Wild Things

I sat in the rally planning meeting feeling like a fly on the wall as the preparations continued. "No one can sell anything" one of the organizers explained. "Tell that to the palatero man!" someone called out. People started to giggle, reminiscing about the palatero man who mysteriously popped up at a rally to sell his little Mexican popsicles, weaving his jingling cart through the chanting crowd. My mind wandered to Phoenix. I had gone to Arizona from Tijuana for a rally and was stunned by the shear quantity of Mexican food that appeared during the march: elote, paletas - all right there in a pueblo vs. Arpaio rally in Phoenix. It did seem funny. So quick thinking. Entrepreneurial.

I watched Alec try to feed Momo her bird-food birthday cake. She ignored it. His ipod started a new song. "This will bring them alive," Alec commented "they like the MC5". I didn't know our birds liked the MC5.

I watched the strange image on the ultrasound machine, as if I would be able to see with my untrained eye the thing they were looking for. I guess most people see babies in a situation like this, but they, well, we were monitoring an ominous, threatening thing that was definitely not a fetus. They had dragged me back in to see if it "had changed". I mentally started counting up the sick days I have acquired in the short time I've been at my new school, all while staring at the image on the screen. Maybe eight? What if this thing had transformed itself into what everyone feared in the last six months? Eight paid days off wouldn't be enough. I started getting pissed at my job again, pissed that they rejected the thirty odd days I had stock piled in my first four years of teaching, pissed at them for opting out of a law that everyone else has to follow. What if I need the days, what if....."The doctor says you're good. No more six month check ups. We'll send you a notice". I grabbed my clothes and got out of there.

My eyes wandered to the cats. The rest of the dinner party guests continued talking, but my eyes were locked on the eyes of one of the many feral cats my friend has taken in. You can tell how tame each is by their eyes. This one was not too tame. I liked looking into its wild eyes.

The advent of spring and a cycle of antibiotics to kill the devil flu has brought me back to the land of the living. My light is beginning to shine. I run out of school minutes after the kids and have been working the kind of short work week that critics of teachers claim believe we always work. I like it.

The wild bird continues to nest on the porch, spring has sprung, the world keeps rotating and many things just can't be tamed.