Phoenix Metro-Light Rail Too Dirty?!

http://www.phoenixnewtimes.com/2009-04-23/news/light-rail-operators-are-not-happy-and-when-you-read-this-crap-you-won-t-blame-them/

I'm not one to discourage cleaning, but these light rails are surprisingly clean. This article talks about how unhappy the light rail operators are with the upkeep and security forces of the light rails, now I ride the light rail at least six times a week, and I have to take the public city-bus to get to the light rail and I feel like I'm at the Four Seasons Maui when I get on the light rail after the bus ride. Granted there are newspapers and and maybe a coffee cup or two laying around, but I have yet to see urine, vomit, feces (from any mammal) or blood. I have had my fair share of conversations with some nasty people on those trains too, but they aren't leaving behind their stench, just holding it in the cart until their stop. I have never seen a passed out homeless person on the light rail either. They know better, because there are officers who come on and ask for bus passes and it's not worth the $50-$500 fine or being arrested (jail here must be miserable because I would think that anything would be better than sitting in the 100 degree heat).
I wish I could speak with the operators personally, like I can on the busses because the bus drivers are never very nice. It's like no one really wants to be on the bus anyway so why do you have to take your anger out on that red light? Why can't you respond when I say "Good morning!" I realize there is no such thing as a good morning, but even if you wanted to respond with "No it's not," at least you are responding. My whole life I've been riding busses, I took a school bus in elementary school, a public bus to see my parents after school, now the light rail and something I learned a long time ago is that bus drivers think they rule the world and in the end they definitely do rule your life. If your driver happens to be super friendly one morning, I can guarantee that you are going to have a better day than if they weren't happy and nice to you. If your driver is running five minutes or even three minutes late-your whole day has been put off-thank you long-nailed, tattooed woman whose hair looks better than mine. Sometimes the bus is too full and the driver chooses to either pass right by you or stop just to tell you you can't get on. I've seen the driver go into a daze many times and completely miss the request for a stop! What can they possible be thinking about that hard?
It's scary riding public transportation. I can't tell you how many times the light rail has come to a sudden halt and the operator comes over the speaker to apologize "Sorry there was a pedestrian, sorry a car almost turned right into us" or they just don't apologize because they were probably half asleep and didn't see the light turn yellow. Really the last thing that should be on the operators mind is the homeless man who didn't pay for his ride and smells like a diaper because they aren't the ones who have to sit near them and smell it for thirty minutes back to Tempe. Instead I would appreciate it if they just paid attention and tried to stay awake.

