The Core

Walking in front of a forklift is bad for your chemical health and saftey.

A bus turned the corner, hope fluttered like a butterfly within my heart. Could it be? Was it true?

A collective groan went up from the crowd of students around me. It was just another city bus. Coach Canada was over half an hour late… yet again.

When the buses finally arrived, I gathered my things and bustled over to the emptiest one. Shut down. The bus driver wouldnt let me board until the other 2 buses were filled first. I grabbed my stuff, moved to the next bus. It was full. I grabbed my stuff, moved to the final bus, and there was one spot left, right in the very front beside a nice lady who had conveniently piled her life onto the ‘vacant’ seat beside her – the seat that i was now expected to squish my hind-parts into.

People often say that i get this look on my face when i am highly irritated or fuming mad. You know, the if-anything-else-goes-wrong-i’m-going-to-break-something look. Yea.

So i’m sitting there, fueling my anger by hating on the buses for being late, the bus driver for making my life so difficult, the cheap eddie bauer duffle bag strap that brokeded and the STUPID pebble in my shoe, man.. that stupid pebble, that probably angered me the most, dont you HATE that? yea. i hate it so much.

2 hours later, the bus rolled past the City of Kingston sign and all hatred and malice in my heart disappeared. Seeing that sign had triggered a feeling of nostalgia and longing within me, in the midst of all my whining and complaining, it had finally hit me. That was the last time i was ever going to pass that sign as a student at Queen’s. This is it, the last 2 months of my undergraduate career, the last 2 months of what some say are the best years of one’s life.

and then my eyes flickered to life as a new realization hit me. I had spent the past 2 hours snarling about how i had been served a dish of injustice by the world, big deal right? but how many times over the past 3.75 had i chosen to meddle in frustration and self-pity, while blinding myself to the blessings that surrounded me?
How many minutes and hours had i wasted away being all whineyMcWhine-sauce when i could have spent those times enjoying the many blessings that this place had been to me?

I had entered university with very few expectations and even fewer resolutions. One however was to live life to its fullest, leaving no room for regret. After passing that sign, the past 3 years flew through my head. Had i really left no room for regret?

i couldnt in complete honesty say that i did.

I have 2 months left here and though i have failed multiple times in the past, I choose to live these months to the absolute fullest. To live a life of joy, of hope, of praise to Him who has given me so much. Quite simply, I choose to live instead of letting life fly by as i sit, stagnant and still.

there will be no more “what if’s” or “what could have been’s”. There will be no more regret.

I blinked and 3 years passed by. If I blink again and my time here is done. So I choose not to blink.. i suppose that explains why my eyes are all watery and crap these days.

i knew kingston was small, but dang.

I like to consider myself a pensive person. I am sure that if asked, most, if not all of my closest friends would list thoughtful, caring and sensitive (to name a few) as some of my most glaring characteristics.

And as history dictates, all great thinkers have their proverbial thinking spots. Newton his apple tree, Einstein his sailboat, and me, I have my lavatory.

It’s no lie, a great majority of the thinking i do throughout the day occurs in the washroom. Some find this strange, but they dont matter.

Anyway, as i was sitting in one of the stalls in the library pondering over the issues of Her-2/neu expression on breast cancer-derived cell lines, a man walks in.

But before i get to that, I should give a little background on a game i like to play when my brain needs a little rest from all the thoughtfulness. When I shake people’s hands, i sometimes think in the back of my mind, “i wonder how well he washed his hands after peeing, and not the notorious turn on the tap for 2 seconds and wet your fingertips to instill a false sense of cleanliness wash, but like washwash with soap and the works”. So while i’m doing my thinking in the washroom, i like to compare the number of poser-handwashers to the hardcore-dryskin-handwashers.

Today happened to be a day when i was playing this game. So i became still as a leaf on a wind-less day. and i waited.

He finishes his thing. walks over to the sink… but instead of turning on the tap, he continues past the sink and walks to the paper towel dispenser, grabs some paper towel, wipes his hands dry, then walks out.

Now, being a guy, i’ve done some pretty dirty things… and so when it comes to bathroom etiquette, i’m quite lenient. You dont use soap? thats fine… heck, i’m even fine with you not washing your hands at all, cuz i understand that some men have been gifted with the ability to pee freely with their hands on their hips.
Honestly, not washing is gross but it can be excused if you really didnt touch anything, OR nothing splashed on you, but if the splashage was so pronounced that you had to DRY your freaking hands off on a paper towel as you walked out, thats just straightup nasty.

2 weeks have passed since that fateful day. Needless to say, the game no longer brings me the same joy and happiness that it once did.

The origins of greatness