priority shift

A few minutes ago I found myself analyzing the final problem of my week-old geometry assignment, tingling with relief that I was almost done after attempting to complete it several times while I was delirious in my illness. The problem presented a rectangular prism, claiming that a fly and an ant dwelled in one corner while food resided in the opposite corner. The directions instructed me to first calculate the shortest distance the fly would have to flutter across this box it was entrapped within in order to arrive at the corner slathered with food. With the use of my elite spatial visualization skills, that part was easy enough to swallow. But when the same problem then asked me for the shortest distance the ant would have to crawl, then I started getting a little peeved. Ants walk in meandering spirals that dance in circles around whatever happens to get in their way, whether that be an ice cream truck or a small child trying to set fire to them. So, I decided to answer by saying that the ant could cling to the fly's back, since it was already on a journey to that end of the rectangular prism anyway.

You know that dog depicted on Looney Tunes? You know the one, the rabid one who's constantly chasing Foghorn Leghorn and yet never succeeds because at the last second he remembers he's wearing a leash and collar and soon finds his pudgy body defying science by being flung backwards through the air? Although Foghorn Leghorn annoys the fuck out of me with his dripping-of-hick ignorance, his entire ability to sidestep frothing jaws of doom reminds me of myself. You see, I possess a regrettable desire to be a smartass in the hope of spiting the school system, but because I never actually violate district code, I can't be punished for anything. Thus, the school system is very much like the said dog who is incapable of learning and always falls short of achieving his goal.

I don't know how people without vivid imaginations can stand to live with themselves. It's as though they're still mulling about in the 50s and haven't yet evolved into Technicolor.

Anyway, on Saturday I realized I was pretty much free from the clutches of the horrible sickness that befell me the Saturday beforehand. Resa called me around 7:30 p.m. that night and invited me over to watch a movie at her house, and I practically wet my pants at the thought of going outside, something I hadn't done in a week. I danced around my house and sang loudly, frolicking upstairs so that I could change into real clothes. Anyone that knows anything whatsoever about me knows this: I do not dance. Therefore, the fact that I was willing to dance and spin around my house tells you that I was absolutely consumed with bubbling happiness. My happiness increased by several notches when I was reminded of how I don't look like an inflated caterpillar with an eating disorder when I'm not bundled up in two or three comforters and actually wearing normal clothes, like the ones people wear when they're, you know, in public.

Resa and I ended up watching West Side Story and making immature jokes whenever serious plot complications arose. Before Saturday I held it to be self-evident that men should not, under any circumstances, wear tight pants. After seeing West Side Story, that belief has been strengthened. I also wondered why it was that, one minute, Maria was frantically praying to the virgin Mary in front of a small wooden shrine, and then less than five minutes later she was playing a far gone game of leapfrog with Tony.

The radical shift in priorities tickles me.