Frailty

I was robbed at gunpoint tonight while on an after school run.  They didn't get much from me - my key ring which is of absolutely no use to them and my old 2nd generation iPod Shuffle, but it was easily the most terrifying thing I've ever been through. With my back to the end of the pier and the barrel of a handgun pressed deep into my cheek I completely froze. I found myself without words and without motion. I couldn't think and could barely speak.  I stood there wide eyed and shaking, hands in the air just pleading with them and praying to God to leave me be. I couldn't create coherent phrases, but thoughts would fly through my head like lightning and then proceed to leave even quicker.  All I remember thinking is, "This is it. They're going take what I have, be mad that it's not worth a damn thing and shoot me right here." I honestly thought that this would be how it ended - on a nondescript Friday evening that up until that point had gone like so many others before it.  

As I stood there, it wasn't memories of my life that flashed before my eyes, all I could think of was how I might not ever see or talk to my family again.  I thought about how none of this made sense, about how this was all just a bad coincidence, a terrible case of wrong place at the wrong time - but still, just because I ended up where they happened to be didn't mean that I deserved what I was getting.  Yet, none of that mattered.  All I had done in life prior to right then meant nothing. This wasn't some rational situation where pleas could be heard or decency was given a second thought, for the first time in my life, my existence directly depended upon whether or not someone else thought my life was worth ending.  That scared me at that very moment, and still does right now.

With seven guys around me, there wasn't anything I could do to save myself; it was up to them. After a seemingly endless number of moments had passed filled with threats of death they told me to turn around and go back to the end of the pier. For a second I couldn't believe that I was just going to be able to walk away unharmed, but then I thought that the second I turned around they'd most likely just shoot me.  I mean, I couldn't ever even fathom what kind of cowardice it would take to take to shoot another human in cold blood, but I can imagine that it'd be a whole hell of a lot harder if that person were looking you square in the face. These people were cowards, so the thought that he would pull the trigger with my back turned suddenly became more of a threat in my mind than having that gun in my face. Every step I took back towards the end of the pier I kind of thought it would be my last.  After fifteen or so seconds, I turned my head to see what to expect, if anything, and I could just make out the silhouettes of them running down the pier.  

Unharmed, I stood at the end of the pier for about 15 minutes just waiting for someone else to walk down there, but no one did.  So, I made what was probably the longest half mile walk of my life. Every bird that would fly overhead would startle me, every shape in the distance made me cringe, I was paranoid of whoever might be waiting behind each and every transformer box -  I guess I was just expecting them to come back. Nearing the shore, I came across a few people making their way down the pier for a walk - all of whom I was scared would be them. I even tried to tell one guy to not walk out there, but half way through my sentence I stopped talking because I was afraid that they'd be waiting ahead in the shadows ready to remind me of their threats had I decided to tell anyone.

Everything turned out to be fine though. Surprisingly, I wasn't harmed physically, but I fear that the psychological repercussions might take their toll. It's a big city, but at the same time it's a small world, and with that I can already feel a sense of paranoia and fear growing inside of me.  What if I get on the same bus as them or what if I run into one of them at the convenience store? I've immediately gone from having a free sense of general safety and security to wondering if I'll even feel comfortable walking home from the bus stop at night.  Life, and the perception we have of it, changes quickly. I was fortunate. Regardless of what they threatened or what material objects they took from me I truly believe that God kept me safe. He has a purpose for me still and tonight wasn't meant to be my last night here.  I just hope I can continue to live life how I know it should be lived - not under a blanket of fear. I'm still alive now to live another day, so here's to tomorrow.

What I'm Listening To: Beck - Go It Alone

Miles Biked: 0 / 586.2 

mcfly

There's nothing more awkward than watching people who have no business running doing an all out sprint while trying to catch the bus.  I see women in high heals, the morbidly obese, the elderly, the semi-handicapped and the homeless realize that they're across the street as the bus starts getting nearer.  In an all out panic they do their best to scamper across the street and dash towards the bus before it begins pulling away without them there.  It can be quite pathetic and still strangely funny at the same time.  I guess it has a strange sense of awkwardness attached to it as well, there's something about watching them run after the bus as it begins pulling away and being completely helpless to do anything about it, just sit there in your window seat and enjoy the show.

