There are few things in life more empowering than sitting in the front seat of a police car. This basically confirms what I have believed over the past several years: that being a traffic cop would be the most kick-ass job imaginable. Often while driving I have daydreamed about ticketing that idiot in the Subaru who cuts me off or the executive in the Escalade who slides into the carpool lane and darts out at the last minute, because he thinks he's above the law.

I hate those people.

But you know who else I hate? Punk kids.

I have been cautious not to allow this feeling to affect how I treat others. For instance, there was a time a couple months ago when I sat next to a baggy-pants-wearing, slouching teenage boy on BART, even though I didn't want to.

The reason that I didn't? I have ridden the train enough to have seen kids with this demeanor attempt to amuse their peers by being rude. Once, a boy remarked loudly about how he didn't appreciate that the man standing near his seat had his crotch so near to the boy's face. Fair enough, really, but when the train is full, that's pretty much the way it works. I felt bad for the man and hated the boy.

The reason that I did? I was walking towards the seat across the aisle from the boy but lost it at the last minute. It was obvious that I was looking for a seat and it would have been rude not to sit next to this kid, even though I didn't want to.

So I sat next to him, and, at one point, he asked to borrow my cellphone. Because I had judged him as a punk kid, I didn't want to give it to him. It was unlikely, though, that he would steal it because he would have to climb over me in order to take off with it. Given that, and the fact that I had no great excuse, I handed it to him. And what did he do? He called his mom, and he told her that he was on his way home. He then hung up, thanked me, and gave it back.

Boy, did I feel like a judgmental asshole.

It was because of this incident (and that special brand of naivete that you folks have so rightly pinpointed in me) that I bravely walked towards a group of six punk kids--all dressed in hooded sweatshirts and baggy jeans--on Saturday around 5 PM. It was still light outside, and I was on a busy street. What I feared was that these kids would say something rude to me, but I figured that I wouldn't have to hear it since I was listening to my iPod. I even smiled at one of them as we passed each other, and he awkwardly smiled back.

After four of them had passed, the last two approached me.

"Is that an iPod?" one asked, noting the characteristic white wire that ran to my headphones. I said yes. "What kind is it?" I told him that it was just an old 20 gig.

And, well, I knew what was happening but I felt somehow both that I had control of the situation (I was older, wiser, and taller) and that there was nothing I could do (I was outnumbered). I ended up taking the iPod out, after the littler of the two asked to see it ("I'm not gonna take it") and then he immediately rushed at me, unplugged my headphones, and swiped it.

"This is mine now," he said. And as I towered over him and his friend, I just couldn't believe it.

"Are you kidding me?" I said, and I looked at him like a disappointed parent who had unwisely chosen to place trust in him.

"Back up, bitch, or I'll beat your ass," he said, but in a voice that was quiet and unsure of himself. I didn't doubt for a minute that I probably could've tackled the kid or, at least, if he tried to "beat [my] ass," he would quickly find out that my being twice his size was not going to work to his advantage. I also knew, though, that I couldn't outrun a physically fit 12-year-old, and as he and his friend took off towards the other four boys, who were waiting for him at the nearest corner, I didn't even bother to run after him.

Instead, I followed him at a swift speed-walking sort of pace, whipped out my cellphone, and dialed 9-1-1.

Oh, yes, I was there.

Leon stuffed two feather pillows in crisp white pillowcases into his backpack and then met me on a BART train headed to San Francisco. We smiled at each other, feeling sneaky and covert, like we were up to no good. But our cover was more or less blown by the number of people who opted to carry their pillows in plain sight, so that by the time we got off the train at the Embarcadero station, there was this exodus of people with pillows, all coming from underground like some mash-up of a teenage slumber party and a Michael Jackson video.

People were definitely staring. A woman waiting for a bus called out, "What's with the pillows?"

"There's a pillow fight," I answered her. "At 6:00."

We got to Justin Herman Plaza about ten minutes before six, enough time to survey the insanity and take each other's pictures.



It was difficult to estimate the turnout, as the entire plaza was lined with photographers, some two or three people deep. There were two helicopters overhead and people looking down from high-rise buildings. More than 1000 people was the number I have heard but I couldn't say one way or the other.

A minute before the six o'clock hour, the pillow fighters started cheering and whistling, waving their pillows above their heads like lassos. And with no official call or noticeable chime of the clock on the Ferry Building across the street, we started socking each other.

