yikes it's been a long time here. been a busy little beaver, but you already know that don't you. not the last few days though, been largely unoccupied the last few days. spent quite a bit of QT with the family members, which i feel pretty good about. lots of times when i mentally prepare myself to go home, i fondly anticipate spending time with my parents and everyone, but then once i get home all i want to do is lay around and watch tv and more or less do my own thing. i prove to be much less talkative than i envision myself being. i am not sure why, but this time has been different. i've had boundless energy for my family; i have not lost interest or developed a sour attitude. so that feels good. i suppose it helps that people are rather busy around me preparing for first christmas and now my sister's wedding. it's hard to be lazy and/or introverted amidst this kind of hustle and bustle.
last night at get together at a friend's house i was innocuously asked by my friend's father how i was doing. people ask each other this question mindlessly throughout the holiday season; if you know me at all you know that these kinds of rote questions drive me insane. this time was different, however. as i was delivering my involuntary response ("i'm doing really well"), it dawned on me that, in fact, i am doing really well. this realization hit me literally as i was saying it, so that after finishing the response, i had the genuine satisfaction that accompanies the knowledge that i am doing well. i haven't taken much time to step back and analyze my ups and downs lately, but lo and behold i've come into a pretty pleasant state of being.
i can attribute this effect to a couple of causes. first--and this would deserve its own post and then some--is the continued and escalating presence of my new girlfriend sara. (i say "new girlfriend" as though i possess old girlfriends, or that i move from one to another. she is a "girlfriend," and she is "new," so try to read the phrase in that way.) but i like her and i like spending time with her, and it's only been four days since i've last seen her and i'm already eagerly anticipating her arrival here in steubenville tomorrow to accompany me to my sister's wedding. in any normal relationship, it would be a bit soon to invite a girl to a wedding, much less one involving immediate family, but with sara everything is different. everything is unencumbered by the stench of expectation or convention or any form of adherance to norms. it's hard to convey how refreshing this is.
the other thing that's got me well right now is the resolution of my housing situation, a situation that caused me much (as it turned out) unnecessary stress and consternation. the removal of any kind of stress always has an amazing effect on me, probably because i live so great a percentage of my life stress-free. but the other side of this housing resolution is that starting next week, i have a much nicer and much much bigger place to live. i've been living in small little nests for 4.5 years now, so i can't even really comprehend what it's going to be like to life comfortably again. it's rather exciting.
so, even after true and thoughtful consideration, i am doing really well right now.
i'm writing a poem to read at my sister's wedding and it's about finished. perhaps i'll share it here once i'm done.
Wednesday, December 26, 2007
Tuesday, December 4, 2007
i subscribe to New York magazine. every monday, excepting holidays or mondays after a double issue comes out, a new issue arrives in my mailbox. the first thing i do with it is go to the back sections with the art/movies/etc reviews and listings, and see if anything interesting is going on. then i like to check out the "approval matrix" and to see if there are any features worth my time. and at some point during the week i'll do the crossword, unless my brain isn't clicking very well, in which case i'll do 90% of the crossword.anyhow, for whatever reason, i didn't find the time to do any of these things last week. there is an untouched black magazine in my apt right now with an asian woman on the cover about to kiss some toes, and there is also a new one with good old rudy giuliani on it that just arrvied yesterday.
i have been busy lately. people say that all the time, usually as an excusal. as i say it now i am wholly forthright. friday i didn't get home from work til after the bars. saturday i spent only enough time in my apt to get dressed, get a shower, and get dressed again. sunday only long enough to eat the mcdonalds that i passed out before getting to the night before, have sex, and spend 90 minutes or so at the end of the day being exhausted (more on this later). the only day from last week that i had fully to myself was thursday and i spent most of that evening shopping for a suit and doing laundry. so i have been busy lately. perhaps i will go back and skim last week's New York, perhaps not.
i have been busy because i've started seeing a girl, something that doesn't happen often. actually, counting mornings after which she or i had spent the night, i have seen her now nine consecutive days. and this doesn't bother or worry me at all. it, and she, is completely comfortable and effortless for me. these are very high compliments from me. so it's good.
