i have a question...

Thursday, December 31, 2015

Best of 2015

MOVIES
Wild
The LEGO Movie
Begin Again
The Theory of Everything
Show 'Em What You're Made Of
Interstellar
Magic Mike XXL
Home
Straight Outta Compton
Sicario
How to Dance in Ohio
The Martian
August: Osage County
The Good Dinosaur
Beginners
Star Wars: The Force Awakens

BOOKS
The Longest Date: Life as a Wife by Cindy Chupack
All the Bright Places by Jennifer Niven
The Girl on the Train by Paula Hawkins
Paper Towns by John Green
The Friend Who Got Away edited by Jenny Offill and Elissa Schappel
Fat Girl Walking by Brittany Gibbons
Sweet and Vicious by Richard Schickler
Sharp Objects by Gillian Flynn
Still Alice by Lisa Genova
With This Heart by R.S. Grey
Sick in the Head by Judd Apatow
Don't Fail Me Now by Una LaMarche
Sounds Like Me by Sara Bareilles
Dirty by Megan Hart

MUSIC
"Can't Stop Dancing" by Becky G
"Four Five Seconds" by Rihanna
Piece by Piece by Kelly Clarkson
"Shut Up and Dance" by Walk the Moon
"My Silver Lining" by First Aid Kit
In a World Like This by Backstreet Boys
"The Crying Game" by Nicki Minaj ft. Jessie Ware
"Keep on Lying" by Jessie Ware
Never Gone by Backstreet Boys
"What Do You Mean?" by Justin Bieber
"Sorry" by Justin Bieber
"Acapella" by Karmin
Hamilton Original Broadway Cast Recording
"Till It's Gone" by Yelawolf
"Stitches" by Shawn Mendes
"Ex's and Oh's" by Elle King
"Hello" by Adele
What's Inside by Sara Bareilles
"Love Yourself" by Justin Bieber

THEATER
Dying While Black and Brown by Zaccho Dance Theatre
Hamilton on Broadway
Waitress at American Repertory Theater

Here's to a happy and healthy 2016!

Thank you, as always, for reading!

Thursday, December 10, 2015

March 29, 2007: "Consolation"

I ask how you are. Remembering that I loved you once. And maybe will again. (Or perhaps it’s that I still do. I can’t tell.)

You pause because there’s bad news. I’m never speechless, but this silences me. A silence as cold and hard and unexpected as a drop of freezing rain down my back. The one that sneaks past the layers of clothes I wear to protect myself.

I think a heartfelt “I’m so sorry” is appropriate here but it comes out like the empty cliché it is. This is a situation in which “I can’t imagine what you’re going through” feels ridiculous, heavy, useless. I don’t think they make sympathy cards for “there’s been an accident and we don’t know if he’ll live.”

I want to fix it. But we haven’t seen each other in months. And it’s never the same, even though somehow and miraculously it is.

I don’t hear from you for days; it feels like forever. I assume, then, that no news must be bad news. And it is.

It isn’t my loss but, because it is yours, it feels like mine. I can’t breathe when you tell me and I don’t expect that. Then, I don’t know what to do. Who to tell, how to say it. What to say to you. I feel far away and wish I could teleport, which I then remember is the super power you said you wish you had. I wanted Inspector Gadget’s mechanical legs. I guess both powers would allow us to get places faster. Maybe the place would be called closer to each other.

I do actually search for a “sympathy” card. (It’s a good thing they don’t make empathy cards because I don’t actually know what you’re experiencing.) I look for 10 minutes for a card that doesn’t make me think of widows in black polyester dresses, blue hair, and casseroles.

The most appropriate one I find is under the category “Thinking of You” because I am.

But that’s nothing new.

