I almost broke my nose this morning on a window. I wanted to go into an office attached to the sound studio but the door was locked so I bent to peer through the glass window to see if anyone was inside and totally forgot that the glass in the window has double-paned soundproofing. I also forgot that since YOU CAN SEE THROUGH GLASS, sometimes you don't even know it's there.
I saw the inside pane because there was paper taped to it. I did not see the pane on my side, the one several inches closer to my face than I thought it would be. The impact was shocking and I thought of the bird I once saw fly into the side of a glass atrium. WHUMP!
After grabbing my face and looking over my shoulder to see if anyone witnessed my astonishing accident, I cussed and pressed the sides of my nose with thumb and forefinger. When I was pretty sure that the only thing broken was my common sense, I called Heather and asked if she had keys to the room. I waited. When she arrived, I asked if my face looked at all bruised.
She looked, said no, and I told her what I did. And her FUCKING AWESOME reply was that "It's really quite funny that you were that stupid." Now imagine it in a British boarding school accent, it's ever so much better.
The people I work with are doing wonders for the anti-Brit sentiments that I've harbored for years. Despite good travels to England and a number of adored friendships, Brits just pissed me off generally speaking. Exceptions to the rule were just that. But now I don't know. I really, really like my co-workers. And it's not just because I'm outnumbered.
It makes me think of the night before I moved from Seattle to New York, Bova and I were crashed on the floor of someone's living room in sleeping bags and couldn't get to sleep. I remember asking him, "Which do you hate more? Seattle or England?"
He thought about it, really thought about it, and was silent for a minute.
"Seattle. At least in England the punks are real."
Which made us laugh very hard. Now I'm appreciating a lot of little things about my friends the English people, like some of the bone driest wit I've ever heard and how someone can seem prim one second and completely batshit the next. I like it when someone says "Thank you very much indeed," instead of, "Uh, thanks," and instead of saying hello asks me if I'm alright.
Asking me if I was alright made me question myself at first. Is my hair screwed up? Does my nose look broken? I though something was wrong with me until I realized that they're just saying hi.
And yes, it really is quite funny that I was that stupid.
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1 comment:
Love the nose splat. Good morning indeed.
My fiancee is british, in a way, iranian raised in a british boarding school. Its easy to remember he's iranian, he looks it, quite profoundly. But I forget he's english too, cause he's so american these days, pool league, karoeke. Yup. he's a kareoke king.
I'll completely forget his britishness until I walk in the house and he says, "there's nothing to eat" and I say "what do you mean, there's chicken salad in the fridge and fries in the freezer" and he'll say "I don't fancy that." You don't what that? You don't "fancy" it? Stops me dead in my tracks each time. What is worse is that he's kind of guys guy, pretty manly and all that, especially the iranian side of him, he's persian to the core sometimes (which given my feminist background makes for really interesting cross cultural dialogues). and then he throws out "fancy" like some pasty, thin, doe-eyed english school boy and it sends me reeling. Its like some huge cross cultural cluster-fuck.
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