wednesdays are crazy days

here's why:

i wake up at 6.33, make a delicious breakfast with tea, have ample time to get ready and i leave the house feeling good. and prepared.

out on the street, the mission is lit with grey and is just starting to wake up. people are scattered about, on their way elsewhere. the air is cool, i'm walking fast and listening to something that gets my energy going. today it was the budos band and 'superstar' by kanye west, featuring lupe fiasco. i listened to this song on one of my first days in the city and it was such the energizer. 'touch the sky, baby girl' was sung just for me.

on the BART, i usually can find a seat to myself, but today i stand and that's just fine. my BART rides are short, but i love them. i love the efficiency and ease of it and the characters that come together on it. people sleeping, shy, curious, reading the paper, tense, rushed, with their ears full of ipod, like mine.

off the train, up to powell street where the obnoxious trolley car terminal is. there isn't much of a line by this time, but soon it'll be swarming with people going 'clang clang' right outside our classrooms. this morning is grey and foggy and lovely and the street isn't too busy yet. my hike up the hill is getting easier and less sweaty.

i lumber up the stairs, use my i.d. to click myself in, say 'good morning' to the security guard who always ignores me or at the very least, gives me an annoyed look or nod. (he'll warm up later in the day, usually) downstairs to use the bathroom and dab the 'glow' from my face, and up to the third floor.

this class-visual elements of the story- is so great. i love what it teaches us, what it's all about and what we're doing as a project. my instructor is delightful and knowledgeable but also relaxed and respectful.

i come to class excited about the work i've done for homework. 'put it up for critique, let's see it'. ok... *deep breath* here goes.

at once my confidence is almost completely dashed. very talented illustrators in my class.

that's fine. i'm learning and improving, but man! i used to like mine. up. then down. then middle.

then the laughing girls start in on their repertoire of excessive, obnoxious and freakin LOUD laughing, usually when no one else offers more than a muted grunt of amusement. one is very sweet, the other:my nemesis. i can't quite convey how ridiculous, annoying and loud the laughing is. i'm working on my impersonation of it, if you want to call to hear it.

so we have the laughing girls and the fact that everyone else in the class has a friend in there. the taiwanese students talk together, expected, but then everyone else talks together, or OVER me about video games.

i got the wobbly table today (curses!) so whenever i tried to draw or write, someone inevitably would repeatedly nudge the table in excitement about video games or while speaking chinese or something so it's much like, as my table-mate observed, drawing on a train.

class today is thankfully a lot of video watching, which kept the cacophonous laughter and train-drawing to a minimum and the video was amazing, a narrated character design sketch and painting, sped up to fit into 90 or so minutes: disc 2 of 'visual storytelling with iain mccraig'.

the journey home is always hot and the streets are now crowded with people who either own the sidewalk in their universe of no one else's existence, extremely dirty, grumpy people begging for money, tourists and people on a mission. i'm the latter. luckily i'm agile enough to navigate the sidewalk, pass people and get through the melee without contacting anyone.

except today. i man side-checked me as we were passing today. grrr.

i get off the train around 3.20. school is getting out and the BART station and the blocks surrounding it are teeming with middle school students, sometimes nuns, today i saw a man-tree who was seriously 7' tall. at LEAST. i walked next to him for a second and felt like a small dog whose legs are a blur as it scampers down the street. i don't mind the crowd as much as downtown. it's more real. less commercial. less touristy. less trolley car-y.

by this time, i feel pretty good. looking forward to napping and eating something. but by the time i've climbed our three flights of stairs and burst heavily, panting, into the kitchen, the sight of ted's sweet face as he looks up from reading at the kitchen table brings back all the angst and i'm grumpy for 5 minutes as i remember to him the laughing girls and my inadequacy. then i nap. eat dinner. and get back to drawing.

i'm working on a post that more thoroughly delves into school and homework and instructors, but i had to get this one out first. here's a picture to bring it all home:

the kitties at home. being adorable.