It's going to be a pretty big push to get things done in the next few weeks.  I have exactly a week from today to prepare a thesis presentation for my committee, then I'm off to Oregon for two days, then it's a solid three days of long working days until presenting final studio presentations on Wednesday, before leaving for Japan on Thursday.  Also, probably within this time frame, I will need to do laundry for the trip, make my way into the city to purchase a Japan Rail pass, and maybe make it over to Target or REI to pick up a few travel items. 

What I'm Listening To: Damien Rice - Grey Room

Miles Biked: 0 / 586.2

Up and inOur studio professor excused us for an hour during studio time to head down to the College of Environmental Design 2010 Career Fair.  Although none of us are in any kind of position to be seriously looking for work, I was still interested to see how many firms and which ones had shown up.  The bad thing is, all firms that were present were heavily rooted in architecture - it's not really at all what I'm looking for at all.  The sad thing is, there was only about 12 firms there and I doubt any of them were really looking to offer people jobs.  If this is where the design job market is now, where is it going to be in six months?  Better? Hopefully?  Anyhow, not all was lost - I did get a free bit size Snicker's bar out of it, and I didn't even have to talk to anyone.

I feel better about studio now that we had a group discussion with Peter (the studio instructor) about where we're going next.  He's letting us pick through our project site and seek out things we want to accomplish and things that we're interested in learning more about or have special interest in. So, I get  to focus on a few things landscape related and a few fun things that deal with the whole architectural aspect - which I can't say I'm entirely comfortable with at this point.  I'd be fine with it if I felt I had a bit more time to learn about what I'm supposed to do with it.  Between now and this being due, I also have a thesis presentation to give, so I don't really have a lot of time to toy around with meticulous ideas and have them shot down for not even being plausible.  I'll probably just have to play it safe and go with simpler ideas that I know will work.

What I'm Listening To: Alkaline Trio - Piss and Vinegar

Miles Biked: 5.2 / 591.4

1911>2010

I fell asleep sometime around 9:00 and I woke up at 11:00 PM and must have slept so soundly for those two hours that I thought it was 11:00 AM this morning.  I sat up in bed, even started looking for a pair of socks, before I realized it was completely dark still. It took me a minute to figure out that there's no way it could be that dark outside an hour shy of noon.  Anyways, it didn't take me long to convince myself that I was fine getting back in bed.

I had a pretty busy day planned out; mostly things that I haven't had any time to do over the past week or more.  I was hoping to get more school work done, but it didn't quite pan out. Anyways, I did get plenty of other things done: I did all my laundry, did some grocery shopping, I picked up my suits from the Men's Warehouse (as well as two shirts and two ties), hit up the BevMo 5 cent wine sale, did some banking, and even made my way down to campus to print out a historic photo of Doe Library and then proceeded to go the library with photo in hand to re-shoot the same scene for my Visual Studies class.

The exercise was a bit nerve racking.  When I chose this site for my re-photography project, I didn't quite know that the location was a reading room.  I just kind of thought it was a library where people would be milling about.  But, instead this was a place of complete and utter silence.  It was a few tense moments of standing there with my camera in one hand and a torn in half photo in the other trying to align the contents of the photo up with what was currently existing in the room and then trying capture that scene with my camera. With every shutter click I could just feel dozens of once reading eyes now focused upon me.  

I have to admit, the suits I picked up are pretty sharp.  Now, I just need a reason to actually wear them. Men's Warehouse was having a buy one suit, get the second for $100, so I figured with the wedding and the potential to someday again landing a job that was worthy of a suit for either an interview or  client meetings, having two suits wouldn't be a bad investment.  I think I'll put the over/under on the amount of times I wear both suits at about 4.  I might just have to start wearing them on Thursdays just to get my money's worth.

What I'm Listening To: Straylight Run - Who Will Save Us Now

Miles Biked: 0 / 586.2

Long Time Coming

Since I got home at 5:00 AM, I ended up getting to bed at around 5:01.  I slept like a rock until about 10:30 and got up to head back to school for 12:30 class.  In hindsight, I should have stayed in bed and got a little more sleep. When I rolled out of bed it felt like I got hit by a dump truck.  I don't think I've felt quite this bad waking up in quite some time. One of my classmates equated the feeling to being immensely worse than waking up with the worst hang over - and I'd agree. Everything hurts; your muscles, bones, eyes, teeth, joints, hair ... you name it, it hurts.