a side effect of this girl (and we can now confirm it's a side effect of seeing any girl) is that i have become moody. not violently so, but still very susceptible to sudden swings in mood. what's good is that i have recognized this quite early and so shouldn't be doomed to suffer because of it.
now, back to the aforementioned 90 minutes which finished off my sunday night. (warning this is an admission that shouldn't possibly be misconstrued as endering or anything above that which might cause you to mournfully shake your head at me the next time you see me.) after a long day of beer consumption and football watching, i returned to my apartment--team victorious--to what i expected to be a satisfying glass of water before heading off to beer-assisted sleep. what i didn't count on was my turning on the tv and flipping around the 7-8 channels i get before stopping on an episode of sex and the city. of course i became engrossed and watched the entire episode. now let it be known that my eyelids because dry and very heavy and yet the allure of the show kept me from submitting to sleep. now let it also be known that this particular episode was one i had already viewed in its entirety. yes ineed. and also that another episode immediately followed on what i think was cw11, and that of course i stayed up and watched all of that one too, and that--yes it gets worse--the second episode that i forced myself to stay up for was also one i had seen before.
i don't have any analysis for you at this time. i'm not sure it can be intelligently considered. it's a classic case of "it is what it is."
i am what i am
Friday, November 23, 2007
i smoked three cigarettes last night. i don't know why either.
i unironically declared my love to a lesbian last night. she responded like any self-respecting lesbian would: by thereafter flirting and teasing me so much that it might be illegal in 17 states.
i got a little excited and took the turkey out of the oven about 15 min too early so some of it had to be returned to the heat. so it goes. my grilled (that's right motherfucker i grilled on thanksgiving) acorn squash was ridiculous though. so the lesson: i should stick to cooking on the grill whenever possible. the squash was an inspired effort though: the grill is without a cover and the squash, and therefore also the charcoal, was rained on fairly steadily for about 15 minutes. somehow i was able to keep it afloat.
i'm at work eating free pizza and all i want is some mashed potatoes. i've been responsible for the potatoes for three straight years now and it seems like they're getting better each year. maybe next year i'll succeed in fully cooking 95% of the bird, and then two years later the whole thing.
you know what i'm completely in the minority on: feeling that guitar hero is crap. if it were faithful to the art of playing a guitar, that would be one thing, but as it is you're just pressing buttons on a video game controller that happens to be shaped like a guitar and following along with grating monotonous songs that are about two times longer than they should be. and it's quite possibly the worst game ever for non-participants to watch. it's like being at a karaoke bar watching the little ball bounce along through the syllables only there are no drunk jackasses making fools of themselves (also known as the only reason anyone ever does karaoke).
i just realized the back collar of the sweater i'm wearing right now has a gash in it like a dog was using it as a chew toy. not sure where that came from.
i've got these two tiny little eyelashes at the extreme outside corner of my right eye that don't stick out away from the eyeball like they're supposed to, instead somehow sticking off to the right but the bottom one goes up and top one goes down so they keep interlocking and i've got an almost constant desire to pull them out only they're so small i can't grab them. it's infuriating in the same way that briefly losing the tv remote is.
i didn't speak to my parents yesterday and it was a holiday. i'm not sure if i should feel bad about this or not. i'm sure they ate turkey and all that. i guess i don't like things that feel obligatory. actually i hate things that feel obligatory. like in high school i used to be violently opposed to the concept of thank you cards. this was a semi-major issue in the weeks after my graduation party, of course. my stance: if you are someone who would be offended at the lack of receipt of a thank you card then really you don't deserve the sentiment contained therein. it's this simple: don't fucking give me anything if you don't want to fail to receive a thank you. i don't really care. i'm not greedy, i don't need things. there is too much use of the phrase "thank you." the two words at this point mean nothing. even if the true desire to give thanks to someone did manifest itself inside me, i don't think it's always necessary to vocalize it. isn't it ok to just appreciate something? do we always have to prove to everyone else how we feel about something, as opposed to simply having the depth of sensation that in itself makes it easily apparent to the casual observer. expressing gratitude has become far more important than experiencing gratitude. these social crutches like automatic "thank yous" and overrampant hugging and cheek-kissing and melodramatic hello/goodbyes and all the supposedly civil but ultimately meaningless things we do when conversing with people do nothing but put up walls around ourselves, our true selves, which are our only "selves" worth a damn.