Tuesday, October 13, 2015

A Change of Place

I have this theory, since I’ve moved so many times in my life, that the last few weeks in a place you’ve lived and struggled in are like the last few days of camp. When you’re just grateful and excited to spend time with the people you’ve been living with and everything goes perfectly and all you have is fun. It makes it particularly hard to transition out of a life that is suddenly carefree and full of love, even though you’ve decided to make a change because things have been HARD and sometimes even UNTENABLE.

But when work stress let up and suddenly everyone wanted to spend time with me and I said yes to everything and I didn’t have a care in the world besides figuring out how to get all my shit across the country and living out of a suitcase for two weeks, it was really hard to fathom leaving. And just when I was really not sure I actually did want to move, I got my feelings hurt by a boy and was sure again. It was a familiar feeling. A sign, perhaps, that Boston isn’t where my life was meant to be.

I can’t figure out if it’s better to exit a place like taking off a Band-Aid—swift and with a flourish and a short burst of pain—or if it’s better to elongate the torture into a long string of goodbyes. When I moved away from NYC in 2008, I packed in a manner of two days with a friend, S threw me a going away party and I left on a weekend, in a mad dash and with minimal drama but lots of emotional turmoil and questions. NYC had never felt like home even though it’s my hometown and I was moving basically to save my life, after a bout of depression that surprised and scared me and truly coming to terms with the fact that there was nothing for me there.

In contrast, leaving Boston meant saying a week of goodbyes to an entire group of people I had fought to gain and chosen to allow into my adult life. A roommate I had lived with for six of the seven years I was there, a bevy of coworkers I had toiled, bled, sweated, and cried with for five years, young people I had seen almost every day for five years—kids I had met at 7 and worked with until they were 12; teens that I had worked with in 2011 who graduated from college this past spring. Seven years is a long time to live in a place that doesn’t feel like home. I kept reminding myself that I’ve done this before and that part of the hard part of being an adult is that, if you’ve had a life that has taken you a lot of places and you’ve connected well with people in each place, your friends are scattered far and wide.

But one of the most difficult parts of extricating myself from a place is what my friend and I call “having the funeral before the death.” I found myself missing my friends while they were still around, another familiar feeling. Fearing the separation, the unknown of where our friendships would go next. Los Angeles is about as far away from Boston as possible, while staying in the continental United States. Those connections began to feel more and more precious. And saying goodbye sucks. What comes next, friends?

I spent a swift 6 hours packing up my life with my mom, confronting and then disconnecting from the seven years I had settled into that room. The evening I finally emptied out all of the furniture from my room, in anticipation of a new tenant moving in, was one of the most disorienting in the whole process. The final straw, putting my mattress, frame, and box spring on the curb, felt horrible, and I was overwhelmed with sadness and fear. What was I doing? The nagging voice that had been relatively quiet through the entire decision and packing process of my move was suddenly screaming at me. Why are you leaving a solid job and a deep and thriving community of friends? Why are you subjecting yourself to this torture? This anxious, homeless, displaced feeling? You did this to yourself. And through the caterwauling in my head, I heard another, calmer, more resolute voice: remember, you may feel anxious about being homeless now but this is just a step on the road to making a home for yourself.

***

When you decide to leave a place, every detail about it is suddenly heightened. The flat rs of the train conductor's Boston accent resonate just a little differently. You suddenly listen to the sound of wind outside your apartment and think, “Maybe I’ll miss that.”

You notice the color of the sunset and commit it to memory every night. You start counting down: how many more times will I tap my T pass to get on the train? This is the last birthday I will celebrate here. This is the last special event I’ll work and the last time I’ll plan a program season at work. The last time I’ll write a rent check to this landlord.

You notice your name on your mailbox each time you return home and think, “Somebody else’s name will be there soon.”

An unexpected rain shower followed by a rainbow is suddenly significant. You’re looking everywhere for signs that THIS IS THE RIGHT MOVE.

I’ve moved a lot in my life. Brooklyn to Cambria, CA in 1997, Cambria to Berkeley in 2001, Berkeley to New York City in 2005, New York City to San Luis Obispo, CA in 2008, San Luis Obispo to Boston in 2008.

