The Other Way Around by Sashi Kaufman Page B

“I’m just not sure I agree with it all. Not yet, anyway.”
    â€œThat’s cool,” Emily says. “I respect that. You have to find your own path.”
    â€œWell,” I say, wondering if that’s something I’m looking for or running from, “I’m not sure that’s exactly how I would put it, but yeah.”
    â€œSo we’re cool?” Emily asks. She sticks her hand out to shake.
    â€œAbsolutely,” I say and shake it firmly. She holds on to it for a second and then gives it a little squeeze
    â€œGood,” she says and lets go. My palm, where she squeezed it, is warm and tingly. Apologizing to girls I like. I make a mental note to add this to my list of useful information.
    G comes back out of the bathroom, and we all drift back over to the van. We wait a few more minutes for Tim, and then slowly one by one we assume our spots inside the van. I take out
Into the Wild
again, but instead of reading I amuse myself by flipping through the pages and letting my finger land on a single word. This word will be a sign for what’s to come.
    The first time I get “polish,” but I can’t figure out how to make a prediction out of that one so I flip the pages again. This time my finger lands on “pursuit.” Somehow that seems more meaningful, but before I can contemplate the full ramifications of this prophecy Tim is back and we’re ready to roll.
    â€œDude,” he says as he climbs into the van, “Killer a.m. BM.”
    â€œI’m sorry, what?” I ask, thinking I’ve misheard him.
    â€œA.m. BM,” G repeats. “That’s what he calls his morning dump.”
    â€œDon’t knock it,” Tim says. “I am, if nothing else, a killer pooper. Smooth and regular every day.”
    â€œYour mother must be proud,” I say.
    â€œMama Lin knows, man. She’s the reason for all this fine peristalsis.”
    â€œYeah, and the reason I can’t breathe through my nose at night,” Lyle snaps.
    â€œDude, you’re just jealous because you’re so stopped up. Maybe if you’d let go of some of your anger, you could let go of those hard little pellets you’re hanging on to.”
    It goes on like this for the next twenty minutes. It’s definitely the longest, and maybe only, conversation about pooping that I’ve ever been privy to. Even the girls get into it. Emily claims of course that even though vegetarians fart more, their farts aren’t as smelly as those of meat-eaters. I try and imagineany of the girls at St. Mary’s having this kind of conversation, but I can’t. It would be like one of those weird Chinese lip-dubbed movies that come on late at night. It’s refreshing in a really weird way. What’s even more refreshing is that I haven’t thought about Mima or Mom or any of the mess back home for at least a couple hours.

PARABLE OF A BUMPER STICKER
    Lunch is in the van, more peanut butter and jelly, and we roll into Rochester around three in the afternoon. Jesse finds a spot for the van in a little park down by the Genesee River. It seems like it would be a nice spot to hang out in the summer. Right now, its only inhabitants are a few homeless people wrapped in blankets or sleeping on the benches. I look at them curiously. There are no homeless people in Glens Falls, none that I’m aware of, anyway. And whenever I saw them in Boston, I just kind of thought of them as a feature of the city. But there’s this one guy curled up on a bench, a heavy vinyl-wrapped bike lock connecting a shopping cart to one ankle. I wonder what his path in life was, or if he ever had one.
    No one knows the area too well, so we split up to scout places to perform and possible food sources, aka dumpsters. “Come on, Andrew,” G says as Emily walks off with Lyle and Jesse heads off with in the other direction with Tim. G and I wander around the downtown area, crossing