A Day Outside The Zone

Today I had an unusual day; a day spent a little outside my comfort zone. I started out at an all day inservice to become a certified accessibility specialist. The MN Dept. of Labor and Industry offers this opportunity at no charge. Since I am involved with accessibility issues at work and the price was right, I decided to give it a go. I didn't know that I, along with 3 others, were involved in one day of a 4 day building inspector class. When the instructor said his first sentence, "We'll be looking at IBC and RBC codes along with ANSI and statutes." I thought to myself, "WTF?" I raised my hand and said, "I think I'm in the wrong class." He tells me, "Oh, no, you're not. You need to know the background on these codes before we get into the accessibility issues." Meekly I lowered my hand and listened. I know more about it now but wow, I really had to learn how to think differently. Most of the people in the class were architects, building designers, and building contractors. They are used to the building codes and reading building plans. I am not. The class wasn't about making things easier for people with disabilities. The class was about the codes. We must meet the codes. If the code says to do it, we do it. If the code doesn't say to do it, we don't do it. White is white and black is black. I work in human services and I am not used to thinking this way. I got the hang of it after a while. We broke for lunch. Our class was directly across the street from a sibling's place of employment. I was so disappointed to see my phone screen fail to light up. when the battery runs out you can't even get the numbers off it. So instead I chose to scout out the places I used to live when I was an East St. Paul girl. I lived in three places. The first place was on Bates (I was 24 when I lived there). My old apartment complex was gone and the space was turned into a parking lot. The second place was on Arcade Street (I was 20 years old) and that was gone too - also a parking lot. So the rest of the day I've had the Joni Mitchell song in my head; the one where she sings, "They paved paradise and put up a parking lot." The third apartment on Minnehaha (age 22) was still there. This was a lovely older home with a wide front porch and an alley on the side. My little studio apartment was still there. On the way back to my class, I stopped at Burger King to grab a vegie burger. I opened the wrapper on my sandwich. I could smell the onion, the sauce, the tomato and the meat. My mouth watered as I opened my mouth to take a bite. It was chicken! It looked good too but I just couldn't bite the chicken. I went back to the counter and said, "I ordered a vegie burger but when I opened it up, it was chicken." I felt calm as I said this but when the words came out of my mouth, the word chicken has an alarming vehemence to it, surprising even me. The Burger King employee giggled. Then she smothered the giggle and apologized. The employee next to her also apologized but I could see him trying not to smirk as well. I guess chicken is a funny word when you say it in an angry tone. I spent the rest of the afternoon learning about codes, the placement of grab bars and the width of doors and the placement of handicapped parking signs. For dinner tonight we decided to try a new restaurant in Anoka on 7th Avenue called Thunh Do. I had the Kung Pao Mock Duck and it was delicious and the portions very generous. No longer do I have to drive to Uptown to get my Kung Pao Mock Duck. WooHoo! I am so happy that they serve mock duck that I'm sure I will return. We had fried tofu for an appetizer. I'm not a huge tofu fan but this was ok. After I dipped my second piece of fried tofu in the sweet and sour sauce, I looked at it and realized I was eating what looked like Sponge Bob Square Pants. We stopped at the Russian Grocery next door - a place I've been intending to visit for the past 5 years but never have. We bought some Russian tea and some Russian chocolate. We passed on the other interesting items - cabbage, canned beef (the cow's face on the label looked so sad), smoked fish with head and tail still attached, Russian cookies and crackers, Russian cheese, jam and candy. On the way home I had an errand to run at the library. As I opened the door to the library, a woman fell forward. She had been leaning her forehead against the door. Her face was full of anguish. She had tears in her eyes and mucous hanging from her nose. I said I was sorry and she turned and leaned her head against the next door. I saw a little girl run up and open that door and the woman again fell forward but this time she kept walking and she went outside. The little girl looked aghast and scared as she ran back to her mother. I wonder why the woman was so upset in public. I just know there is a story there and I hope things get better for her. All in all, it's been a most unusual day.