This skin stretched taught
Over bent bones
Can't lose itself
Can't unravel
With the pull of a thread
Until coils pile beneath
The framework
Left standing balanced
On slippery, calcified heels
Not suited for tile floors
And wobbly on shag carpeting
A sudden burn
And my hand snatches itself away
Before I can think
It would be a good idea.
And it leaves me wondering
How those synapses fire so fast
How my mind just barely catches up
To the rest of the world
Of which my body is only a part
Reacting on its own
To sudden stimuli
And pausing just enough for the rest of me
The part I think of as me
To catch on.
Poem:
I burned myself the other day. So there you go. And I'm on my phone, so this will be short. I just wanted to finish this post up and get it posted finally. Sorry for the delay.
Observation:
People don't like being taken for granted. I guess that makes sense on some levels, but I'm not sure it's as bad as everyone says it is. I think a distinction needs to be made. There is a huge difference between being taken for granted on a day-to-day basis and being taken for granted during something out of the ordinary. The first doesn't seem to be much a problem, while the second is disastrous. In fact, taking something for granted in a day to day scenario could easily be seen as a good thing. At that point, taking someone (or something) for granted is an indicator of reliability, not an indicator of lack of care. If I take breathing for granted, it is not because I don't care about breathing, but rather because I can't imagine not breathing. Similarly, if a person (say, an employer) takes you for granted, it is not necessarily a sign that they don't care you are there. Instead, you might take it to mean that you are so reliable they don't need to worry about you. In a relationship, therefore, taking the other person is a testament to how much you rely upon them. I am not offended when someone takes me for granted in this case, because it just means they know I'm not going anywhere.
Now, the second situation is another matter altogether. When you are taken for granted in a situation that is out of the ordinary (either good OR bad), I take that as an indicator there is something going poorly. Say an employee shows up late for work and nobody notices. Or if that employee comes in early and does more work than necessary on a project. Those are situations where a person deserves more attention, where taking them for granted is incorrect. Carrying the analogy forward, if a person in a relationship does something good or bad, it should be appreciated as such. So while it is not necessarily bad to take someone for granted, it can be hurtful. It is probably the case that most people are put into problem situations when these situations of "priority" don't line up properly. Take the stereotype of the woman in the kitchen. Now, I think it is awesome when people make me food. I appreciate it, and try not to take that for granted. But it seems obvious that that is something many people do (or have) take(n) for granted. And if both people agree that it is an everyday thing, I suppose it's fine. But if I make someone a five course meal (assuming I knew how to do that, or had any competency) and they take it for granted because that's how things always are for them, we're going to have some problems. So, like everything to do with interactions between people, it seems this boils down to communication. Go figure.
Exercise:
What is she thinking? What is she drinking?
She glanced up dubiously before taking a sip of the broth that had been offered her. The china was cool to the touch, and so, unfortunately, was the soup. It was an unwelcome break from her first day abroad. Florentine had hardly taken a sip when the sounds of the ocean outside forced her to break eye contact with the boy who brought the bowl. By the time she looked back (having satisfied herself that the seagulls were doing nothing but being seagulls after all), he had disappeared, leaving the door slightly ajar behind him. She set the bowl down on a nearby endtable and returned to her book. She had an hour left before her appointment with the captain of a ship, and she wanted to brush up a bit on her nautical terms. She was a bit more nervous than she had thought she would be. Her trip to the coast had been pleasant so far, but now that the business portion was rolling around, the salty air was taking on a bit of a pungent with anticipation.
Me:
I did some more bicycle-related things this weekend. Friday was the race put on by my tea, Colorbiotics. It's called the Rose Festival Twilight Criterium, and while I am not very thrilled with the course (it has a few odd sections, one with gravel and potholes), it all turned out okay. I was talking with my teammate Kevin before the race and he asked me if I was going to try to break away from the beginning again, and I said sure, why not. Then I forgot that in order to try that, I would need to be at the start line. I realized I hadn't put any extra wheels at the start line in case of a flat tire, so I stopped to get that figured out. By the time I rolled up to the start line I was literally the last person there. So much for the "attack right away" plan. I spent the first two laps sitting near the back and gradually moving up, person by person. I attacked to the front and stayed there for a while before trying a move from there. I got a small gap, but was quickly brought back to the field. Then a few people started attacking. I didn't really want to chase them down, since if they stayed away it gave the race some purpose, and I felt strong enough to get there if it looked like they were strong. Two people attacked together, and then three more followed. The group of five had maybe five or six seconds on the rest of us. Then someone attacked the break, and we caught three of the five. The other two seemed to not be losing time, so right as the person at the front of my group stopped pulling hard, I attacked to try and bridge up to the two riders ahead. I think I chose a great time, because nobody came with me, and the field seemed to slow down with that guy's stoppage in effort. It took me two laps to make it up to the front, at which point I just hung on to the wheels of the two guys for another couple laps while I recovered from the effort. I attacked a bit to test them out, but they responded right away, so I didn't try anything else. We stayed away from the main field, though we didn't seem to pull away much more. With two laps to go one of the guys attacked. I was just starting to sprint to catch him when the other guy opened up his own sprint. So I sat on his wheel while he tired himself out. He wasn't strong enough to bring us all the way back to the guy up front, but I had saved myself while he went hard and was feeling fine. We got within eight meters of the guy right before a small rise in the road, and I attacked. I shot by the guy doing all the work, caught the guy up front and didn't look back. I was fortunate that the second rider decided to try and bring the attacker back by himself, since it set me up perfectly. They had both done way more work than me for an entire lap, so the last lap was all mine.
Saturday was a completely different story. It was a forty mile road race, and I was thinking it would be fine because I was strong the day before. So I attacked early and often. By the end of the first lap, we had shed half the field. At one point I thought three of us could get away, and we got a small gap, but were caught pretty shortly. I tried solo right after that, thinking all the strong people would be tired, but then we made a turn into the wind and I didn't have enough to stay away by myself. So we all sat there. If I wasn't doing something interesting, things just slowed down. Nobody attacked, nobody pulled hard, nobody really seemed like they wanted to race. I attacked one more time with eight miles to go, but didn't get any space. So it was going to come down to a sprint, and with the huge hill right before the finish, I was thinking I might still be okay. Then I got forced out of the pack by an erratic rider, couldn't get back in to find a draft, and my calf cramped, all in the last few miles. They opened the sprint up with almost a kilometer to go, which is way too early, and even though they all died out before the finish, I didn't have enough energy to stay on for the initial acceleration. So I finished a disappointing seventh.
That was all for racing, but yesterday I took my new cyclocross bike out for a test run. My suspicions were confirmed: I am going to be the worst cyclocross rider ever. At one point I was headed downhill and needed to make a right turn. I started to lean, and my tire slipped a little. Now, any decent rider would just lean into it and slide through the corner. I, however, slammed my brakes on, came to a near-stop, and took my own sweet time getting around the corner. What a disaster. The bike itself seems good, though. I'll be taking it on vacation when I leave on Friday, along with a set of road wheels. I haven't planned anything specific to do, but if I have time, I'll try to get on and get some more miles in before my return.