But this move feels different. 

This move is both the most impulsive one I’ve made and the most adult.

Ultimately, I moved to Los Angeles because it was cheaper than trying to find a place to live alone in Boston. I felt unanchored there, frustrated in my work, unhappy living with roommates, ready for whatever the next chapter in my life will be about. And I am lucky and grateful to be able to now be where I have family and friends and also a great place to live. So I spent my last few weeks in Boston fantasizing about the hook I would hang my robe on. The hand soap I would buy just for me to use. My very own toothbrush holder. Hanging my mirror by my front door. Buying a brand new bed and all new bedding!

I was texting with a friend about my plans and I told her, mostly in jest, that it felt like this was a move that could make all of the fantasies about my life come true. She told me that made her cry, and I asked her why. She said I had never said anything like that about Boston. And I told her, well yeah, Boston was about WORK.

This move is about LIFE.

Monday, September 28, 2015

Overheard at Work, vol. CXXIV (the Final Volume)

On Thursday, September 24, I left my work after almost five years. This is the final installment of quotes from that amazing place--a place where a part of me will always live. I can't wait to see what my colleagues and all those wonderful kids do next.

Colleague A: Yo, you ever just loved salad?

8 year old boy, to me: I'm gonna try to play guitar now so I can ignore you.

Same 8 year old boy, as I raised my arm to point at him: Ew! Pits!

Me: Is 2003 the year you were born? I'm so old!
12 year old boy: You are old. You're from like 1874.

2nd grade boy, at his first visit: Nice place ya got here!

15 year old boy, talking about my departure: I don't cry but...I get achey.

12 year old boy: When you leave, can I have your wallet?

14 year old girl, to me: Did you guys party? I have the heart of a 21 year old.

12 year old boy: Why are you leaving? You've been here for like 700 years. How much money do you have?

Monday, September 14, 2015

To My Cousin's Daughter, on her Fifth Birthday

Dear E.W.E.,

Today, you’re 5! A hilarious, brilliant, willful five year old.

You just started kindergarten. In the first week, you learned about different jobs and shared things about yourself. You seemed particularly excited about learning about meteorologists and telling us about your cubby where you put your backpack.

You will likely always be the youngest in your class. I think this is the perfect situation for you because that means you will always be challenged by your classmates who are bigger. You’ll be so prideful, you will consistently work hard to stay in pace with the kids around you. But, lord knows, you’ll give them all a run for their money too.

You’re old enough now that we’ve spent some time alone together. The last time I babysat, you were so excited that we would stay up all night together! You also insisted that if you, ultimately, changed your mind and went out with your Mama, that I could stay home and do the dishes.

We shared popcorn and watched The Boxtrolls and you explained every detail, so I wouldn’t be confused. When that movie was over, you asked if I’d ever seen Ghostbusters. So we turned that on and you swiftly fell asleep on my legs.

(We’ll save staying up all night for another time, I guess.)

I wish you all the best this year, that you face new challenges head on, with your sharp mind and your wicked sense of humor, that you make lots of memories with your friends and big family, that you know that I am just one of the people who loves you so much and is here for you always.

Happy birthday!

Love,

Pretzel

Friday, August 28, 2015

Overheard at Work, vol. CXXIII

Summer 2015 programming ended today, in a flourish of team games, whipped cream, and friendship bracelets. It was the fastest and most grueling summer in my history there, and I am both shocked and relieved that it's over.

Me, to 7 year old boy: What was the best part of your day?
Boy: Going to the bathroom.
Me: Did you poop?
Boy: No, the best part of my day was...licking a toilet.

12 year old girl, answering "Who would play you in the movie of your life"?: Amy Schumer, Kevin Hart, or Ice Cube.

13 year old girl, to me: Did you hear that I was looking for you? It was all over the news!

7 year old girl: Everyone's hair looks nice. But some people's hair smells bad but I don't say anything about it.

