October 16, 2008

I’m sitting in Seattle Central Community College, the SAM building. I keep telling Leasha that SAM makes me think of the Seattle Art Museum, but she just ignores me and maintains her position of Science & Math. Whatever.

It’s a nice place this cozy little college in the heart of the city. Out of the corners of my eyes, I enjoy watching the diverse mix of people walk by me in my spot where I sit invisible in this chair. I’m not an actual student here, but that’s not important, is it?

I’m spending the day with friends, doing something different. It’s a big school, they don’t care if sit in their lobby typing whatever words I may type. I’m not actively doing anything disruptive. If I was going to do that, I would have followed Stasie into her math class and shown the professor who the heck is boss. It’s numbers, plain and simple. Algebra, geometry, you never really learn much beyond the basics, it’s just different ways to do the exact same thing.

There’s a broom leaning against the wall across the room from me. It’s casual, like it’s some sort of cool cat over there next to the fire extinguisher. It’s seen better days since it was new. The black paint of the shaft is beginning to wear away near the handle, and the bristles all curve inward where you can tell it’s taken the brunt of the impact from sweeping the floor.

I wonder idly if it gets used. I want to touch it, to feel it, to acknowledge that it exists with something other than my eyes. But I won’t. I have no qualms being that crazy guy who everyone remembers for molesting the broom – I’ve done worse things – but it seems almost rude to disturb its peace. It’s sleeping over there in its corner. It hasn’t done anything to me.

I feel like it should be able to come alive at any moment and start dancing, or grow arms and start gathering buckets of water like in Disney’s Fantasia, but there’s no Mickey Mouse with a wizard’s hat here, just me, my imagination and a bunch of college students passing through on their way to classes. The fluorescent lights aren’t flattering to its figure, but it would be pole thin no matter what light I saw it in.

I want someone to spill something. A bag of chips or bread crumbs, give it a duty.

“NO FOOD in recycle”

The sign is just to the right of the broom, above the recycle bin. It’s commanding and forceful. Someone probably put it there because people were putting food in with the recycling. The three arrows in that familiar triangle mark the bin, each opening labeled. Glass, cans, plastic, paper. I wonder if people listen to it.