May 26, 2002
Sunday

Road trips can make all the difference.

I'm in North Carolina. When you breathe the air here, you can feel it moving through your body. Most locals probably take that for granted. But I've driven non-stop 15 hours to get here from sweltering heat and several counties that received a failing grade for air quality from the American Lung Association.

But if they were dancing around at all, I shocked them back into submission the moment I got to my friends house. Image four cats and a gigantic litter box that hasn't been cleaned in weeks. Imagine that this litter box is in the kitchen (where you keep your food) and is the room you step into when entering the house. Imagine the stark contrast and fighting back nausea the first hour until you get "used" to the smell.

My lungs could almost fight their way out of my chest and run away into the mountains where they would live the rest of their lives in secluded happiness. They would be afraid to run across the carpeting though. It's soiled and topographical with hair and garbage. And my lungs aren't the only ones afraid. I refuse to step on the carpet without socks or shoes.

The two friends I'm visiting this week are living in filth. If they ever died leaving the city had to come to clean the house, it might even make the local news. Boxes are stacked against walls as perpetual storage. Two dirty mattresses, leaning against another wall in this guest bedroom. Crates and bins heaped with "clean" laundry. Full garbage cans, inside and outside, which haven't been taken out for a week. And a bathroom overrun with mildew, stains and debris.

The night I got here, I freaked out bad. Every time I reset an expectation, I'd be hit with something even worse. The smell, then the soiled carpeting, then my bed (which I'm able to shove out of my mind now that it has a clean sheet), the garbage. The bathroom may have been the worst. Not necessarily in severity, though it's close, but because I wanted a shower so badly after my trip. It seemed to me, though, that I might be cleaner if I just stayed out.

That is when scenarios started flashing through my mind. What am I going to do? Maybe I can secretly get a local hotel room and clean there. Maybe I should just throw friendship to the wind and head back home, or out west. Maybe I should stay the night and then come up with an emergency the next day -- family or work crisis. Perhaps I could site lack of space and a hampered ability to work next week, therefore requiring that I move into a hotel room.

I'm not slamming. I love my two friends. And it hurts me to know they are living this way. There isn't any reason for it. Beth's life doesn't suck anymore. I have no idea why Kerrie allows them to live like this. It just doesn't make any sense.

Well, I left Wednesday evening and arrived here Thursday afternoon. As I write this, it's Sunday afternoon and I've been dealing with the situation much better. A couple trips to the store produced extra socks, Benadryl for my sudden allergies, liquid soap for the bathroom, some food staples which don't require silverware to eat and plastic cups. My little corner in the guest room has been conquered. And I cleaned the litter box yesterday, which improved the odor quite a bit.

The truth is, however, that I'm having a great time. I would have left anyway -- but I've missed these two so much. And the "jealous life partner" phenomenon is completely non-existent, making them two of the few I still count as friends. They're good people. It seems to me that their lives together should be different. But tragedies linger like scars, and change us forever.

And speaking of tragedy. I'm an idiot. An IM idiot, specifically. Austin sent me an Instant Message on Friday, and if he hasn't found my journal site after that conversation it is nothing short of a miracle.

What happened was that I was still exhausted following my nonstop drive and visitation without sleep. I crashed around lunchtime -- though still online. When I heard that loud "bleep, bleep, bleep," he must have pulled me out of a deep Stage 4 sleep. Probably I wouldn't have even woken up save for the fact that I thought it was someone from work and I realized in parallel that I had been sleeping.

When I saw the AOL instant message, for some reason I thought it was Shack. The people I talk to on AIM are Shack, Cabell and Austin. There are others, but they don't seem to use instant messaging very much. And despite that I only end up talking to three people, I have two different AIM accounts -- one is SushiPanic which is the one I use the most. But I created another for people who shouldn't know about the journal site. (If you search for Sushi Panic on goggle, BitchPanic comes right up. Why would anyone search for that, Shack asks? I don't know.)

The reason I thought it was Shack may have been the feeling I was logged in as SushiPanic. It may have also been my blurry vision. It may have also been a "Freudian" slip. I don't know. He asked me about the trip and I started to tell him -- except that I was exhausted and asked him to read my post on Cabell's board such that I wouldn't have to re-type the story.

The conversation (with names changed) went something like this. And thank the Goddess for typos -- as minor as they may be.

austin: Boo...
austin: How's the trip?
sushi: Hey
sushi: Well,
austin: Yup?
sushi: You know I love Beth and Kerrie...
sushi: But I'm weirded out
austin: Having fun then...?
austin: Why's that?
sushi: Can you read the post I did on the "misc" at poisonsodo.org? [[typo'd poisonsoda.org]]
sushi: brb--I was taking a nap.
sushi: My sleep schedule is fucked...
austin: I'm just getting up...
sushi: Okay. Let me know when you read it.
sushi: You know our old apartment? This is so much worse that that.
[[insert my stunned realization here]]
sushi: EEK!
sushi: AUSTIN???
austin: which site?
sushi: I thought you were my friend SHACK!
austin: Yeah?
sushi: I'm such a fucking idiot.
austin: I'm stealthy today...
sushi: You have absolutely no idea what I'm talking about.
sushi: Well, okay....
sushi: (sorry)
austin: That is true, but I can smile and nod.
sushi: Heh. Here's the story...

If he's curious at all, he figured out the correct URL without exerting any effort whatsoever. But if I'm lucky, his desire to visit with his own friends (he's also visiting friends out of state) kept him from digging.

The possibility is burned into my mind, regardless. Like looking into the sun by accident and seeing it for days. "Hmm, poisonsodo.org. That doesn't load. I wonder what boards she is posting on? Maybe they're interesting? I wonder if she meant poisonsoda.org? That's a close match. Yup, the site loads. Here's a forums link. Yup, here's a section titled misc. Hey, here's a post that sounds like what she just told me. Hey, she has a link to a web site. <click, click> Hey, this person she's writing about sounds like me. <reading> WTF? <reading> WTF?"

There's a feeling of freedom one sometimes gets when the drastically unexpected and unwanted happens -- provided your survival isn't in serious jeopardy and a love one hasn't died. Once the feeling of shock fades away and the heart slows back down, everything looks new. The sky is a deeper shade of blue. You can hear birds in the distance. "Have the always been singing?" It's a feeling of surrender and new possibilities. Life is an adventure again and who knows what will happen next.

Beth is prodding Kerrie and I to quit writing so we can go out and do something. I think we're going for lunch and ice cream. Maybe we'll hit the coffee shop again or a book store. I had wanted to drive into Asheville, but they weren't up for the trip. Kerrie and I did some light round-robin writing last night. I hope we can do some more. It was a lot of fun.

I'm really glad I came up. Friends are so important. I'm feeling so much better.