ok enough of that.
i still would like to learn how to play the piano.
the pictures i take with the grainy pixelated camera on my cell phone are better than anything i take with a proper camera. i'm a shit photographer but a good seer. sometimes it's good to be talentless in some aspects of life. it's endearingly human. and i like it. for instance i could never be attracted to a model. when i was a kid i was the best hitter on the baseball team but couldn't field for shit. i get crushed at chess to inferior brains all the time. i beat superior running talents in college regularly. i can't find a musical beat to save my life but can effortlessly divine a cornucopia of complex themes and symbols in a piece of literature. i once made 116 free throws in a row but could probably let a similarly skilled player beat me off the dribble 99% of the time. i could tell you the winner of every super bowl and every world series since 1960, but would not remember your name upon meeting without having to be reminded two or three times. i can multiply moderately large numbers almost instantly yet received Ds on consecutive college calculus classes. while drunk, i can draw a map of the united states with all state boundaries on a styrofoam cup but i don't know how to operate an ipod. without the benefit of a watch, i can precisely and consistently run at any desired per-mile pace but i have no sense of speed control when behind the wheel of a car. i'm a terrible public speaker but an amazing one-on-one conversationalist.
i don't like that there are precious few pictures on this blog. here is one:
i unironically declared my love to a lesbian last night. she responded like any self-respecting lesbian would: by thereafter flirting and teasing me so much that it might be illegal in 17 states.
i got a little excited and took the turkey out of the oven about 15 min too early so some of it had to be returned to the heat. so it goes. my grilled (that's right motherfucker i grilled on thanksgiving) acorn squash was ridiculous though. so the lesson: i should stick to cooking on the grill whenever possible. the squash was an inspired effort though: the grill is without a cover and the squash, and therefore also the charcoal, was rained on fairly steadily for about 15 minutes. somehow i was able to keep it afloat.
i'm at work eating free pizza and all i want is some mashed potatoes. i've been responsible for the potatoes for three straight years now and it seems like they're getting better each year. maybe next year i'll succeed in fully cooking 95% of the bird, and then two years later the whole thing.
you know what i'm completely in the minority on: feeling that guitar hero is crap. if it were faithful to the art of playing a guitar, that would be one thing, but as it is you're just pressing buttons on a video game controller that happens to be shaped like a guitar and following along with grating monotonous songs that are about two times longer than they should be. and it's quite possibly the worst game ever for non-participants to watch. it's like being at a karaoke bar watching the little ball bounce along through the syllables only there are no drunk jackasses making fools of themselves (also known as the only reason anyone ever does karaoke).
i just realized the back collar of the sweater i'm wearing right now has a gash in it like a dog was using it as a chew toy. not sure where that came from.
i've got these two tiny little eyelashes at the extreme outside corner of my right eye that don't stick out away from the eyeball like they're supposed to, instead somehow sticking off to the right but the bottom one goes up and top one goes down so they keep interlocking and i've got an almost constant desire to pull them out only they're so small i can't grab them. it's infuriating in the same way that briefly losing the tv remote is.
i didn't speak to my parents yesterday and it was a holiday. i'm not sure if i should feel bad about this or not. i'm sure they ate turkey and all that. i guess i don't like things that feel obligatory. actually i hate things that feel obligatory. like in high school i used to be violently opposed to the concept of thank you cards. this was a semi-major issue in the weeks after my graduation party, of course. my stance: if you are someone who would be offended at the lack of receipt of a thank you card then really you don't deserve the sentiment contained therein. it's this simple: don't fucking give me anything if you don't want to fail to receive a thank you. i don't really care. i'm not greedy, i don't need things. there is too much use of the phrase "thank you." the two words at this point mean nothing. even if the true desire to give thanks to someone did manifest itself inside me, i don't think it's always necessary to vocalize it. isn't it ok to just appreciate something? do we always have to prove to everyone else how we feel about something, as opposed to simply having the depth of sensation that in itself makes it easily apparent to the casual observer. expressing gratitude has become far more important than experiencing gratitude. these social crutches like automatic "thank yous" and overrampant hugging and cheek-kissing and melodramatic hello/goodbyes and all the supposedly civil but ultimately meaningless things we do when conversing with people do nothing but put up walls around ourselves, our true selves, which are our only "selves" worth a damn.
