My Time as a Human

Hoodie sweatshirts surround me under a grey woolen sky and a cold breeze caresses my cheek. I am back in San Francisco for the first time in years.

The last time I was here I rode a bicycle without a seat up across the park to the other side of the peninsula. I rode standing up and cranked my way up and down hills that were cruel jokes played to a chorus of bicycle shop owners saying, “oh we don’t have one of those sized seat posts. If you go just a little further down…” An afternoon of little furthers brought me from the ocean to the bay and gave me calves like iron.

This time the city feels full of holes. The beloved friend who’s bike I borrowed then is in France with her lover. Another is living in a cave with a Turkish cowboy. My friend Zylah, who I used to stay with, is designing little box logos for people in upstate New York and visually illustrating the mad ramblings of the brilliant and insane.

Fortunately two good friends have kept Zylah’s apartment in the family and so I climbed the same steep hill off of Haight to the familiar iron bars outside the door. I felt light this time without all of the video equipment and tripod I used to haul with me years ago. This time the product of all of those visits fit on a tiny silver disk in the pocket of my cargo pants. At long last I was going to have to show Dicky and Logan what I had done with our time together and their art project. At last they would see the warped mirror, my meta-art in the form of a documentary.

But for now, sleep. Tomorrow I’ll seek out one of San Francisco’s finest coffee shops and tell the tale of the evening’s events. Today’s bloggistic obligations met, I rest my keys.

“Can I fit in there,” she asked from behind me as I stepped into the elevator with my bike. I sensed right away who she must be, having pedaled past her on the way in. I moved my bike to one side and she rolled in behind me. “Third floor, please,” she said, and I jabbed at the cold metal button until it gave up and lit.

It was unclear whether the woman had grown to fit the electric cart, or if the cart was required for the size of the woman. Either way, she was already beginning to outgrow it. Rolls of fat were pushing through the holes under the arm rests. I tried to ignore the situation, but despite how little time we had together the quiet little room wouldn’t allow me to escape the inevitable inner conflict. I struggled once again to understand and legitimize my feelings about people who are so extremely unhealthy. My sadness fought my anger and it suddenly mattered quite a bit to me which came first: the woman or the cart.

I once had a coworker who was large enough that she had difficulty walking. Because of her weight, she began to develop ankle problems. I felt bad that she was having to suffer so much and couldn’t enjoy some of the things I love most about life: running, dancing, jumping and moving freely. Then one day I overheard her.

“I went out to celebrate last night with my husband and we ate two whole pizzas,” she said cackling. “For his birthday I got my husband this really nice easy chair. It even has little cup holders and side tables for snacks. He likes to spend a lot of time in front of the TV so it’s perfect for him. He loves it.”

I felt cheated. Used. I had given her the benefit of the doubt, been willing to assume she had some kind of health problem that lead to her condition. I began to take notes on the things she said each day.

“I love the way they give you so much food you can’t even eat it in one sitting.”

“We had a dinner with steak and chicken and fries and potatoes…”

“How about some nice greasy enchiladas? To be honest I’d be happy with a nice turkey.”

“Oh god help me there’s pizza left isn’t there. Like a little guppy.”

“Oh my… look at all them tators…”

Most of them were about food, but the rest were more along these lines:

“When Zack had his cancer and they were removing his kidney there was a Schlotski’s right down the street.” *cackles*

“I just found out that my insurance will probably pay for one of those little motorized carts. So I’m really excited about that.”

The fact that she was excited about sinking even deeper into her sad state by rolling around in an electric cart filled me with rage. How could she give in? How could she be so eager to give in?

I turned to look at the woman beside me, and the elevator slowed. I didn’t know anything about her, and there she was, equally as likely a product of illness, injury, well funded junk food advertising campaigns, depression, or laziness. We came to a stop. The doors began to open. I cleared my throat.

“Madam, we have arrived at flour three. I hope you had a pleasant flight!” Her laughter filled the little box and poured out into the hall. As the doors were closing behind her she shone through the opening between them and said, “thank you so much. I really needed that today.” My mind cleared. I had discovered something more important, and all that was left was her smile and mine as I whistled my way up to the next floor and down the hall.

Every now and then the eighty hours a week of coding and living at work used to wear little cracks in my happy world view. When the sun was starting to feel a bit too bright and my brain was starting to rattle I went to my favorite Korean restaurant, sat far in the back in a walled booth, and ordered a hot bowl of dol sat bi bim bap. After a couple of spoonfuls of rice I could feel myself relaxing and adjusting, coming back to earth and regaining perspective. Everything was right in the universe again. I don’t know why, but somehow that dish had become my soul food.