Me, calling out trivia questions: What is a female adult horse called?
15 year old boy: Horsette.

Friday, August 7, 2015

Overheard at Work, vol. CXXII

I cannot discern one day from the next, and mostly, I'm just glad that it's Friday and that means I can drink ALL THE WINE.

Colleague A: *makes disgusted face* That's how you say "No" in sign language.

Colleague B: I'm eating this pizza, thinking about my life choices and wondering why I didn't wake up early to make stuffed chicken!

9 year old girl: Were you in Annie?
Me: Yes, when I was in 6th grade!
7 year old girl: Were you in the white one?

8 year old girl: She has gray hair!
7 year old girl: Oh my God, you have gray hair! What are you doing to yourself?!

12 year old boy: Annie!...Annie!...I forgot...I'll tell you later...OH! Annie! Can I have my phone?

14 year old boy, opening my snacks: I had to use my chest muscles to open this.

8 year old girl, describing the clue, "Dinosaurs": They were extinct. Like 300 years ago!

Friday, July 24, 2015

Overheard at Work, vol. CXXI

What can I tell you?

Days are long. Kids are hilarious.

Colleague A, regarding his crowded program space: I feel like I'm in the womb. With 125 siblings.

Colleague B, to me: All of my friends have seen your Dubsmashes. I have three friends.

Me, to a room of young teens: I'm running to the restroom. Don't kill each other.
13 year old girl: No promises.

13 year old girl, in an exercise where she was creating a life timeline: I'm gonna get divorced at 56.

Colleague C: I love cotton candy. It's like eating a cloud.

Me, to a 7 year old girl missing her two front teeth: You lost some teeth?
Girl: They're coming in September.
Me: You ordered them online?

9 year old boy: I can sniff better than any dog.

Colleague B: I'm bringing [Colleague D] a bagel...she's Jewish.

Me, to an 11 year old boy jumping around the room: You'll crack your face open!
Boy: I need a new face!

7 year old girl, reading "Rule #1": Rule hashtag 1.

Thursday, July 2, 2015

Overheard at Work (and in Vermont), vol. CXX

Oh heavens, so it's July.

June zoomed by in a flurry of special events, final presentations, a birthday celebration, and a graduate school reunion weekend that basically consisted of my three very good friends and me drinking for about 50 hours straight. Also some high belting and lots of laughing.

I have just survived my first week of my fifth summer at work, and I've compiled quotes from the last month or so, so we here we go!

Colleague A: It is warm enough. I can use my boomerang.

14 year old, creating the tagline for my impending birthday: 32 sexy for you!

Me, to an 8 year old boy soaked from the sprinklers: Do you have water in your ear?
Boy: I have water everywhere, I think.

Me, to my 23 year old colleague, who swiftly identified "Crossroads" by Bone Thugs n Harmony: Why do you know this song?
Colleague B: Because my dad's a thug.

Me, reflecting on my job: I feel like after this, I could run the fucking Pentagon.

7 year old boy: In three years, on November 1, I'm gonna be 8!

7 year old girl: I don't follow the rules. I don't play games. I just watch Netflix.

12 year old girl: How do you spell Impressionism?

And here are the collected quotes from my weekend of drunkenness, spent with wonderful old friends in Vermont, in celebration of our graduation from graduate school five years ago. They will likely not amuse any but ourselves.

SN: Hashtag, I was never a west.

PM, shrieking at a bug: Nature got a little too close!

SN, as we discussed dipping into the pond: Guys! I'm gonna get an infection!

Me: What's in the middle of the country?
SN: Laura Kraybill.

MW: Vagina: the city that never sleeps!

PM: All these cabinets smell like cheese.

SN: No offense, you're my best friend!

Emerson College, class of 2010 FOREVER!

