June 30th, 2001
No Title Given
I had a great hair day today. No particular reason for mentioning that. Was just that proud of it.
Got up early this morning, around 9:30. I needed to go to Germana Community College to get my transcripts for the Psychology courses I took during senior year. I was going to go by myself, and had set my own pace, but my father asked if he wanted me to go along. That basically meant he had invited himself, and I have to give him an estimate of time as to when I would be leaving. After I had taken a shower, I had wanted to go and tell him he didn’t need to come, but he had already gotten showered and dress and was pouring himself some coffee. It was then I noticed just how thin he has gotten… He’s lost about 50lbs, I would guess. He looked like he was wearing clothes that were two sizes too big, and his aged really showed. He almost seemed caring and nice in such a fragile condition, so I just decided to let him come. We went up to Germana in the scorching heat around 10:30, went into the building that was closest to us, and then asked for the lady that my mother had been told over the phone yesterday. We picked up the transcripts (both the school’s copy and my copy given to me – the school’s copy was supposed to mailed to the school. But oh well. Hopefully they won’t have a problem accepting such a letter so informally and on such sort notice.) On the way home, he brought up my recent report card. I’m not sure how the subject came up, but my father immediately started ripping to the fact that I got one F in a class. He couldn’t comment on the A’s I got, just as he never did. The only thing that ever caught his attention was an F, and he took it upon himself to confront me in such a hostile manner, repeating over and over “I wouldn’t show that report card to anybody.” That, of course, is in comparison to the number of people he showed my straight A report card to, which is zero. Zero is also the number he said he wished he could show the report card to. Zero is the number of comments he made about it at all. My parents are completely uninvolved in my school work until I screw up. Then, my father puts a foot in the door and starts screaming. I’ll never understand how he can’t understand the logic that if I do not get praise for doing good, I won’t have a problem with doing less. Seems as though if I can state that logic that I would be ahead of it… But I’m not. If I see them as thinking it’s not important, then I will treat it as unimportant. And even though I had A’s on that report card, he focused on the F. Even when I tried to show him I got two A’s in college classes, and my transcript read “Academic Honors”, he said the F would always outweigh such accomplishments. Sometimes I wish his fragile body would just collapse into dust.
Work was alright. I was talkative and probably a little annoying the entire evening. The major crisis was the cashier, James, who smelled so freaking rank I thought I would be sick. And the fact that you can detect a hint of man-perfume to try to cover up the smell just made my throat want to close. His shirt was dirty, too – with some yellowish like stains near the bottom of his shirt, where it usually would have been tucked into his pants. Yuck. He’s also the son of a woman I HATE who is a office manager of sorts. He greases his hair back to try to look slick, and talked about the dullest topics, which usually only include him and his friends. I used to joke around and talk with him until he started showing up to work smelling of putrid BO, something I cannot stand. Something that I usually tried to hold my breathe through the duration of when customers came through my line. But I couldn’t hold my breathe for 4 hours while he was working the register in front of me. It slowly went away. I even told Valerie about it, and we joked some… She had worse things to say about it than I did. She said she even talked to Dot about it, who is my boss, so to speak. Dot responded with, “I’ve never been that close.” You didn’t need to be that close. I don’t know how the customers could stand it. I told Chris about it, a bagger, and as he slowly went over to bag for James, I made eye contact with him and put my hand over my nose. He just stayed looking at me, then turned away.
With the 4th next week, a Wednesday, the schedule is completely packed. I know people will try to wiggle out of the schedule. I really have no problem with the schedule, as I have nothing planned. But the fact that I am work 39.5 hours is a little upsetting. I work 9 hours every day, Tuesday through Saturday, with the exception of Wednesday which I work 8 1/2. The 39.5 hour work week is assuming that I take an hour lunch every day. I think just to be snotty I’ll take 45 minutes every day so I’ll have a little bit of over time on my table. The only good part about working the schedule I do this week is because I will get holiday pay on Wednesday. Because I have worked there for more than a year (almost two) and because I meet the qualifications to get the holiday pay. You have to work the day before, the day of, and the day after in order to get holiday pay on the 4th. So dumb. Sucks for everyone else who CAN BE HOME. Ugh. It’ll be a $400 gross pay check… Probably my largest to date.
24 hours from now I will be somewhere in Radford, possibly still driving down there, or maybe in the hotel room asleep or awake, depending on how nervous I am. I am not looking forward to spending the night there on Sunday. I suppose it’ll serve as a good introduction to what college life will be really like, but I would rather sleep in MY room. Not just in a place with temporary strangers that I will have to talk to just to waste time. I’m a little nervous to be seeing the campus for the first time. I’ve heard it’s beautiful… I just hope to hell that the buildings aren’t old. Can’t stand old looking buildings from the inside, with their small hallways and tiny doorways that the average man has to duck to make it without knocking their forehead. Hell, maybe I can meet someone just tomorrow. I can’t wait to go to college… 8,000 people. At least a couple of them will be attracted to me. And hopefully I’ll return the gesture. I really want to meet someone. Have a normal relationship… Find out what it feels just to fall in love, without having to do it alone (Carl) or having to force myself into it just so that I can have the closest thing to it (Alan).