ok enough of that.
i still would like to learn how to play the piano.
the pictures i take with the grainy pixelated camera on my cell phone are better than anything i take with a proper camera. i'm a shit photographer but a good seer. sometimes it's good to be talentless in some aspects of life. it's endearingly human. and i like it. for instance i could never be attracted to a model. when i was a kid i was the best hitter on the baseball team but couldn't field for shit. i get crushed at chess to inferior brains all the time. i beat superior running talents in college regularly. i can't find a musical beat to save my life but can effortlessly divine a cornucopia of complex themes and symbols in a piece of literature. i once made 116 free throws in a row but could probably let a similarly skilled player beat me off the dribble 99% of the time. i could tell you the winner of every super bowl and every world series since 1960, but would not remember your name upon meeting without having to be reminded two or three times. i can multiply moderately large numbers almost instantly yet received Ds on consecutive college calculus classes. while drunk, i can draw a map of the united states with all state boundaries on a styrofoam cup but i don't know how to operate an ipod. without the benefit of a watch, i can precisely and consistently run at any desired per-mile pace but i have no sense of speed control when behind the wheel of a car. i'm a terrible public speaker but an amazing one-on-one conversationalist.
i don't like that there are precious few pictures on this blog. here is one:
Tuesday, November 20, 2007
Film Review: Stranger Than Paradise
Stranger Than Paradise (1984), Jim Jarmusch.
Not going to say much here cause frankly I don't have much to say. It was quite good though, and I enjoyed it; certainly worth the scant 89 minutes of its runtime. I even laughed out loud a couple times (especially when the old aunt says "son of a bitch"), but I didn't like it as much nor do I think it's as good as the other Jarmusch film I've seen recently, Down By Law. For one thing, Tom Waits and Roberto Benigni are not in this one, though Richard Edson does a good job. If such a thing as a scene-stealer exists, it's Edson here. And he's quite a bit better than either John Lurie or the girl.
Still, I did enjoy this film and I can say that it is good. I can imagine that the French must have loved this movie, because it very strongly reminded me of an old French film, such as a Godard: black and white, spare scenes, few actors, mundane but beautifully realistic dialogue subjects. Actually, one thing that is very notable about this film is the almost perfect utility of every scene. They are extremely efficient in that nothing superfluous ever happens. No exposition, no fluff, no fading in and out of the emotion of the scene. It just gets to the point and cuts to the next one. This is very impressive for such a dialogue-heavy film. Very impressive, and very instructive from a writing perspective.
Not going to say much here cause frankly I don't have much to say. It was quite good though, and I enjoyed it; certainly worth the scant 89 minutes of its runtime. I even laughed out loud a couple times (especially when the old aunt says "son of a bitch"), but I didn't like it as much nor do I think it's as good as the other Jarmusch film I've seen recently, Down By Law. For one thing, Tom Waits and Roberto Benigni are not in this one, though Richard Edson does a good job. If such a thing as a scene-stealer exists, it's Edson here. And he's quite a bit better than either John Lurie or the girl.
Still, I did enjoy this film and I can say that it is good. I can imagine that the French must have loved this movie, because it very strongly reminded me of an old French film, such as a Godard: black and white, spare scenes, few actors, mundane but beautifully realistic dialogue subjects. Actually, one thing that is very notable about this film is the almost perfect utility of every scene. They are extremely efficient in that nothing superfluous ever happens. No exposition, no fluff, no fading in and out of the emotion of the scene. It just gets to the point and cuts to the next one. This is very impressive for such a dialogue-heavy film. Very impressive, and very instructive from a writing perspective.
