Sitting in the lab, I realized that this girl had piqued my curiousity all week, and it bothered me a little bit. She was very weird-looking, definitely not American, maybe European. Not one drop of makeup, but that was not what was bothering me, it was just something else that I noticed about her. It was something that I couldn't put my finger on....boyish. Yes, definitely boyish. She must be in her early 20's with a small, boy-shaped body and cropped, spiky blond hair and small, angled, crystal blue eyes. And her head was triangular, like a cat. Not at all pretty, not even potentially, really. My first impression, matter-of-factly, was that she was a lesbian. Intriguing, different. For some inexplicable reason, I decided that I didn't like her without even talking to her. There was lots to do, and I had made the decision within milliseconds and had mentally moved on. I later came to know that her name was Janie and she was a lab worker in the group that was supplying all the cells and reagents for the rest of the Ph.D's, so I would see her come and go with vials of God-knows-what all week. It was quite an insignificant thing at the time to just write her off in my mind.
I've been wrong before. Sometimes I suck at interpreting first impressions.
One such case that comes to mind immediately is Eleanor, an older woman who I worked with (there's no way it's) 15 years ago. She seriously looked like the meanest person on the face of the earth. She had a loud, hoarse voice and she would spit and sputter and "holler" (she was from Mississippi (wow-that was fun to type) and that's what they do in Mississippi (had to get it in just one more time) when they get mad). Everyone in the office truly hated her.
I got stuck pulling "crap duty" with Eleanor, which was the shift where we both came in at 4:00 AM on Saturday to do a quick systems backup and power on the mainframe so the computer operators could have the day off. At first I dreaded working this with her because I was crabby enough about missing my Saturday having to work (I was in college and I would use the day off during the week to cram in as many lab classes as possible each semester).
The first month wasn't too pleasant, but as weeks went by I learned a lot about Eleanor and her hard life. Her and her husband were Red Cross employees overseas (Eleanor had been an RN), and her son, Michael, who would have been close to my age, was hit by a drunk driver and killed at the age of 4 right in front of her. Then her husband had died at a young age. She had gotten tougher and she had just continued living life.
One time, when the topic came up, I asked her if she had ever done CPR. She answered "Yes, on my son." It was heartbreaking. Because my name is Michael and I was born around the same time as him, as we got closer I knew she would gaze away and make a connection that wasn't really there...
As weeks stretched out to months, we unexpectedly became good friends. She had lived in Europe, and she told me that she loved cappuccino, which I had never had. She brought her machine up to work and we celebrated "crap duty" with a 4 AM cappuccino, and she taught me how to steam the milk with the machine. We made it a weekly tradition, and she would secretly store the machine in a cleaned-out bottom drawer of her desk, putting her reference books on the floor to make space. "Crap duty" started to become fun for about a year and a half until Eleanor moved on.
Don't get me wrong, she really was mean as hell. But I came to appreciate her, and realize that there's more to people than first impressions. But that didn't stop me with Janie, for some reason...
We all had gone to the wine and cheese party on opening night, and I had purposely avoided meeting her in particular when the opportunity arose--it was easy enough in a group of nearly 100 people.
In and out of the lab, all week, without a word. Maybe she sensed that I just was not interested in talking to her. I mean, I have enough friends in the world, and I was working with 5 people that I didn't know very well, becoming friends with them. It takes a lot of energy to make friends, doesn't it? I don't want to be one of those idiots who just gushes at everyone they meet and confides the details of their life without any discernment, do I? Well, dude, you don't have to be a judgemental asshole, either, do you? (sorry, I was talking amongst myself for a moment).
So there I was, sitting in the lab. The first time I realized that there was more to Janie than meets the eye was when, bleary-eyed at 11:00 PM, I was working with a group on an experiment. Our cells were undergoing changes and we were graphing them over time. When the experiment had ended, Janie walked in carrying a beer (pretty common during this course). She was wearing shorts and a white, worn-out t-shirt, guys' shoes, and her wash-n-wear hair was looking as cropped and spiky as ever. She walked over to the experiment, which was still set up although our work was done, and with her right hand typed a couple of characters on the keyboard and with her left hand slowly poured beer over the cells.
Okay, now that's my kind of science. Weird science.
We graphed the reaction out, and I pulled up both graphs in succession, saying very dramatically. "These are your cells. These are your cells on Guinness. Any questions?" And she laughed. Man, I guess I'm just a sucker for that.
The next day, after Janie had left the lab, I found out that one of the girls that I was working with, my friend Laura, knew Janie.
