I Didn't See It Coming

Late Winter 2007

No matter what, life will play its course. You can live your life and try the best you can but life is simply life. Just when you think things will get better or maybe there is a shred of hope, diaster and unfortune can strike at the most sensitive time and moment. It is impossible to always expect the worst, but it's even more impossible to expect the best. Being in denial and unconsciously torturing yourself to death. Not realizing you're going the wrong way and then it becomes too late to change for prevention. It hits you so hard your mind and body don't know how to react. Then you suddenly feel like you're slipping towards insanity or coming upon the verge of a nervous breakdown...

I woke up this morning with an uneasy feeling. The same uneasy feeling I have every time I open my eyes. The same feeling I've learned to ignore over the past few years. I had to go to work early this morning. I was a little hungry, and although I have a job, I haven't been making enough money to buy groceries lately. So instead I drank some water and got dressed for work. Today I have a job interview after work. I hoped it would be something comfortable with good pay and security. I packed some things I would need for my interview. My resume, lip gloss, a pen, house keys, and my beige open-toed pumps. I smashed it all into my raggedy tattered purse. It was ripping and tearing at the seams. If I do well on this interview and get the job then maybe I can buy myself a new purse. I hope.
I was hungry and tired from lack of sleep, but I made my way outside to the bus stop. It was still early in the morning but the sun was beating down hot and miserable. The more sun I was exposed to the more my hair burned and broke off. Occassionally, my face would break out into a heat rash from excessive sunlight. I was too ashamed to use an umbrella. How would it look for a Black person to be walking down the street on a perfectly sunny day while using an umbrella? It would look as if I were ashamed of my brown skin and didn't want it to get any darker. So instead, everyday I stood outside waiting for the bus while the sun seemingly baked me alive.
My bus showed up and I got on. I fell asleep in what seemed like seconds. My eyelids felt like bricks. I hunched in my seat. Only 5 hours of restless sleep last night. I've never been able to sleep a whole night through since I was 17. That awful uneasy feeling keeping me up at all hours. It always gave me that sudden urge to talk to someone. To have someone listen to me and agree on everything I was saying even if what I was saying was completely wrong.
But today I wanted to be happy. I had a job interview and things could possibly change.
I went to a nearby coffee shop just before I went to work and bought me a cup of hot tea. I shouldn't have wasted my money but I didn't want to be sad today and I thought a nice drink would make me feel better.
It was peaceful and quiet at the store where I worked. No one was there except me. It was still early in the morning. I sipped my tea and busied myself with small chores and tasks of preparing the store to be opened. I enjoyed 2 calm hours to myself before my manager came in for her shift. Immediately she put me to work cleaning and dusting. I felt terrible and vulnerable but I did my job anyway. But I had a job interview today. Maybe I wouldn't have to work here anymore! I counted down the time before it was time for me to leave. A few minutes before my shift was over a young man comes into the store and starts talking to my manager.
"I'm going to interview him for the position," my manager tells me. The position. One of my co-workers quit a few days ago and my manager has been scrambling to hire someone to take her place.
I went to the front of the store and looked at the clock. It's time for me to go. There is no one else here to run the store while my manager was conducting an interview. Now I was going miss MY interview. Why did she have to schedule this at the end of my shift? I wait 10 minutes in agony. The buses are so slow here in L.A. I'll never make it on time. I have to leave. I interupt my manager and the young man and I tell her I have to leave. She seems to be annoyed with me and I try to apologize. She blows me off. I smile and politely leave. I was in no mood to be mean or bitchy.
I quickly changed my shoes to my beige open-toed pumps and head for the bus stop. I have about 30 minutes before my interview.... I wait for 15 minutes. Out of nervous habit I clench my left pointer-finger back and forth. When the bus finally shows up the bus driver tells me that my bus pass is invalid for freeway transportation and that I have to pay. My heart sinks. I hardly ever carry cash on me. I begin searching through my wallet for some coins to put in the machine. Then I pay and sit in the rear of the bus. The air conditioner blew cold, painful air into my left ear. I cocked my head for comfort. I remained that way for the rest of the trip. I tried not to think of the worst and hoped that I would somehow make it to my interview on time.