The reviews went well today.  It was surprisingly calm and productive, much unlike all the reviews from last semester.  I felt like our presentation went really well and we got a lot of productive and positive feedback.  I'm a little nervous moving forward with the next stage of the project since it's now on to individual work.  We set ourselves up pretty well to move forward with the next step, but a lot of that work is going to entail working with specific architectural forms; something I'm not really all that familiar with.  I think this is when that steep learning curve really hits for the landscape architecture students pursuing urban design.  Somehow, I've got a week and a half to figure out how different building typologies work, at least spacially, and make them fit a specific look and use. It's going to be fun.

It's a little after 8:30 PM, and I'm just completely worn out.  I got home, had dinner, went for a photowalk, took a shower and watched a little bit of 30 Rock - the best show going right now - and now I think it's time to get in bed and watch TV 'til I fall asleep.

What I'm Listening To: Tom Petty - American Girl

Miles Biked: 0 / 586.2

Big Brother

It was a rainy morning, which was a slight pain.  I drove down to Lake Merritt for church and almost got lost.  I don't really know my way around the area, and it can get slightly confusing since there's a giant lake right in the middle and if you miss your turn you end up going who knows where else.  My usual turn was being worked on by CalTrans, so I had to find another route.  The other route turned me around so much I had no idea where I even was.  Luckily enough I saw a familiar corner store just before I was about to give up and go home and was able to navigate the rest of the way.  I parked a couple of blocks over and ran through the rain in a mostly futile attempt to stay dry, and when I walked inside the door, the usher who was handing out the announcement flier looks at me and asks,"can I help you?"  I was taken aback and just kind of stared at him with a "are you serious?" kind of glare and just told him I was here for the bible study.  What kind of stupid question is that.  How many people show up at 9:00 AM to a church, who has service at 9:00 AM, for some other reason than to attend the service?  I found it to be slightly rude and a bit short sighted on his part.

The nice thing about Sundays and studio work is that I can drive my car down towards campus and park on the street for free.  On a rainy day like this, especially one where I just know I'm going to be there late, it makes a lot of things much better.  I was able to find a pretty awesome parking space not far from Wurster Hall and was able to leave it there until I left in the morning - at about ten minutes 'til 5:00.

At a certain point in the evening, our group's list of things to accomplish started getting smaller and smaller.  Some of that being through work getting done and some of it due to a realization that we weren't going to get it all done and somethings weren't as important as we had originally strived for.  We ended up with far more work to show than I would have thought we would - and a lot of it looked really good.  I was a little nervous about presenting what I thought we would have, but now I'm more than confident the review will go well.  

What I'm Listening To: Taking Back Sunday - Little Devotional

Miles Biked: 0 / 586.2

Re-Cast as a ShadowAs expected, most of the night was a monotonous exercise in graphic diagrams.  I spent most of the night in studio, along with a majority of my classmates, laboring over the details of our project.  It was a start contrast in liveliness and fun when I compared this late night studio session with so many that happened last semester. Maybe people are enjoying the project more this semester, maybe it's the group work, or maybe it's just that last semester's studio load and guilt laden expectations just brought everyone down and left them in a late night trance of deep depression and silent working.  Whatever the cause, it's actually nice to be able to work late in studio and have people around making light conversation and making the most of the given circumstance.

We all worked until about 11:30 PM, I think more people had the idea of working later, but I probably spoiled their expectations by bringing beer and wine back to studio to celebrate Mishkat's birthday.  Not only did people stop working for about 30 minutes to sit around and socialize, but a majority of the people seemed to decide that there was little chance of them sticking around to do work after a few drinks.  I felt the same way.

I did head back down towards the marina though, there's a bunch of old warehouses down there that are prime for exploratory photography sessions.  It's a bit nerve wracking down there.  It's mostly dark and empty, aside from a few random cars and transients wandering about.  It kind of makes me re-think the entire thing when a car drives by slowly and I'm not really sure what's going on, but I don't ever really feel too unsafe around here.  Even a lot of the crazy homeless people seem to be pretty nice.  Anyways, in the midst of all these dark streets, this body shop had a bright spotlight that cast the longest shadows I've ever seen after sundown.

What I'm Listening To: The Postal Service - Nothing Better

Miles Biked: 5.2 / 586.6