Evading the Hour

I heard a piece on the radio the other day about a man who walks around in a Superman costume sometimes. A real, honest-to-God authentic Superman costume. And he just throws it on and goes to a bar, or fills his car up with gas, acting otherwise normal. He doesn't get made fun of--he actually gets respect and attention because people are impressed that he has the balls to do such a thing. And he's apparently a really nice guy. So anyone intending to make fun of him upon approaching is quickly dissuaded. Anyway, why does he do this? One simple, heartbreaking reason: his wife died a few years ago.

Huh?

What if the only reason we're not insane is because something tragic hasn't happened to us yet? Lately it seems like everyone around me is in pain and channeling it through some other endeavor, be it for good or naught. It occurs to me that more people than one might expect are walking around carrying invisible elephants on their backs, or hosting dinner parties wherein only the host can see the lumbering elephant hanging out in the corner. And here is my deepest worry, dear diary (er, I mean, blog): how will my escape manifest itself when the time comes? I'm sure it will come, (no one gets by unscathed). I guess no one can be prepared and there's no sense worrying...

Ok enough of that. A jumble of observations over the past few weeks and I needed to express it somehow. Unfortunately, my blog became the vehicle for that. I guess it shouldn't be surprising that the patterns I've been noticing in people and about life are nothing new. Getting through life despite the occasional crisis blindsiding you is the most universal human struggle there is, right? Maybe I should read more... I'm sure Joyce or Keats or someone figured all this out already.

On a lighter note, the following is something I was told the other day:

"Ladylike subtlety has never been one of your strong points."

hmm...I'll take that as.... a compliment! : )

And finally, speaking of private pain and, in this case, a very public vehicle for it, I was fascinated by this piece (or pieces, rather. There's over 180 parts.) at the American Art Museum (Smithsonian.) My fascination stems from a) it's pure bizarreness (is that a word?); b) the title: The Throne of the Third Heaven of the Nations Millennium General Assembly (awesome); c) the fact that this guy was from SC and moved to DC; and d) anybody who actually prepares for the second coming of the Lord, well, it's always interesting to see what's involved (usually bomb shelters, preparing emails to your un-saved friends for delivery after the Armageddon, and/or mass suicides).

I now have a 8 x 5 iridescent postcard of this scene hanging in my cubicle at work.

I'm making fun, but truthfully I think it's really cool that a janitor from SC's secret garage work--which he may or may not have thought of as "art"--is on display at the Smithsonian.

And finally, because my favorite poems are way better than anything I write, I found an appropriate one:

The Hour
by Michael Lind

Maybe the moment recurs daily at six, when commuters,
freed from the staring computers,
elbow and bump in unsought intimacy on a station
platform with you, and frustration
rots what is left of your strength. Maybe the hour comes after
dinner, when televised laughter
seeps from a neighboring room; maybe the time is the dead of
night, when you ponder, instead of
dreaming. Whatever the time, you will escape it—by sinking
down with a book, or by drinking
secretly out in the dark studio, or by unbuckling
pants on a stranger, or chuckling,
one with a mob, in a deep theater. Soon, though, the hour
comes to corrode all your power,
pleasure and faith with the damp dread that it daily assigns you.
How you evade it defines you.

On my big decision

Because the "right No" would haunt me forever, and even the wrong Yes might open unseen doors...

For some people the day comes
when they have to declare the great Yes
or the great No. It's clear at once who has the Yes
ready within him; and saying it

he goes from honor to honor, strong in his conviction.
He who refuses does not repent. Asked again,
he'd still say no. Yet that no--the right no--
drags him down all his life.
-C. P. Cavafy

This poem is like Nike's "Just do it." Only more...poetic. : )

Plans

Why is it that major life decisions have to be made at the most inopportune times?

And how is it that a person can feel so compelled to abscond and at the very same moment be content with the here-and-now?

Let's do a visualization exercise.

... this:

or this?:
Since I'm at a loss for words (and blog-posts) these days, I'll once again steal the words of someone else to give you something worthwhile to read.

