開始

So it's finals time, yet I find myself cramming food into my mouth instead of the actual cramming for finals.

Looming over my boiling pot of instant noodles (food for an all-nighter: PB & J sandwich, taquitoes, sandwich, chips, almonds, carrots, 2 packs of indo mie and more to come), I was thinking about the soul food I had last night. Even though my stomach was almost full, I felt empty. In spite of the name, it didn't feel like it had any soul to it. Maybe northern Californians just aren't able to reproduce Southern cooking. I've been thinking if maybe I've been too critical of Drab, as well. Maybe I should just let things be, let the friendship "go with the flow." I was checking out at Safeway today, and the cashier lady says to me, "You graduated from the CIA, and you're making sandwiches?!" It's finals week, give me a break. As much as I don't like to admit it, I do wear the blue shirt that Drab got me from the CIA- except only on the weekends when I don't give a shit about how I look when purchasing food. I tried to explain to her that I didn't go to the CIA, that a friend just gave it to me, but she just kept going on and on about how those techniques I learned- julienne, dicing, knife skillz- were going to waste. One of the more friendly cashiers I've met at that store to date.

Earliest memory: to this day I still can't recall anything that happened before the age of 4/5, except for this one visual dream-like sequence where I am heading forward along this dark path with a yellow light at the end of this tunnel. Once I would touch the light and cross the threshold, all my memories of being in California, living under the same roof as my extended family, would begin. That always bothered me when I was young, not being able to remember what happened to me immediately postnatal. I wasn't even a child running; I was an adult male, no specific ethnicity. The closest thing I could find in a religion that could explain this was reincarnation, but I still have my doubts.

Next up: preschool, kindergarten.