This whole apartment thing ain't working out anymore....(Or: I'm too old for this shit)

I go to bed around 1:00 (adjusted time) last night, savoring the extra hour to myself.

Then, around 4:30, I'm awakened by a woman's moans. I'm disoriented, worried, and blind (I've got 20/600 vision). I also hear "no."

I jump to my feet, grab around for my glasses. Can't find them. I rush to turn on the light. I'm pissed my gun is in the other room, not that I'd be able to shoot anyone if a woman were being assaulted outside of my window, since I can't see one foot in front of me.

Then I realize it's either (a) my neighbors having sex, with her being extremely vocal or (b) my neighbors blasting porn.*

As that awareness washes over me, my heart settles from about 220 beats per minute to a (still high) 150 beats per minute. And my worry turns to fury. I turn to the wall and beat on it three times, vowing to myself to call the authorities and report a domestic disturbance if it didn't cease (it WAS a domestic disturbance...they were disturbing me).

Ms. Oooh-Yes-Oooh-No shuts the fuck up.

But it takes me about twenty minutes to get rid of that adrenaline and settle back to sleep.

Undergrads. Can't live next to them. Can't shoot them with my 9.

*I'm guessing porn, due to her sounding JUST LIKE a fucking porn star. And owing to the fact that as soon as I banged on the wall, all noises stopped. Headphones? 

"The Plan"

I'll go ahead and admit that I'm not always the most loved person in class. I like to bullshit with the teachers, have an opinion on a lot of subjects, and sit in the front row. I'm essentially a gunner sans the annoying asking questions part of the equation (which I would argue is essential to being a gunner and thus excludes me from their ranks). I'd also argue that I'm not a gunner because my seating on the front row stems from years of being unable to see the chalkboard because of my lack of VISION (you can re-read that blog entry here, if you want to inform yourself about how I'm blind and all) and not due to my need for the professor to see my hand. What you don't understand is that this is all part of the plan.

Let me explain: I had a couple classes I did not like my 1L year. Sure, the material wasn't that difficult, but I hated the subject. During those classes, I would make comments. And then I noticed something...because I spoke, then the teacher would NEVER CALL ON ME. EVEN WHEN I WAS UNPREPARED. (Which was essentially all the time...who am I kidding?) I went through Contracts 1 and 2 without EVER.BEING.CALLED.UPON. (And this is a lady who literally checked people off as she went along.)

Genius, right?

........Right?..................

Now, about my personality and the realization that doing this could make me potentially unpopular........

Let's not kid ourselves--law students are a particularly annoying bunch of people. The people that generally sat at the front of the classrooms in undergrad. The students that asked follow-up questions and made sometimes-astute-observations regarding the subject at hand. The type A personalities that freaked out and did the group presentation work all on their own. The type B personalities that fucked up your curve...quietly.

The people bitching about gunners now were almost certainly that bunch in undergrad.

And they can kiss my law-loving ass.

(Although I am inclined to want to bodyslam anyone who talks with 30 seconds remaining before the class ends.)

Forget LSF's....I CAN'T SEE!

That may be a bit of an overstatement. I've always had a really difficult time with the whole seeing thing. This was blatantly obvious to me tonight, as I couldn't see the road in front of me. DAMN YOU, lacking night vision! Although I'm (thankfully) not legally blind, when I'm not wearing corrective lenses, my vision is generally about 20/800. Just for those of you that don't know, there is a big E at the top of the vision chart. For those of you who didn't know that, you most certainly will not know that there is a HUGE A above that.

Folks, I can't even see the A. 

Now, how does one become so utterly lacking in vision? When I was younger, I used to read voraciously. I would read at the dinner table. I would read during class, hiding the book under my desk. I would read in the dark with a flashlight. Notice how that last sentence is underlined? Yeah....I think that's why I can no longer see. My mother likes to tell the story of the first time she noticed I couldn't see, which was when I was in third grade. At the time, I had a (moronic) teacher who, TO THIS DAY, I remember could not differentiate between the pronunciation of "broad" and "board." (I am still pissed about her marking my spelling wrong when I TOTALLY spelled the word she announced to the class, but I digress...) Every day, my mom would drop me off at school then head back home, but this day, I forgot my lunch and she had to come in to drop it off to me.

::CUE SCENE::

My mom arrives at the classroom, where I am literally a foot away from the board writing down our "DOL" (Daily Oral Language or something stupid like that) problem.
My mother, to the teacher: "Why is Erica so close to the board?"
The moronic teacher: "Oh, she does that every day. She says she can't see the board."
My mother: "And you didn't think to tell me?"
The moronic teacher: vacant smile

Later that day

Mom: "Why were up at the board this morning?"
Me: "Because I couldn't see the board."
Mom: "What else can't you see?"
Me: "I dunno...if I can't see it, how do I know it's there?"
Mom: (backing up) "How many fingers am I holding up?"
Me: (squinting really hard) "Two?"
Mom: "I'm calling the eye doctor."

::END SCENE(s):: 

As an aside: I was an overachiever even back in grade school. When the school administered the hearing and vision tests, I literally thought I was being graded on them. So when I misidentified the panda bear as the birthday cake (how ISN'T that a dead giveaway, people?!?!?!), I totally played it off, like "Oh yeah, that's what I meant." And somehow, they believed me.

Just recently, my dad told me "the rest of the story," as Paul Harvey (may he rest in peace) would say. We were talking about my pitiful vision skills and he said, "I still remember the day you got your glasses." Your mom took you to the eye doctor, and when they gave them to you, you told her "Wow....I can see!!!!" Your mom told me "_______, I felt about two inches small." That still makes me laugh, because she needn't have. I literally didn't know what I was missing...because I just couldn't see it.

To this day, my mom tells me I owe her my sight. She fed me so many carrots and sweet potatoes when I was a baby, the palms of my hands and the bottoms of my feet turned orange. She swears without this extra beta-keratin, I would have been doomed to spend the rest of my life with a stick and a dog. My mom...the optimist.