new books make everything better

scene of me yesterday: i'm sitting outside of visionary eye care professionals at clark and foster. i kind of want to cry. i had an appointment for 5:30pm. i biked down and filled out the new patient form. when i brought it up to the front desk, i handed them my insurance card as well and asked if they accepted blue cross. he played around on his computer and told me i wasn't in their system. i asked how much an appointment would be and he told me $100 if the doctor had to dilate my eyes, and more if he wanted to see me again. i asked if that would be necessary. he answered with a blank stare, (slash didn't). i told him i just wanted to buy contacts. i don't even need him to look at me. i'm sure i sounded dramatic, and it's not this dude's fault, but what the f? i hate dealing with this sort of stuff, (p.s.). clearly, because the contacts i have in right now i should have thrown out a couple months ago. anyway, i cancel my appointment and walk outside and i'm frustrated with the whole impossible medical/insurance bullshit system and even more frustrated with myself for always being such a baby about dealing with this stuff. fortunately my favorite bookstore is across the street. i figure as long as i'm down here with the afternoon free now, i may as well stop in, and ultimately spend money i don't have to spend. which i do. i have three books in my hand after wandering the store, but i talk myself down to two: Fun Home by Alison Bechdel and A Field Guide to Gay and Lesbian Chicago by Robert McDonald and Kathie Bergquist. the one that gets put back is The Rivals by Johnette Howard. all three of these books have been on the constantly growing list in my head. my friend marian told me about bechdel's graphic memoir over breakfast one morning last spring. marian and i have some stuff in common with bechdel: we're homos, we went to oberlin, we're creative (marian makes pretty postcards and is entering a master's program in book and paper arts at columbia college in the fall, i'm hoping to get into a master's program at northwestern for creative nonfiction writing). i was pretty excited to find it yesterday. it took me awhile to track it down because i was looking too hard--it wasn't in the mix of other comicesq books, it actually had it's own table and a sign with a picture of ms. bechdel herself, to let us know she was stopping by to say hi and sign books in a couple weeks. the field guide i read about in the reader last week. i think the woman author of it actually works in the bookstore i was wandering around in. she may have actually checked me out. it seemed like a book i should own, loving the gays and exploring this city as much as i do. a small part of me is against guide books though. i worry that the great places they describe will suck once they are populated by people following a guide book to their entrance. and i'd kind of like to discover them on my own. anyway, i caved. the rivals has been on my list since it came out. i try to read everything on women and sports, especially with a queer edge, as research for my own project/future and because i can't get enough of it. but i also need to branch out, hence the decision to postpone my purchase.

i bike home and decide to do laundry so my day can still feel somewhat productive. mostly, i'm just excited to sit down on the curb and start reading fun home while i wait to move my clothes to the dryer. my girlfriend meets me at the laundromat with the same look of frustration that painted my face earlier. she has spent the whole day working on a finance assignment. she expected to be done hours ago, and instead feels she still has hours to go. i tell her it's okay because i have a new pretty book to distract me. which is the truth. she is sitting over my laptop at the kitchen table. i am propped up in my bed, the next room over. i have twenty pages left when she finally decides to quit. she tells me she wanted to take a break a while ago, that she was staring at me waiting for me to look up and tell her to take a break, but i was absorbed in my book. i shrug and smile. 'i would have looked up if you said something,' i say. 'i know,' she replies.