At first, I hit Leon. And then the few people nearby. And before I knew it, I was wading from one side of the crowd to the other, whacking my pillow at whomever I came across. There were men in suits, children with stuffed animals, teenagers in costumes, and an assortment of clever people of all ages who had taped pillows around their heads. Others wore helmets. There were geeks, punks, yuppies, hippies, students, old married couples, and young business men and women. It was a free-for-all to take that Valentine's Day aggression out on whichever demographic you could possibly choose.

It took me no more than five minutes to make my way across the crowd and near the "Trauma" team, a few young men wearing white lab coats and yellow helmets and holding clipboards. I worked my way around the perimeter of the pillow fight, looking for Leon. We connected about five minutes later, and he soon dove back into the mass of people.

This was when some guy spotted me, standing outside the action and holding a pillow. He dropped his cigarette and asked me if he could borrow my pillow. I said, "Sure...but will you bring it back?"

"Absolutely," he said. "In fact, here's some collateral," and he dropped his hefty messenger bag full of what he called "design stuff" at my feet. "I'm just going to get in a couple good whacks," he said.

And I stood there, thinking that I had made a good trade and that I had made this stranger momentarily happy.



It was several minutes before I realized that my pillow was scarcely worth the contents of his bag and he should have been worried that I'd run off with it. A few minutes after that, I began to see that I had been taken advantage of--having given this guy a free pillow rental and place to keep his belongings. But I figured he'd return soon, having taken his couple good whacks and wondering about his bag. Surely, he must have reasoned, there would come a point when I would decide that my pillow was not worth the wait and then I would ditch his bag.

Forty minutes later, though, that reasoning hadn't hit him. Leon had come back to me and the two of us were looking for this guy in the crowd. Leon suggested both that he watch the bag while I went back in with Leon's pillow and that we just leave. I said no to both.

I was irritated and I wanted someone to steal the guy's bag. But I also wanted to do what I said I'd do and get my damn pillow back. And I wanted to have the opportunity to say to him, "A couple good whacks, huh?" Because that would show him.

I told Leon that I'd give the guy five more minutes.

And then I saw him. Leon thought he was looking through the crowd for me, but he clearly wasn't. I discovered this when I worked my way closer to him and waved my arms. He didn't seem to even notice me and continued to whack my pillow at a couple of nearby girls. Finally, I got his attention.

"Where's my bag!?" he said immediately, thinking that I was the one who had failed in our pact. I was so caught off guard by this that I didn't bother to say anything rude. I even thanked him.

Later, as Leon and I were walking through Chinatown on our way towards dinner, we decided to put our pillows in his backpack. It was at this time that I untwisted the makeshift handle of my pillowcase and saw...the blood.

There were drops and smears of blood all over one half of my pillowcase! I couldn't believe it!

So either this guy cut his hand and bled onto my pillowcase (best case scenario) or he was such a jackass that one good whack in his face left him with a bloody nose, which he then wiped on someone else's belonging!

"What an asshole!" I said out loud. "Why are all these bad things happening to me?" I then asked Leon, as I'm sure both of us were musing about my recent string of bad luck.

"Karma," he said.

"Really? I deserve this?"

"Not this much," he said. But the point was made. Bad things are due to come my way.



Later, as we were having our delicious dinner of chicken tikka masala and lamb biryani, Leon asked me, "How's life?"

It was an attempt at conversation, but I just shrugged. "Not that good," I said. "But I suppose it could be worse. You?"

"Pretty damn good," he said. "I'm having a good dinner with a fun person who wants to go home and do more fun things."

I didn't point out to him that he thought this "fun person" should be on the receiving end of some bad karma, because it felt good, and I had to concede that life in that moment felt pretty nice.

…Not as nice as whacking that asshole in the head with a pillow would've felt but nice all the same.

There was a delay on BART this morning, and I sat at the 19th Street station for 15 minutes, waiting for the train to move just one more stop so that I could go to work. The delay was caused by another train getting stuck in the trans-bay tube. That is, stuck under the bay. Under the water. Stuck.

There are evacuation procedures for any spot along BART's routes--underwater included. In this case, I presume that the doors were pried open and everyone on the train walked through the tunnel to San Francisco. It would've been a pain in the ass, but not dangerous.

