daverea.com

I remember a series of Folger’s commercials a while back where they showed people working in a cube farm, drinking coffee, set to music like you’d hear played at the olympic games. The announcer billed them as “coffee achievers!”

After spending nine hours sitting (and sometimes sleeping and/or drooling on myself) in an ambulance at last night’s SWAT team standby, I arrived at work this morning primed to be such an achiever. Two giant cups of Folger’s later, I think I’ve hit the mark.

Spending extended periods of time in an ambulance, not doing anything, is sort of like taking an international flight in “steerage” class. You have about a 4-square-foot area in which to find the least-uncomfortable position and try not to go stir-crazy. Barry, my partner and the driver for the call, performed admirably in this endeavor – despite having to contend with pedals and a steering wheel invading his similarly-sized alloted space.

I eventually caved and flopped down on the gurney in the back, enjoying brief bouts of unconsciousness interrupted by the groan of the idling diesel and the occasional bark of one of the K-9 units’ German Shepards.

The SWAT team members mostly walk around and get in and out of their cars. It’s definitely not like you see in the movies or on any of TV’s cop dramas. Eventually, they convinced the guy to come out peaceful-like, and we all got to go home.

As far as I’m concerned, mission accomplished.

A certain princess has taken over my kitchen… She has filled the little 6′ by 7′ room – taller than it is wide – with noise and fury and, in strategically-selected spots, bread batter. She’s in the process of baking a dozen loaves of pumpkin bread. And one of them’s for me! Yay!

Before she started, I took a walk over to her place – about a half-mile away – to retrieve her little blendy-thingy for her. You know, one of those jobs that looks linda like a hair dryer, and you use it to puree stuff? It was a beautiful day outside, with autumn approaching and people out and about to enjoy our last few crisp days of warmish weather. I thought about today’s trip to the Amazing Maize Maze out in the next county, and how much fun we had negotiating the giant corn field maze of cut paths.

My mind wandered to that photographer’s question that’s been around as long as have been high school intro photo courses: “If our entire civilization was wiped out, and aliens landed some day and had nothing to go by but our photographs, what would they make of us?” A hundred steps or so down the sidewalk, that had morphed into something more along the lines of: “If I disappeared tomorrow, how would what I leave behind describe me?” How would the thousands of photographs on my computer’s hard drive tell a story about me? What would the stacks of paper in my office, the books and magazines on my shelves, the food in the fridge tell about me? What about my web browser’s history? My journal? The accounts of my family and friends?

It’s just one more facet, I suppose – we all have many “selves”: the people we are to our friends and our family, the people we believe we are, the people we wish we were, and the people we try to make ourselves out to be. And now, add to that list, “the people our lives describe us as…”

Which is probably the closest to who we really are.