I do make it to school more often than not I am also absent more often than most, frequently because I am late to the bus stop. My bus must travel 30 minutes to my high school (I am shipped some distance to a "specialized learning center" for science and engineering), and I have no classmates living nearby, so my only option for getting to school is to ask my mother to drive me on her way to work. Of course this trip to school becomes a guilt trip, and I invariably wind up with my various privileges revoked. So this morning I decided that I did not want to go through all that, that I would just skip school altogether. I had two options for doing this: a) go back inside and lay in bed, incurring the wrath of my mother (and quite possibly a call to 911 to have the medics lift me from bed, put me on a gurney, and take me to the hospital; I joke not, this has happened) or b) stay away from home until my mother has left, then return (or possibly not...). I had always chosen the former, but on this fine day I decided to risk the outright deception. If she didn't see me before leaving for work she would assume that I was off to school, and so long as I didn't run into anyone I knew no one would be the wiser. Of course the school will find out and probably place a call to my house later today... but the escape would have been made for the moment.
The housing development I live in has one main road which is a circle and many smaller circles sticking off of it where the actual houses are. I began walking off around the main circle in the opposite direction that my mother would go to work, because I didn't remember when she leaves each morning and the last thing I wanted was to be spotted. I continued walking and greeted a few strangers taking early walks (this was about 7:10) and then I came upon a section of woods off to my right with a path through it. I had walked around the development many times and always wondered what lay down this path, and this time I took it. Before long it became just a slight clearing in the trees and I was walking behind the backyard fences of another development. Several overprotective dogs harassed me through the fences and I gave them plenty of room (I've had two terrible experiences with aggressive dogs in my life and though they were safely fenced away I still didn't feel safe). Eventually I came out onto the main road that runs past my development on one side and I realized where I was and where I had gone, clearing up the disorientation of my unknown path through the woods. I had come clear around the circle and this was the road which my mother would drive down to get to the main highway on her way to work.
On the other side of the road for many years had stood a reasonably large forest, but in the past few years it had been knocked down to construct a massive shopping center. I decided to quickly cross the street and take a walk about the parking lots and grounds for a while until I determined that it was safe to return home. At this point I was still carrying my backpack of about 20 lbs and my lunchbox, so anyone seeing me would immediately take me for a student (though they might be confused by my beard). I walked down the main street through the middle of the center, past construction workers just getting started with some of the final construction. I passed a proto-EB Games and bakery on my right, with nothing but a huge parking lot with a strip of clothing and craft stores beyond to the left. I passed an Applebee's where I had eaten the night before, and an "Italian Country" restaurant that I had heard was not too great. I then made my way along the right side of a huge Kohl's, made larger by the 10 feet or so of facade above the roof. Past Kohl's a ramp descended to the left to let one down past the retaining wall to the other half of the center.
Here I passed a large Barnes & Noble and I made my way to the edge of the lower retaining wall which ran behind the stores on this half. I looked out into the woods, at about eye level with the tops of the trees which remained out there, and looking down I saw a pile of red shopping carts piled on the forest floor. I walked behind the Target and Loews and found the huge detention basin required by law to collect the runoff from the parking lots, which of course cannot absorb the water like the soil they were placed over. It had rained a few days ago and the basin still contained a thin layer of water, with a few patches of soil sticking up through it. Where the back of the Target ended and the Loews began there was a fence, most likely required by law, separating it from the farm which abutted it. I walked on the farm side of the fence, not wanting to be harassed by or disturb the workers who were loading lumber behind Loews. There a saw a horse or two through the two mesh fences, one probably built by the developer and the other probably from the farm, and I heard a rooster crowing loudly. I had not heard it as I approached, only when I drew near, and I wondered if it was crowing in response to my presence or that of the sun. I smelled the farmy smell for the first time, too, a faint horse manure odor at my distance, not at all unpleasant. Eventually the farm, fence, and Loews came to an end at the next road and I had to decided once more what to do. I decided to make a right turn, up along the road and the edge of the parking lot, so as to complete one more side of my circuit of the monstrosity. A few people were walking on their way to work, and parked behind the Super Foodtown I saw an Enteman's bakery truck and a Coca-Cola tractor-trailer. By this point I had made a gradual 90 degree turn and I was now passing along the main highway, back in the direction I had come. On the other side of the Foodtown was its nearly empty parking lot, with the metal structures designed for holding shopping carts. Out of curiosity I lifted one side of one, to see if it was in any way connected to the ground, and I found that it was not. As I did this an SUV made its way through the parking lot, and I cursed my poor timing and hoping I didn't look like a vandal I proceeded on my way. I made my way up a shallow hill which on this side of the property replaced the huge retaining wall behind Kohl's, getting my feet quite wet in the dew of the ill-fitting newly-lain sod. Upon reaching the Applebee's again I turned towards the strip of clothing and craft stores, intending to walk around behind them to see the names on the doors of the storefronts under construction, but I saw parked directly in my path a police cruiser and, not wanting any inconvinient questioning as to my cause for being there I moved on.