Spinning my wheels

Too many thoughts on the brain to go to sleep. Such a range of things too. This weekend was overall pretty worthless I would say. I should have gone to Coachella (music festival in Cali) with some old friends of mine, but I chose not to. Why? Well for one I definitely don't have the money. But, I also thought maybe I would miss out on something here, like hanging out with my friends or a guy that I spend some time with these days. I was WAY wrong. Everyone ended up working all day everyday and I spent most of my time alone, which, as most of us know, I do not enjoy after last semester. So what happened was I went in and out of mood swings as I attempted to do school work and find a place to live for next year. Mostly I would say I was in a bad and annoyed mood. I am sick of missing out on things because I try to plan to be with people. I feel like I am always planning my life around someone and then miss out on things because of it. I need to stop and learn that I should take the chances of losing some money and time spent with people because I never know what might happen when I do.
It sucks because I like people to think of me as a generally happy and life-loving person. But lately I haven't been that way and I don't know why. I have these mood swings of emotions that overwhelm me and ruin everything. I think I am still adjusting to being able to feel emotion. I wonder how long it will take me to understand all the emotions possible... I feel so behind.
One fun thing I did do this weekend was go to this city in Arizona known as "Little Mexico" called Guadalupe. Surprisingly and slightly scarily not far from Tempe lies this ghetto town that even Mexicans can get nervous about entering. I went because I have this list of things to do before I graduate and going and adventuring in Guadalupe is one of them. So my friend Marco and I went to a carnival in Guadalupe and I was the ONLY white person there. Not even white girl, just white person; with my Versace glasses on (because I need contacts since I seem to be going blind) and my thinning hair. Everyone stared and some people tried to talk to me like it was no big deal that I was sitting there waiting for my friend on the Zipper (roller coaster) all by myself. Honestly, I enjoyed being there, I liked to watch how these people interacted with each other, the clothes they wore and how everyone seemed to be related whether it was "oh that's my sister's nephew" or "nope that one's mine!" The best part of the whole night was across the street was a fiesta and what did they have? STREET TACOS! I haven't had them in years (the last time I went to Sayulita) and they were amazing! Just like tacos from the red chair place in Sayulita, all I needed was a crepe and I would have felt like I was there. My friends and I decided to get a few drinks at our favorite bar "Monkey Pants" down the street from our apartment to finish off the night.
So that was my one crazy and fun night, which was actually quite relaxed the whole time. Today was just as lame as the last two and I have to work in the morning but can't sleep because of all these stupid things on my mind. My foot really hurts, I think I did something to it during my run last night, it hurt all day but I went running today anyway.
I am supposed to go to a Formal this Friday but I don't like any of the dresses I have. I really should get a hair cut because my split ends are taking over the few hundred hairs I do still have. Luckily I can paint my own toes and nails! But my brows need a serious hacking at.
Then there is always this one person. This person I enjoy spending time with, but who doesn't have all the time I want to have with. This person does a lot of volunteering and extracurriculars and it takes up most of the time. I'm at a point where I cant decide if I would be happier with or without this person in my life because when I'm not with it I want to be and get annoyed when we cant hang out but when we are together I worry about all the work and sleep this person needs. It used to be so much fun and now I just plan my life around it (as usual) and I hate it. I promised myself after many things that happened last semester that I would never plan my life around someone and wait anymore. I need to do what makes me happy-but how do I figure that out? There are so many risks to find happiness.
Finally there is my family. I miss my family like crazy. Everyday I think about them and it sucks because when I talk to them on the phone you would never guess that I miss them as much as I do. I used to talk to my grandma on IM every night, but we have both been busy with other things lately. My sisters are all over the place and next year they will be even farther, and I wonder what I have sacrificed to be out here in the heat. My parents are always willing to talk and help, but from far away it just isn't the same. And every time someone mentions baseball I can't help but be sad about Graham's games that I am missing.
Tomorrow is 4/20 known for so many different things. National Drug Day, Hitler's birthday, 10th anniversary of Columbine. Some will be mourning, some will be high as a kite and living their lives however they choose-maybe seeing as many people as they can in a day, or going to places they've never been. Of all of the days in the year, this is one that I choose not to smoke on. Never have and probably never will-there is no rhyme or reason to it, just the way things have always been and something I don't ever want to change.
Well, I hope you have all enjoyed my insanity of a brain. I know it might be a lot and absolutely unentertaining. But, that's me. I will try to get some sleep now. I have a big deadline at work tomorrow.

The Point of Deletion

When do you finally come to the point of deletion in your life? When it is just time to say goodbye and let it go forever. The point when it's so hard to take anything that you just have to delete it all.

Sometimes things get overwhelming and you cry for no reason, sometimes things are fun and crazy and you cant help but smile.
But when things just don't make sense at all and there is no direction to go, no clear choice to pick, what do you do? Delete it all? Delete one way? Try one way and pray that it works out and hope that if that was the wrong way then maybe the other path is right behind you waiting.

Why can't it be more clear? It seems so simple from the outside: there it is, right in front of you the most perfect thing in the world practically begging you to choose it. Meanwhile all you want is for the other thing to show up out of the blue and make it all better. Is it a matter of you want what you cant have? Or is it truly something else, something deeper-a feeling, a wish, a sign from above.

It consumes my mind, makes my hair fall out. It's a constant cloud over my head, sometimes it clears for a few hours and then suddenly the storm rolls in and all I can think is this must be the point of deletion.

Jason Schechterle -Making Coffee

I was at my internship at Banner Good Samaritan Medical Center yesterday and busy at work when my Outlook Express popped up with a message of "Speech with Jason Schechterle 12:00 p.m." I had a lot to do and wasn't going to go, but both my boss and my boss's boss came to make sure I was going to join them. I wasn't sure what to expect because I was not in Arizona when Jason's accident occurred and I was not really in the mood for another sad story.

Our CEO Larry Volkmar introduced the speaker and out from behind the wall comes a very tall man-an obvious burn-victim with a huge smile on his face. He raised his large, damaged hands in thanks and to stop the clapping and began his story. I sat and listened in awe as this man told the horrific story of how everything happened for a reason the night of his accident and every little miracle was so perfectly planned out somehow. He went on about the recovery process (which will probably never end) and his family who stuck with him through it all. It was an unbelievable story, from beginning to end. He was a police officer just trying to help another unit out when he was struck by an epilectic taxi driver and severely burned, blinded and morphed for life-in more ways than just physically.