Really, it doesn’t make much sense. For a comfort food to have that powerful an effect it seems like it would have to be something with deep rooted emotional ties. I didn’t grow up eating Korean food, and didn’t even try it until I was hanging out in Champaign. Of course, every time I had it there I was with my best friend Zeevus, and maybe that’s where I built the association.

Zeevus was dating a very cool Korean girl from Chicago at the time. Her parents had recently had a serious talk with her about who she could date. They had decided that they had been a bit closed minded about the whole thing, now that she was growing up in the U.S., and it might be OK for her to date someone Chinese, as well as Korean, although certainly not anyone Vietnamese. To this day I assume they never even heard about Zeevus.

The work days in India were exhausting physically and, often, emotionally. By the time we returned to the house where we were staying, it was cold and dark. We stumbled in and sat shivering around a small table topped with a variety of white covered bowls. I loved the anticipation of that moment. There was a magic to the unveiling, lifting the lids one by one to peek inside. I would pick up the first to uncover a stack of hot, fresh rotis. I could feel myself getting warmer just smelling them. The next would be dahl, spicy and dark. Mixed with rice, the lentils were just firm enough to be really satisfying. Next I’d pull open the carrot subzi. This was a mixture of dark, orange carrots particular to India and a variety of other vegetables. Sometimes there would be reita, a yogurt mixed with garlic. Dessert would be sweet noodles or, the best, carrot halva.

Every day we had essentially the same food. While the Americans who were with us grew anxious about this around day two, I left six weeks later dreadfully sad to leave it behind. Those meals where my only time to pause and reflect on what was happening to us every day. I became very close to Zeet and Zameet and often the three of us would spend the later part of those meals talking and connecting over what had happened that day. Sometimes we would just sit and eat and that was wonderful too. The warm food pushed back the chill and the company cleared my head and made me feel close to them and to this place.

Now whenever I’m feeling pressured or behind the curve I crave it. I want one of those warm rotis in my left hand and a spoonful of dahl in my right to balance me out. I’ve been to every Indian restaurant I can find and none of them is quite right. I have a new soul food and it’s thousands of miles away. I’ve started trying to cook my own with little success, and so I can only lie awake at night and dream of it.

Click on images to find the credited photographers on Flickr.

My world was uniquely distorted one day in high school when I lost just one of my contact lenses. After about half an hour I was doing a reasonable job of not bumping into things, and once I had basic safety taken care of I started to notice odd side effects. Simple social pressures and the usual drama didn’t seem to bother me. I became completely fearless and walked right up to the most classically intimidating girl and started chatting her up like a pro. Without the cute girl panic squeezing my teenage brain like a vice, I was funny and charming. I spent the rest of the day experimenting with my newfound superpowers.

Stage lights had a similar magic for me in jr. high. Back stage it was hard to breathe and my legs kept vibrating wildly under my king’s robes. When at last I stumbled out from behind the curtain I turned to face the crowd of two thousand and was instantly blinded by hot yellow stage lights. I couldn’t see, and at that moment I couldn’t hear anyone either. I was completely alone on that huge wooden stage. I looked around, and there was nothing to fear. Slowly my lines started trickling in, and then pouring out through my mouth in spite of my brain. It was like I was in my bedroom alone in a towel, or daydreaming the whole thing. Again I was fearless.

There’s something wonderfully freeing about distorting our senses and taking a moment to look at the world in a different way. Errol Morris, a documentary filmmaker, built a device called the interrotron. He wanted to be able to look his subjects in the eye, and visa versa. The person being interviewed looks at a projected image of the person asking them questions and the camera is placed right behind the image so that it looks directly into the eyes of the subject. The effect is that the person being interviewed feels like they are looking right at the person they are talking to.

I saw him demonstrate this device at Sundance one year. Someone noticed that the image they had to talk to was in black and white, and asked him if he’d ever used color. It turns out that people respond better to a black and white image. In fact, the interviewer doesn’t even have to be in the same room, or even the same building. When interviewing Fred A. Leuchter, Morris was behind a screen. Leuchter was so willing to talk without stop that when Morris had to walk out to get water or food, he would sit patiently and start right where he left off when Morris returned. For some reason color didn’t have the same effect. Seeing the person react, in all the subtle ways humans do, was most important. Then, the abstraction from reality provided by the black and white video image offered some kind of layer of safety that allowed people to really open up.

Now that I’ve remembered all of this, I think the next time I’m in an uncomfortable situation I’m going to either take off my glasses, look into the sun, or stand upside down on my head.