"The Summer Day" by Mary Oliver

The Summer Day

Who made the world?
Who made the swan, and the black bear?
Who made the grasshopper?
This grasshopper, I mean—
the one who has flung herself out of the grass,
the one who is eating sugar out of my hand,
who is moving her jaws back and forth instead of up and down—
who is gazing around with her enormous and complicated eyes.
Now she lifts her pale forearms and thoroughly washes her face.
Now she snaps her wings open, and floats away.
I don't know exactly what a prayer is.
I do know how to pay attention, how to fall down
into the grass, how to kneel down in the grass,
how to be idle and blessed, how to stroll through the fields,
which is what I have been doing all day.
Tell me, what else should I have done?
Doesn't everything die at last, and too soon?
Tell me, what is it you plan to do
with your one wild and precious life?

from House of Light. © Beacon Press, 1992

p.s. Nebraska photos are by a very talented guy named Ryan McGinnis, NOT ME, found on Flickr. Not sure what the rules are, but I figure if he would rather I not post them on my blog he'll ask me not to and I'll comply. = ) Until then, he probably wouldn't mind a little publicity, right? He takes some pretty sweet HDR shots.

A gentler post

I've been inspired by a piece Judith Warner wrote in the NYTimes last week: a blog post that started out as an essay on her love for coffee, transformed into a tracing of her life through memories involving the brew, and ended up saying a lot more about growing up, loss and childhood, and about the hurried times in which we live. There's something to be said for a warm, welcoming pot of coffee in a home. It's different from the impersonal bustling of coffee shops, instead creating a sense of place and a feeling of timelessness.

I discovered coffee (and by discovered, I mean the cannot-live-without-you-nor-imagine-how-I-did-before-meeting-you kind of love that most reserve for other human beings) last summer in NY. I had always loved the creamy, sugary espresso drinks offered at Starbucks and other standard coffee houses--my sweet tooth is not discriminate-- but could never get into the straight-up brewed coffee thing. The smell of coffee I always loved; my earliest memory of it is riding in my friend's mother's car on the way to Moultrie Middle School (which is now a pile of rubble I found out on a recent trip home) every morning. She always had a travel mug of the best-smelling flavored coffee. I almost looked forward to early-morning rides to school for that fact.

I forget when or how, but I realized that with enough cream and sugar, even a weak cup of coffee can be made tolerable, and is a much cheaper alternative than a $4.00 cappuccino. And perhaps this is psychosomatic, but an espresso drink accelerates my heart rate and gives me the jitters so bad it scares me, while a cup or two of regular coffee does the trick without giving me palpitations. Anyway, this summer, leaving my apartment at 7am to ride the subway for a 1/2 hour I always grabbed a cup of coffee from the Nascent on the corner of my 'hood in Brooklyn; that is until I realized I could get a delicious cup from the bodega after I emerged in Bed-Stuy for a buck cheaper, AND the cream and sugar were already mixed in. Perfect. (That's the laziness kicking in.)

As I'm getting older (I'm pushin' 24 now...phew! (kidding)) I think I'll one day make it to the pure cafe noir, sans cream or sugar. Mostly because I want to be like my dad, who shakes his head and with a knowing gesture (like the gesturing Warner speaks of) refuses any additives offered to him by a stranger. I like to imagine him in the early mornings when I was younger, when he would be up before everyone else in the house (we're talking like, 3-4am early, since he worked 1st shift and was home by 3 to pick us up from school), sitting in the yellow kitchen, probably reading the paper with a cup of coffee brewed in a pot I don't remember. Or nowadays as a retiree, starting his day the same way, albeit a few hours later, in a much bigger, state of the art kitchen (looking a little out of place among all that marble and stainless steel in his flannel and faded denim), always awake already when I stumble out of bed and into the kitchen on my visits home. Already sitting, drinking his black coffee over the paper, with the pot still on and warm, waiting for me.


"Sit, drink Your coffee here; your work can wait awhile..."
by: Vikram Seth

Sit, drink your coffee here; your work can wait awhile.
You're twenty-six, and still have some life ahead.
No need for wit; just talk vacuities, and I'll
Reciprocate in kind, or laugh at you instead.

