Two extra hours of sleep mean the world, the moments of nerve-wracking, the strange feeling when one finds out someone of one's teenage acquaintance got arrested for murder, of peon ex machina from meetings of infinite awkwardness, of possibly being the 'missed connection in a Craigslist ad for the first time to my knowledge (I don't remember saying anything to him, and think I only looked back because I got that sixth sense of being looked at and wanted to see who was doing the looking), of strange characters that I need to be nice to as a civil servant though they give me the creeps and I can't tell if they're just socially awkward or if they're creepy, though it seems to be the latter more often than not when the age gap is bigger than half your age plus seven. I don't envy the awkward position of the male species, especially the non-Type-A's.
I do not hide my feelings well even when I say nothing. The perpetual smile inherited from my father is both a blessing and curse, though it's harder to hide my anger than my cynicism (because I hold almost nothing except God to be sacred and so everything is ripe for snark), and when I deal with the creeps and those who come on too strong, I have to force my cadence into monotone, avoid eye contact, detach out of risk of getting pulled in.
Every time I think of turning my string of non-degree kicks-and-giggles classes into something like a real piece of semi-worthless paper, I sit in a class where I am condescended to and my synapses are stimulated only the absurdity of immature undergrads and sycophantic adults, and the grad student tales of department politics that remind me exactly of why I used to call my mom up every other week and claim I was going to drop out of school, and why I didn't want to continue on to do an MFA or literary crit. I know I have the brains, but when the classes don't grab me, when it's theoretical or revisionist or regurgitating, I check out.
I like to read things that are written well, that make me want to learn more, filled with passion and brimming with brilliance, not the self-indulgence of academic deconstruction written for conferences and journals that no one reads, kind of like the ivory tower counterpart to Yngwie Malmsteen albums that are owned only by uber-musicians who subscribe to Guitar World to read John Petrucci's columns religiously. It's boring as hell for everyone else and there's nothing to capture one's inspiration.
And I've been so tensed up, as I always am when there is change and when I'm dealing with Powers That Be whom I distrust, but I caught the early bus home and made a joyful noise tonight practicing for Sunday's music with dear friends who are also fantastically fun musicians to play with, everything loud and loose, and I need to get back to my parents' house and find my distortion pedals to add to the reverb and tremolo waves from the amplifier, laughing and messing with harmonies and key changes, hanging out in the cool already-fall night talking about books and museums and weirdness.
A late night dinner that didn't turn out so well, another comfortingly cloudy day, a morning to drink coffee with the neighbor who's come by to fix the drain and with whom discourse of caffeination and good conversation was had. And now I'm here, and it's not so bad...
Thursday, September 8, 2011
Monday, September 5, 2011
healing waters
Some tension on the flesh-and-blood end had me wanting to bail before dinner, but a cooling-off walk around the block with the closer of my two siblings helped my troubled soul to chill out, and I made a much more graceful exit post-dessert, driving home through bleak streets and grey clouds, attempting to make sense of a sea of emotions and being unable to, venting to God because I don't want to bother anyone on a holiday weekend and He seems to be okay with my salty mouth and aching soul laid bare.
But with a full gas tank and looking so melancholy that even the attendants were trying to cheer me up, I began to drive towards the little bit of golden I could see in the sky, detouring from the route home to the lake when the clouds suddenly became so panoramic and vast and a deep blue-grey swirling over the hemisphere, and a band of golden on the horizon over the white-cap-flecked water, I could see the surf from the exit and knew I could find solace here.
Two of my former softball teammates were hanging out on the pier, people I didn't know very well but we were euphoric under the kaleidoscopic clouds deepening to dusky rose and blazing gold and rich blues over the swirling water crashing into the rocks and over the walkway like the ocean, the wind blowing my hair out as I huddled in a hoodie on the platform, wishing I had my camera, but knowing I'd miss this moment if I ran back to get it. The 1-pixel snapper on the phone and my memory would have to do.
We walked down to the beach, where the surfers were out and the sun set over pools in the sand, as seagulls flew silhouetted into the horizon and the water glided within inches of our feet as the darkness deepened. We walked back and I watched the water swirl some more before heading home, wondering why the turbulence calms me so intensely.
But with a full gas tank and looking so melancholy that even the attendants were trying to cheer me up, I began to drive towards the little bit of golden I could see in the sky, detouring from the route home to the lake when the clouds suddenly became so panoramic and vast and a deep blue-grey swirling over the hemisphere, and a band of golden on the horizon over the white-cap-flecked water, I could see the surf from the exit and knew I could find solace here.
