And it’s not that I mind, not one bit; it’s how we’ve become close that I find amusing and uncomfortable.

It involves Miller Light.

Sort of.

Before I go any further, I want you to be plainly aware that this is not about an academic caste system.

And I have a previous story to prove it.

Though I rarely tell this story from my Disney Days, prior to having the high-class job of character entertainment and the allure of being an Attractions Host at Disney Studios, I will come clean and tell you that the first job I was offered, through the Walt Disney College Program, or the CP, was that of Custodian.

I well remember the interview.

“Hi, my name is Kris, and I like people. If I’m hired to work at Disney, I want to be around people.”

“Ok, Kris. That’s easy enough, then. Your job will be Janitorial Host.”

Placing the word “host” at the end of it, however, didn’t make it any better. Also, people using the bathroom were not the sort of people I had in mind.

I still took the job, because I was eager to leave Mississippi. I was just past nineteen. A week into the actual position, where I was not only seeing what I had to do but smelling it as well, was enough for me. I marched right up to Christine at the Backstage Employment Office, she was the CP Coordinator, and told her that to be “quite honest, the magic had been ruined for me.”

I simply wanted to go home.

I also lied and told her that I wasn’t going to get any college credit at all if I didn’t do something that was, in some small way at least, theatre-related.

This was apparently the absolute-perfect-thing-to-say because the next thing I knew, I was ushered through Disney’s  “fun job doors,”  where I found myself in a new, cool and hip, cross-utilization program learning how to be both an Attractions Host at the Great Movie Ride (I won an award in this position, by the way) and in Guest Relations, both of which led to my brief tenure as a candidate for those Disney characters in the 5’9” height range: Pluto, Eeyore, Tigger, et al.

The magic had been restored.

However, for a solid week beforehand, it had been a torturous, hellish keg of cherry-scented chemicals, urinal cookies, and scrub brushes.

So, believe me, I have full respect for janitors.

I also understand their dire need to satisfy their curiosity; surely your Mama’s told you to be careful with what you throw out, right? U.L. certainly has, and for good reason.

A reason which is responsible for how I came to know on a first-name-sometimes-I-might-give-you-an-on-the-spot-nickname basis with the janitor at the college, where I work.

She’s taken to calling me “Red,” lately, due to the unfortunate dye-job from a few weeks back. I call her Georgia, because I don’t know why. I guess I thought that was her name, originally, and it’s stuck.

Georgia and I met last semester. She has an erratic, irregular work schedule. I have often come to work to find her in my office, at 8:00 in the morning, sweeping my carpet. I don’t think she has a vacuum? Or, perhaps, it is too loud and so she chooses not to use it.

I have sensitive ears myself. When I listen, at all. Whatever the reason, she only has a broom.

Other times, I’ve been typing away like mad trying to figure out the various ends and outs of the paperwork side of my job and she’s just let herself in (she has a master key, of course) and busied herself either with trying to get to my trash can (snuggly squeezed under my middle desk) or draped herself over one of my many chairs to eat Ruffles.

It was annoying, at first. Now, I’ve merely gotten used to it.

But here’s how we met: Miller Light.

When I started working here at what will soon become my former job, I would stop on my way in, nearly every day, at the Scooba Junction, for Red Bull. Because it’s legal. And it gives me energy. I’d say it gives me wings, as that’s how the commercial goes, but if it ever did, they were always clipped…like, after about twenty minutes.

So, I’d have to buy more than one can, sugar-free, of course, just to get through the top half of my day. I easily went through ten or eleven, if not more, a week.

I’m guessing here, but I’m going to say that at Scooba Junction they have only one price-gun, I’m assuming that’s what you call it (you know that dispenser they use to place the sticker price on each item?), and apparently that one price-gun comes from Miller Light because all the Red Bulls I’ve ever bought, as well as the Cheez-Its and Chips Ahoy, have all been emblazoned with stickers that are labeled “Miller Light.”

I’d noticed it a hundred times, myself. But, thought nothing of it.

They place these stickers over the pull tab, so in order to open the drink, you have to remove the sticker.

Stickers that I then discarded in the trash, either by dropping them in or sticking them to the side of the plastic garbage bag.

Again, thinking nothing of it.

By my third week here, Georgia had become overly concerned.

She met me outside my office door, one afternoon, and asked me in a polite way if she could talk to me about something.

I said, Sure.

She stepped into the office and pointed at my heavily stickered garbage can. (Pointing, by the way, is not polite. That’s Disney 101).

I felt as if this were a test of some sort and that, even though it appeared to have an obvious answer, I was going to fail it.

“Yes?” I remember saying.

“You really drink that much?”

Assuming she meant Red Bull, I said, “I do. Honey, I need it.”

She was dumbstruck. It dawned on me then; she wasn’t looking at the empty cans. She was looking at the stickers.

God only knows what would have happened had I not had a Red Bull sitting on my desk that I’d not opened yet.  It was my only proof. She might have turned me in.

Either that, or she was wanting to go twosies on a six-pack.

We have a good laugh about it, these days. It’s a good, funny, strangely comforting memory to have.

As a matter of fact, we were laughing about it just now.

Because she was drinking coffee, sitting on the steps outside my office, when I got to work this morning.

…if only it had been a Red Bull, this would have all tied together.

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It’s the oddest thing: no double doors are both unlocked, at the same time. Only one side is. Ever.  And you never know which side because it’s never the same side.

