Reid Upadhyay

8:30am

Awake and acclimating from my dream reality to my waking reality except my brain is doing an unnecessary and annoying dream scan for evidence of [redacted] before my rational mind is awake enough to notice. My cat is screaming at me. If I don’t turn the faucet on for her she will knock over the mini Virgin Mary statue in my room.

9am

Eating oatmeal at a snail's pace and looking out the window but not really seeing. Okay now I’m seeing and it’s beautiful. There’s a buzzing noise in my head. Or maybe it is coming from outside of me? I investigate the room to find that the buzzing is in the ceiling. I catch a glimpse of my concerned/scared face in the mirror. I turn on the light and the buzzing concludes.

10am

Washing the dishes in the sink before going on a walk. I left dishes overnight out of exhaustion which I try not to do, even more so after seeing an instagram witch warn that leaving dishes in the sink overnight causes financial strain. That can’t be right but I’m porous and then superstitious. She was probably just trying to scare her roommate into cleaning the dishes. Joke’s on her because I’m Catholic and it’s pay day.

12pm

On my walk I see my upstairs neighbor. I try to smile at him but he looks past me. Calling Verizon, eating a peach and then a leftover cheeseburger. Watching the Olympics, trying not to get emotional about it. The butt tap is really ubiquitous across all sports. After the climbers finish some guy has to come out and vacuum the chalk off the mats. In the women’s high jump a guy sits next to the pole and his job is to pick it up when the ladies knock it over. I wonder about these people and how they got those jobs. Every day I watch the Olympics, always with chills and tears in my eyes.

1pm

Yoga w Adriene and finish a new drawing. 

3:33pm

Some time has passed that I can’t account for. I put on a shirt and pants to go to the grocery store. You can see my bra through the shirt. I don’t care.

3:36pm

I’m inside Grocery Outlet just kind of standing there. I remember I’m in public and have a goal. I end up buying a bunch of random stuff. 

4:15pm

No one will let me out of the parking garage on 44th street. The car behind me honks. It was this couple I saw in the store earlier. The woman said I don’t get that, ‘plant based’. The man said nothing and kept pushing the cart down the aisle as if he were her assistant. Later in the parking garage as they’re loading up their Subaru the man says I wanted to talk about what we talked about before. Maybe he honked at me because they’re fighting now. Anyway I’m waiting to get back on the road and I see what appears to be a man smoking hookah in his car. He’s blowing huge clouds, holding the hose while talking on the phone while not letting me onto the street. Someone finally lets me out and I drive through a small pond. It’s raining. I’m wearing a see through shirt.

5pm

I realize I bought two different kinds of ice cream at the store. Showering and getting dressed to meet some friends at a wine bar. I’m wearing a dress that a toddler might wear to church except I’m a 28 year old woman. With my adidas windbreaker and earrings that are mini bells.

6pm

S picks me up and says you’re wearing your dress and I say you’re wearing your tank top. We’re at the bar and the music is at an absurd volume. It’s packed but A finds us and we sit down at a tiny table with T. I can’t sit comfortably or hear anyone but I like looking at my friends. It’s the type of establishment where they trust the patrons with a lit candle in the bathroom. We talk about Montreal, egregious stand up comedy, our summers, and sexual faux pas. There are too many glasses and plates on the table.

8pm

T leaves. I stand outside with A and S for a second and I call out S for immediately opening Hinge. We walk to a weird ice cream place where there is only one guy working and he brings S his ice cream on a tray and rings a bell. We walk to A’s boyfriend's apartment. I feel like that photo of Hillary Clinton any time I’m in someone’s apartment for the first time. A opens instagram and there’s a new post from an abject instagram throuple that we’re mesmerized by. On the couch we laugh for an hour.

9pm

S and I have to leave because our parking is up. A drives us back to S’s car and we attempt to get to the bottom of what attracts many women to this unpleasant guy we know. Many such cases. S drives us home.

10pm

I get home and immediately eat ice cream on my couch. I have to wake up so early for work. Failing the don’t-think-about-my-ex challenge.

11pm

I start texting my friend about spiritual discernment but my eyes won’t stay open.