The Post About Traffic

So I don't mean to be trite, but I sat in traffic for the majority of the day. I know it's not even interesting because everyone knows there's a lot of traffic in LA, and that is, in fact, the reason that most people told me not to go to LA. That and the fact that it's really expensive. Both of those concepts proved to be true today. I'll give you a run down.

8AM- I wake up.
that's a lie.
8:20AM- I wake up, needing to be at work at 9:00. This drive takes me about 20 minutes each day. It would take me 15 were it not for light traffic on the way. I do not have time to go running this morning. Running has become a necessity for me, not necessarily for fitness reasons, but for anxiety management reasons. Put very simply, if I don't run in the morning, I feel like I will have a heart attack. I also need to do it in the morning, because then I start my day feeling like I've accomplished something- a feeling that quickly dwindles as the hours pass. I essentially run around the block for thirty minutes each morning. I used to be more exploratory, but my last adventurous run lasted an hour and a half and ended with me asking a postman how to find my very specific address, which he knew exactly. During this run, I ran down a street with the same name as mine and stumbled upon a field of flowers and plants that stretched as far as I could see. Above the plants, there was a strange buzzing sound, as though they were being electrified. Nobody was around. What likely happened is that I accidentally ran into a different dimension and the postman kindly directed me back to human earth, circa 2008.

9:10 AM- I go to work at the print shop. I can never get there on time. I can never get anywhere on time. I am wearing a silly outfit because I have to go to visit a fancy private high school today--As I've mentioned over and over, I do recruitment and admissions for a scholarship program, so occasionally I have to visit high schools for this reason. I seem to have left all of my business-casual attire somewhere on the east coast, so I have to settle on an ill-fitting Brooks Brothers skirt and a pink sleeveless sweater shell, with green low heels. I look like a receptionist at an eye doctor's office. Jose at the print shop tells me I look great, and I appreciate his encouragement.

11:30 AM-
I drive to the fancy school, which happens to be located in Brentwood. My drive is pleasant, good even, and I arrive with time to spare. When I ask for a cup of coffee, they offer me lunch from the cafeteria, saying, "You probably don't want it. It's taquitos today." And the terribly embarassing thing is-- I do want it, and I take some taquitos, and a salad, and some corn salsa, and some guacamole, and a cup of iced tea-- this is like Chipotle, it's wonderful! Except then I have to meet with three eager high school students with a plate of taquitos. The administration sits me down at a picnic table to finish my food with one of the gym teacher, a woman who seems quite disinterested in my existence. The receptionists in the college guidance office treat me very nicely until they find out I want to be an actress. When I say that, one of them stands up and sayd, "Well, the only thing I can tell you is good luck. You know how hard it is." She doesn't even disguise her absolute disbelief that I will ever be remotely successful, which is refreshing in a way, but also made me want to get famous just so I can come back to school and say, see here, Ma'am. You're wrong about the world!

1:30:
I leave the school, after three meetings with stellar students- I mess them up a little bit by talking to much, mixing up my words a bit, forgetting my business cards so instead I have to write my email address on index cards for them, messing up my email address on the index cards so I have to cross out the mistake email address.

2:00:
I go to Westwood Park, so I can indulge my compulsion to run constantly. you see, I brought my running clothes today! I go for a run in Westwood, which is actually quite lovely- I stretch on the field in the park until a group of Asian college students begins throwing a football where I'm trying to remember hip flexor exercises.

3:30-
Hell begins. I get in my car. I waver a bit about whether to go home and relax, take my shoes off and do some work trying to get hired as an independent counselor (remember the manic poster.) , or to sit in a coffee shop in Brentwood. I drive to Brentwood, I drive around the little town. I'm looking for a coffee shop that's a little more....dark. Everything here is a little too clean and well-lit. There's no illusion of kitsch in the coffee shops- they all look like Starbucks to me. (except the Aroma cafe, but that's another story.) I park, I pull out of my parking space, I circle the town, decide to go home, I park again, I leave and decide to go home again. By the time I decide to go home, traffic is in full swing. I stand still. Stand still trying to get on the 101. But when I near the entrance, I am one lane over and I get honked at. I am always getting honked at, and sometimes yelled at out of windows. I don't move quickly enough when making a left turn into wild oncoming traffic, apparently. I pass the 101, missing my window of opportunity. I scoot, almost imperceptibly moving down Wilshire. I snail through Beverly Hills, and at this point I am screaming at the top of my lungs inside my car, the windows rolled up tightly:
"F*ck you Los Angeles! I hate every last inch of you! F*ck you GPS- you've never done a damn thing for me! F*ck you LA- the stupidest-ass city in the whole f*cking world. What a piece of sh*t you are!!!! F*ck you, f*ck you, f*ck."
I was directing most of this verbal abuse at Lee, my australian GPS narrator, who was incessantly telling me to turn right and move back toward the 101, which I was not about to do. Not to get burned again."

5:30- I get home. I eat carrots, hummus, cucumbers, a grilled cheese, tomato soup, a diet caffiene free Dr. Pepper. My roommate/surrogate Grandmother Virginia tells me that I should never drive during these hours. I feel exhausted by my own inability to accomplish anything.

7:08- I leave to see a show at the Groundlings. I sit in literal stand still traffic going "over the hill" on Highland.

7:50- I arrive and park 6 blocks away from the theater. This is a "good" parking space.

[the show is quite good]

9:45- I walk to my car, drive to a bar/mexican restaurant named "El Coyote," to meet my friend (friend 1 of approx 2). I then pay someone 5 dollars to park it in a parking lot that I could have easily parked in myself. Valet makes me feel like I'm living way beyond my means-- every time I use it (three times), I feel like I'm putting money down for a house in Maui or something. I feel like the ball is going to drop on my crazy overspending any minute now. I also feel pissed that there's no parking in all of this massive urban sprawl.

10:30- I leave to drive home. I sit in stand still traffic. I have time to look at the building-sized builboard of the charcoal sketch of Shia Labeouf. Billboards weird me out here, because most of the people on them live here. I wish that's how it was in all towns. If my neighbor Luz was on a billboard, yelling at my little brothers for breaking her birdbath, that would be a riot. There is an excessive level of Billboard in LA. I cannot wait to be on a billboard.

11:00-- I arrive home.

And I have exhausted myself.

Until next time,
The driving lady,
Madeline