debtless
so i'm positively erumpent with joy and therefore feel the need to share with you the news that i passed through a pretty important moment in any person's life today: i paid off the last of my student loan. that, coupled with the fact that i'm ridiculously scrupulous about carrying credit card debt, means that i have absolutely no debt right now. completely non-beholden. free. another way to look at it: if i were to die tomorrow, no one would care. i can now view with unfettered scorn that big stupid national debt calculator on sixth avenue. going forward, i will also have $200 more to spend each month, something i hadn't thought about until just now.
it's a good feeling. anomalous in these irresponsible times, especially for someone of my age. so i guess i'm "better" than most people. livin the high life.
it's a good feeling. anomalous in these irresponsible times, especially for someone of my age. so i guess i'm "better" than most people. livin the high life.
invariability
i'm going to relate something for you which probably isn't remotely surprising or shocking to anyone, but that doesn't mean it isn't noteworthy. it got me to thinking, at least.
you see, it pretains to stereotypes--what they are and what they mean to both us as a populace and them as the -typed. is it justification for the generalization when it manifests itself, often repeatedly? is it condemnation of the generalization when it does the same, because maybe that's just an inherent way of life, a wholly natural action that happens to be propagated by a marginalized group? is it in any way deductive to even define these "stereotypes," any more than it is to attempt to divine understanding simply from a person's diction or his hair color or his waist size? am i, as a member of a majority, often looking down my nose at the subjects, actually the one being manipulated--fooled into rejecting the presence of individuality by the recognition of a shared trait that is really in no way inherent but actually ascribed by me upon them? or are they unfortunate and unknowing actors in a play that's been scripted for them by someone else, relegated through time, circumstance, and repetition to merely doing what's expected of them? are they ignorant byproducts or are they beautiful naifs? am i an ugly definer or an enlightened discerner?
decide for yourself. what follows is as truthfully as i can relate something i witnessed on an F train this morning.
i was standing in the closed entrance well of the subway car when several people entered through the opposite door, including one black woman, perhaps 28-30, who stood in the other half of the entrance well to my left. also boarding the train was one large black man of similar age who ended up directly opposite the woman after the doors shut behind him. the woman was wearing a black overcoat and some kind of skirt/dress that left her whole black-stripe-stockinged lower leg exposed, and below that a rather garish pair of black, red, and excessively silver heels. it was this silver which briefly caught my eye. what caught the man's eye was neither silver nor brief. i'm not sure how long it took me to notice that this gentleman was doing some serious perving on the woman, but to say that he was "checking her out" is akin to saying that the bomb we dropped on hiroshima did "a little damage." the woman wasn't leaning against the doors like i was, instead standing about a foot in front of me, so i couldn't get her reaction to the man's leerish affrontery, but i can assure you that while i am in no way prudish, it was surely making me uncomfortable. of course, just as i had about reached my limits with his slow up and down rape-eyed stares, what did the man do but start to slowly lick his lips. i'm not sure how i kept myself from laughing. thankfully by this time we'd nearly reached bryant park and i didn't have to ponder if i'd have to intervene in a felonious assault by the time we got to queens. then, to my surprise both the woman and the man exited in front of me at my stop. here i became truly curious and lagged behind slightly to see what would transpire. of course, if you've been reading this whole thing, you can probably guess: the woman reached into her purse, scribbled what can only be assumed was her number on a card, and handed it to the man. sufficiently amused by this resolution, i passed them on the stairs went about my business, smirking and philosophizing.
you see, it pretains to stereotypes--what they are and what they mean to both us as a populace and them as the -typed. is it justification for the generalization when it manifests itself, often repeatedly? is it condemnation of the generalization when it does the same, because maybe that's just an inherent way of life, a wholly natural action that happens to be propagated by a marginalized group? is it in any way deductive to even define these "stereotypes," any more than it is to attempt to divine understanding simply from a person's diction or his hair color or his waist size? am i, as a member of a majority, often looking down my nose at the subjects, actually the one being manipulated--fooled into rejecting the presence of individuality by the recognition of a shared trait that is really in no way inherent but actually ascribed by me upon them? or are they unfortunate and unknowing actors in a play that's been scripted for them by someone else, relegated through time, circumstance, and repetition to merely doing what's expected of them? are they ignorant byproducts or are they beautiful naifs? am i an ugly definer or an enlightened discerner?