At the edge of the former forest there was a small "professional center". It was still there, and since I was passing that way I decided to take a look through it. I discovered, to my surprise, the local International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers office, along with the orthodonsits and pediatricians. Next to this was a small self-service car wash, where a friend and I would walk on occasion to buy a soda from the vending machine. The machine was no longer there, but I pondered the various automatic car product vendors which must have been designed to look futuristic twenty years ago. At this point I continued on, along the border of the large shopping center, between two fences, one for a small detention basin and the other for a disreputable motel, and I came again to the road where I had emerged from the woods. Here I decided I was far enough from the cruiser (if indeed it was even there) to take a walk behind the strip of stores from the other side. On this side there were two men high up on scaffolding painting a border onto the top of a store of unknown variety. Behind here were the temporary construction and employment offices in trailers, but they seemed to be abandoned at this time of the morning. I had almost passed a car parked in the lot there before I realized that an old man with a shocking moustache was sitting in it, seemingly asleep.
Another retaining wall ran behind this strip of stores, part of a hill that seperated it from the development situated there (I'm sure the inhabitants were none too pleased to discover that the woods in their backyard was replaced by a mini-mall). I walked up the least steep part of this hill and behind the fence that was built there. The back of the row of stores looked imposing, with huge red cinder block walls sticking out seemingly at random. On the hilltop I found a pen that someone had assembled from construction materials, with a pair of household scissors sitting on it. The hill sloped back down, and where it was level with the parking lots the fence ended. Here I went, around behind the Kohl's again but this time behind the Barnes & Noble. Here there was a small slope and a wide grassy pathway through the woods. I couldn't resist walking down it.
The path was covered in green grass and populated by two Canadian geese. They honked and flapped as I came near, when I walked past them they calmed down. I turned around and saw some colorful grafitti on the retaining walls, very little of it of any artistic value.
The path was crossed by two streams, formed between pools of rainwater at different levels. The first stream I easily crossed by stepping over it, but the other was quite deep and wide. I noticed that a small bridge, made of construction refuse, had been constructed across it. I tested it with my foot and it seemed to hold, so I walked across it and I suppose I was surprised that it held up. At the end of the path was the back of the development I mentioned earlier. Yet another detention basin stood there, with a section of the fence rolled away by some intrepid explorer of the past. On the far side I found a concrete path up the side of the basin, with various broken bottles and spray painted vulgarities upon it. A path led through the woods in an arc and I followed it, double back to take another arc that led from that, and found yet another path leading off of that one. Here there were a few golf balls with caricatured penises drawn on them in marker, and as I looked about the woods I could spot more off of the path. The path itself I did not see, and I remarked to myself that I would have to make my own path to go any further. By this point my shoulders were aching from the weight of my backpack, so I retraced my steps to the concrete ramp and sat down. I took out my GBA SP and played a few minutes of Tactics Advance.
Then I returned home much as I had left, encountering one more person before I escaped the mall. He was on his way to the temporary offices when he saw me coming down the hill towards him, on my way out. He asked me if I lived out that way, and I responded that I did not and pointed in the direction I was heading instead. He wanted to know what I was doing there, and I said I was taking a walk. He repeated "taking a walk" back to me. I affirmed it again. He told me "We're putting up signs, no trespassing" (and indeed I had seen no such signs or I would have thought twice). I can understand his position, what with the amount of vandalism I saw. I apologized and went on my way back home. My mother was not there, my computer was, and I set about typing this up.
And no one will ever read this far.
'twas a good walk.
<P ID="signature">-http://hcs.freeshell.org/index.cgihcs</a>
<hr>
A fool cannot be forced to admit that he exists.</P>
So today I got to do what I had hitherto only dreamed of doing. I had very often had the thought before, and I wonder if the only reason I acted on it now is because of the medication I am now taking for depression. Might it have channeled my desire to stay home into action?
