09.08.2004 - 5:42 p.m.

I was standing in line--no, in a loose mob--in front of the MVA today, old plates in hand, ready to call myself first when the doors opened. It was eight-something, not too bad, although in order to get there at that time I'd been up for about two hours. I need to cut back on that up-before-dawn thing. It gives me bags under the eyes.

Anyway, I was leaning against the brick next to the door, keeping an eye on the cigarette smokers and a shoulder turned in front of the woman beside me (who had shown up five minutes later than I did) when I noticed a frog on the sidewalk. I'd thought it was a foreshortened cigarette butt, or maybe a stray piece of mulch until it jumped, and I watched it for the four minutes or so until the doors did open, and I did get to be first. It just sat there, not terribly troubled to be in the middle of what must have seemed an unending slab of concrete, punctuated with beings larger than it was by several orders of magnitude. Sit, hop, sit. Towards the parking lot. Because it had nothing better to do.

Returning the tags took ten minutes. Although I should've, I didn't renew my license. Turns out tags and licensing are separate lines, and anyway my hair wasn't dry.

When I walked out, the frog was still there on the curb. He had a green body and speckled brown legs, and I doubt he was much bigger than my thumbnail. And the frog is exactly why I will always need to live somewhere green, because I need things around me that don't need to call the music coordinator to have another packet mailed, and don't need to reserve a projector for the meeting tomorrow, and certainly don't have to worry about the fucking meeting.

There are more important things, like being outside at eight-thirty in the morning, because you have nothing better to do.

-stonebridge

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