I woke up feeling dizzy, the way I always do when I haven't been taking my anti-depressant. The dizziness reminded me to take it, and I popped the pill, confident that the grogginess would go away. I forgot to think about the headache that sometimes comes. Or maybe that's this climate.
I get around the Mesa/Gilbert area by a combination of Bus and Bike. On Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays, I bike about a mile each way to and from the bus stop, and then ride route 61 straight to campus. On Tuesday/Thursday, I ride to a different stop, about 1.4 miles away, take the bus for twenty minutes or so, and then cycle another 5.5-6 miles to the other MCC Campus. It's called Red Mountain, and it's really picturesque, rust-colored and aesthetically pleasing. I wish I had all my classes there.
When I ride my bike, the air is so dry against my face that I am perpetually thirsty, and consistently lick my lips to moisten them. This makes them chapped and irritated, but it's a difficult habit to break, and it forms relatively quickly. Today I biked my 5.5-6 miles into 30mph wind. I was crawling, at somewhere between 2-10mph, depending on the intensity of the gust. And I'm not fit. I dance three days a week and bike relatively often, but I'm nowhere near strong enough, or patient enough.
An SUV, a minivan, another unnecessarily large vehicle drives too close to me, too quickly, purposely, it seems, veering into the bike lane to frighten me as I crawl along. This happens every day, but I am making no progress, I am thirsty and my lips are chapped and the wind is blowing into my face harder every moment. I keep stopping to replenish my water bottle.
At the Jamba Juice there are these two adorable girls with ponytails and blue-jeans and glasses playing the Fratelli's a little too loudly, and I wish I was doing what they were doing. The water I relieve is not cold, and I gulp it down too quickly.
I keep having these moments, riding my shwinn cruiser, where the wind drops for a moment and suddenly I feel myself accelerating. I begin to rejoice in the fulfillment of my potential, speedwise, the sudden freedom of being able to move without working so dreadfully hard, and then the wind picks up again. By the time I am close enough to imagine stopping for another refill at the McDonalds less than half-mile from campus, I harbor so much spite toward everything I can think of that I know it must show on my face. My lips are set in a straight line, my tongue dwelling on it's constant thirst, and I know my brows are furrowed beneath my sunglasses; I scowl at the elderly couple pulling out of their gated 50+ community. There is a Taco Bell next door to the McDonalds and I consider going there instead, knowing that, if there is a smell, it won't be as bad. But I'm so angry. I start to imagine all the disgusting people retrieving their breakfast from scrawny McPloyee's, and my wrath grows. I'm going to McDonalds. I'm going to take the water out of their soda fountain and hate them all for being fatasses. I ride my bike into the parking lot and reflect on how I hate everyone who has ever set foot inside one of these buildings, including myself.
I leave my bike unlocked and walk inside without feeling the respite of the air conditioner. At the soda fountain I unwittingly block the way of a slim, youngish businesswoman trying to get at her Iced Tea, and I think how I hate her. I still can't resist returning the polite smile she gives me, with equally polite deference, and I wonder about that reflex--is it a reflex, a courtesy, or, I wonder in my bad mood, am I just weak?
There is a gaggle of old men at a table inside the door, and I think how ignorant they are, how their arteries are going to swell up, how they're going to die. I fill my water, and as I do, my eyes fall on the cooler of McIced Tea and I imagine screaming and flinging it across the room like the Hulk.
I walk out of the McDonalds. I have not said a word. I climb onto my cruiser. I pedal away.
And, like so much extra baggage, the anger falls away and loses significance--it was in jest. All of it. The wind has died. I cross the street at, my speedometer says, 25 km/h, unencumbered, free. The air rushing at my face, this time from my own momentum as I cut through it, feels cool on my damp forehead.
The wind picks up again.