This morning I woke up within ten minutes of the expected arrival of the bus. This is not unusual for me, and more often than not I make it. Today, though, I decided to actually sit down and have breakfast, 3 bowls of Golden Crisp. I usually don't have breakfast at all, and why on this particular morning I decided to is beyond me. I also asked my brother for some batteries for my MP3/CD player, which I recently bought to replace my previous one which was left under the chair in my Western Civilization class with American Beauty in it and subsequently stolen. My brother would agree only if I let him borrow my standard CD player, a 6 year old Sony Discman, and I capitulated, though I had to fumble about my room to find it, and then show him how to put the batteries in correctly. I also had to quickly take my medication, which too far longer than usual because for whatever reason I just wasn't swallowing the pills correctly. Of course by this time about 11 minutes had passed and when I finally went out to the bus stop I knew I was too late. I waited a half hour or so, just in case, enough time to see my brother leave on his own bus to a different high school.
So I stood there thinking: Great, I've missed the bus again. Though I do make it to school more often than not I am also absent more often than most, frequently because I am late to the bus stop. My bus must travel 30 minutes to my high school (I am shipped some distance to a "specialized learning center" for science and engineering), and I have no classmates living nearby, so my only option for getting to school is to ask my mother to drive me on her way to work. Of course this trip to school becomes a guilt trip, and I invariably wind up with my various privileges revoked. So this morning I decided that I did not want to go through all that, that I would just skip school altogether. I had two options for doing this: a) go back inside and lay in bed, incurring the wrath of my mother (and quite possibly a call to 911 to have the medics lift me from bed, put me on a gurney, and take me to the hospital; I joke not, this has happened) or b) stay away from home until my mother has left, then return (or possibly not...). I had always chosen the former, but on this fine day I decided to risk the outright deception. If she didn't see me before leaving for work she would assume that I was off to school, and so long as I didn't run into anyone I knew no one would be the wiser. Of course the school will find out and probably place a call to my house later today... but the escape would have been made for the moment.
The housing development I live in has one main road which is a circle and many smaller circles sticking off of it where the actual houses are. I began walking off around the main circle in the opposite direction that my mother would go to work, because I didn't remember when she leaves each morning and the last thing I wanted was to be spotted. I continued walking and greeted a few strangers taking early walks (this was about 7:10) and then I came upon a section of woods off to my right with a path through it. I had walked around the development many times and always wondered what lay down this path, and this time I took it. Before long it became just a slight clearing in the trees and I was walking behind the backyard fences of another development. Several overprotective dogs harassed me through the fences and I gave them plenty of room (I've had two terrible experiences with aggressive dogs in my life and though they were safely fenced away I still didn't feel safe). Eventually I came out onto the main road that runs past my development on one side and I realized where I was and where I had gone, clearing up the disorientation of my unknown path through the woods. I had come clear around the circle and this was the road which my mother would drive down to get to the main highway on her way to work.
On the other side of the road for many years had stood a reasonably large forest, but in the past few years it had been knocked down to construct a massive shopping center. I decided to quickly cross the street and take a walk about the parking lots and grounds for a while until I determined that it was safe to return home. At this point I was still carrying my backpack of about 20 lbs and my lunchbox, so anyone seeing me would immediately take me for a student (though they might be confused by my beard). I walked down the main street through the middle of the center, past construction workers just getting started with some of the final construction. I passed a proto-EB Games and bakery on my right, with nothing but a huge parking lot with a strip of clothing and craft stores beyond to the left. I passed an Applebee's where I had eaten the night before, and an "Italian Country" restaurant that I had heard was not too great. I then made my way along the right side of a huge Kohl's, made larger by the 10 feet or so of facade above the roof. Past Kohl's a ramp descended to the left to let one down past the retaining wall to the other half of the center.
Here I passed a large Barnes & Noble and I made my way to the edge of the lower retaining wall which ran behind the stores on this half. I looked out into the woods, at about eye level with the tops of the trees which remained out there, and looking down I saw a pile of red shopping carts piled on the forest floor. I walked behind the Target and Loews and found the huge detention basin required by law to collect the runoff from the parking lots, which of course cannot absorb the water like the soil they were placed over. It had rained a few days ago and the basin still contained a thin layer of water, with a few patches of soil sticking up through it. Where the back of the Target ended and the Loews began there was a fence, most likely required by law, separating it from the farm which abutted it. I walked on the farm side of the fence, not wanting to be harassed by or disturb the workers who were loading lumber behind Loews. There a saw a horse or two through the two mesh fences, one probably built by the developer and the other probably from the farm, and I heard a rooster crowing loudly. I had not heard it as I approached, only when I drew near, and I wondered if it was crowing in response to my presence or that of the sun. I smelled the farmy smell for the first time, too, a faint horse manure odor at my distance, not at all unpleasant. Eventually the farm, fence, and Loews came to an end at the next road and I had to decided once more what to do. I decided to make a right turn, up along the road and the edge of the parking lot, so as to complete one more side of my circuit of the monstrosity. A few people were walking on their way to work, and parked behind the Super Foodtown I saw an Enteman's bakery truck and a Coca-Cola tractor-trailer. By this point I had made a gradual 90 degree turn and I was now passing along the main highway, back in the direction I had come. On the other side of the Foodtown was its nearly empty parking lot, with the metal structures designed for holding shopping carts. Out of curiosity I lifted one side of one, to see if it was in any way connected to the ground, and I found that it was not. As I did this an SUV made its way through the parking lot, and I cursed my poor timing and hoping I didn't look like a vandal I proceeded on my way. I made my way up a shallow hill which on this side of the property replaced the huge retaining wall behind Kohl's, getting my feet quite wet in the dew of the ill-fitting newly-lain sod. Upon reaching the Applebee's again I turned towards the strip of clothing and craft stores, intending to walk around behind them to see the names on the doors of the storefronts under construction, but I saw parked directly in my path a police cruiser and, not wanting any inconvinient questioning as to my cause for being there I moved on.
