mandalay

the post-it

This monday and last monday, I became acquainted with the local DMV. I had to register my car, which involved getting new plates and a California title, as well as getting a California driver's license. The registration process was definitely the most involved and I ended up having to leave after paying $200 and waiting in line to find a smog check place before returning to get my car inspected so I could leave with new plates. When I returned to the inspection station outside the DMV, there was a guy in the bay in front of me digging through his car. I walked up to the door and rang the bell (following the sign on the door) and stood around, waiting for something to happen.

It didn't.

After glancing around, starting to pace, returning to the door whilst considering ringing again, the guy said "Yeah, I think the bell's just a sham. I've already rung the thing three times." We struck up a conversation and I soon learned that this here was a Navy boy who is finishing his undergrad work—finally, he said, with a bunch of kids—and is in pre-med and psychology. He asked me what the practical application for Social Documentation was (after being unable to really figure out what it meant) and I have to say: I was stumped. The application is documentation, right? I wasn't committed to my answer. After about five minutes, someone finally came through the door and commenced to inspect his car. He kept trying to talk to me while the lady was asking questions of him. She moved on to my car and he said it was nice to meet me, introduced himself, and then tried to shake my hand with the woman in between us. It was a bit awkward.

He drove off and I continued my inspection and then went inside to finish up. Once I got a number (you have to wait in line to be assigned a number to wait: a brilliant system), I saw him sitting in the front row of chairs and sat down beside him and we resumed our conversation. While we were talking, he pulled out a not-really-pocket-size knife and started cleaning his fingernails. The action in itself wasn't surprising to me. My dad does this, I've seen it done by many men around me. In West Texas, all boys carried knives. The main goal of half the guys in choir when we toured Germany was to buy switchblades that are illegal here. And they did. Personally? I use my other hand to clean under my fingernails. This knife was a sort of large black utility knife. And I have an active imagination.

I won't say that I am prone to fantasize in my daily life. I think of it more as "running through scenarios." It's something I do throughout my day, during many activities, and I have no idea how many other people do this as well. So even while carrying on a conversation with the nice Navy boy, I was glancing around at the people in the room, wondering if he could be a psycho. Would someone behind the counter start screaming? See the knife and call in the police? Slyly reach behind the counter and trip a wire? Would he grab me and stab the thing into my neck? (Cambria, this is where your movie theory collides with my inner dialogue.)

The automated voice came over the speaker announcing his number. He stood up, closed and returned the knife to his pocket, excused himself, and walked over to the counter and perched as the woman dug around for a temporary registration permit for him. He walked back a couple of minutes later with a little yellow post-it with his name and phone number on it, smiled, and said to give him a call and we could get coffee some time. I smiled back and said sure, that'd be great.

What do you think? Is it weird to go out with a guy who has killed you in your head?

posted by amanda @ 2:11 PM