"She's cool. She's from Sweden. She works in the lab and she really knows what she's doing."
That night, Janie came into the lab and had to do a quick set-up of some equipment. I considered myself pretty skilled with my hands, and I recognized that she knew exactly what she was doing with some very complex stuff. It was impressive, because as I watched, I appreciated that she didn't waste one movement, and she didn't get anything wrong. She easily estimated the size of the bolt she was putting in and picked the right allen wrench out of a kit and there's just something in the hands that you can spot and know that someone is on the ball mechanically. Janie had it. Then I realized that of all the lab workers that I was running into all week during these long days, Janie was the most competent and cheerful while others were kind of breaking down mentally through the stress of the 12-20 hour days.
Then I felt like a total dork for snubbing her for absolutely no reason. At least that's the story I'm sticking with. I would hate to examine my motives and find some other, more sinister thought lurking in there that I have to retract, but maybe it is in there. At any rate, I decided to grace Janie with my acquaintence, and she forgave me for being such a jackass by hanging out in my lab with my group.
Laura introduced us and we sat around chatting at 1 in the morning after all the work was done and all the equipment was cleaned off and shut down.
We were discussing a trivial incident, and she mentioned that it will probably end up in someone's blog somewhere.
I squirmed.
Laura shot a glance over at me. She was the only one around that knew that I kept a blog, and she didn't even have the URL, although I had sent her several very short stories in the past. She had just read "Memoriable Day Weekend" earlier that day.
Janie continued, saying, "In Sweden, everyone keeps a blog. It's kind of the thing to do..."
I inserted a comment "Well, then, you could put it in your blog, then." It was the first comment I made directly to her, and she smiled, blushed, and looked down. I wonder if she keeps one...but I didn't want to talk about mine.
"Mike is a writer", Laura blurted out.
"Really?"
"Well, short stories and such..." I tried to minimize the damage. Damn it! Doesn't she know I'm shy about that? I'm glad some people push me out of my paranoid shell.
"...vignettes" Laura continued. Is that good? That doesn't sound too flattering to me...plus, she really hasn't read too many things I've done...
"Yeah, I try to write but it just sucks. So I keep writing."
Laura didn't correct me like I was hoping she would.
Janie bought my self-deprecation. "You don't have to say it sucks."
"Well, I'm working on it." I think she saw through me.
So my secret was somewhat out. I'm glad Laura didn't tell her I pound out copious mundane observations in a very boring blog, because I think I would have been humiliated. Like, everyone would think "Yeah, that's what he does with his time instead of doing something smart like we do..."
But, over the next couple of days, I went out of my way to talk to Janie when she came in the room, and realized that she was a kind, smart, and extremely competent person.
On the last night, there was a lobster bake. (If you are a person who is not from anywhere near the ocean and are ever invited to a lobster dinner near the ocean, here's a tip: It's not a fancy occasion. It's like a backyard barbecue. So don't wear your nice dockers, new shoes, and button-down shirt, cause it's possible that you will look like a moron. You could also conceivably find yourself on the beach searching for seaweed, soaking ocean water into your once-new shoes...) I realized that, in this large group of people, I felt myself gravitating to Janie and I had a great chat with her by the bonfire.
For some reason, up til this point, I hadn't told her that, in 4th grade, I had written a report about how I wanted to go to Norway, Sweden, and Denmark and all the things that I had researched and wanted to see. She was shocked. Then she laughed and laughed. But I could tell that she was very pleased.
Janie told me about her family and what it was like to grow up in a village of 32 people. She was dreadfully homesick.
I asked her about the movie Insomnia (if the first thing you think of is the Robin Williams/Al Pacino version, think again--the first one, in Norwegian and Swedish, is fantastic and darker.) I asked her about a scene where a boy is offended by a Swedish guy speaking Norwegian to him, and his accent. She told me a lot about how the different accents sound to her. I remember her saying that people from Denmark sound like they are speaking Swedish with a mouthful of mashed potatoes.
I said good-bye to Janie and hugged her. Then it was a little awkward because I didn't leave right away and ran into her again. I told her "I've already said goodbye to you so I can't talk to you anymore." She laughed again, but I hugged her again (which is really good for me, who really isn't too comfortable with that kind of stuff most of the time). I know I'll run into her again somewhere.
I can't believe I almost missed out on making a cool new friend, definitely one of the most interesting and kind people I met all week.
You know, most people have really good hearts. Be good to them.
Hannibal Lecter version of the moral of this story: "You know, most people have really good hearts...try them with fava beans. And a nice chianti..."
No comments:
Post a Comment