Saturday, June 6, 2015

Overheard at Work, vol. CXIX

It's been another weird month. Not overwhelmingly busy but broken up by a week in Los Angeles with family and overridden with special events and prep for summer which is only two work weeks away!

8 year old boy: I'm done with homework!
Me: Where are you going now?
Boy: Australia.

10 year old boy: We have a lot of energy!
9 year old boy: STEROIDS!

10 year old girl: You went to California? Did you meet cowboy people?

18 year old girl, to her fellow (male) basketball players: Your feet don't have to stink to play ball!

Me, to a 9 year old girl: When are you going to be President?
Girl: When I'm 32.

Me, to colleague: I was definitely about to punch you in the mouth.
Colleague: You would have definitely broken your hand forever.

Teen boy: Guess whose birthday is on Sunday.
Me: Yours.
Boy: The artist, formerly known as Prince.

Friday, May 8, 2015

Overheard at Work, vol. CXVIII

I lost a month of blogging to heavy special event prep--our annual fundraiser was last Saturday! And, though we did raise a record $115,000 that night, it was an insane amount of work and led to a gap in blogging, not to mention sleeping, eating regularly, and relaxing, in general.

Me, to a 14 year old girl: Your friends are in that room.
Girl: I have friends?

Alumna, to me: Your lips look like you took the Kylie Jenner lip challenge.

8 year old girl: I want to be the President! Or a doctor.

14 year old boy, to me: Waddup sexy slim?

Me, to a teen boy: Why are you fancy?
Boy: Because it's Tuesday.
Me: It's Wednesday.

Colleague, to me: You look good. Are you ovulating?

Friday, April 3, 2015

Overheard at Work, vol. CXVII

Made it through a very long March and the weather is even turning. I walked outside today with NO JACKET!

Me, to newest colleague: Do you not know all the staff?!
Colleague A: I still can't find the bathroom!

Colleague B, regarding cats: They are cold-blooded killing machines.
Colleague C: And they're fluffy.

Me, to teenage boy on the phone: Was that your mother?
Teenage boy: It was YOUR mother.

Colleague D: I feel so weird today. Weird head space, negative energy...
Me: Your aura is gray?
Colleague D: My aura is gray...Cloudy with a chance of meatballs.

Group of boys: ...sitting in a tree. K-I-S-S-I-N-G! First comes baby...

Wait, that's not right.

Saturday, March 28, 2015

From the Archives: Personal History

I wrote this for my Theatre and Community class my first semester in grad school: September of 2008. I just reread it for the first time in probably 7 years and was struck by so many things. I work with kids like this every day now.

I wonder where Tyshawn is today. He'll be 17 in July.