Two of my former softball teammates were hanging out on the pier, people I didn't know very well but we were euphoric under the kaleidoscopic clouds deepening to dusky rose and blazing gold and rich blues over the swirling water crashing into the rocks and over the walkway like the ocean, the wind blowing my hair out as I huddled in a hoodie on the platform, wishing I had my camera, but knowing I'd miss this moment if I ran back to get it. The 1-pixel snapper on the phone and my memory would have to do.
We walked down to the beach, where the surfers were out and the sun set over pools in the sand, as seagulls flew silhouetted into the horizon and the water glided within inches of our feet as the darkness deepened. We walked back and I watched the water swirl some more before heading home, wondering why the turbulence calms me so intensely.
turning leaves
The rain so soothing last night, the soft rush of breeze and comforting grey, for melancholy music and the first preludes of the autumnal. Last year at this time as my living situation unraveled, I had driven out to the End of Civilization to stargaze caffeinated with my east-siders, but a year later I find the unplanned more solitude ever more comforting, as I settle in, having been here almost a year now, seeing the garden begin to go to seed, even as the zinnias and sunflowers are vibrant for awhile longer, as I'm ripping out more mint and pulling out weeds grown way too tall, where did August go, do I really miss it all that much...
It'd be a good day for museums if they were open, but it's sufficient for introversion, for reading books and pondering, for fighting the inevitable entropy of apartment life, not having to be anywhere until much later, beginning to tune out the warplanes flying overhead for the airshow at the lake, cup after cup of tea. I need days like this more often.
It'd be a good day for museums if they were open, but it's sufficient for introversion, for reading books and pondering, for fighting the inevitable entropy of apartment life, not having to be anywhere until much later, beginning to tune out the warplanes flying overhead for the airshow at the lake, cup after cup of tea. I need days like this more often.
Saturday, September 3, 2011
codas
The heat permeating, the inability to cool down, hair metal on the radio all weekend, no breeze to speak of and I end up spending the afternoon fleeing the heat and Getting Things Taken Care Of in strip malls and big box stores like a Real American because I need groceries and work clothes and art supplies. I've spent the night drinking tea and listening to 70's rock, swirling paint around to Skynyrd and Sabbath, relocating to the balcony because it finally feels good out here. I know it's the weekend of cookouts and revelry for the Peonage and their overlords, but I'm just not there right now.
We went to visit my great uncle this morning at the nursing home, and it's the first time I've seen him since he had a stroke a couple weeks ago. His words come slower, and he apologizes constantly for what he deems boring talk ("I just can't do the small talk anymore") but this is the best conversation I've ever had with him. Instead of sitting alone in his house listening to the radio where people keep talking about buying gold, he's found people there to talk to, a priest he likes (he's never liked organized religion because he thinks it's all about parting fools with their money, I understand this), a nice lady friend down the hall "Nothing romantic, we just talk about old times. I need an alliance now like I need a hole in my head..." He knows this will probably be where he spends his last days trying to learn how to walk again, how to speak the way he once did, but as strange as this is, it might be a good way to end, a place where there's people to talk to and take care of him so he won't die alone.
I hate nursing homes slightly less than funeral homes, but this place is beautiful and if I become unable to take care of myself I'd rather be there than a lot of places. Catholics do the nursing home thing well, that whole sanctity of life/having the funds to stay there I guess, and I'm relieved I no longer have to fear going to check on him at his house and hoping he's still alive because I don't know what I'd do otherwise.
The prayers I struggle most with are those involving the changing of souls, because it's just such an impossible thing for me to understand that divine calculus of how it all works, but between this time and the last time I saw him he's a different person or rather not different but alive in a way that he wasn't before even as he grows closer to shedding the mortal coil now after 90 years of life and disappointments, a childhood in poverty, the hell of the Pacific theater (which he still doesn't talk about), an unhappy marriage with a woman who couldn't see past her own issues("She wasn't all there, but I didn't treat her right. I supported her financially but not emotionally..."), a daughter in worse shape than he is, a house full of tchotchkes worth nothing, if this is the closest thing to heaven how tragic is that?
