Bridges Coming to a Close

School has been dominating my life for the most part. In fact it should be dominating my life right now, but I am being a slacker.

So my required time in Bridges has been met, unfortunately to get signed out of the program I had to finish my workbook. So I've been frantically trying to get it done for the last two weeks. I did about two hundred pages in those two weeks. At some point I felt like I was really getting a self-overdose. I really put a lot of work into finishing that book, but sometimes I felt like I was putting in overtime beating the dead horse of my life.
As part of finishing the book I had to watch a couple of movies. The last two that I had to watch were This Boy's Life and Were Warriors Once. I wouldn't recommend either one of these for a first date, and they were by far from feel-good flicks. Were Warriors Once was hard core, I was really blown away by the story, and the harshness of the violence. This Boy's Life on the other hand just made me feel crappy. The step-dad character in it (played by De Niro) starts out as Mr.Niceguy, and after awhile he gets a little snarkier, and then reveals himself to be this full on control-freak asshole. It sucks to admit but some of the things he did when his true colors were starting to show through, I had done myself.

Anyways, I missed my first class, and I guess I missed a good one. The Crazy Russian, who's new nickname is "Drago," got his turn in the dreaded Todd-Chair. I was really disspointed that I missed that, because when I first started the class Drago was one of the characters I really zeroed in on. Ever since my second class where the discussion was winding down and Todd asked Drago if he had anything to add, and he replied by casually pulling out a piece of paper from his pocket and began to read us a poem he'd written. I don't remember what was in that poem but I remember thinking "What the hell? Do I have to write a poem too?" until I looked around and realized that everyone else in the class, Todd included was as perplexed as I was.
After that day though, Drago became less and less involved in the groups. Usually whenever he was pressed he would deflect by giving some sort of ambigous religious answer. Todd might ask him, "So what considerations should you give to your children's friends when they're in your household?" and Drago would say "Well, I just love God, and I love people." And that would be it, and I would be sitting there thinking, what happened to the crazy accusational poem reciting Russian dude that I used to know?
So I wasn't in the group when Todd focused on Drago and brought out the dry erase marker he uses to evicerate people more thoroughly than any lightsaber could. I guess it didn't take long for Drago to break down into sobs. I really feel like I missed out, because I have been wanting to hear his story almost since I began the program at Bridges.

On another note, Ogre has been looking crazier and crazier every time I see him, which due to our unfortunate proximity in living areas happens more often than just when I show up to Bridges. In the same class that I missed, they also had to point out to Ogre that just generally being an inconsiderate dick, is actually a form of absuse. Ogre lives with his grandma, and from what I understand he was upset because she was constantly asking him to stop doing things like: blasting his music all night long, using words like "goddamn" and "fuck" frequently in front of her guests, and (this is classic) hocking loogies into her sinks. Mind you, he was upset because she has been "nagging" him about these things all the time. I guess it took some time, and quite a few reiterations and examples for Ogre to see that maybe he should just stop pulling all these dickhead moves. This guy is a real piece of work, when he doesn't show up to class I'm always a little dissapointed.

Just because I met the required time in Bridges, I don't think I am going to stop going. I think the progam has been really good for me, and while I still have a few things to take care of before I am officially a graduate, I think Todd is going to let me continue in the program voluntarily. I can't believe I am even considering that, especially when I think back to those first few weeks when I was so angry about having to do this program. Eh, life.