This causes no end of embarrassment, as you can imagine. Especially for me, a new faculty member. Call me crazy but it really is a blow to your credibility when you can’t even open a door properly.

And they'll turn on you quicker than a cottonmouth.

It’s happened to me twice already today.

This morning as I went to deliver the receipts from my conference trip, I turned back to tell the secretary, “Have a good day!”, and then immediately ran into the door – full face, glasses fell to the floor, skin imprint left greasily along the glass pane, the Works. It seems that today’s choice was the Right Side. Last week, the Left Side had been unlocked – the whole week long.

But not so, today.

Then, leaving the cafeteria, with my Guest Speaker, I, politely, tried to open the door for them, first, and nearly broke my wrist as it unyieldingly remained locked. (As we left, we encountered a confrontation between a student and a security guard. The student was being reprimanded for his use of foul language. Ah, good, old Mississippi community colleges…or, maybe just this one).

I touched no more doors after this, though. I couldn’t take any more humiliation.

Instead, I just stood around and waited for someone else to come through. That way there would be no mystery, and consequently, no accident.

This is, wouldn’t you agree, a rather unnecessarily frustrating experience; I mean, if you see a door, or doors, you naturally assume that either will open for you. When one doesn’t and you ram your forehead into it, it’s demoralizing.

And really, one time doing that is enough. Every time I approach a door, I shouldn’t have to wonder Who’ll Win? Never once should it cross my mind, OK, Kris, here comes a door. Take a deep breath and realize that you may fail. You may not be able to figure this out, but we’ll get through it.

I wonder who’s idea it was to instill a policy founded on the principles of the Guessing Game. I mean, are we so lazy we can’t afford the effort to unlock all doors constructed for public use? Just in case…? Or at the least, unlock the same side, each time?

Leaving an outline of my oily skin on the front doors to the Administration Building wasn’t my choice, and it certainly wasn’t the fitting reception I had hoped to receive, having been gone for the past few days.  But, it’s what I got.

Oh, and get this, even worse, I think only the janitor (God love her heart to death and all the way up Jacob’s Ladder) was aware that I’d been gone at all.

Sigh.

I really am at an impasse: loving what I do but not where I do it. Not even a little bit.

And I’d been so inspired, too, at this conference, despite the fact that the bathrooms, which were located on the basement floor, had what was quite possibly the most offensive odor I’ve ever had the great, massive misfortune to inhale.

You just can't trust grits, these days.

I’m not sure if it was a dead animal or just cheese grits, but it was something that I hope to never smell again. (I discovered a can of Lysol, under the cabinet, and I made sure to use the entire can in that bathroom because I was going to be at this conference for two days; one of us had to go, me or that smell. Let me assure you: there was not enough Lysol, and, in fact, I am the one who left).

But, aside from that, I fell in love with Hattiesburg, again. Like, an ounce of me did, at least. It’s gotten so big and fat.  And busy. I like that in a city.

Now, I’m back in my office, depressing myself. Literally and figuratively:

I’m having a mood swing (and the chains are loose, so watch out).

I’m also trying very hard to press my body into the smallest possible shape against the hard edge of faux wood that is my actual desktop.

Maybe no one will see me, I think.

I mean, it’s a wide impasse. I meant to tell you that, a moment ago, did I tell you that? I’m afraid I really don’t want to be here, but I have no one to blame except the Economy.

Also, the blood is cutting off in my hands because I’m leaning so hard against the desk, typing. And even though sometimes that’s a wonderful feeling, in truth, it isn’t really a wonderful feeling at all. Though I do wish I could make the rest of me go to sleep that fast.

Anyway, long story short(er): I’m happy to be back. Blogging, I mean.

And not to upset the delicate balance between what this would read like if I’d let Amanda edit it, and what it’s about to look like underneath my random typing fingers, I’d like to close with a few things I overheard yesterday while searching for clean underwear at the Turtle Creek Mall.

• I hate that. I have never liked pink. Never!
• He wasn’t gay yesterday.
• I can’t for the life of me find the Chuck E. Cheese’s.
• It’s not for me, man, it’s for my mom.
• That’s the stupidest place to put a Foot Locker.
• The people at Buckle still scare me. Do they you.
• Are you crazy? She’s too small! The ropes will kill her.
• He said the Chuck E. Cheese’s was down at the other end, by Dillard’s.
• I took her to IHOP because I don’t like her.
• I don’t know, I just think, that’s, like, one chain too many.
• What’s a Dippin Dot, Mama? I want a Dippin’ Dot, Mama. Can I have a Dippin Dot? Mama? Mama! Can I have a Dippin Dot?

And the piece de resistance:

• Well, I guess you heard him wrong, then. The lady at Kirkland’s said the Chuck E. Cheese’s is in front of Sears.
  

  This is a mullet. I fail to see the inspiration.

I passed by this particular Chuck E. Cheese family three times. The Mother had a mullet, and so did the Father; the Grandmother was a Pentecostal, and the three tow-headed children, one of which was asleep in a stroller, were sharing what appeared to be parts of the same outfit (i.e., one girl had the shirt, the other girl had the pants, etc).

I only hope they were able to find the restaurant. I think they needed it.

I was in and out, quick like that, myself. I haven’t been in much of a People Mood the past few days, and coming back to work hasn’t helped that mood much, but I will say two last things: 1) I got some great underwear, no lie, like I may marry them, and,

2) Hattiesburg has, at least, one thing going for it, in its favor. All the doors were unlocked…

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