decide for yourself. what follows is as truthfully as i can relate something i witnessed on an F train this morning.
i was standing in the closed entrance well of the subway car when several people entered through the opposite door, including one black woman, perhaps 28-30, who stood in the other half of the entrance well to my left. also boarding the train was one large black man of similar age who ended up directly opposite the woman after the doors shut behind him. the woman was wearing a black overcoat and some kind of skirt/dress that left her whole black-stripe-stockinged lower leg exposed, and below that a rather garish pair of black, red, and excessively silver heels. it was this silver which briefly caught my eye. what caught the man's eye was neither silver nor brief. i'm not sure how long it took me to notice that this gentleman was doing some serious perving on the woman, but to say that he was "checking her out" is akin to saying that the bomb we dropped on hiroshima did "a little damage." the woman wasn't leaning against the doors like i was, instead standing about a foot in front of me, so i couldn't get her reaction to the man's leerish affrontery, but i can assure you that while i am in no way prudish, it was surely making me uncomfortable. of course, just as i had about reached my limits with his slow up and down rape-eyed stares, what did the man do but start to slowly lick his lips. i'm not sure how i kept myself from laughing. thankfully by this time we'd nearly reached bryant park and i didn't have to ponder if i'd have to intervene in a felonious assault by the time we got to queens. then, to my surprise both the woman and the man exited in front of me at my stop. here i became truly curious and lagged behind slightly to see what would transpire. of course, if you've been reading this whole thing, you can probably guess: the woman reached into her purse, scribbled what can only be assumed was her number on a card, and handed it to the man. sufficiently amused by this resolution, i passed them on the stairs went about my business, smirking and philosophizing.
Wednesday, November 14, 2007
Film Review: No Country for Old Men
No Country for Old Men, 2007, Coen Brothers. Fine film. Reminiscent of Fargo in the good ways: not a funny film but many instances of humor, superb dialogue, engaging and eccentric villian, and of course a wise but humble cop tying it all together. Also, I'm told by a gentleman with the good fortune not to be seated in the front row that the photography was excellent, particularly in the first 30 minutes. From my poor vantage point, I can't confirm this but I strongly suspect it's correct.
Now let me tell you why I can give a complete, aggressive, and untempered recommedation of this film. There are two reasons actually, and I'll give you the short one first: Javier Bardem. I have no idea what constitutes an Oscar-type performance and I don't know if he will be in the conversation but that doesn't really matter because he was extremely good in this film. His character, and the way he played it--all the way down to his enunciation (which I found intoxicating)--are enough on their own to recommend this film.
Second, and this is more personal, but the guiding theme and philosophies jibe very well with how I view the world. Shit's going to happen whether you want it to or not. It's even going to happen whether you choose to do anything about it or not. You could call it "destiny" but that doesn't seem quite right; "inevitability" is better. I'm not going to give much anecdotal evidence here because I wouldn't want to spoil anything cause it's fairly new to theaters still, but suffice it to say it's there.
Also, in an odd way, I think that the theme of the title is in good harmony with my snuffing-it-at-60 plan. No Country for Old Men. What's the point of playing out the string? What do you like? You like to be alive, not just alive. Tommy Lee Jones verbalizes this well at the conclusion of the film, and while some people no doubt leave the theater with a feeling of unfullfilment because of the lack of a clear resolution, for me it was just the opposite: enrichment and satisfaction.
At least for me, this film both requires (not from the front row) and demands, not just a first, but a second viewing.
Now let me tell you why I can give a complete, aggressive, and untempered recommedation of this film. There are two reasons actually, and I'll give you the short one first: Javier Bardem. I have no idea what constitutes an Oscar-type performance and I don't know if he will be in the conversation but that doesn't really matter because he was extremely good in this film. His character, and the way he played it--all the way down to his enunciation (which I found intoxicating)--are enough on their own to recommend this film.
Second, and this is more personal, but the guiding theme and philosophies jibe very well with how I view the world. Shit's going to happen whether you want it to or not. It's even going to happen whether you choose to do anything about it or not. You could call it "destiny" but that doesn't seem quite right; "inevitability" is better. I'm not going to give much anecdotal evidence here because I wouldn't want to spoil anything cause it's fairly new to theaters still, but suffice it to say it's there.
