a smattering of currents

It’s slow. We’re getting a jump on clearing the August graduates, but today is registration for summer school and I’ve been seeing classes get added to a student’s schedule after I already declared them missing, so I’ve decided  I may as well just wait till tomorrow when classes actually start and everyone is enrolled.  I want to write but am uninspired. A perfect time for Currents!

Current Amusement: Anyone who has read my OD for any amount of time knows all about Aggravation Receptionist, she of the neverending ailments and ceaseless family draaaama and constant states of crisis and heaver of perpetual sighs. Who I actively try to avoid because once she gets started on the current ailment/drama/crisis she will never ever shut up, and I have more than once gotten up from my desk and pretended I just HAD to go somewhere else right that minute because that’s the only way to get rid of her. I’ve even been known to go into the file room and pick out a file at random just to look like I was NOT just trying to escape. Seriously, it’s maddening. She doesn’t do this to me as much as she does to Miss Artsy, because Miss Artsy is much friendlier to her than I am. I’m not unfriendly. I just don’t ever start conversations with her because I know what happens when I do. I end up deep inside a Coma of Unbearable Boredom. 

ANYHOW. Our boss is currently on his way to Cuba with a bunch of students for an international study class. AR’s parents were from Cuba, although she was born in Miami. This morning she tells me that our boss is going to try and go by a hotel not terribly far from where they will be staying and get some pictures, because AR’s father built this hotel years and years ago, before they left Cuba. So she’d been going through a bunch of old stuff that belonged to her mom over the weekend, trying to find pictures of the hotel for our boss.  And she found a bunch of stuff that she’d never actually looked at since her mom passed away years ago. 

She starts telling me about this hotel. That her father built. He wasn’t just on the construction crew, like I initially assumed– he had it built with his money. Her family was quite rich. It was a huge resort on the beach and is still there, as she discovered when she and her husband found it on Google Earth and even were able to view it with Street View. It’s surrounded by ghettos but is gated, and Castro has been using it for all these years. Because her dad knew Castro. And Castro would come stay at this luxurious beachfront hotel. And when her dad realized Castro was bringing Russian missiles into Cuba 1962 he told …. someone. Higher ups? She said he turned Castro in, but I’m not sure that’s what she meant. Then her grandmother turned her DAD in for telling– whoever he told– about the missiles and her parents and older siblings had to flee Cuba with just the clothes on their backs. It was like Sound of Music! Although probably without the music. AND her dad died in mysterious circumstances after they reached the US. They still think Castro had something to do with it.

What is hilarious is that while she’s telling me this amazing story (and showing me pictures of the hotel- she’d scanned some of them and pulled up the online album. And kept trying to get the screenshot of the hotel’s location on Google Earth to go into street view, while I kept saying, "ummmm…. I think that’s just a screenshot- I think you’d have to go back to Google Earth to get to Street View… " and she kept saying, "I’m sure this works! It worked last night! I don’t understand why it won’t work now!!")  …while telling this great story she’d also keep saying, "Oh, I’m sorry, this really isn’t that interesting! I’m sure you don’t want to hear all this!"

And I’m thinking, "Yeah, what’s REALLY interesting is your half-hour long incredibly detailed descriptions of every ailment you’ve ever dreamed you have, complete with excruciating pain levels! And the unending current crisis/drama/whatever going on with your family, none of whom I know or want to know!! But the story of your parents being in the Communist Party in Cuba and being buddies with Castro and owning this gargantuan resort that Castro loves to stay at and your dad then turning him in at the eve of the Cuban Missile Crisis and the whole family having to FLEE in the NIGHT after your grandmother turns your dad in and escape to the USA as political refugees…. yeah, that’s boooooooooooooring!!!"

Anyhow. It was quite the shock, having AR tell me a story that was…. fascinating. I’m not sure of how accurate it really is — how, for instance, her mom had all these mementos despite fleeing in the night with just the clothes on her back. And I’m sure it’s largely family lore, and like all family lore it’s some truth that’s been combined with a lot of embellishment throughout the years. But whatever the level of truthiness, it’s still a great story. She also has gotten the idea that once Castro and his brother are dead, her family can get the hotel back. They have the paperwork still. Although I’m not so sure that the Cuban government is just going to hand them this hotel because they have 60 or 70 year old paperwork saying her dad owned it. 

I’m still trying to process the fact that I had a 45 minute conversation with AR and don’t feel like I must fling myself off the top of the building to break out of the suffocating lethargy that normally results from a five minute conversation with AR. 