He used to always talk about money and a good job and being a decent person being the ultimate most important thing and for the first time in 92 years, he's finally started talking to God after being so bitter and so stubborn for so long. I've never heard him apologize for anything before. I've never heard him say that what you have doesn't matter. I've never seen him so peaceful, so ready to face a pending mortality, ready to let go of all the other things he clung to so desperately. I'm glad he can't see me crying because I just couldn't stop.
We went to visit my great uncle this morning at the nursing home, and it's the first time I've seen him since he had a stroke a couple weeks ago. His words come slower, and he apologizes constantly for what he deems boring talk ("I just can't do the small talk anymore") but this is the best conversation I've ever had with him. Instead of sitting alone in his house listening to the radio where people keep talking about buying gold, he's found people there to talk to, a priest he likes (he's never liked organized religion because he thinks it's all about parting fools with their money, I understand this), a nice lady friend down the hall "Nothing romantic, we just talk about old times. I need an alliance now like I need a hole in my head..." He knows this will probably be where he spends his last days trying to learn how to walk again, how to speak the way he once did, but as strange as this is, it might be a good way to end, a place where there's people to talk to and take care of him so he won't die alone.
I hate nursing homes slightly less than funeral homes, but this place is beautiful and if I become unable to take care of myself I'd rather be there than a lot of places. Catholics do the nursing home thing well, that whole sanctity of life/having the funds to stay there I guess, and I'm relieved I no longer have to fear going to check on him at his house and hoping he's still alive because I don't know what I'd do otherwise.
The prayers I struggle most with are those involving the changing of souls, because it's just such an impossible thing for me to understand that divine calculus of how it all works, but between this time and the last time I saw him he's a different person or rather not different but alive in a way that he wasn't before even as he grows closer to shedding the mortal coil now after 90 years of life and disappointments, a childhood in poverty, the hell of the Pacific theater (which he still doesn't talk about), an unhappy marriage with a woman who couldn't see past her own issues("She wasn't all there, but I didn't treat her right. I supported her financially but not emotionally..."), a daughter in worse shape than he is, a house full of tchotchkes worth nothing, if this is the closest thing to heaven how tragic is that?
He used to always talk about money and a good job and being a decent person being the ultimate most important thing and for the first time in 92 years, he's finally started talking to God after being so bitter and so stubborn for so long. I've never heard him apologize for anything before. I've never heard him say that what you have doesn't matter. I've never seen him so peaceful, so ready to face a pending mortality, ready to let go of all the other things he clung to so desperately. I'm glad he can't see me crying because I just couldn't stop.
Thursday, September 1, 2011
driving music
Things that sound absolutely amazing when one is driving home at night through empty streets past a glittering skyline, the perfect soundtrack to equal parts euphoria and resignation. I miss my late night Cleveland drives so much.
the last summer night
Writers block in attempting anything creative, the tap has run dry and the Sea of Stories is so fast that I'd drown attempting to dive in and come up with some kind of treasure.
But there's studying to do, and a decent flow of people coming through, the student diverting the creeps away. A half hour longer and I'll be home to be back here again.
But there's studying to do, and a decent flow of people coming through, the student diverting the creeps away. A half hour longer and I'll be home to be back here again.
paper scraps and paper chase
Being Peonage of the Towering Slab of Ivory, I hear a lot of people talk about their degrees, the degrees they want, the degrees that someone else has or doesn't, and there is some degree of cultural capital in certain circles where you're validated by how many letters are after your name or where you went to school, what you studied, and how far you went, where you got published, what conference you presented at, who you know.
And then there is the vicious cycle of a cramped job market, where everyone has the same credentials but possibly more experience or better connections, where you don't get called back because you don't have some piece of paper, or if you have too many pieces. I only got my gig of relative underemployment due to not graduating in time and learning the hard way after not getting called back for looking too overqualified or for having the right credentials but not the 20 years of experience that belonged to others. In Proverbs, it's said to be wise is to ask God for neither poverty nor riches and that's what I did, and that's what I got. While the interpersonals can get complicated, it's truly everywhere.
My peers defer adulthood and keep taking out more loans, to find out that they've screwed themselves over because that golden ticket never did materialize. Most of my fellow grad-schoolers pursued other dreams instead or held out for that Really Good Job because they considered themselves too good to do what I do. I've got free tuition and really good health insurance and a couple good coworker homies, which makes up for the lack of pay most of the time, but to think that one is entitled based on having such and such a degree or two, when there's little work ethic and even less decency towards others, starts seeming absurd.
