The Home Buddy for this Homebody

Friday, June 19th: Geordi was supposed to go to the groomer's that day. We took him there, he didn't cooperate, they left him in his carrying case (that's a little too small for him), he pooped on himself, we brought him home, without the lion's cut we were hoping to get him.

The next day, he didn't seem right; not the usual morning wake up, seeming to be in pain. I just assumed he was having stomach problems, like he does every once in a while. He didn't seem to get better and at night, Lauren saw blood. We took him to the 24-hour vet, waited 1.5 hours. Who knew the emergency room was so busy for animals on a Saturday night - I guess it's for all those animals who party on the weekend and end up hurting themselves. Anyhow, he had urinal blockage. They would put a catheter in him, and we would have to leave him overnight.

Two days later, there was hope that he would be okay, but he wasn't. The vet said he was still blocked and they would leave in the catheter for another day. If that didn't work, they would have to operate. All the while, I could feel our bank account decreasing. "No surgery" I kept thinking to myself, "that would cost a fortune at the rates this vet charges".

It was odd to not have Geordi around. I found myself waking up much earlier than usual, which is odd since he is often the one who wakes me up. I would be working at home and hear a noise, assuming it was him, only to turn around and not see him there. It was odd to walk around the kitchen without stepping on the grains of litter he leaves everywhere, and seeing no new clumps of fur on the carpet brought a sense of sadness I didn't know I had.

I went to see him at the vet one of the days he was there and he just wasn't the same. He had a cone around his head to prevent him from licking himself. The nurses said he didn't like them, he would hiss and try to bite them every time they tried to do anything to him. Of course, I went in there and pet him, and got him to purr in a matter of seconds.

On Wednesday, he was free to go home. I went to pick him up and had to wait for over 30 minutes, on a Wednesday afternoon - I don't get the waiting at this place. Anyhow, he came home, walked to the middle of the living room and gave himself a good licking. I guess not being able to clean yourself for 3.5 days makes you feel kind of gross.

He was exhausted for that first day back. Passed out on the coffee table, not talking at all, which was good and bad at the same time. He seemed like a different cat. By Thursday afternoon though, he was back to normal - trying to get out of the apartment when I came home from work, fighting with me when I tried to brush him while napping, and sitting on papers I was trying to grade:

Lauren said to me a few weeks ago that it would be difficult for me when we move to Oxford and leave him behind. At the time, I kind of brushed it off, but after this past week, I realize how hard it will be for me to not have him around. I'm a homebody, and Geordi is my home buddy, and as he jumped on my lap this morning preventing me from getting up, and thus forcing me to watch E! News talk about Jon and Kate (like I need to see more of that crap), I didn't push him off. I sat there, and enjoyed the 30 minutes of him sleeping peacefully, on my torso, glad that he was back home.

"You were like a rockstar yesterday"

I've never liked being the center of attention. I want to be the quiet guy no one notices in the room. To some extent, I am that person; I was voted Quaintly Quiet my senior year in high school, the quietest person in my class. People who know me now from purely a social standpoint, probably think of me as the quiet guy who avoids being the center of conversation.

For someone with this outlook, I seem to end up being the center of attention far more than you would think.

In high school I sang in the choir, and ended up with a number of solos, not the kind of the thing done by someone who doesn't want to be noticed. I also did musicals in high school, and if people didn't think of me as the quiet guy, they thought of me as the guy who sings.

In college, I purposely went to a gigantic university. Part of me wanted to be the number on my student ID and not the person, but having dreadlocks always brought attention, even though I never liked it.

For fun I play soccer. What position do I play? Forward - the position that scores goals and gets a lot of attention; somewhat odd for a person who doesn't want to be noticed. I really should be a defender if I don't want the attention.

Lastly, my job. A month before I ever taught for the first time, teaching was just about the last thing I wanted to do. I didn't want the attention that would bring, standing in front of a room and have students hang on my every word, but that's what I ended up doing, and what I've been doing for 11 years now.