***
          I graduated from UC Berkeley in June of 2005 and moved to New York City that same month with the dream to start a theater company. By the end of that summer, not only had I not started a theater company but I didn’t even have a job. I spent four painful, ego-shattering months pounding the pavement and being confounded by the fact that a Bachelor’s degree from one of the best universities in the country didn’t guarantee me gainful employment. Needless to say, New York City was not the city of bright lights and theater dreams come true that I expected it to be.
            After nailing down a job at a non-profit sexual health organization and falling into two production management gigs, I suffered from serious theater burn-out and subsequently took a year off, wondering if I really wanted to pursue a career in the arts.  By the spring of 2007, I had been at my dead-end day job for a bit more than a year, making little money, and dealing with a creative and moral depression that crippled me. On a suggestion, I decided to pursue volunteering and discovered a music project for children, ages 6-14, at a shelter on the Lower East Side. I had never worked with or overseen children and was panicked that I’d feel steamrolled by them.  However, I figured that volunteering twice a month wasn’t a very big time commitment, and I found encouragement in the subject matter, music being another serious passion of mine. It seemed a potentially ideal project, fulfilling a creative hunger I hadn’t been able to satisfy since graduating.
            My first day as a volunteer, I met a nine-year-old boy named Tyshawn. I sat down next to him and asked him his name, feeling slightly self-conscious and not really knowing what to expect. He was enthusiastic and hilarious and we spent the day working together. We went around the circle and told everyone our names and what our favorite kind of music was, pairing it with a gesture and sound that indicated that music style. When the project leader asked if anyone could recite each person’s name and repeat each person’s gesture, Tyshawn didn’t volunteer. However, when we took a break, he did it perfectly on his own.
The leader of the project had been a musical theater student and injected each class with opportunities for the children to be the centers of attention, to tap into their creativity in a very accessible and non-threatening way. This became an essential part of the project every week we gathered, and I continued to enforce it when I became a co-leader of the project in June. We set a high standard for participation in the class, asking our volunteers to work closely with the children to create songs, dances, or poems that they rehearsed and presented to the rest of the group.
            Tyshawn and I spent three weeks working as a duo. I learned that he liked writing. That he had a baby sister and an older brother. That he was turning 10 in July. I learned that I had a natural gift with kids. That they gravitated toward me, seemed to respect me, responded to me in a way that felt really special. I had fun with them; I learned from them; I was moved by them. It was an epiphany.
Summer holidays interrupted our bi-monthly meetings and I hadn’t seen Tyshawn for a couple weeks when I arrived at the shelter one week and discovered that the project had been cancelled that day. As I turned up the street to head back to the subway, Tyshawn was crossing. He saw me and bolted across, throwing his arms around me and yelling my name. I nearly burst into tears, realizing that I really had connected with him over the previous weeks. He dragged me back across the street and insisted I meet his mother, who wasn’t much older than I was and who was preoccupied with a baby in a stroller and having just lost her contact lens. She also didn’t seem to have any idea who I was, but Tyshawn introduced me as his “favorite teacher” anyway. The shelter was a transitional living situation for female victims of domestic abuse. Soon after this meeting on the street, Tyshawn stopped coming to class, and I can only hope that means he and his family found a more permanent living situation somewhere else.
 I co-led this project for almost six months before moving back to California where I prepared to enter grad school. Over the months, we introduced the kids to blues and rock n’roll; we sang Christmas carols with them; we tried to teach them about rhythm and rhyme. Every week, we led an introduction game, made a craft, broke up into groups and had them create pieces to perform at the end of the night. Every week, it was evident how important these gatherings were. I didn’t know anything about what these children’s lives were like outside our meetings, but I could tell their recreation time was important and special for them. They were being creative in ways I knew were different from what they were used to. They were working together in ways I knew were different from what they were used to, and they were being led by caring and patient adults in ways that I knew were different from what they were used to. Even more powerfully, they were working with young men who paid close attention to them, listened to them, and were gentle with them.
 Working with these children was educational to me in ways that I’m not sure I’ll be able to fully articulate until I have some more experience under my belt. They being the first children I ever worked with combined with the vulnerability and potency of their situations made the work such a heady and emotional experience. It planted the seed for my ultimate goal as a theatre teacher and artist: to establish an organization that will allow populations of children a creative outlet that they don’t have in any other capacity. Theatre, with its tenets of collaboration and expression, seems an essential medium for urban children, arguably our most vulnerable community. I want to foster the enthusiasm I saw in Tyshawn with kids just like him, and I hope he is somewhere continuing to express himself as he was able to do with us.

Friday, March 20, 2015

Overheard at Work, vol. CXVI

Happy Spring! (It's snowing.)

Super tough week over. Another big one next week.

It was one of those weeks when I wasn't sure what day it was, I was just kind of putt-putting along...On Tuesday, I couldn't believe it wasn't at LEAST Wednesday.

8-year-old boy: I'm not Mexican. But I do love tacos!

Colleague A, during a Jeopardy round for the kids: Who invented Facebook?
6-year-old boy: The Internet!

13-year-old girl, inspecting my mac and cheese with tuna: Is that tuna? My mom makes it the exact same way. That's that Haitian in you!

