i went to the cafeteria to get lunch today. i ladled a gloop of chicken noodle soup ('with homemade noodles *ding*), and i froze, having a flashback to exactly a year before when i was doing exactly the same thing.

one year ago, for lunch, i walked to the cafeteria in a daze. i schlupped a bit of the beefy noodle soup into a bowl. they had different bowls then, wider, flatter bowls, not like the ones they have today that come with lids. i remember being the only person in the food buying part of the cafeteria, only one cook, the manager, walking around. i remember the soup was greasy that day, but had big morsels of roast beef. i crave beef sometimes. i paid my $1.62 silently to the equally silent cashier, then sat at a table with my two packets of crackers. (they charge you ten cents for each packet over that, you know.) the table section of the cafeteria had quite a few people in it, we were all sitting together, watching a t.v. sitting on one of those roller stands we had in science class, where the teacher would roll in the older model t.v. that was just big enough to see from the back row, old enough to not have a remote control, yet new enough to have a button to turn the channels with instead of a knob. we didn't say anything to each other, just sat in our knot, not spread apart like we usually were, as if we took warmth in our closeness.

i remember the television saying "AMERICA UNDER ATTACK!" and thinking about how that's something you don't see every day, and something you never thought you'd see.

i thought of people like shari that deals with stuff like this on almost a daily basis.

i remember getting a second bowl of the greasy noodle soup. i couldn't taste it, anyway.

amazing how something can sit so clear in one's mind, even though it was a year ago.