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MINUTES six short memories by Kathryn Belongia
preface Minutes tells true stories that have taken place over the last few months--in increments of only a few moments at a time. All are told by me, and seldom do they relate to each other. Honestly I don’t have that kind of attention span or capability of producing a long and seemless body of work. I hope you enjoy it. Please note: 1. October 16 and The Poem I Couldn’t Bare to Write do not center around the same person. 2. I haven’t really proof-read any of this, and I’m not sorry for any profanities, spelling, or grammar mistakes. 3. The Poem I Can’t Bare to Write is not written in the past tense. 4. The photograph on the cover was taken by me three summers ago in Beijing, China. And it really has nothing to do with anything unless you would like it to. 5. And it wasn’t my period causing problems in Sick at School so you can forget about that diagonosis. 6. Questions ending with a period are my way of showing they are hypothetical. Most of the time appearing when I am thinking to myself.
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Sick at School
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navigate these are some things I remember.
Old Man on the Bus Texting with Friends Washing the Duvet Sick at School October 16 The Poem I Can’t Bare to Write
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Old Man on the Bus My umbrella. Forget it. I am not missing this bus. I am not missing this bus, if it means walking a block under the pitter pattery rain that defines this very morning. I make my way down the stairs. The stairs are carpeted; they picked blue. The colour matches with nothing, and the sound-of-impact-absorbedness makes walking down the stairs all too muted. Everything in this entire building is quiet and carpeted. Nothing is comfortable. The couch in our living room is made of fake leather. Or whatever it is, makes sitting down extremely awakening in a bad way--visiting bare legs are greeted with a platter of cold and really unnerving sensations---the opposite of what a couch is supposed to greet you with. I push open the door and step outside for the first time today, while simultaneously checking the time on my phone. I’m early. The bus is also early. It’s waiting on the corner at a stoplight, which is now turning green; waiting for me to catch it, snatch it up, ah-ha! I have you now. The driver sees me. I can feel all faces and eyes on the bus looking at me, watching me cross the street, get on the bus, sit down in a window seat near the front. I wonder what these strangers think of me, my hair, what I’m wearing, or if any of them care at all. Time goes by and I’m thinking about nothing, really. I stare off into the limited viewing distance; shops and houses pass by slowly, I watch people in cars talking. I can see you, can you see me? Oop, look ahead. The bus makes a stop; it’s almost filled in here now. I notice an old man is making his way down the aisle in my general direction. He’s heavier-set. He’s going to sit next to me, I know it. I skootch over getting closer to my window in an attempt to make room, but not really going anywhere at all. He’s holding too many things. He lowers himself into the tiny neighbouring fabricated bus seat, adjusting his things. The most important of these probably being his cane. I’m watching his every move but facing down towards my phone held in my lap. No one knows. He’s carrying with him a big plastic bag with stuff in it; maybe there are two bags. He might have had an umbrella too, I can’t remember. Oh, I remember thinking to myself, He thought ahead, checked the weather. He did have an umbrella.
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The old man smells like skin, and is wearing a cute hat, the kind in which I cannot recall it’s proper hat kind name. He spends the next few seconds both adjusting his larger self and the things he is carrying most important being his cane. I begin studying his left hand. It’s closest to me, holding up the newspaper he’s started to read. People read the newspaper, you know. The skin of his hand looks tight, like whatever flesh is hiding underneath his hand skin is trying to get out. It’s tanned and covered with freckles. It’s actually kind of cute. I’m taller than he is in the seat. Maybe we are the same height; it’s hard to tell when sitting. The side of his coat body is touching the side of my coat body pretty evenly. For some reason this doesn’t bother me at all. This man could be my grandpa. My adorable wide-set grandpa and I are riding the bus together. We’re going to my school. I’m going to show him around and tell him all about the artwork I make and where I like to go to write about when him and I sit on the bus together. My stop is coming up next. That was too fast! He just got comfortable! I should’ve been paying attention. Should have got up and stood and gave him my seat before he sat down. I could have made things easier. “Excuse me”, I say to my grandfather that is temporary. “Oh!” He is delightful and gets up quicker than I expect him to be able to. For a second we are both standing; I compare how tall we are to each other. I am taller. A randomly selected group of people that includes myself descend from the exits of the bus like cattle. I didn’t get a chance to say goodbye. I will never see you again in my whole life. For the remainder of the walk to school I write down everything that just happened in my notebook, the most important being this old man and his cane that he doesn’t know what to do with because I was sitting there.