Of course, all I could think about was my mom and her last visit to the Bay Area. She nearly had an anxiety attack when we rode BART under the bay, because she had just watched a documentary about earthquakes that basically stated that a strong enough earthquake could break the tube, causing it to burst open and water to flood in. Everyone on board would drown.

And so each time we passed under the Bay, for that minute or two under the water, she held her breath and closed her eyes, but not before making us promise--my dad, Leon, and me--that if there were an earthquake and we were all going to drown, we would knock her unconscious.

"Just punch me," she said. "Knock me out. I don't want to feel myself drowning."

Fearing murky water for the majority of my life, I understood just how she felt. But I found myself praying that we'd be spared an earthquake, not so much because I wasn't ready to die, but because I didn't want my last actions on earth to involve beating the living crap out of my mom.

I would, however, like to see how the CSIs would make sense of it.

I never used to understand how people could forget to put on deodorant.

...Oh, don't look at me like that. You know what I'm talking about. Doesn't everyone have a couple of friends who occasionally sniff at their pits and remark, "I don't think I put on deodorant today." No? Just me. Well, it happens.

But such a part of my morning routine is putting on deodorant that I didn't understand how it could be forgotten--it's the first thing I do out of the shower after drying off.

But then I forgot. Or I was convinced that I had. I was sitting at the BART station yesterday and waiting for my train to take me to the Embarcadero station in San Francisco, where I'd hop on a Muni train and ride to the Angel Island ferry to take me to my company picnic.

And as I sat there waiting, I thought to myself, "I'm not wearing any deodorant." I was wearing a cap sleeved shirt, so I thought I could discreetly touch my armpits and then sniff at my fingers, a la Mary Katherine Gallagher, but this is much harder than it sounds. Try doing it while you're sitting there in your office chair. Pretend to scratch an itch on the underside of your upper arm and then dare to bring that finger to your nose for another oddly placed scratch. You can't do it! Common decency forbids it.

So I wasn't able to scratch and sniff, but I did sort of touch my underarm and it didn't feel like an underarm that had been slathered with anti-perspirant.

Then, suddenly, the 90 minutes that I gave myself to take two forms of public transportation to Pier 41 in San Francisco didn't seem like nearly enough. I knew I couldn't go back home to get some deodorant, but I also couldn't go without--it was going to be a hot day of treasure hunting on an island. This is Sweat City, people.

I had a stroke of genius, though, and realized that I could take BART into Oakland, run upstairs to Walgreens, buy a Speedstick, and run back down to catch the next train into the city. Brilliant.

Of course, once I was in Walgreens, it dawned on me that there was no opportunity to put the deodorant on. Stores in downtown areas don't have public restrooms and short of walking an extra two blocks to take a urine-soaked elevator down to BART, I wasn't going to have a chance to rub this white stuff into my pits. Instead I realized that I was going to have to do it in the store.

I ran down the personal hygiene aisle of this Walgreens and was pleased to find that the entire store was almost entirely empty, save for maybe three women and four employees. I quickly scanned the deodorant aisle, grabbed what looked to be the cheapest stick, popped off its cap and protective seal, and ducked behind a display of cosmetics. From there, I lifted up my shirt and generously applied the stuff to my pits. Then I paid for my now tampered product and darted out the store in time to catch the next train to San Francisco. Perfect.

For the rest of the day, I felt confident that, not only were my armpits fresh and dry, I had a full supply of Lady Speedstick in my purse, should the day's activities require it. And, at the end of the day, after walking from Pier 41 to the Montgomery BART station (~ 2 miles) in the summer sun, a second application probably would have done a world of good. But by that point, I was too damn tired to care, and it may have had something to do with no one sitting beside me on my return trip. So maybe forgetting deodorant isn't such a bad thing after all.

Yesterday, a middle-aged man tried to chat me up while waiting for BART. He asked me how I was and when I returned the greeting, he said, "Fine, except I might be dead in an hour."

Obviously, I thought he was drunk, high, and/or crazy. He assured me that he was neither of the first two and then proceeded to tell me about this great "deal" he had and how he invested money in some guy's business.

"It's called 'furniture,'" he said, as though he expected me to believe he works for IKEA. It made me wonder if "furniture" is slang for cocaine.

