Saturday, January 29, 2011

Blog Place 2

It’s 2 a.m. on a Saturday. It smells like nature just threw up. This isn’t what nature is supposed to smell like. I’m pretty sure someone just vomited somewhere. I just can’t seem to find it. I was hoping to see if I can be at this place when it’s completely dark, but I forgot I lived in the city. No place is completely dark. I can’t even see the stars. It’s just blackish with a hint of orange/gray mist, which I think is pollution.  Oh is it the reflection from all the lights coming from Pittsburgh? I should look this up. I see other footsteps. A couple of people were here right before I came.
It’s freezing right now. I should’ve dressed for the occasion. I’m usually running to this spot with sweat coming down my face. Now I want to cry ice cubes from my eyes. I closed my eyes to hear the wind, but I can’t help to hear the cars driving and making out words like, “Hey!” and “French fries.”
I make a mental note not to come to this place at 2 a.m. again. I thought it would be more isolated, but it’s the exact opposite. Oh crap, I’m standing in vomit. I’m out of here.

5 comments:

  1. Nature doesn't always smell good anywhere. Where I live, they spread horse, cow, pig, and chicken crap on the fields for fertilizer. Actually, if you live in this type of environment your whole life like I have, I think that you can get used to it...especially the cow crap. I'll never get used to pig or chicken crap; they're intolerable! (And yes, you can distinguish the difference by smell!)

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  2. Thanh - So we had our MFA Council meeting the other day (for extra-curricular programming), and my friend Marla says, "Hey, do you know that guy Thanh Huynh?" I say yeah, he's in my Nature Writing class. Marla says: "Isn't he HILARIOUS?" Now I'm starting to see why :) There's a touch of Joyce in there (the stream-of-consciousness at the end). Reminds me of South Oakland during the undergrad days...

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  3. Mr Ruff- My friend lived on a cow farm and I hated visiting him because it always smell. I don't think I can ever get used to it.

    Mr. Isenberg- Marla is such a great person. I hope your undergrad days didn't consist of vomit.

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  5. Reposted to fix spelling errors.

    Ew.

    This reminds me of the scent that wafted through SRU a year or so ago. It lasted a few days and smelled exactly like run-over skunk. It got stronger near East Lake, a small brakish pond that had a pretty fountain installed to oxygenate the water in order to introduce more organisms to break down the mud and gunk that allowed birds to stand out of water in the middle of the pond. After a while, but I figured out that a skunk had probably been hit, and then we had a huge snow storm that caused inches to pile atop the carcass, and then a snow plow covered it even more. As warmer days came and the snow melted, the scent of the skunk spray was released from its icy captivity to spread over campus. Not fun.

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