Moments

It is dark when I leave campus, like everyone has already gone home for the night. I feel rather than see people moving by. I want to talk to someone, connect with them. But I left all connections back in the classroom. The frustration they call a discussion. We get a grade for participation. My hand hangs limply. It shoots up every time a voice stops talking. But no one sees me. My frustration mounts. Let me talk! By the time it gets to me, all the good stuff has been said already. It's no wonder I don't feel like talking in class.

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My hair hangs down around my face, like a curtain. The benefits of having long hair. Duck down behind it and pretend that I am invisible.

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I wait after class to have a private word with him. Seems like I'm not the only one. I'm tired. I pretend that I don't understand so he will keep talking. His eyes focus intently on mine. He has an accent, lending an allure to the way he talks.

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He says no phones allowed in the classroom. I ask how we will know the time, there's no clock in here. I get a secret thrill when he throws his watch to me. I feel like a groupie.

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He sees me in the hall going in the opposite direction of the classroom. He tells me that I better not be leaving. I can't help smiling as I say, don't worry I'll be right back. He says, you better come back. I try not to let the feeling that he wants me there go to my head.

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The movie is violent and I wish he would skip over the bad parts. Instead, we watch a second time as the black guy is killed by the cops. It's not a good night for me to see this. I never like violent films, but this is truly depressing. He tells me to cover my eyes, but nothing will make me unsee that image.

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I look down and fiddle with my pen during the love-scene. Call me a prude. When I was little we always covered our eyes during the kissing parts. And this, in a college classroom. Ugh.

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He's not from here. He tells us he thinks everyone in NY has guns. He looks at me and says he'd be particularly worried if I had a gun. I'm not sure to be insulted or take that as a damn fine compliment. How big is the line between tough and gangsta?

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I didn't wear my Magen Dovid that day. She comes in, that girl who said she's Italian and Jewish. I see a small Jewish star hanging around her neck. I can't help feeling proud, and like it was because of me.

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Her, with the mickey mouse pen, who looks like she's 12, with a wedding ring on her finger. She keeps repeating her name back to him, because he keeps saying it wrong. But really, who cares?

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He, who talks about the disadvantage of blacks in NYC, how the lucky ones go to college, and the rest go to prison. He says it's important to him to make it in life. He shows me a pic of his daughter. Huh. He looks too young to have a kid.

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The accent, I wonder where it's from. I ask him, since he seems to want to know all about us. He says it's a long story, and that's all he will say. I do a little stalking online. Germany. I hear it now. I wonder why he refrained from sharing that information.

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The song is stuck in my head. It's the music that gets to me. The lyrics play on repeat:

I know you're tired of loving,
With nobody to love.
Just grab somebody, no leaving this party
With nobody to love.

I try to interpret that. I hear desperation in the song. Yet here I am not sleeping, listening to it over and over. I wonder where the line is between desire and desperation. I'm the last single one, after all, in my high school class. I don't think about it, until I see that last girl who got married. I can't help noticing her baby bump.

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The letter 'Aleph' is painted on a beautiful background of brilliant vivid color. The artist is quite talented. But I won't see that painting, or the artist again. We could say, hey this didn't work out, but let's be friends. But that's just not how it works.

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I wish I knew how to translate music into words. I wonder what my song would be.

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Those lonely nights when you feel like going back to your 'safe haven', only to discover that your haven has moved on.

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My hands tense around the pen, breaking it in half. The ink pours into my hands. I watch it stain, and wonder if it will be with me forever.