So, he was going to go meet with this guy who had sold him low-quality "funiture" that the middle-aged man couldn't sell. And he thought he would face this seller's short temper. "And I'm going there alone," he said.

I started to tell him that he should take someone with him, all the while knowing that other people waiting for BART thought I was naive and didn't know when to ignore strangers. But he interrupted me, which is just as well because he probably would have asked me along. And it's just as well, because I have trouble saying no to people, even when they appear to be out of their minds and when I have a perfectly good excuse, like work.

When the train came, he told me that he'd see me later, by the grace of God or something. And then he went and sat in another car.

But while I was on the train, I kept thinking that it would have been such a fucking cool idea to ditch work and follow some guy on an adventure to a warehouse in East Oakland where there would be a shoot out over "furniture."

Cool and stupid, obviously. I need to start ignoring these people on BART.

So, I got hit on yesterday on BART. I was heading home, and I just knew it was going to happen--not because I have a big ego but because I kept making eye contact with this guy who was standing about six paces away.

One thing that I may never completely understand is that if you look at a guy, he automatically assumes that you have the hots for him. It doesn't matter if he's a burn victim with no ears (which I'm sure could be totally cute on some people), he'd still think you want him.

But I was actually looking at BART guy because there was something strange about him--something that suggested that he eats ketchup straight from the packet or that he was wearing women's underwear under his chinos. Not that there's anything wrong with either of these activities. They're just a little odd.

Anyway, when the man who was seated next to me got off at the Ashby BART station (one stop before mine), this lanky, shaggy-haired guy came and sat beside me. I probably smiled at him, which, I should know by now, is even worse than eye contact on the yeah-she-totally-is-checking-me-out-and-wants-to-get-bizzay scale.

The next thing I knew, he was tapping me on the arm, and I was taking out my iPod earbuds, so I could hear what he had to say. He asked where I was from and what my name is, which were so awkward to answer, because I totally knew where the conversation was heading but didn't want to be presumptious enough to actually say, "My name is Kate, and I'm married." I wear a ring on my left finger--isn't that good enough?

He asked, "So, what do you, like, live with your mom and dad or something?"

And I said, "Actually, I live with my husband." And I think he said that was great but then he turned ninety degrees away from me and didn't engage me for the next sixty seconds or however long that awkwardness lasted before I got off at my stop.

I felt bad for him. Leon said that it's pretty sad to be cruising for chicks on BART but then conceded that there was some merit to it. There's a good chance he'll find someone who is employed.

Anyway, I always expect that being hit on will be flattering, but it just makes me feel bad. It makes me feel kind of skanky and gross. And, in this case, it made me feel sorry for him. I felt almost depressed about it (well that in addition to some other things) and didn't really understand entirely why.

…I'm just so weird sometimes. It's like I eat ketchup straight from the packet.

Joe stopped by the apartment yesterday while I was at work. Leon and Sam were there, and when Leon answered the door, he more or less told Joe off. Leon then called me at work to let me know what had happened but I didn't get the details until I talked to...Joe. He was at the BART station when I was getting back to Berkeley from work.

And even though Leon had warned me, I felt completely unprepared to face him. I just made up a lot of (legitimate) excuses to explain why I was not going to get on BART and accompany him to Target. He insisted and tried to pull me by the arm.

He told me that Leon "was very bad to [him]" and that it made him feel ashamed. Leon had told him off about hitting on me and Joe once again tried to dismiss his actions like they weren't serious and he obviously didn't deserve to be treated that way by Leon.

I'd be lying if I said that I didn't feel sorry for him. He's really not unlike the homeless people that I regularly see on the streets of Berkeley. He doesn't have a home, he doesn't have friends, and he's completely reliant on the kindness of others.

But I also know that isn't my damn fault, and he should try to get a job instead of mooching off of everyone. He needs to take responsibility for his actions and not try to get people to pity him. I know his situation well enough to know that he is intelligent and capable, but he's choosing to work on his demo tape while some poor mission family in Florida pays his bills.

Anyway, I'm a bit worried that Leon and I have set up the good cop/bad cop dichotomy where Joe thinks that Leon doesn't like him but he can seek some sort of refuge with me. It ain't gonna happen, buddy. I may listen to your sob story in the crowded BART station, but it won't go any further.

(And yes, I know I said I'd just act like a crazy person but you should know by now that I am all talk.)