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Texting with Friends
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did they put u in da cornr did u hav 2 wear a hat did they, hit u 4 THEY MADE ME WEAR 5 5 HATS!!! :( 1. Screen printing screen. 2. All Senior Meeting - a discussion about thesis space 3. This is a lie. 4. I am trying to lighten things up. 5. He’s taken the bait to lighten things up, and rolls with it.
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it was like abu graib wuuuuuhhhhh no WAI not 6 ABOO who day 7 omggggg GOOGLE and you will KNOW it was basically like my little pony except my little holocaust nate >:( 8 Oh oh wait <:( 9 is that me with a dunce cap? u tell me 10 thats me with a dunce cap from like a dogs point of view.
6. What? No way. Not that guy. 7. Who is that? I have no idea who he is referring to. 8. I google Abu Graib, and become extremely distraught. 9. I am imitating what I saw Abu looked like. 10. It wasnâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t meant to be, but I am not opposed to the idea.
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lololol 11 ˚_˚
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,_, !_! (.-.) upside down 13 (‘__’) T_T torture
.____________________o x___x ded
OH MY GOD i just laughed out loud SO HARD on the bus hahaha :0 C===3 14
11. I imagine that I am a dog looking up. 12. He is obviously initiating a new rule in which we can only converse via characters assembled to look like faces. 13. This was an accident but I liked the way it looked. 14. Looks like a character penis about to enter a mouth.
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:0C===3 15 AHHHahHaha 16 :===3 17 Hahahah :3 18 OMGggd :3
nate I did thy one already 19 I DID THY ONE
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15. The character penis is within close proximity of the mouth. 16. I find this hilarious and uncomfortable at the same time. 17. It is in the mouth. 18. Now the whole thing; I feel like a 13 year old boy texting. 19. Autocorrect has changed “that” to “thy” and it is funny.
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Washing the Duvet I went downstairs to check out how disgusting my room would be this time. I knew it’d be disgusting. The last time I was home, I don’t know, was well over two months ago. And it’s not like it’s really my room anymore, it’s more of like a guest bedroom. Everything’s relatively new: the drywall, carpeting, this bed and the sheets, the television. It’s Thanksgiving break. I’m at my parent’s house and my designated sleeping area is in the basement with all the-“Ahhhhhhmmyyyy gawwwdddd!!” There are fucking spiders everywhere. I’m so, ohhhhh I just have shivers everywhere. I’m so happy I still have my boots on. I tip-toe through the doorway anyways, across the basement and up the stairs. I’m so pissed. “Whaaaaaatttt?! Whooooo sleeps down there? There are, OHMIGOD, spiders EVERYWHERE!” I don’t even know who’s listening to me. I’m kind of yelling into the air in the kitchen to anyone who will listen. I know I must sound stupid and with my voice and just the way I sound I know I sound like straight out of an angry 80’s sitcom where I play the deranged valley-girl-esk older sister. My mother and step dad are chilling on the couch watching the news. They don’t say anything. They look in my direction and shoulders are shrug but I am invisible and this is unacceptable. “HEY I’m washing the bed sheets.” “Why?” “Are you kidding? That room is disgusting? Who sleeps down there?!” Everything I say now is in the form of a question. “Your beautiful sister sleeps down there.” My mom actually says this. I don’t know how I’m supposed to go about reacting. What? I look at her while crinkling my nose and tilting my head slightly to one side. She’s giggling at me. My stepdad watches TV. “Oh my god.” I storm away from them, heading back downstairs. Does she really sleep down there? It doesn’t matter. I’m definitely going to wash them all,
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right now. It’s happening. When I get to the bedroom, everything feels smaller. I notice just how short the ceiling is. The spiders, are closer to my head. I grab the blanket and start unbuttoning the covering. There are so many buttons. Why is this so difficult? I take the giant fluffy white inside of the blanket, bunch it into a ball form the best I can and put it on the wooden chair that’s sitting right next to the bed. I take their cases off and stack the pillows on top of the white inside of the blanket I just gut. I throw everything into the washing machine around the corner, feeling better but not really. Gross. I walk upstairs. My mom’s doing dishes. “I’m washing the bed sheets.” “What.” “I told you, I said ‘I’m washing the sheets’, they’re in the wash right now.” “Oh my god” She turns the water off, her head turned around staring at me. In the most serious voice she says, “Where’s the doo-vayyy.” “The what.” “Oh my god, the doooo-vayyyyy!!” I have no idea what that is. “I have no idea what that is. The shiny blanket?!” I start kind of laughing. The way she says that word is just so funny to me. Like it sounds so formal--“The doooo-vayyyyy!!” She scrambles down the stairs and I run after her giggling. I yell again, “WHAT ISSS THAAT?!” I’m laughing out loud now and I can actually feel that my laughter is taunting her but I am not doing that on purpose. She opens the washing machine and frantically lifts through the pillowcases and the now heavily soaked blanket covering. “Where is it.” “Where is what.” “Oh my god Kate, the dooo-vayyy.”