This brings me to the title of this post. It was said to me on Friday, a day after the MPS end of year ceremony, by a colleague who happened to be in attendance.

For a little background, I'm an MPS instructor, and have had a bunch of the same students for the last 2 quarters. We have a ceremony at the end of the year, as many of the students have struggled with math and getting to this point is a big accomplishment.

At the ceremony, I had to put some papers on the podium for one of the speakers. I planned to walk up there quietly, while everyone was mingling, and get off the stage. The second I got on the stage, I realized I was be the furthest thing from a wallflower that day. There was a huge roar of applause as I stepped on the stage, throwing me off and making me feel uncomfortable. The applause went on until (and a little after) I got off stage.

Later in the ceremony, I was asked to say a few words. Again, huge applause, a few people were screaming. I had to wait for the crowd to settle down. My first words into the microphone were "I feel like Stephen Colbert", because of the raucous response he gets from his audience at the start of every show.

At that moment, I did feel like Stephen Colbert, like a rockstar, but I can't say I liked it. I don't like being the center of attention.

photo by Joel Avila

Birthdays

Today is my birthday.

I find that I don't remember my birthdays very much, at least not for the reasons you would think. I was talking to Lauren about this; how I seem to remember the bad birthdays better than the good ones. She thought it was because we have such high expectations for our birthdays, that they become very hard to live up to. I think this is the case for me, so I decided to write this blog about the birthdays I do remember.

The first birthday I remember was when I turned 13 - all my birthdays before that year are made up of pictures, not real memories. My family had moved to the U.S. nine months prior to my 13th, and we were in the process of moving from Illinois to Maryland. On my birthday, we were visiting Maryland (I don't think we had moved yet). I remember being in a food court, and getting ice cream, or something. Nothing really stands out, except that I'm taken back every time I go into that food court, to my 13th birthday.

The next birthday I vaguely remember was when I was 18. I actually don't remember the specifics of the day, but I do remember that it was the day before my high school graduation. No one seemed to care that it was my birthday; it was all about graduation.

From birthdays 23 to 25, I happened to be in other countries.

I was in Guatemala when I turned 23, and spent the day getting from Tikal to Antigua, flying into Guatemala City, and then bussing to Antigua. I remember calling my parents at a phone, and then running through the rainy summer night, because I didn't have an umbrella.

My 24th birthday was spent in Barcelona. I remember waking up early, going to the empty beach, climbing onto a lifeguard tower and looking into the beautiful blue Mediterranean Sea. I took a picture, but it didn't come out. This was back in the days of film cameras and it was the last shot on the roll, and didn't make it. That moment, of me standing on the tower is the favorite birthday memory I have. It was just me, the beach, and the sea. I can still see it and smell it, when I close my eyes.

That evening, I was involved with an altercation with pick pockets - they got nothing from me, and I almost got something from them - but that's another story for another day.

My 25th birthday was in Vancouver. I was taking an ESL certification class. My class went out to dinner for the event, and during dinner a classmate some very racist and sexist remarks. This resulted in the rest of us attacking him, and him dropping out of the class because he felt uncomfortable. I don't know if that was really a bad memory, because he was a jerk.

On my 28th birthday, I decided to fast for 24 hours, midnight to midnight. I did it, I got a migraine, I remember that birthday well.

On my birthday last year, when I turned 32, I was looking forward to the rare Saturday birthday, until I saw the MBA class schedule for that term - I would have a class from 9-1 on my birthday. Things got worse when I saw the syllabus for the class - we would have an exam on that day. As it turned out, after the exam, the professor wanted our group to meet with him for a group project. This resulted in a 45 minute meeting and making about 2000 copies after that, at a location 10 miles away from class. I ended up being involved in class stuff from 9 to almost 3.

So this year, I've made it a plan to do as little as possible. I figure if I have no expectations, maybe I'll not have anything negative remember about the day. I'd rather have a birthday I don't remember than one I remember for the wrong reasons.