14-year-old boy: I remember Tom Sawyer from Everybody Loves Raymond!

(Our nation's future, ladies and gentlemen.)


Friday, March 13, 2015

Overheard at Work, vol. CXV

Trudging along.

Spring is near.

16-year-old boy, upon viewing my Tempting Trail Mix from Trader Joe's, which has pictures of cherubs on the bag: You're eating demon nuts!!

Me: Where have you been?
7-year-old boy: Oh! I can't because I got beat upped.

Me: What if I just took a bite out of your head?
9-year-old boy: It would taste bad.
Me: What do you think it would taste like?
Boy: Doo doo.

Colleague A: I want a cookie.
Me: Do I want my pizza or my sandwich for lunch?
Colleague A: Um. You want a cookie.

15-year-old boy, upon seeing that I follow Ludacris on Instagram: That's crazy. You follow Ludacris and you don't follow me?
Me: Ludacris is a grown man who has been around for like 20 years.
Boy: I've been rapping since 6 months! I came out saying, Yo yo!

13-year-old girl, giggling at something I didn't catch: I'm not laughing! It's the hormones!

Saturday, February 28, 2015

Overheard at Work, vol. CXIV

February vacation week and this past week both went smoothly, with no weather interruptions beyond a late start one day because of the cold.

I'm just counting down to Daylight Savings Time, now that I realized it's NEXT WEEKEND!

15-year-old boy: Your Blue Diamond Almonds are BOLD. They have no fear. They're just...out in the world.

Colleague A: My earlobes are stretched because I used to be a hood rat. Well. I'm still a hood rat.

10-year-old boy, commenting on a colleague's drawing: A warehouse? What kind of warehouse?
Me: ...your mom.

13-year-old girl, looking at the games on my phone: You like...Activia Crack?!

13-year-old girl: Why does she want you to wear a dress?
Me: Because she thinks I should be girlier.
Girl: That's better though! It's good to keep expectations low.

15-year-old girl: He said he's an OG. An old gangsta.

Me, to a 7-year-old girl: Your mind is fascinating. I wanna spend some time in there.
7-year-old girl: You are in my mind. In a gown. At a ball.

Sunday, February 15, 2015

Overheard at Work, vol. CXIII

Plenty has been written and posted and shared about what an insane winter Boston is having this year.

The club has closed three weeks in a row on Monday and sometimes on Tuesday. The MBTA has closed for at least one day every week for the last month. Currently, my blinds are open, my space heater is blasting, and the wind outside is so crazy, I fear for my windows.

The latest report is that we have had over 95 inches of snow this season.

It's the SNOWPOCALYPSE.

For reals.

13 year old girl, as I began to join her in song: This ain't no High School Musical, why are you joining in?

Me, to 13 year old girl: Why are you so mean to me?
Girl: Cuz I love you so much!

Colleague A: Seth is gonna be a staff here.
Me: Except he hates kids.
Colleague A: ...Perfect.

Colleague B, referring to our staff: We're dirty motherf*ckers.

Sunday, January 25, 2015

Overheard at Work, vol. CXII

It's been almost a month back in the grind since the holidays, which is kind of insane.

BASICALLY, it is ALREADY 2016!

8-year-old boy, explaining a confrontation with another boy:  He kicked me in my B-E-L-L-C-S.
(Not sure how he got there from B-A-L-L-S.)

Me: What are you doing?
Teenage boy: Anything with a heartbeat. JK.

I ran a teen acting program hour and we did an exercise where we interviewed each other, in pairs, and then condensed the information we gathered down to a haiku. Here is mine:

He sleeps, once dreaming
Of fighting fires. One day,
He'll study oceans.

13 year old girl, riffing on my habit of naming my 30s birthdays: 31-derful, 32-sday, 33-some...

Me, getting up, in a fit of activity: On to the next thing, on to the next thing, on to the next thing, on to the next thing, on to the next thing...
Coworker A: ...Annie broke.