Also, in an odd way, I think that the theme of the title is in good harmony with my snuffing-it-at-60 plan. No Country for Old Men. What's the point of playing out the string? What do you like? You like to be alive, not just alive. Tommy Lee Jones verbalizes this well at the conclusion of the film, and while some people no doubt leave the theater with a feeling of unfullfilment because of the lack of a clear resolution, for me it was just the opposite: enrichment and satisfaction.
At least for me, this film both requires (not from the front row) and demands, not just a first, but a second viewing.
Monday, November 12, 2007
i've got a noland bull's-eye on my phone. i'd have rothko too but the light wasn't right cause it's just a cell phone after all, and his orange turned out kinda brown. damn shame messing up orange.
i've almost weaned myself off of the wetting eye drops. 6 weeks since the surgery. that's good healin.
mother i don't think you've ever read this before thank goodness but if you are now, please hide your eyes. i was as high as i've ever been last night. maybe it was the 4.5 hours of tap budweiser that preceded it but lordy those two bowls i shared set me dizzy. dave and i were literally crying laughing walking in the cold talking about hamster wheels. don't even ask me about the show at the knitting factory. i got the paranoid jumpy jitters for a while and had trouble focusing on anyone who dared talk to me. i made an epiphanic and amorous exclamation to someone late friday night and the recipient was at the show and was adorably concerned about me. made me smile (an actual smile not just a cannabic smile). if that doesn't say all you need to know about my lot in life, i don't know what does.
i realize that van gogh is pretty famous and starry night is too but that painting had easily the largest crowd around it of anything in moma last friday. seemed odd. i was able to walk right up 6 inches from both the aforementioned rothko and noland and stand there for 3 or 4 solid minutes without bothering anyone behind me waiting for a view. warhol's soup cans were similarly dismissed. a huge pollock and a huger monet were probably the 2nd and 3rd most popular pieces in the museum. i will say that the monet--something like "clouds reflecting on a pond"--produced the finest effect of anything on me: after a couple minutes of staring from a normal distance away from the probably 30-foot wide painting, the clouds really started to seem as though they were drifting and floating across the painting. it was surreal, and positively sublime. a similar, if much more frenetic, effect was produced by a mondrian called "broadway boogie woogie."
the previously number-one-ranked football team of my alma mater was defeated tragically close to the end of the season on saturday. i'm supposed to be pretty upset by this, but i'm not. my favorite pro team very nearly lost to a rival on sunday as well but that wasn't really causing me any distress either. i think i'm getting too old to stress out about sports. i enjoy them, but throughout their duration i am fully aware that the outcome really doesn't matter much to me.
if someone were watching a videotape of my weekend he or she would be hard-pressed not to say "sheesh this guy drinks too much." it seems like i share the same feeling at the front end of many weeks. not this one though. 27 is a good age to be in new york city. 28 will be a good age too, but probably slightly less so. 29, 30, 31.........you understand the pattern. it doesn't really get better, presumably. the time of your life. is it ok to know it's the time of your life while it's happening, and not merely much after the fact. can you forsake the warmth of nostalgia by superheating the glory of the act itself? i am molten. now.
the whole point of my stated and reinforced claim to willingly leave this earth after just 60 years is that you don't need all those later years if you live yourself out before you get there. out loud out front outside out of bounds out out out out. my 81st year is living vicariously through my 27th right now, sensing and savoring and experiencing and remebering my 27th year all at once. i want to get to 60 and just be too exhausted to have any desire to continue. i want for the world to be too exhausted to let me continue. do not begrudge me.
i've almost weaned myself off of the wetting eye drops. 6 weeks since the surgery. that's good healin.
