A Day, an Outsider and Others

It's December already and it gets harder to wake up and abandon the warmth of the blanket. I wake up and begin to look around and recall all the details of my room. Warm colors often it is in and that's how I like its familiarity. There is familiarity in things that I relate to.

I fix my scarf in the elevator and I look at my hair and I know I look awful. It's normal to look awful at 7 am on my way to university, or at least this is how I stop myself from being too self-aware. The first wave of cold wind that reaches me while going down the stairs is the worst one. It is young and powerful and it sends chills all over me. It also reminds me of how much I love winter and the feeling of winter solitude. I walk the line to the street, the same line everyday. Humans are creatures of habit. I know that once I am out of this area there will be sun and the sun will make me feel warm. It will revive many senses that the wave had taken away. And every time I realize that about the sun, I ask myself, how come I love the sun and the rain at the same time? How come I love the winter and the warmth of the sun? I rarely find answers, and if I find them, I forget them on my trip to university and try to remember them the next morning.

In the bus driver there is always certain ethnic familiarity I never find in the university. He has certain body gestures that I try to notice as the outlines of his body move in the morning light coming from the front window. The bus moves like a snail. Sometimes it makes me nervous, sometimes it makes me relaxed as if I am someone living in the 30's and there's absolutely nothing to miss. It all depend my mood. It all really depend on my mood but often, the colder it is, the more relaxed I am because feeling winter makes me think of my grandmother in the pictures with the 30's setting. Short dresses but detailed scarves. My grandmother always said that the French legs do not feel cold. There's always certain bitterness in the mood of relaxation and remembering, or certain coldness.

Once I reach university it's the time for action. Even though the buildings are old and relaxed, time exists for I should not miss classes. There's always in the buildings certain solitude that I can relate to, and certain not chosen solitude, loneliness. I can bet, seeing all the people at university, that they do not feel the same way I feel. They feel certain warmth I do not understand. Seeing their assured faces, their trained feet know where they are going and what they are doing. They know where to go to and the next step. At university, I am also a creature of habit. Ten more minutes before the class starts, I get a latte and a cookie and wait patiently for someone I know to pass by, and I pretend I do not see them. Certain choices that I make are like the old buildings. Even though I feel warm seeing familiar faces, it's when they start talking that I feel cold.

When the latte is over, I am through with the phase of awakening myself. I become an assured face; I draw a sketch in my head of a time-table and a to-do-list. My trained feet pull me towards the class I am going to. Everyone is suddenly fading away and my focus is on something important like a paper, or an exam.

I walk from the smoking area to the elevator. I do not see who is looking and who is not, and I do not really care. I do not see who is doing what, and I do not care. It is morning and I am busy. However, the minute my feet step before the elevator, the early morning feeling comes back. In waiting for the elevator, there is certain solidarity between myself and others. Four of five different faces are waiting for the same thing. One of the five is always someone who is standing next to the door to make sure they will get in first. They know that this elevator only takes a certain number of people. They want to get in before it is filled up. Two people are always talking, waiting for the elevator. Sometimes they know each other well enough to talk about subjects that seem alien to outsiders; sometimes they are people who know each others' names and age. There is always an old man or an old woman. They are often professors. These kinds of people, waiting for the elevator, either look up or down. Never straight. The ones who look up are the ones who want to see the elevator coming, they are busy people. The ones who look down are dwelling in their thoughts. The ones who look down are also these who find the elevator too filled up all of a sudden and are inclined to wait 10 more minutes for the next "ride". All this comes to me in flashes. I check each member, and then I smile. I never counted myself here; I have always been the spectator of the show. I was never an actress in the show, even though I take the same ride.

In the elevator, there is warmth and there is distance. Warmth is being in the middle of many others. Like a building between others. Distance is the feeling I get when I know that if I look someone in the eye, they will look away. The first floor has passed. I watch the people going up the stairs and the second floor has passed. On the third floor the elevator stops for some people to get off. Third floor is always an alarm for me that this elevator is not going to last for infinite floors. The first, second and third floor have disappeared now and, before I start to realize that, the ride is over. I am standing in front of the class, smiling to my colleagues a faded smile, and I sit in the solitary left-board chair if I find it. This chair makes me feel familiar and taken care of, and I relate to its feelings.

Classes go by rather quickly. Sometimes I talk and am interested, sometimes I just stare at people, imagine them as a subject of a picture and in my imagination I form a picture frame. I look for the expressions in the eyes. Someone could act like they are listening but they know that the person talking is saying nonsense just to get the participation grade.

When class is over I go sit somewhere and have a cigarette. By then it is noon and sun is tender. Everyone is having chit-chatty talks. Figures move in the light, and for me, it is all the mise-en-scene of a movie. I sit alone and watch them. Sometimes I write in my blue notebook. Noon is the time to see others more passionately. I eat even though I am not hungry. It makes me comfortable to be busy doing something and belong to all those people I envy for having something to do.

The buildings have flickering shadows on them. They feel pale and unnoticed. But unlike me, they are not interested in anyone else.

The trees feel like cats and the cats feel like trees. The trees feel like cats because they are loved and taken care of, and the cats feel like trees because they are independent and they do not care about people. I try to watch and see how people can feel either one of these two feelings. Often, I feel they are too busy doing whatever they are doing that they do not have time to think about what they feel, or ever even realize that they feel. It makes me think that only solitude lets you feel others.

I see people I know. They pass by, say hi and ask me how I am doing. I know that most of them do not really know me, and do not really care whether I am alive or dead. Finally, someone who really cares comes and sits with me a little. I know this is what it means to have a friend in this university. We might walk around and talk about our classes. We might talk about other people. If the friend is someone I really like, we might talk about our personal lives. And once they have something to do, I pretend I have something to do. I feel busy and assured.

My cell phone rings and it is always my boyfriend who cheated on me, or an old friend which I hardly know anything about. I like it when my phone rings even though I hate the ring tone. I like it because it makes me feel that even though I am the in the background of someone's life, they still see my colors and notice me.
I have another class in another building. I walk the backstreet to reach the other building. I smoke in the street taking the risk that everyone in the street would think I am a prostitute. I keep thinking of how much I hate all these movies that always show the prostitutes smoking. I suddenly have hatred for the people in the background, and then I start to love them both for existing, and being distant.

The other building is new and furnished, and it feels estranging. Everyone is new and furnished, even I feel new and furnished. I go up the stairs to my class realizing that I should stop smoking. I enter the class and start working on my ugly sketches instead of taking notes. Leaving the room behind, I always feel tired and bored. I know I will go home now. Today is like all the other days, and I feel the same.

I get a latte and I sit down thinking of what I have to do for today. What I have to get done with. All the things that make me busy.

I walk to the bus station and I am too tired to see anything, the imagery in my head is blocked with the afternoon. I get in the bus feeling it is completely different from the morning bus. This noon bus is slow and tired. I think of the morning bus and I fall asleep. Somehow I wake up two stations before I should get off of the bus. I leave the bus, cross the street. At that moment, I long to feel the morning feeling once again. That's not so bad, however, because I know that I will get it again tomorrow morning.