unicef doesn't care either

The day began at 6am, a long journey of trying to get home to a condo that was locked and cold. It was two planes and a Starbucks stop, then the light rail, and a walk to a bus route.

Jared or Jason or someone who on any other day would have probably made a wonderful friend interrupted my walk to the bus and I wanted to punch Jay-Jared in his energetic face.

He worked for unicef and asked me what I was doing. “Uh, trying to catch a bus.” Then he introduced himself. I offered up my name while internally replaying words that have been said to me on more than one occasion: Kristie, you’re too nice. I stood in 40 degree weather with a bulging carryon, laptop, and not enough sleep, while J-something went on about unicef and how if we want to change the conditions in developing countries then we needed to start with the children. “Or women” I interjected. “Or women,” he agreed, asking if I had read some book, presumably about empowering women in impoverished countries. “No.” I was really thinking “No dumb-ass, isn’t that just common knowledge? Remember that dude who won the nobel peace prize in '06? He knew that.”

J-fuck then realized he was off track and veering from the script and went back to unicef and children and statistics and sad news about the fate of children-kind everywhere except the US. And I stood patiently because it was all I could do to keep from physically assaulting him or bursting into tears. Since each hand held a bag, tears were going to be the faster option.

“How old are you?"
“27.”
“27?!”
Really, does every one of your sentences need to end with an exclamation point?
“Yes, 27.”
“Great! Well then you can donate anywhere from $15-$60 a month!”
“Oh, really?” Thanks for the artificial options.
He asked me to donate.
“I’m not going to.”
“Why not?”
“Because I don’t want to.”
“Why not?”
“Because I’m in the middle of a divorce and trying to figure out my finances. Because I would rather volunteer my time than money.”
“Really? So do you have time to take off a year and go to the horn of Africa?”
“I know you might not hear this often, but nothing is off the table for me right now; I just might.”
“You know, I hear that people would rather give their time than money a lot.”
“Well, I actually do. I volunteer at the Phinney Ridge food bank, okay?”
“Yea, I’m just saying that a lot of the stuff unicef does isn’t actually possible without money.”
“Look. I’m on the verge of tears and I need to catch a bus.”
“Ok. You don’t have to stand in front of me while I’m talking.”
So I didn’t.
I left.
And I called my best friend to ask her what the fuck one would expect me to do while carrying on a conversation.

I walked away toward a bus station with my eyes stinging, willing the tears to stay in only to realize the routes to my condo had been changed since I was last on 1st Avenue and Pike Street. Fuck.

So I stood at the bus stop staring down the street wanting to sit on my bag and cry in the middle of the city that was once the place I could go to escape everything. I hailed a cab, hoped in and when the cabby asked how I was doing I mustered everything within my being and lied through my teeth: “I’m good. You?”