The world is too opaque, distressing and profound.
This twenty minutes' rendezvous will make my day:
To sit here in the sun, with grackles all around,
Staring with beady eyes, and you two feet away

How to live by denial: ignore the blindsiding facts

I don't have the time nor the energy to tell you all the reasons that all the wrong people insist on asking me out, especially 33-year olds with more baggage than a first-class Titanic passenger, a terrible haircut, and a butt-chin (yes, I'm a terrible person); but I do have the strength to report that I am, proudly, the least "plaid" of the hetero siblings in my family according to my eldest brother. That is, I was until I got demoted since I was heading to an American Gladiators party....but all too soon, for the gathering was hosted by two friends who happened to be...lesbians! So my status is once again lifted, though I have the tough task of trying not to become too plaid (i.e., hetero, mainstream, terribly boring). I don't think I have to worry too much about that, what with my Dilbert-esque competition in an engineer brother, and the daily head-shakings of my roommates who mutter either, "That bitch is crazy" when I leave the room, or "Where did we find her??"

In far more interesting and bizarre news, Tom Cruise is a fucking nutjob. What is he even talking about in his rant about scientology?! If for some reason you're not convinced that he's crazy, and especially if you haven't seen it, please watch. And be sure to catch all the parodies of it, especially Eugene Mirman's version. Had me laughing pretty hard.

I had a class this morning taught by the Paula Deen of health management. I mean literally, she was the spitting image, complete with spiky silver psuedo-mullet, colorful personality, and the ability to stretch any honest, sensible one-syllable word into two. It's gonna be a good semester, I can feel it.

And because I feel like this is a weak post, I'm gonna leave you with another poem, because let's face it, I'm basically a Garrison Keillor wannabe. I have to give you something of worth for your time, dear reader.

Earl

by Louis Jenkins

In Sitka, because they are fond of them,
People have named the seals. Every seal
is named Earl because they are killed one
after another by the orca, the killer
whale; seal bodies tossed left and right
into the air. "At least he didn't get
Earl," someone says. And sure enough,
after a time, that same friendly,
bewhiskered face bobs to the surface.
It's Earl again. Well, how else are you
to live except by denial, by some
palatable fiction, some little song to
sing while the inevitable, the black and
white blindsiding fact, comes hurtling
toward you out of the deep?

Continuing to fail in good spirits

So my one reader has commanded me to "update." Here goes.

Just a few things I remember from last night's bout of binge drinking:
-Two people carrying me to the top of the stairs because I refused to step anywhere on the floor that was not covered by a blue carpet circle, which were sporadically placed around the room, for fear that something awful would happen. Then I proceeded to slide down the stairs on my ass knocking over something large that was perched on one of the stairs, proclaiming at the end that "ow I have carpet burn on my butt!" Well, what did I expect?
-Becoming convinced that the bulletproof Escalade leaving for the bar was actually a ruse, and that in fact we were being corralled only to be sent off to concentration camps. All it took was one friend to introduce this idea into my head and I went with it. I was told at one point I screamed at someone, "This is ETHNIC CLEANSING, and I WON'T STAND FOR IT!" My friends only egged me on: "Don't get in that car. I wouldn't if I were you." Indeed. "I will not be privy to your anti-semitism!" Hm...
-Related to the previous event, I claimed I was a quarter Jewish, "on my dad's side, and THAT still COUNTS!" When someone later realized this was not true, and in fact my Jewness is on my mother's side and therefore doesn't count, they accused me of lying, to which I defended myself by saying, "I wasn't lying. I was just drunk." I'm pretty sure I was lying.
-Took control of the cake situation, even though I was by no means in charge of the celebration at hand. But I was hungry and not enough action was being taken in this matter. So we found some tea lights and slapped it on the cake, lit those suckers up and got down to business.
-Oh, and how could I forget. I led a bout of Indian leg wrestling, circa ~1995 style. Please tell me other people know what I'm talking about? But my opponent's sartorial choices gave him an unfair advantage. Cheater.

What defective filter exists between my brain and mouth when I'm sober completely disappears when I've had a few drinks. "Do you know when these cupcakes would have been good? THREE DAYS AGO!" I angrily told my roommate, who had made us wait til the party to consume them. It's ok though, because she doesn't remember much of anything that happened last night anyway.

