Is It Normal?

I am so tired right now. I must be getting old. I ate too much last night, didn't drink close to the amount I used to at these wonderful dinner parties and have been bone dead tired all day. *sigh* It's hot and it takes too much energy to move...in any case...had a lovely dinner last night. We entertained a couple with young children. The evening was great, the company fabulous the conversation sparkling and the kids a delight. But by 10:30 p.m. I was ready to fall asleep. It's just not the same as it used to be...a bunch of twenty-somethings gathered around a make-shift table in the living room, plates piled high and balanced dangerously with bottles of beer and glasses of wine. Everyone eats, drinks, and talks too loud waaay into the night. Even those evenings are a far cry from the informal gatherings I would have as a barely twenty-something late at night after a dinner shift working at the restaurant...where chips and salsa and mixed drinks were the call of the hour and we'd go until dawn...

it must be the slowing down of old age and i don't really care for it

I hope my friends still invite me out when I have a small child. I hope that someday I will regain the power to stay up all night. I'm only afraid that by the day that comes, I'll be too old to enjoy it.

At least one thing hasn't changed. I still get the Sunday evening blues.

Day Two...

I have the Light Rail situation well in hand now. Whew! I am a person who can navigate, as long as I don't deviate from the norm, I'll be OK. I even managed to figure out the easy way to get home. Note to self...asking questions is not a sin.

Having figured the commute out, I was free to take note of my fellow passengers today. Why are we so afraid of silence? A large majority of the train passengers either are on their cell phones the entire ride, or are plugged into some kind of music device...mp3, iPod, even old school CD Walkman...I saw one kid yesterday who had some kind of large DVD looking player blaring the worst death/speed metal I have heard in ages...I almost asked who they were, I couldn't figure out why it was so bad...but I digress.

Silence. There is a lack of silence pervading our society today. Are the thoughts you think when you're alone rocking along with the morning commute or even walking across campus to your next class so frightful that they must be drowned out? Is there something wrong with simply enjoying the free flow of thought, or even of just listening to the sounds your feet make on the pavement? I do this all the time. Right now, I'm typing in silence, enjoying the click of the keyboard and capturing my thoughts. Don't get me wrong, I love music. There is a place for music and conversation. They both make life much more enjoyable. What troubles me is the dependence on outside sources to constantly fill our head spaces. In order to really enjoy a conversation or even really appreciate a piece of music, I think that every once in a while you have to live inside your own head. Get to know your own silence, embrace it.

Perhaps I'd feel different if I had an iPod. But for now, I will embrace my silent train ride and give my thoughts free reign for at least 15 minutes out of every day.

Back to the stacks of homework waiting for me. *sigh*

It was a day of many "firsts" for me, but I have managed to survive. The first day at SJSU. I am now a very small fish in a very large pond. No warm fuzzies from my professors, no "Glad to see you back" greetings from classmates, no knowing exactly where I am and where I am going. Nope. Just a load of first weekend back homework. And I signed up for this??

The other first was my trip to school. Living as close as I do, it just didn't make sense to pay $200 (!) for a parking pass that doesn't even guarantee a spot...and it takes 45 min to an hour to get that figured out...yikes! Included in the fees I have to pay already is a VTA pass. So, I get ride public transportation for "free" all semester long. whoo-hoo. Only thing that gave me pause was the fact that I have never ventured out on the San Jose public transit system. It's not that I've never ridden public transportation...I've done CalTrain, BART and even MUNI. I've ventured out in foreign countries. I'm not scared of public transport...it's just never made sense to me in San Jose. Also, I am addicted to driving my car. So, on to Light Rail. I wanted to do a "test run" as I am hopeless with spatial relationships. I have a really hard time telling my left from my right, let alone map reading and the whole compass rose thing. But everyone said it was too easy to get to SJSU. Hop on at the station close to home, hop off at Santa Clara and walk three short blocks and wham! I'm at school in half an hour or less. Yeah. So, I get on this morning just fine. I can at least tell which direction downtown is. I hop off at Santa Clara and walk three blocks. In the wrong direction. I should have known something was wrong when all the other backpack toting adults got off at the station before me. Great. I'm looking for a giant campus in the middle of town. I'm wandering...kind of in the right direction now...but can not figure out where I am. Really. I don't hang in downtown. If I do, it's at night, it's dark and there is alcohol involved. I'm useless at 11:00 am. Now I'm getting desperate. I'm worried I'm going to be late for class...a first day sin if ever there was one. It's getting warm, my back is getting sweaty from fear and a large black backpack, and I still don't know where the hell I'm going for sure. I am on the verge of tears (and of calling my poor long suffering husband for directions, not for the first time ever, but certainly for the first time while I'm on foot) when I stumble, almost by accident, onto the back side of the college. I was saved. All that was left was for me to navigate the "small" campus and get to class...sufficient to say I made it just in time. Good thing I gave myself an hour for all this scrabbling around.

I hope tomorrow goes better.