Current sadness: Kim’s dad passed away over the weekend. The funeral is tomorrow. It was such a horrible rollercoaster for nearly three weeks, with the doctors telling them he was about to die, then he was much better, then he was about to die, then he was much better— but Friday they put him in Hospice. He didn’t linger long after that, which was a very good thing since he was in a lot of pain by then. His kidneys failed, on top of congestive heart failure. We’re going to the funeral, of course. 

Current anticipation: I am also taking Thursday and Friday off, to….. paint the spare bedroom. This is more exciting than I can say, since the spare bedroom has had children’s stripy primary-color wallpaper with a border of dancing alphabet bears across the top for, oh, as long as we’ve lived there. And I’m assuming a whole lot longer than that. I’m sure the child who originally inhabited this room has children of her own by now. Why have I never done anything about this? In THIRTEEN YEARS???? I have no idea. Other than I kept hoping the elves would do it for me. I also spent a whole lot of time thinking I’d have to remove the wallpaper and not wanting to deal with removing the wallpaper. I finally discovered that you can actually paint over it if you use primer, as long as it’s on there very tightly. And this is on there VERY tightly. Of course it’s been years since I discovered that, and it’s still taken me this long to take action. My first step was scheduling these two days off a couple of months ago. I realized I would never ever EVER do this on a weekend. I needed specific time beyond the weekend to do it. I’m sure it will take all four days, especially since my dad iscoming up to do several other small projects on Saturday so there goes most of that day. I even went to Lowes yesterday and discovered that I don’t actually have to wash the walls, as long as I use primer. I still don’t have the paint but I do have a bunch of chips and am going to do a lilacy-lavendary-thing. I’m thinking whatever color I end up with will be such a huge improvement that I won’t really care what exactly it is. I am also taking this opportunity to EXCAVATE the room and make it pleasant. So A) it’s not embarrassing to have someone stay over, although nobody’s actually stayed over but Kim, and B) I’ll have an actual real room of my own. Mark has a "study" downstairs… I have the livingroom. Which is actually fine, but I want my own spot. That is soothing and pleasant and not full of anxiety-producing clutter. 

I am hoping very much that this creates a landslide effect of home improvement projects. We stopped by a neighbor’s house last night because we’re (believe it or not) the POA Presidents this year (only for two more weeks!! Yay!!! We have been the WORST presidents EVER. Well, except for the one who embezzled money from the POA fund) and this neighbor is the treasurer and we needed to give her some letters to mail about turning people’s water off if they didn’t pay their POA fees (an example of our incompetence– we were supposed to do this in March but kept not doing it) (now we’re doing it just in time for the NEXT president to have to deal with the fallout. Hey, maybe we’re not just lazy- we’re clever!) ANYHOW, my point is, I was standing there looking around at her cute cozy pretty little house thinking how NICE it was and how I LOVED it and how I REALLY WANT A PRETTY, INVITING, COZY HOUSE and not something that looks like college kids or hobos or both have taken over…and suddenly I realized….

OMG. It is EXACTLY LIKE OUR HOUSE!!!

Except it’s NICE. It was built by the same person and is exactly like ours inside, although turned around in the opposite direction, but….it’s NICE. The walls are painted white (we have uuuuugly dark fake paneling) and they have wood floors (we have incredibly nasty ancient carpet that the cats are ripping up) the kitchen is bright and airy (again, white painted walls vs. dark fake paneling — it’s one of those open kitchens that just has a bar between it and the living area, unfortunately) , they’ve got pretty french doors to the deck (we have an ancient sliding door that is nasty looking no matter how I clean it) and there’s an extra big window that’s been added beside the door, letting more light in. 

It’s what our house could look like, if we fixed it up. And the fixes that really make a difference… like LIGHT WALLS…. are things we could actually do ourselves. My point in all this being that I really hope once I get the back room painted, I will be inspired to paint the rest of the house!! We are also getting carpet if I have to rip up the old carpet and glue new carpet down myself. (Sadly wood floors are out. WAY too expensive, and too loud for Noise Neurotic Baker B). Carpet is something else that isn’t outrageously expensive. Anything would help enormously.

So. I’m all full of home improvement ideas now. We’ll see how long THAT lasts. But, as I told Baker B when we decided we really can not afford to move now, we are fixing that crazy-ass house up if we can’t escape it. And I actually LIKE our house. I’m just sick of the clutter and the 1960s-but-not-in-a-good-way vibe. 

Okay. I’ve ranted on long enough and must make an effort to get back to work.