get the hell out of the left lane

i am one of those people that goes from being extraordinarily polite (if i'm trying) to a crazy bitch within seconds; all i have to do is get behind the wheel of a car. i suffer from road rage.

for example:
when an idiot gets into the left lane because they like the view from there, or because they have no idea it's called the passing lane, and they definitely have no idea why i'm driving up their butt and flashing my brights behind them it - it agitates me. why? because it slows down not only my car, but every other idiots' car behind the asshole cruising on the left. it undermines the system created to make traffic f-l-o-w. i appreciate systems that work, and get annoyed when people don't use them properly.

if you are going at the same speed as the person to the right of you, then you have two choices: accelerate and drive ahead of them in their lane, OR drop behind them into their lane - but don't fuckin hold hands with them along the jersey turnpike. if i were a traffic cop, that's what i would ticket for.

rushing nowhere

i was running down into the subway station, carrying two grocery bags from zabar's - determined to make it onto the train that just pulled into 79th street. i rushed past one group of people meandering down the stairs, past another strolling toward the turn-styles but then got stuck behind an old lady unable to get her metrocard successfully swiped. she kept re-swiping over and over again as hoards of people exited the train and spilled through the remaining turn-styles, making it impossible for me to enter through any besides the one this old lady was blocking.

"la puta que me parió" i muttered quietly- and the moment i heard myself say the words, i was instantly ashamed. why was i so annoyed? apart from aggravating my o.c.d. for anything related to efficiency, what difference did it make if i got on this train or the next? sometimes i feel like this city turns me into a little ball of tension.

layers

as i was peeling layers of wallpaper off this wall last sunday it struck me as profound . each layer, superficially replacing the last, revealed something new - different care taken to install each, perhaps different families having occupied the space during these different periods marked by the varying patterns . i wondered what stories were buried inbetween these layers and what happened to them when i scraped them loose and let them fall to a pile on the floor. there's something very therapeutic about digging/scraping and exposing what's hidden underneath.

just like my mother

it occurred to me as i was proudly dragging my butt up to the fourth floor of school for the 6th time in one day (instead of taking the elevator) that this silly pride in taking the stairs came from somewhere. and then i remembered my mother mentioning that she made a point of taking the stairs at her school where she also taught spanish- it was her main source of exercise in her almost senior status.

the same is true for me - except that i am not a senior.
but i am, like my mother, a spanish teacher...

it's funny how women talk about not wanting to grow up to be like their mother, and inevitably end up doing exactly that.

there are many ways in which we are different - but i think there are times that i am not only like her, but am somehow channeling her; especially in the classroom when i raise my voice to a student in a way that says both "i love you" and "shut the %*#@ up" simultaneously.