Basement Chronicles

Errant Inspiration

"It's mine, it's pure, and as decent as I can make myself. Inside, we all know, only the strong survive"

Over break I've been doing what I usually do when it comes to Chronicles. I stay up late, start writing incoherent inspirational phrases, and stop making sense. Normally, these would go the way of shift-end-delete, but I've made it today's resolution to somehow include them all, no matter if I can't remember what they meant. Yeah, I'm scared too.

"Quiet Moments"

How many days after you visit the dentist do you stop flossing?

Don't get me wrong. I don't wish to imply you have bad dental hygiene. I'm sure most people have better habits than I do. The reason I ask is because my bi-annual checkup was last week, and I'm still going on the floss thing. I might even go so far as to say that this is a new record. Well, for me at least. I'm proud. Or maybe just still scared of my dental hygienist.

But, alas, pride or fear, I don't think its meant to endure. One night I'll be too tired. Another too busy. Another, I'll just plain forget. And then I'll be finding myself once again banishing my partially used dispenser to its brethren beneath the sink. Oh, mint. And cinnamon, too? Even the grape of my youth, left to waste its days with the Ajax and the toilet paper.

I'll go to bed wondering what I missed when I'm flossing. What'd I eat today? Was it small enough? Did I drink any soda? That tooth doesn't feel like it did yesterday...

It eats at you the way plaque eats your enamel. The tough, bone-like ceramic of your soul, slowly softened, pitted, and cracked. You worry and worry, but by the time you're ready to do anything about it you're already asleep. Another six to eight hours you lose. And they win. Again and again.

You brush and you brush. But its always the same story. Its stupid to floss after you brush, because you'll just have to brush again. You may do it once. Twice. But eventually it becomes compelling enough to skip the flossing altogether. Maybe you take another pass. Scrub extra hard on the molars. The incisors. The bicuspids. Maybe even a little scratch on the top of the tongue.

But you'll never reach in between your teeth, and you know it. Sonic waves? No chance. Anti-bacterial paste? So are the rest of them. Eventually you find yourself stranded on the toilet. You hop, hop, hop over to the cupboard beneath the sink. There your forgotten armies of floss dispensers disdainfully regard you as you reach past them with your pants down. You close the cupboard and try to forget.

Ok, so maybe this hasn't happened to you. Hasn't happened to me, either. But I have amassed quite a few floss dispensers in my time.

When I brush my teeth I have the compulsion to walk. Or rather, to pace. In recent days I've confined my self to the bathroom, but I used to go about the house as I went about brushing, often walking to and fro amongst confused family members.

I also nearly destroy my toothbrushes. After a month, the bristles have surrended and lay down flat.

I guess I worry too much when I brush my teeth.

--

"What inspires you?"

This week somebody asked me how I stay calm about things. How I keep my cool, how I don't let anything get to me. I didn't really have a good answer for them. I told them to simply realize things for what they are, and to understand the problem. It sounds like I read that out of the front of a science book teaching the "scientific method." Truth is, I don't know that I'm necessarily cool about a lot of things. I don't have any educated guesses. I just deal.

I think that everybody worries about things. About their teeth, their health, whatever. Worries that never really surface on a day to day basis. To say someone isn't worried is a lie. It just that they don't worry about what you do.

So what am I worried about?

I'm worried about growing up. And worse yet, everbody else doing the same. And worst, maybe them doing it before I do. I imagine that every day, starting yesterday, will only get harder. That any struggle I have today, I'll give a painful laugh tomorrow when I realize it was nothing. That each passing day is a smaller fraction of my life.

I'm worried about my education. Whether it'll be worth it, whether I should be staying. How much the bookstore will gouge out of their buybacks. Whether I've done well enough to make it into the professional program at ASU so I can continue my last two years.

I'm worried about my family. Families, I should say, having two between here and Arizona. My parents, my grandparents, my sister, cousins, aunts and uncles that I don't get to see nine months out of the year. Everyone I can't be around to help when they need it.

So there. That is what bugs me. Not at all different from anybody else, except that I don't let it get to me. I just do what I can, and accept it. If not, it usually ends up in a Chronicle.

--

"Perfect memory"

After this there were a series of entries that began with "Memory?"

Here's what I had afterward, presumeably things I wanted to remember about this break.

"Pocket watch"
- An heirloom, my grandparents gave me a very nice pocket watch. I'm nervous about taking it on the plane, especially since they've searched my bag every time I've been to AZ and back.

"Extreme sledding, pitch black, with herding dogs chasing us"
- Ah, yes. Though it nearly didn't happen, I did get a chance to go with Brad to do some extreme sledding up in Bear Valley. We started at like 3pm, which meant it quickly turned to night, making it extremely dangerous. And the neighbor dog thought we were sheep and wanted to herd us.

"So when are you leaving?"
- The second thing anybody asks you when you come back from college. I know its with good intentions, but after a while it just starts to sound like "When are you gone?"

"College changes people, Josh."
- Something my mom said when she found puke all over our downstairs bathroom after having people over. Pretty accusatory, but it wasn't any of my friends.

There's more stuff I want to remember, but I never wrote it down. Maybe for a reason. Maybe not.

--

So here I am, wrapping up another winter break. Its about 0 degrees Kelvin outside, and snowing lightly. I'll be glad to get back to where I can walk outside without a coat. But that doesn't mean I won't wish I was still on vacation.

Oh bother.