Tuesday, May 09, 2006
The Youth Gone by
After some 2-day festive celebration of the end of the semester - as well as the end of my coursework process at grad school if not for the rest of my life - I'm here after 8 hours of sleep, contemplating about what to do next.A ton of work awaiting me to start, staring at my face so hard that I can't flee from its presence. "Read me read me!" "Dissect me, deconstruct me!" "Digest me and learn from me and write about me!" ... I can just hear those 30+ number of books sitting in the corner calling out for my attention.
Not now please, not now. Give me another half an hour. Even if I'll have to pay for that later.
Oh gosh, it's finals time again.
And "oh gosh" x 2 - I have 5 papers to write.
*****
I went to Fenway on Saturday. Red Sox vs. Orioles, 9-3, the Sox won. Granted that I've never been a diehard baseball fan or any type of sports fan by any means, I was more excited about the game than other times. F dragged me to City Sports to buy a $15 t-shirt that reads "Red Sox Girl (line 1)/Enough Said (line 2)" and had me put it on right there in the fitting room. I rolled my eyes for the 5th time by then, although I promised not to turn that $15 t-shirt into the new summer PJ.
Except that before we got off at Part St. for a transfer, I already spilled orange-apple juice on my brand new shirt. Later I also went home discovering a few more ketchup marks. Gosh, I thought I've long passed the infant stage.
It was a fun game, fun esp. for someone like me who's there more for the atmosphere and cultural learning experience than for the game itself. Although it really wasn't a bad game at all. The Sox scored 5 pts in 2nd inning alone and did well overall throughout the rest of the game. I think whoever decided to install the 7th-inning stretching tradition was ingenious. B/c by the 7th inning I indeed was getting progressively bored after the scored had remained stagnant for 3 innings in a roll. Although it was also cool to see how I wasn't alone in the process of thinking about what to do next - to take a nap on the plastic chair, to go out and get another slice of pizza, or to start making some catch-up phone calls on the cell - as some folks in the crowd decided to entertain themselves with a corporate beachball-bouncing contest, which eventually invited more unpleasant yelling and cussing even. All this testosterone in the air ... Who says that mankind has been civilized?
And why aren't there women's players on any of the baseball teams in the U.S. (or the world even)? And no women's World Series? I didn't even realize that the World Series is men-only in the first place. Although since the feminists have most definitely contested that area, I'm not gonna bother to go there.
Leaving Fenway at 10:20 pm, I found myself the minimal few who were in a rush to get home. Never realized that the biggest clubbing scene in Boston is right by the stadium, and I still don't know how those girls were able to endure the 45-degree evening chill with mini-skirts and spaghetti-strap tank tops on. So many people standing in line with so much drinking, smoking, flirting, and the eager anticipation for a long night of carnival and decadent partying. F and I pushed through the crowd, walked past the bars and cafes still packed with exhilarated night owls, and at last arrived at the quieter side of the Commonwealth Ave.
"Why didn't we stay and join the partying crowd for a drink?" I asked, having left the Fenway craze behind?
"I don't know," F shrugged. He's not even a clubbing type to begin with.
At that moment, I realized that I'm in such a different stage in life now. Though occasionally yearning for some fun and rigorous festivity, what fill my head most of the time are the books, the papers, the academic discourse, the debates/questions/issues unfinished, unanswered, unresolved. I need to go home 'cuz I'm cold and am dressed too conservatively for the clubbing boys and girls anyway. I need to go home 'cuz I wanna make sure I can catch the last bus home as I'm too poor to haul a cab. I need to go home 'cuz I need to send out that email written half-way b/c I need to be responsible. I need to go home 'cuz I still have stuff scheduled for the next day and some prep work is needed.
Seeing the #1 bus slowly pulling itself down Mass Ave from afar, F and I quickened our footsteps and jaywalked across the st., almost got majorly booed by a car full of college kids nearby. A few mins later, the #1 bus rushed past us, leaving us and a few other passengers standing in awe on the sidewalk.
Darn that bus driver, I wanted to yell. You think the bus was too full to pick up a few more passengers? You better never to visit China or any of the developing world.
"I hate Boston, F" I said at last. "With a passion." I don't care if this city has supported a World-Serious-winner baseball team that continues to feed on to its city residents' pride. If this city doesn't know how to transport the stadium-packed amount of people back home after the game is over, and if the city continues to run a transportation system that boasts for sporadic time schedules and token-machines that are "out of order" 24-7, this city ain't gonna win my love and pride.
So were my thoughts, shivering along with my cold body as F and I slowly walked towards Newbury St., banking on the hope that the next bus won't pass us by again.
梅ちゃん at 1:55:00 AM