At the edge of the former forest there was a small "professional center". It was still there, and since I was passing that way I decided to take a look through it. I discovered, to my surprise, the local International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers office, along with the orthodonsits and pediatricians. Next to this was a small self-service car wash, where a friend and I would walk on occasion to buy a soda from the vending machine. The machine was no longer there, but I pondered the various automatic car product vendors which must have been designed to look futuristic twenty years ago. At this point I continued on, along the border of the large shopping center, between two fences, one for a small detention basin and the other for a disreputable motel, and I came again to the road where I had emerged from the woods. Here I decided I was far enough from the cruiser (if indeed it was even there) to take a walk behind the strip of stores from the other side. On this side there were two men high up on scaffolding painting a border onto the top of a store of unknown variety. Behind here were the temporary construction and employment offices in trailers, but they seemed to be abandoned at this time of the morning. I had almost passed a car parked in the lot there before I realized that an old man with a shocking moustache was sitting in it, seemingly asleep.
Another retaining wall ran behind this strip of stores, part of a hill that seperated it from the development situated there (I'm sure the inhabitants were none too pleased to discover that the woods in their backyard was replaced by a mini-mall). I walked up the least steep part of this hill and behind the fence that was built there. The back of the row of stores looked imposing, with huge red cinder block walls sticking out seemingly at random. On the hilltop I found a pen that someone had assembled from construction materials, with a pair of household scissors sitting on it. The hill sloped back down, and where it was level with the parking lots the fence ended. Here I went, around behind the Kohl's again but this time behind the Barnes & Noble. Here there was a small slope and a wide grassy pathway through the woods. I couldn't resist walking down it.
The path was covered in green grass and populated by two Canadian geese. They honked and flapped as I came near, when I walked past them they calmed down. I turned around and saw some colorful grafitti on the retaining walls, very little of it of any artistic value.
The path was crossed by two streams, formed between pools of rainwater at different levels. The first stream I easily crossed by stepping over it, but the other was quite deep and wide. I noticed that a small bridge, made of construction refuse, had been constructed across it. I tested it with my foot and it seemed to hold, so I walked across it and I suppose I was surprised that it held up. At the end of the path was the back of the development I mentioned earlier. Yet another detention basin stood there, with a section of the fence rolled away by some intrepid explorer of the past. On the far side I found a concrete path up the side of the basin, with various broken bottles and spray painted vulgarities upon it. A path led through the woods in an arc and I followed it, double back to take another arc that led from that, and found yet another path leading off of that one. Here there were a few golf balls with caricatured penises drawn on them in marker, and as I looked about the woods I could spot more off of the path. The path itself I did not see, and I remarked to myself that I would have to make my own path to go any further. By this point my shoulders were aching from the weight of my backpack, so I retraced my steps to the concrete ramp and sat down. I took out my GBA SP and played a few minutes of Tactics Advance.
Then I returned home much as I had left, encountering one more person before I escaped the mall. He was on his way to the temporary offices when he saw me coming down the hill towards him, on my way out. He asked me if I lived out that way, and I responded that I did not and pointed in the direction I was heading instead. He wanted to know what I was doing there, and I said I was taking a walk. He repeated "taking a walk" back to me. I affirmed it again. He told me "We're putting up signs, no trespassing" (and indeed I had seen no such signs or I would have thought twice). I can understand his position, what with the amount of vandalism I saw. I apologized and went on my way back home. My mother was not there, my computer was, and I set about typing this up.
And no one will ever read this far.
'twas a good walk.
<P ID="signature">-http://hcs.freeshell.org/index.cgihcs</a>
<hr>
A fool cannot be forced to admit that he exists.</P>