Wage decay observations.

My front neighbor who knows my one art school colleague who wears women's clothes observed the other day that they really, really want to buy their own place so they don't have to deal with rude upstairs neighbors anymore, but they can't because their job pays so low.

(And, they have contract campaign signs in their window, so I know that it's a union job, for what that's worth; they're some sort of counselor at the local university, and have been for years.)

I also had read something about how some lower-level higher education admin jobs and many social work jobs now all require graduate study, but they don't pay enough to the point where you can afford to pay back your degree in a timely manner.

I also also finally saw someone recognize that non-profit jobs have collapsed as a sector, which I mentioned to my mother, and she was like, "But you've been saying that for years."

An afternoon on the front porch of the front house.

I hear a light grating sound, and I look out at the big tree out by the front curb, and this squirrel is out on the trunk way up it scooting up the trunk and dragging up behind it a big paper chocolate wrapper with some metal still left inside of it, before it takes it out on a branch and noses into it and then drops it like twenty-five feet to the ground.

And, it then runs down the tree and around a little bit on the street, and once out by where the chocolate bar wrapper had fallen, but it never goes over right there to touch it again.

Later, the (older) (white) (dyed blonde hair) replacement postal lady comes by to deliver mail, and we talk about the weather.

"This is perfect," she was like, "Sixty, seventy degrees. Anything more than that, and it's too much for a fat girl like me."

I also mentioned the mosquito problem on the street, and I said that it confused me since there didn't seem to be any standing water anywhere, and so she reached out her hand and pointed over to across the street to where the wizened old hippie lives, and she was like, "She's a hoarder," and she reminded me that we don't know what she has sitting out in her backyard.

Touching farmers' market moment.

At the one stand where I buy tomatoes at the local farmers' market, this one (extremely short) and (rather brown) (indigenous Mexican-looking) woman was by the one end of the stand with her two young sons who were like four and five or so and were almost as tall as her, believe it or not, and one of whom was carrying a round loaf of artisanal bread and holding it back over his shoulder, so that you could compare the bread loaf to the size of his head, and his head was just a little bit bigger that that, and both of the kids were just super, super cute, they were that age, and they were kind of making a stir.

Anyhow, later after I had picked out my tomatoes, they were up at the register just before me, and the one (older) (white) lady with severely slouchy tits picked out two nice apples, and gave one to each of the boys, both of whom looked skeptical and one of whom then smiled.

And, after she left to do something and the (older) (white) guy was done getting change, he turned to the oldest kid and counted out the change into his hand in front of his mom, like he was the one paying.

And, the kid looked confused and then got a big smile.

Parking lot exchange.

For some reason, when he was in town, my one (white) colleague from Mississippi's texts wouldn't always go through to my phone, or vice-versa, so I had to call him up when I got out of work, for example, since he had never responded to my texts about getting together for dinner afterwards like we had texted about earlier that day.

And, at that point he was already setting up for the night in his SUV, out in the Cracker Barrel parking lot by the highway.

"They have a little section where people can pull over and sleep," he was like, beginning to tell me about the system they have and how he was going to use it. 

"This sounds like some shit like you're living out of your truck like a trucker and abducting women," I was like.

And, he chuckled and was like, "Oh no, you should see it, I took out the back seats, and put in a place where I can sleep..."

"And I soddered in these little metal U-bars for the zipties," I was like, interrupting him and imitating him like I was him finishing his thought.

"Oh no," he was like, "But there's really not enough room for a woman in there."

"That's why you chop off their legs," I was like.

And, we continued our conversation for a bit, and I said other things to that effect.

He also said that we should get together for coffee at my place the next day, and he'd be rested and we'd have a lot of time to chat then, since he only had like a three hour drive afterwards to a Cracker Barrel in the southern part of the state.

"But don't forget you need to budget in forty-five minutes for backroads so you can go dump the body in the reservoir," I was like.

"Thanks, I"ll keep that in mind," he was like, chuckling.

"You know," I was like, "Plastic tarp and whatnot, real Laura Palmer shit."

Friend revelation: "Checking out."

So, my one (white) friend from Mississippi is kind of checking out and making a major life change.

For years now he's been regularly phoning in some undergraduate teaching and doing editing as his main thing and then going out on tours and coming back to apartments that he'd have on short-term leases, or sometimes apartments that he'd share with girlfriends, but he's done with that now, and he's doing all remote editing, and since he can do that and he wanted out of a relationship with this last girlfriend before he had to pay October rent, he switched cars and got an SUV and adapted the back so he can sleep there, and he also has a battery-driven cooler and a place for this big water tank with internal filtration, and now he can drive around the country and linger different places and his only rent is his gas money, as he put it.

"And repairs," I was like, "If you have car problems."

He also said the last winter really got to him in the city, in a way that it just never had before.

"Bad vibes," I was like.

He also also said that he felt like he'd run out of options in the city and was thinking to when he was happiest, and he realized that it was on the road touring, so he thought that he could pick up stakes and make that work, after spending some time with his family in Mississippi, and maybe the winter in Arizona.

And, Cracker Barrels have designated sleeping spots in their parking lots where people can pull over and sleep, and you can use your Planet Fitness subscription to work out nearby and shower.

He also said he likes how I describe what I'm doing not as "dropping out," but as "checking out."

"If you check out," he was like, "That implies that you can always check back in."

But, he said that he actually didn't think that there would be any opportunities coming down the line that would be worth working towards, and when you're in that situation, you have to not worry about work and go and find for yourself a life worth living, though the one thing that does make him worry is retirement.

Mosquito revelation.

My one (white) colleague from Mississippi was surprised at the amount of mosquitos outside my little back alley cottage where I live now, when we sat out there and had coffee this past weekend.

I was telling him that I actually have to put on not only long sleeve shirts and pants when I'm sitting outside, but sneakers, too, since if I ever just wear sandals, the mosquitos actually just go and bite through my socks.

"What color are your socks you wear?", he was like.

"Black," I was like.

"That's probably it," he was like, and he said that he read somewhere once that mosquitos gravitate to landing on very black things as background camouflage for themselves and that he noticed once after that that once when he was walking around in shorts and sandals and black socks, that he was getting a lot of bites through his socks on his feet, but none on his legs, even though his legs were just right out there and all exposed because he was wearing shorts.

So, he thinks that that's what that is.

Addendum: Romanian saying.

I can't remember the exact phrasing, but there's this (Romanian) saying that enforces generosity by penalizing un-generosity, that you say about someone who comes to a gathering without bringing anything to eat or drink:

"He showed up with his hand on his dick," or something like that.

The logic is that their hands were full, but not with what everyone wanted, or maybe that they were too busy doing something else in order to do what they were supposed to?