The happiest of Memorial Day Weekends to everyone one! (a.k.a. a much needed 3-day weekend to many of the working class) I actually took my extended weekend a step further by taking a vacay day on Friday so ya girl had a whaaat....4-day "staycay" due in part to the dedicated men and women of the U.S. Armed Forces. #THANKYOU
Now that that's outta the way, I must commence with my usual 'debrief-ifcation' of a recent ocurrence that literally took my breath away! So I went out for a run this afternoon on one of the beautiful greenways of the Queen City. There are a significant number of persons of Indian (from India) descent who also inhabit my small apartment complex community. They mostly keep to themselves and only socialize amongst themselves with the exception of an occasional 'hello' or 'excuse me' on the stairs. Therefore, I know no one's name and am not quite sure of many other details that I haven't learned from simply observing (i.e. which kids belong to which family and which ladies are stay-at-home moms).
Well, one key thing that I have observed is the significant difference in hygiene practices. Now, while I appreciate diversity in many different forms....I don't know if you've ever walked into an enclosed space with 6 full grown Indian men working out on various cardio machines before....but lemme tell you, I've been to the Ringling Bros. and the Universoul Circuses (is that a word?) and niether of those events have anything on the assault to my nostrils that I naively walked into. I've never huffed any substance with the goal of getting high from doing so, but I would imagine that the light-headed feeling that I got as I attempted to 'brave' the setting and run anyway on the treadmill came pretty close to the equivalent of huffing methane gas! This actually happened earlier during the spring months...so fast forward to today's casual afternoon run when I ran up on this 4 person Indian family on the greenway. Mom, Dad, child of about 4 and another baby in the stroller. I was about 50 feet behind the family when I initially began to smell that very distinct scent of curry, patchouli, and plain ole body funk that I have become very familiar with acknowledging as the 'Indian smell.' Mind you, it wasn't windy today! The closer I got to this sweet and unassuming family, the stronger their scent became which propelled me into the run of my life (uphill) because there was no way I was going to remain behind them on the path without my trick knee giving out and then collapsing on the path a la Sophia in The Color Purple after she hit the white man! As I eventually passed them I tried to have a pleasant look on my face, a lil smile to acknowledge that 'I see you and I'm not going to hurt you,' and hold my breath while running uphill....yea, I attempted to do all of that at once! As I looked at the innocent faces of the children, I couldn't help but wonder how much of the odor was being emitted from their sweet little bodies :( You lil funky bastards...bless their hearts! (you know when you say 'bless your heart' after something....it makes it less offensive!)
So I'd just like to go on the record to say that I totally respect cultural differences and I believe people should exist as they wish without judgement from others (barring their not hurting anyone of course). But damn if my sense of smell wasn't a little wounded as my cocky deoderant and body spray wearing ass decided to breath (outside mind you!) while I went for my afternoon jog! Now pardon me while I attempt to stretch out my ham strings that have tightened up tighter than gnat ass after my impromptu uphill sprint this afternoon. #EASYDOESIT
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