Suburban Sketch: Running on Empty

Sometimes little things strike me as a pretty visual, or a nice feeling. I like jotting those down into story sketches. Sometimes metaphorical, mostly fictional, maybe the beginning or middle of a story. This is one of those.

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The gas pump wurrs and clicks rhythmically as the diesel flows through the tube connected to my car. The waves pumping through the hose gently rock the car a little as I lean with my back against it; back and forth, back and forth, back and forth.

It’s late October and the night air is clear. Faded music from the half-broken speaker set above Pump No. 2 is carried in on a breeze. Whoever closed up the station lobby and left the radio running didn’t let it know that the only audience member to this quiet concert tonight would be alone. It’s playing only the left half of an old love song; something from the 50s.

Thursday, 10 PM, isn’t exactly prime time for a four pump gas station. Letting my head rest on the rusty roof of my old sedan, I close my eyes and tighten my arms closer to myself from inside the pockets of my sweater. One singularity, alone in the flickering fluorescent spotlight.

I needed to fill up before leaving from home. Or leaving for home, I guess. It’s been getting harder and harder to tell these days. When you make a new home where does the old one go? They say home is where your heart is, but my heart carries a home in each chamber and ventricle, and it’s starting to get heavy.

Either way, I always end up back here. Always returning to start, and never actually starting. Never fully leaving, but not fully there anymore either.

As the cracked screen counts the flowing gallons, I look up and count the stars above me.  All those little white dots in the inky blue sky. Little singularities, flickering and floating around on their own. All reflecting and illuminated by the same big, bright moon.

There is one more long wave of fuel before the pump clicks a final time, cutting off the flow to the nozzle. Going in circles uses up a lot of gas.

Hello!

This is my very first Blogging 101 assignment (it’s not the first, but it’s my first).
The task was to introduce ourselves by creating a “who I am and why I’m here” post.

So, just to begin, my name is Paige. I am 22 years old, and a New Orleans native. I recently graduated from the University of New Orleans with a major in English, concentrating in regional literature, and a minor in History. I have always had an interest in art, I have a very loyal heart, a large family, a tight group of lovely friends, and an extremely supportive boyfriend. According to myself at 13, as recorded in a very full diary, I have dirty blonde hair, hazel eyes, my favorite food is crawfish, and I like all movies and all animals. Also I have a really big math test tomorrow.

To answer the questions as provided by The Daily Post:

1) Why are you blogging publicly, rather than keeping a personal journal?
Just from a quick glance at my book shelf I have about 12 personal journals chronicling my life from the age that I could hold a pen to yesterday. It’s always been cathartic for me to write out thoughts, ideas, or the details of my day, knowing that I’ll always have them there to look back on later. That being said, I’ve finally reached a place emotionally where my diary isn’t locked with keys that I wear on a charm bracelet, and the yellow caution tape stickers, warning that this marble notebook is “private”, has worn thin. So, even though this is new for me, I would really enjoy a community of people who are interested in the things I have to say and have their own thoughts constantly pouring out of them as well.

2) What topics do you think you’ll write about?
I have a couple of plans for this blog, but I would mainly want it to be a place where I can vent after a long day or celebrate after a day that was so good it probably went by too fast. I plan on expressing my current thoughts and revisiting my younger self too. I would love to have a weekly throwback Thursday post where I share a (hopefully not too embarrassing) page out of one of the many old journals I’ve mentioned. I’d like to share some creative writing and character sketches. But mostly I’d like to give advice, through lists and reviews, that I wish I had received before being thrown into this big blue world.

3) Who would you love to connect with via your blog?
Starting out, I would appreciate some like minded friends. People who also see themselves as creative kids at heart, who love the moon but are afraid of the dark, and can help me help them make all of our little voices a little bit louder just by being there to help each other.
Ultimately I would love to blog professionally. I don’t know how xojane.com and jezebel.com work but I read their posts and value those voices and also I just want to be Carrie Bradshaw.

4) If you blog successfully throughout the next year, what would you hope to have accomplished?
A little family of mutual followers, a better understanding of the layout, a doodle I made as my personal header/life logo, a blog with my own url, and at least one published piece of creatively written material (in no particular order).

Good luck to my fellow Blog 101-ers!