Mathematics

I was thinking about the way you are perceived vs. the way you are, how sometimes there are differences, and the ways these differences influence each other. For example, I talk slowly (which can be easily observed), but I’m also very impatient (which can’t) and while that’s going on, I also am desperate to be liked (which can sometimes be apparent, sometimes not), which I can manage by trying to be funny (same as last one). So I wonder if A (talking slow) + B (impatience)+C (eager to please) + D (humor) is the full equation of me. (i.e. the way I am) Or do they just hear the slow talking and think: airhead. (i.e. the way I’m perceived) If it’s that, then isn’t there also an element of: oh, poor thing. Yes, I sometimes think there is. In fact I have to admit, I’ve counted on it, because then when I do say something smart, it’s a total shock, and therefore worth more points, like a word with q or x in scrabble.

And does talking slowly influence my own impatience? And, though I’m not desperate to be liked by everyone, why am I desperate to be liked by people who want nothing to do with me? And while people who haven’t known me for longer than a week may read this and think it’s interesting, everyone else knows that all of this is simply my habitual disorder of wasting time.

Yet this is what is going on in my head this morning while I’m trying to get myself and two sleeping children, out of bed , dressed, coffeed up, fed and into the car before 7 am. The reason it was going on in my head is because at 5:30am while I was staring at my computer screen, I heard “Come out with your hands on your head. Your house is completely surrounded”. Carlos!

I ran to the window and saw 10 police cars in the street and cops lined in a U shape around Carlos’ house. All I could think was: how did 10 cop cars drive right beneath my window, unload a full force of vest-wearing cops and create a U formation in complete Navaho warrior silence, all while I was staring at my screen with nothing to write.

I’ve written about Carlos before. There is obviously a huge gap between the way he really is vs the way he is perceived. I mean I know he does illegal things, I just don’t know what. But I also know him as a guy with kids and a granddad and a dog with huge balls that we call Mr. Jing-Jangles.

So while I'm driving in a huge line of cars down the 101, I am thinking does the way that the cops perceive Carlos define who he is to himself, I mean partly? Or are they just an annoyance to him, usually outside of his realm of existence.

What is the equation of Carlos?