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“Okay, haha, I don’t know what that is. Are you talking about the shiny blanket? That’s it!” She looks at me, dumbfounded then says looking down at the covering, “...the white part...” “Oh! It’s in the room. I didn’t wash the white part, Mom!” Of course I didn’t wash white part, duh. “Do you think I’m a iddddiot?” I say “a idiot” because my mom always uses “a” instead of “an” in front of words that start with vowels, the most common phrase being, ‘a idiot’. For example, driving in the car with her, ‘Look at this guy, he’s driving like a idiot.” Like, who says that? Gets me every time. Her eyes bulge out at me when I say that. I open my mouth really wide with a huge smile because I think it’s funny she’s realized she’s now mad for no reason. She lifts her hands and grabs my face and kind of gives my head a shake. Her hands are soaking from the dishes, from the washing machine suds. She starts lightly screaming in an exhausted kind of way, when you’re imitating a scream because you’re so annoying but relieved at the same time. I start screaming like that, too. She makes me show her the white blanket, and where it is presently, like she needs proof that it’s actually not tucked deep inside the washing machine and she just somehow missed it. “So the white part, that’s the duvet?” (I later discovered this is a French word). “Uh, yah, duh.” “Who saaayyys that?” I laugh again. “The dooooo-vayyyyy! Ohhh my gawwwdd, did you wash, the dooOoovaayyYy?!?!” She looks at me, turns around and goes back upstairs. And I can’t believe any of this.
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duvet n. A quilt, usually with a washable cover, that may be used in place of a bedspread and top sheet.
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Sick at School Oh I’m so warm, I never want to move. I should go home. I wish I were at home. Why did I even leave my bed this morning. I wish I were at home. My body is occupying our little black couch in the design department. I’m lying on my side. My scarf ‘s covering my face, sweater on my legs. I raise my left hand and tug on the top of it letting the florescent light seep but it doesn’t seep and this terrible light blinds me and I immediately regret this decision to lower the light shield. Oh, ouch. Ouch. What the fuck. I make one move and my stomach or possibly lower than my stomach; whatever is down there is hurting. I just lie there. I don’t say anything to anyone. I’m just so warm I don’t want to move. Maybe it’ll go anyway. People are starting to migrate into here, surrounding the couch. No. Go away. I get up and quietly walk like I just broke my water over to the couch on the opposite side of the room and no one is there. This couch is shorter in length than the one I travelled from and I have to curl my knees to my stomach just to fit on it. I need to go home now. I reach into my pocket feeling around for my phone so I can call my mother. It’s ringing. She’ll come get me. Wherever she is, it doesn’t matter. I’m sick at school. Come get me, I don’t feel good. She answers, “Heyyyaaa”. I’m about to say something like, just come pick me up. But right when the words are on the tip of my tongue I can hear more and people coming in, just a few feet away from me now. I don’t want to seem weird. I mean I’m already on this couch facing the wall curled in a ball is this normal? Do people even notice? Can they feel my negative vibes and that’s why no one is over here taking care of me? “Helllloooo???” she says, so confused why I’m not saying anything. I just, barely whisper into the phone. There’s less voice audio in this whisper, there’s so much more air---I’m sending her a message through le telephono like a gentle breeze in the summer air. “can you come pick me up”
“Hello? What?” “pick me up. i’m at school. my stomach.”