Self-perpetuation of those already entrenched, ageism of the you're too old or you're so young, the stress of maintaining image and lifestyle, of making a good impression and paying the mortgage while the domestic life disintegrates. Maybe this is why people like Jonathan Franzen novels and Desperate Housewives. At least someone's suburban misery is worse.
Suburban desperation has long been a cultural trope and one I've found ridiculous and overwrought, but I've never existed in the world of the super-suburbs, just the working-class one where the people in my life who went to college ended up being truck drivers or stay-at-home moms who used their brains to help us use ours, so I've never truly understood this, and living in the city means that I see less of it, so when I do, it stands out intensely.
And as education becomes more to do with becoming good little cogs with culturally appropriate opinions, and higher education a lucrative enterprise that's bought into with the expectation of economic payoff, of higher wages and greater prestige, more people have bought in and it's gotten more cramped, and I watch more and more people reduced tears and bitterness because the system they paid so much into is not producing the returns that were expected.
And then the people who do have the qualifications who got where they were more or less by accident of birth, of getting in while the getting was good back when there were times of relative economic prosperity, when degrees and diplomas meant more, look down on everyone else who is not so lucky.
These are things that I don't deal with as much, only observe. I hover in social limbo between suburbanites and those that have little to nothing. I can't say that I've dropped out of this system, but I've left the rat racing to others, but I see it all around me and sometimes I wish I was doing a little bit better so maybe I could travel somewhere outside the United States just once, or maybe not live upstairs from someone, and realize that there's still residue of these American dreams that have fueled all sorts of bad things. We've all got our struggles, and those of us who preferred learning for the sake of learning and art for the sake of art are the ones living paycheck to paycheck, but I still feel like I made the better trade.
And then there is the vicious cycle of a cramped job market, where everyone has the same credentials but possibly more experience or better connections, where you don't get called back because you don't have some piece of paper, or if you have too many pieces. I only got my gig of relative underemployment due to not graduating in time and learning the hard way after not getting called back for looking too overqualified or for having the right credentials but not the 20 years of experience that belonged to others. In Proverbs, it's said to be wise is to ask God for neither poverty nor riches and that's what I did, and that's what I got. While the interpersonals can get complicated, it's truly everywhere.
My peers defer adulthood and keep taking out more loans, to find out that they've screwed themselves over because that golden ticket never did materialize. Most of my fellow grad-schoolers pursued other dreams instead or held out for that Really Good Job because they considered themselves too good to do what I do. I've got free tuition and really good health insurance and a couple good coworker homies, which makes up for the lack of pay most of the time, but to think that one is entitled based on having such and such a degree or two, when there's little work ethic and even less decency towards others, starts seeming absurd.
Self-perpetuation of those already entrenched, ageism of the you're too old or you're so young, the stress of maintaining image and lifestyle, of making a good impression and paying the mortgage while the domestic life disintegrates. Maybe this is why people like Jonathan Franzen novels and Desperate Housewives. At least someone's suburban misery is worse.
Suburban desperation has long been a cultural trope and one I've found ridiculous and overwrought, but I've never existed in the world of the super-suburbs, just the working-class one where the people in my life who went to college ended up being truck drivers or stay-at-home moms who used their brains to help us use ours, so I've never truly understood this, and living in the city means that I see less of it, so when I do, it stands out intensely.
And as education becomes more to do with becoming good little cogs with culturally appropriate opinions, and higher education a lucrative enterprise that's bought into with the expectation of economic payoff, of higher wages and greater prestige, more people have bought in and it's gotten more cramped, and I watch more and more people reduced tears and bitterness because the system they paid so much into is not producing the returns that were expected.
And then the people who do have the qualifications who got where they were more or less by accident of birth, of getting in while the getting was good back when there were times of relative economic prosperity, when degrees and diplomas meant more, look down on everyone else who is not so lucky.
These are things that I don't deal with as much, only observe. I hover in social limbo between suburbanites and those that have little to nothing. I can't say that I've dropped out of this system, but I've left the rat racing to others, but I see it all around me and sometimes I wish I was doing a little bit better so maybe I could travel somewhere outside the United States just once, or maybe not live upstairs from someone, and realize that there's still residue of these American dreams that have fueled all sorts of bad things. We've all got our struggles, and those of us who preferred learning for the sake of learning and art for the sake of art are the ones living paycheck to paycheck, but I still feel like I made the better trade.
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