In other news, I haven't blogged much lately because school's started back up and I imagine it's only going to get worse. I have my first "real" job interview next Thursday morning. I might poop my pants, which won't look good. Part of me is excited to be moving on to the next phase of life, where things like "income" and "weekends" are viable, tangible, attainable things. But the other part of me is terrified that I'll not be happy and end up doing something rash like quit and move to South Dakota to live on a horse farm and play music and read all day.

Let's see, a poem to express this mood....Ah yes, enjoy:

by Cheryl Denise

They'll

take your soul
and put it in a suit,
fit you in boxes
under labels,
make you look like the Joneses.

They'll tell you go a little blonder,
suggest sky-blue
tinted contact lenses,
conceal that birthmark
under your chin.

They'll urge you to have babies
get fulfilled.
They'll say marriage is easy,
flowers from Thornhills
are all you need
to keep it together.

They'll push you to go ahead,
borrow a few more grand,
build a dream house.
Your boys need Nikes,
your girls cheerleading,
and all you need is your job
9 to 5 in the same place.

They'll order you never to cry
in Southern States,
and never, ever dance
in the rain.

They'll repeat all the things
your preschool teacher said
in that squeaky too tight voice.

And when you slowly
let them go,
crack your suit,
ooze your soul
in the sun,
when you run through
the woods with your dog,
read poems to swaying cornfields,
pray in tall red oaks,
they'll whisper
and pretend you're crazy.

my thoughts can be best expressed by a poem...

by Paul Violi, from Overnight. © Hanging Loose Press, 2007

Appeal to the Grammarians

We, the naturally hopeful,
Need a simple sign
For the myriad ways we're capsized.
We who love precise language
Need a finer way to convey
Disappointment and perplexity.
For speechlessness and all its inflections,
For up-ended expectations,
For every time we're ambushed
By trivial or stupefying irony,
For pure incredulity, we need
The inverted exclamation point.
For the dropped smile, the limp handshake,
For whoever has just unwrapped a dumb gift
Or taken the first sip of a flat beer,
Or felt love or pond ice
Give way underfoot, we deserve it.
We need it for the air pocket, the scratch shot,
The child whose ball doesn't bounce back,
The flat tire at journey's outset,
The odyssey that ends up in Weehawken.
But mainly because I need it—here and now
As I sit outside the Caffe Reggio
Staring at my espresso and cannoli
After this middle-aged couple
Came strolling by and he suddenly
Veered and sneezed all over my table
And she said to him, "See, that's why
I don't like to eat outside."

On my eponymous blogger name...

Ok so, I'm not exactly sure about the copyright rules here, but I am citing the author so I assume this is legal. Anyway, a break from school seems to pose the perfect opportunity to post (alliteration!) this, one of my favorites. (And also because I have nothing to say today, b/c I'm depressed after watching Hotel Rwanda, and b/c Olivia left, and b/c we had a terrible dinner at Ted Montana's at which the waiter made me extremely uncomfortable just by being awkwardly and overly fake-friendly and additionally gave Beth sweet tea with sludge in it and me a merlot in a dirty glass with food particles encrusted all over it and b/c I saw that movie about Bob Dylan today which was really good but I didn't really understand it b/c I don't know Dylan that well and so now I have a lot of listening and reading to do and I don't know when I'm going home b/c my brother seems to think that he can call me at the last minute and say "ok I'm ready to leave now!" and I haven't played my oboe since the wedding in October unless you count the time at my party a few nights ago where I drunkenly made my oboe sound like a french siren (I had never drunk-oboed before that night) and I'm supposed to play at home at Xmas and....whoa. How's that for stream of consciousness? I'm going to bed now. Just read the poem.)

Beside the Point

by Stephen Cushman

The sky has never won a prize.
The clouds have no careers.
The rainbow doesn't say my work,
thank goodness.

The rock in the creek's not so productive.
The mud on the bank's not too pragmatic.
There's nothing useful in the noise
the wind makes in the leaves.

Buck up now, my fellow superfluity,
and let's both be of that worthless ilk,
self-indulgent as shooting stars,
self-absorbed as sunsets.

Who cares if we're inconsequential?
At least we can revel, two good-for-nothings,
in our irrelevance; at least come and make
no difference with me.