Caught in the System. On Spring Street.

I’m standing in line at the Metropolitan Court House on Spring St. in downtown Los Angeles; how ironic that a concrete mountain of authoritarian architecture would be on a street called Spring Street - more like Death Street - or Wake Up and Smell the Coffee of Life Street. I am feeling like a complete reject of society, like I want to fight, fist fight maybe, just so that I can unleash my aggression and have something to show for it, even if it is a black eye.

I wonder why all the rest of the people are in this line? They can't be hardened criminals, or else they wouldn't let them freely wait in the line. But, a part of me wishes they were. That would make life more exciting, wouldn't it? Just a little...

I imagine the man in the blue Dodgers’ hat three people in front of me throws me against the wall and passionately kisses me. I like it for a second and then I pull out my Jiu Jitsu and throw him on the ground. The security guard startles me out of my martial arts fantasy when he asks me to remove my belt so I can go through the metal detector. Now I'm a dangerous cowgirl on the run, turning in my guns so I can enter the Court House. - in my imagination, of course.

How have I gotten to this place where I am in debt, lonely and lost? I'm so angry at society. No. Myself. Angry at myself. That's the real truth. I am the only white girl in a line that wraps around seven or eight times. None of the signs are in English. Only Spanish and I feel proud that I can read them. I speak Spanish, so I am not really a stranger.

I admire the beauty of the other women in the line. She wears Michael Jordan red high tops, the woman in front of me. Gold hoops. Glittery acrylic nails. Perfectly styled and swooped hair. Dramatic eyeliner. I feel like a country bumpkin. My outside doesn't match my inside. I wish I looked like her. Her outside matches my inside.

A woman asks who is here for collections and a man yells out, “I'm completely broke, I don't know what they're gonna collect!'” Everyone in the line laughs like they feel his pain. I feel the pain of this line. I am in the same line.

There is one man dressed entirely in camouflage splattered in paint- not blood. Its artist’s acrylics not house paint. He calls his friend (on his Smartphone mind you-- everyone here manages to have a Smartphone) and talks about how he's going to head down to the beach later and sell everything out of his van before he gives it to the mechanic. I get the feeling he won't be picking it up from the mechanic though. I get the feeling that what’s in his van is all he's got left. But then he starts talking about how “there's a chance the sun might make it through the clouds at the beach. He's not depending on it, and he'll go either way. He's not closed to the idea of a little light.” He hangs up and starts to sing scales. He's warming up his voice. Maybe he's going to sing it out after this. Sing the pain out, that is. He may have lost everything today, but like Bob Dylan said, 'He's got everything he needs; he's an artist he don't look back.'

I want to be like him. Instead of feeling so angry that I am 26, alone and in debt, when everyone I know seems to be in a serious relationship and on their way to being everything their parents always thought they would be, I want to remember why art is so important to me. The only vehicle to seek and express human truth.

I look up and I see a man wearing shorts that rest only an inch or two above the tops of his high-tops. I remember a man I once knew that used to wear those shorts. When I first met him I wondered if he just didn't know that they were actually a few sizes too big, not understanding his deliberate style. I think about how I fell in love with him, despite the fact that I thought he looked completely silly. I wonder how silly I looked to him. He probably thought I was a country bumpkin. Maybe he still does. Do we ever feel fully understood, or is mutual understanding just one of the many illusions of life? Is the ultimate goal to just understand ourselves and be fully satisfied alone, as individuals?

My thoughts swirl, but now that I understand them, by writing them down on my Smartphone, I feel less blocked and I've almost made it to the front of the line.

Now I feel like the people around me are my friends. I probably wouldn't throw that guy in the Dodgers’ hat on the ground if he tried to kiss me. Instead I would thank him for waking me up out of myself, just for a minute. Maybe this place should be on Spring Street after all.