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21 April 2002 (Sunday): wonderland

I was sitting in a Chinese take-out place in a shopping mall this afternoon, along a wall of mirrors. In my field of view were half a patio table, half a stucco pillar, and the parking lot beyond. A car drove past, behind the pillar, and because of the mirrors I fully expected it to come out the other side...but it just vanished. People ambled along the sidewalk, crossed the threshold marked by that pillar and were never seen again. Meanwhile, a girl was sitting at the table having a heated conversation with a clone of herself. But they kept interrupting one another, and finally both of them burst into tears.

About an hour later, out of nowhere, I remembered a moment from seventh grade. I'd been invited to a sort-of-friend's birthday party, and immediately sensed that I was out of my element. Earlier that weekend I'd been digging canals in the back yard with Emmett and writing stories about our stuffed animals; these girls were discussing nail polish and wanting to watch Basic Instinct. On the ride to the movie theater, conversation settled on (surprise, surprise) boys. Decidedly clueless but desperate to contribute, I blurted out, "Now if you really wanna see some cuties, check out the guys in the soap operas." "Ewww!" the others screamed in chorus. I thought fast and put on my best exasperated face. "I was being sarcastic, you guys. Duh." Laughter, and acceptance. Inward sigh of relief.

Sometimes life still imitates seventh grade. I'm trying to be more honest these days, both about my ignorance (I didn't watch soaps) and about my taste (but from the glimpses I caught, the guys in them were sort of cute, in that prefab sort of way). And I try not to hang out with the nail-polish people.

posted by enjelani @ 07:37 PM PST

Replies: 4 comments

hey there, i like the new 'facelift' to your site. it looks less 'commercialized' with those consumer ads. banners absolutely drive me absolutely bonkers!

posted by david @ 21 04 2002 11:08 PM PST

hey e...

so now once again i'm left in the dust as the only geocities squatter... inertia is one of the banes of my existence.

but yeah. must feel so good to be free of banner adds, huh?

nice.

posted by dardi! @ 21 04 2002 11:57 PM PST

hey, e - did you *manually* modify the greymatter control files to get the old dates to show?

posted by azudemai @ 22 04 2002 08:59 AM PST

heheh. that would have been geeky-impressive of me, but no.

i used a mod that Noah wrote: http://www.foshdawg.net/gm/mods/functionality/adding_entries/

i think it's made GM in general a tad buggy (e.g. the 14 Apr - 20 Apr archives aren't getting generated for some reason), but i did transfer all past entries in a couple of hours, instead of a couple of days.

posted by enjelani @ 22 04 2002 11:27 AM PST