Obviously anyone who lives through such an experience and can come out and speak about it has something amazing to say and is inspiring, but Jason had more to say than his life was a miracle. After years of piecing together the broken puzzle pieces of that night, Jason sees the accident as him doing his job to save other lives because that cab driver could have hit a mother with her children or anyone else who probably wasn't strong enough to survive such a trauma. He told jokes and shared the amazing experiences he had that scared him shitless, like throwing the first pitch at the D-backs season opener with his disfigured hands and walking the Olympic Torch in front of thousands of people.

He concluded his speech (for lack of a better word because that makes it sound boring and mandatory) with a small story that a woman wrote to him during his recovery. Here is a short version:
What are you carrots, eggs or coffee beans?:
A daughter was complaining to her mom about what a bad day and week she was having and how everything was going wrong and on and on. The mom put three pots of water on the stove to boil one had carrots, one had eggs and one had coffee beans. After her daughter was done with her harangue on life the mom told her to empty the pots into bowls and asked her which are you-the carrots, the eggs, or the coffee beans. The daughter was annoyed with her mom and said she didn't get it, to which her mom responded:
"When the water got hot and hard to tolerate the carrots got soft and flimsy, the eggs hardened inside, but the beans turned their water into coffee, and the hotter it got the stronger the coffee was."
We all sat in silence and Jason said "I've learned that life is 10% what happens and 90% how you react." This hit me. Hit me hard and I never wanted it to stop.
Life is hard, and rocky and sucks sometimes, and Jason knows that everyone has problems and he wasn't telling us that our problems are minute-he was just saying that we decide how to react and what to make of them.

So instead of telling a story of a survivor, Jason was telling a story of life and lessons that come with it. He used his story to back up what he believed and it was an amazing one. We asked if he does inspirational talks for other burn victims or Iraqi soldiers and he hesitated. He said that everyone comes from a different story and past and he can't stand in front of a 24-year-old soldier with missing limbs, who doesn't have a wife and kids yet and is half his age and tell him that it all works out in the end. Everyone's story is unique, and he knows that other victims of terrible traumas would look at him like "you have no idea what it's like to be me, because your life is so different." Jason knows what hurt is, but he knows what strength is too, Jason is making coffee.

90% Reaction.

"Your problems are controlled"

So I was on the light rail on my way home from a five hour extremely long, tedious and frustrating class and I was in a surprisingly good mood considering the lack of sleep from last night, the large amounts of work I have to do and the day I had just completed. I sat down next to a boy that started conversation as we were waiting for the train to arrive thinking that he and I would carry on our conversation, instead a man who was sitting on the other side of me started conversation about the book that I had taken out (Biology).
I couldn't quite tell if this man was a drug dealer or had truthfully gotten all of these pain killers from a doctor for an accident he was in seven years ago. Either way he was very interesting to talk to. I could tell he was definitely high on medicine, but he had so many interesting things to say to me. He could instantly "read" my personality and tell a lot about me, which for me was very nice because I am usually the one who can read people and they never really understand that. So we had a good connection. He read my hand for my life line and love line, etc and told me stories of his life, asked me questions and made the thirty-minute trip fly by and very enjoyable. He had me laughing and smiling to the point of a foolish school-girl who doesn't know any better when a boy is just playing his game. It wasn't that he was flirting with me, he was just so real with me and I truly appreciated it.
There was one point in our conversation that he said "You have no problems." I just looked at him and said "Well that's just not true, everyone has problems." He quickly corrected himself by saying, "You're right, but your problems are controlled... am I right?" I just looked at him and said "You know what you are right, you are very right. My problems are controlled." After we talked about AC/DC and The Beatles, our mitzvah's and many other random things, my stop came up. I shook David's hand and told him to feel better soon and have a good night. He was so grateful for meeting me and wished that we could have only met earlier because we would have been a great pair.
I walked off the light rail happier than I have felt in weeks. He was so right, my problems are controlled. I have many of them, but I have them under control. I skipped with joy back to my car and picked some flowers for my apartment as well as grabbed a rock off of the train tracks to put in my fountain. I wanted to have something to remember the day that I was so happy I cried.