“What? I can’t heeear you. What?!”
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I move my phone from my ear to right in front of my nose and press the End Call button. I send my mom this exact text message:
She doesn’t know how to text back. My mom told me once that she can totally see it if you send her a text, but it’s a one time deal. She is literally incapable of retaining the knowledge that deals with locating the inbox on her AT&T flip phone that hasn’t been updated in probably over four years. I lay there still for a minute, all hope is lost. A second later she calls me back. “Yeah. I gotta run down by your sister for the FAFSA and then I’ll swing by and pick ya up.” “thanks.”
“In an hour. Bye.” I should feel relieved but I don’t. I feel unsatisfied and horrible at the same time. I feel like that guy in the movie Alien at the dinner table right when he’s getting those stomach pains and everyone’s trying to help him ‘What’s the matter?!’ then a disgusting alien comes ripping out of his chest and then he dies. But no one’s helping me. Just please leave me alone. I want to be invisible. But what if I start to feel better? And right when she gets here she’s going to call and I’m going to answer, “Are you here?” and she’ll reply, “Yahhh, I’m outssiiide”. And I’ll say “Nevermind, I’m sorry, I don’t need the taxi right now I’m sorry” and she will so pissed. That will not happen. If anything and I start to feel remotely better then I’ll just fake it! Yeah. Oufff. What is happening. I want to be at home. I wish again that I had never left home in the first place. That was stupid. The next time I’m at home and don’t want to go to school I’m going to go with my gut instinct, for sure. Some time passes. Ten minutes maybe, but it feels like forever. I’m in a
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stomach-achy daze. Oh no. I totally have class starting in like five minutes. There are so many people in the studios now. Hustling and bustling, getting ready for class! Fuck. What’s making this situation worse is we have class in the studios. Right there, five feet away. Once class starts, we all heard over to that table like a bunch of cattle. I can’t stay here, that would be weird. And I can’t leave now; I can hear my teacher. She’ll see me. She’ll think I’m just being lazy. I am lazy. I manage to sit up. I’m honestly feeling a little better, but not really. I wish someone had told me at that very moment, Mind Over Matter! I love that phrase. I just wish like a little elf would have just popped up from around the corner and then look at me so cute and just be like, Hey, Mind Over Matter! And I will be like, yeah! And the elf will leave and then I’ll feel better but not feel better but be able to walk through the motions of feeling normal again. I walk over to the table and claim a stool of my own. Teacher starts talking. I can’t think about anything but my stomach and how out-of-it I feel... My phone starts to vibrate. I look at it, Mom it says. I think for a second. Mom’s calling me. Mom’s calling me. Shiiiit! I can’t believe this. I forgot I had class. I forgot I called her like the little baby that I am and told her to pick me up. I get up and walk around the corner into the hallway. “Hello?”
“Hello? I’m here, I had to pee I’m going to tha bathroom.” “Okay I’ll be right down.”
I sneak back in the studios around the back way, over to my desk, grabbing my backpack, coat. I just leave. I’ll email her later. Once I get outside I see our car and walk over to it. I open the door, place my stuff on the floor of the passenger’s seat and sit down. “Where do you need to go?” My mom says. She’s so nice to me. I can’t believe she’s here. I can’t believe I just left class. I can feel the tears coming. I put both hands over my face and start sobbing quietly. I feel terribly depressed but so happy that she’s here now. Mom to the rescue. It was the worst day but now it seemed manageable.
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Bibliography Belongia, Kathryn M., and Nathan Pyper. Message Inbox. 18 Nov. 2011. Raw data. My iPhone, Milwaukee. Belongia, Victoria K. “Washing the Duvet.” Interview by Kathryn M. Belongia. 8 Dec. 2011 “Duvet: Definition from Answers.com.” Answers.com: Wiki Q&A Combined with Free Online Dictionary, Thesaurus, and Encyclopedias. Web. 11 Dec. 2011. <http://www.answers.com/topic/duvet>.
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Here’s the place in the book I saved for you. Actually it was that other page. But look, I put the bibliography over there, because that’s more important. You don’t even get a folio Just this plain grey page, all to yourself. I was going to write a poem about us. A freaking poem About the terrible way you make me feel But you make me sick to my stomach so, I’m not going to do that. You’ll never see this. An indescribable pain.
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