By the time I got off the bus it was already past due. I walked for 10 minutes before I realized I was going the wrong way. I cursed myself. I couldn't find the address anywhere. I called the company I had my appointment with and asked for directions. Twice I got lost walking up and down the street. My feet began to hurt and I switched back into my moccasins. When I finally arrived I was exactly 35 minutes late. I felt like an unprofessional, unorganized, fool. I didn't feel like an adult at all. I couldn't believe they still wanted to interview me. I was introduced to two women and ushered into an office. I began rummaging through my raggedy purse for my resume. I then noticed that I was still wearing my moccasins. I cursed myself again for not changing back into my pumps before I entered the building. I withdrew my resume and set it on the desk between me and the two ladies. My resume was crumpled and wrinkly. I had accidentally smashed it in my purse with my beige pumps. I cursed myself for the third time. The three of us looked at my pitiful crumpled resume sitting in the middle of the desk. Then they looked at me. I must have looked a mess too after being lost for nearly half an hour. My face was flushed, my armpits were sweaty and my hair was askew. I tried to answer all of the questions in the interview but I could tell that I was just wasting all of our time. My palms became sweaty. For every answer I gave, that same uneasy rumbling feeling came into my stomach. Or maybe I was just hungry.
I knew in my heart I wasn't going to get the job.
"We'll call you," one of the ladies said. They must have noticed my flushed features and they offered me a bottle of water. I accepted. I hadn't eaten anything all day and I could fill myself up with water until I could find some food. As I left their office I heard one of them sigh a remark of pity.
"That poor little thing."
Yes, I am a poor little thing, I agreed in thought. It had become cold outside and I wrapped my thin jacket tighter around me. I felt like my insides were cracking. I walked slowly to the bus stop and thought about all the wrong things I did today. It seemed like just being alive was a mistake. I fell into a deep depressing thought as the moments flew by. I stood at the bus stop for over an hour. My bus never showed up. Dozens of times this has happened to me but this time for some reason it seemed unbearable. I got really angry and I wanted to cry. Standing there in the cold and my stomach growling in hunger. I could feel that stupid uneasy feeling creeping up and down my back and I couldn't make it go away. Years of disappointments and broken promises suddenly fizzed up in my memory. My head and eyes began to hurt. Why did I feel so bad?
I thought that things could be different. I thought that maybe I could make a change and have something that felt right in my life. I thought I could stop pretending to be happy and actually BE happy. But I was so wrong.
I had lost. Whatever war I had unawaringly waged against myself had been lost.
That's when I began to walk. I didn't even know where I was or where I was going. I was literally lost and my bus had disappeared off the face of the earth. I walked and walked until I started to cry. But no tears came. I think crying without tears has got to be the most uncomfortable type of crying a person can do. The wind whipped at my face and froze my lungs. I'll be damned if I get pneumonia again. It was getting darker and clouds had filled the sky. It seemed even the sun had given up on me. I took out my cell phone and pointlessly browsed through my phone book. There was no one to call. Not one person. No friends, no family. For a moment I almost had a feeling of what it felt like to be homeless. How could person live that way? No human should ever have to experience that type of life.
I continued wandering the streets looking for something or SOMEONE. Anyone. I wanted help so bad. But there was no one to ask. How come I don't have any real friends? How come I can't get close to my family? I just wanted someone to take me home. I felt like screaming, but if I did then I knew I would cry real tears. I didn't want to do that. I didn't want to reveal tears in public of my loss against myself. At least I could have control over that part of my life. The uneasy feeling spread throughout my body and I kept taking deep breaths to keep from crying. I don't know whats wrong with me but somehow I feel like I already knew I would reach this strange depressing point. I walked the streets until I came upon a bus stop with a familiar sign. I was frozen stiff by the time a bus arrived. Again, the bus driver told me that my bus pass was invalid for freeway transportation and that I would have to pay. I felt so sorry and bitter that I didn't even care about giving my last bit of change to the machine. I got on the bus and sat in the back again. I closed my eyes but didn't fall asleep. I wondered what I was going to eat when I got home. I didn't really have much to eat in my apartment.
When I got home I found one of my roommates and her boyfriend cuddled up on the couch watching a movie together in the living room. I felt terrible and went to my room and threw my raggedy purse on the floor. My head and eyes still hurt and I laid on my bed. I wondered what it would be like to have a real someone. Someone who cares enough. Someone who could've given me a ride home when my bus didn't show up. Just a friend. I wish I had real friends. I wish I could be closer to my family. I wish for a lot of things. But the only thing I know how to do is pretend.
Pretend I enjoy being alone. Pretend I love my job. Pretend my fake friends are real friends. Pretend I'm close with my family. Pretend tomorrow will be better. Just pretending that things will get better soon...