mother i don't think you've ever read this before thank goodness but if you are now, please hide your eyes. i was as high as i've ever been last night. maybe it was the 4.5 hours of tap budweiser that preceded it but lordy those two bowls i shared set me dizzy. dave and i were literally crying laughing walking in the cold talking about hamster wheels. don't even ask me about the show at the knitting factory. i got the paranoid jumpy jitters for a while and had trouble focusing on anyone who dared talk to me. i made an epiphanic and amorous exclamation to someone late friday night and the recipient was at the show and was adorably concerned about me. made me smile (an actual smile not just a cannabic smile). if that doesn't say all you need to know about my lot in life, i don't know what does.
i realize that van gogh is pretty famous and starry night is too but that painting had easily the largest crowd around it of anything in moma last friday. seemed odd. i was able to walk right up 6 inches from both the aforementioned rothko and noland and stand there for 3 or 4 solid minutes without bothering anyone behind me waiting for a view. warhol's soup cans were similarly dismissed. a huge pollock and a huger monet were probably the 2nd and 3rd most popular pieces in the museum. i will say that the monet--something like "clouds reflecting on a pond"--produced the finest effect of anything on me: after a couple minutes of staring from a normal distance away from the probably 30-foot wide painting, the clouds really started to seem as though they were drifting and floating across the painting. it was surreal, and positively sublime. a similar, if much more frenetic, effect was produced by a mondrian called "broadway boogie woogie."
the previously number-one-ranked football team of my alma mater was defeated tragically close to the end of the season on saturday. i'm supposed to be pretty upset by this, but i'm not. my favorite pro team very nearly lost to a rival on sunday as well but that wasn't really causing me any distress either. i think i'm getting too old to stress out about sports. i enjoy them, but throughout their duration i am fully aware that the outcome really doesn't matter much to me.
if someone were watching a videotape of my weekend he or she would be hard-pressed not to say "sheesh this guy drinks too much." it seems like i share the same feeling at the front end of many weeks. not this one though. 27 is a good age to be in new york city. 28 will be a good age too, but probably slightly less so. 29, 30, 31.........you understand the pattern. it doesn't really get better, presumably. the time of your life. is it ok to know it's the time of your life while it's happening, and not merely much after the fact. can you forsake the warmth of nostalgia by superheating the glory of the act itself? i am molten. now.
the whole point of my stated and reinforced claim to willingly leave this earth after just 60 years is that you don't need all those later years if you live yourself out before you get there. out loud out front outside out of bounds out out out out. my 81st year is living vicariously through my 27th right now, sensing and savoring and experiencing and remebering my 27th year all at once. i want to get to 60 and just be too exhausted to have any desire to continue. i want for the world to be too exhausted to let me continue. do not begrudge me.
old soul
(the topic of this post certainly does justice to the title of the blog.)
for any students in the class of folg, i've got a little homework assignment for you. ruminate on this: for the second time now in the last couple years of my life i've been told, without any flippancy, that i'm an "old soul." this from two wholly disparate personalities too: one was a 22yr old hippyish girl who was working as our receptionist and the other a 35ish (sorry kim don't know your age) female friend who had been married for i think 10+ years. this subject is topically revelant of course because i just celebrated a birthday this past weekend.
when the naifish receptionist dropped the moniker on me a ways back i didn't take it as terribly complimentary, nor for that matter do i think she meant it so. i can't recall the exact context of her exclamation but she was a subordinate of mine and i want to say it had to do with some kind of delegation of responsibilities. as it were, ms kim called me the exact same thing on saturday only (i assume) she was being complimentary. she asked how old i am now and was impressed by my relative youth.
so what exactly does it mean to be an old soul, and what does that say about either myself or the way i present myself to the world? there are very contrary ways of approaching these answers but i'm inclined to think it means a person is a mature or otherwise composed individual who gives off a kind of reserved or aloof or judicial veneer. on the other hand, an old soul could just be a curmudgeon, a beat-down man who's so depraved he's lost even the impression of innocence.
for any students in the class of folg, i've got a little homework assignment for you. ruminate on this: for the second time now in the last couple years of my life i've been told, without any flippancy, that i'm an "old soul." this from two wholly disparate personalities too: one was a 22yr old hippyish girl who was working as our receptionist and the other a 35ish (sorry kim don't know your age) female friend who had been married for i think 10+ years. this subject is topically revelant of course because i just celebrated a birthday this past weekend.
when the naifish receptionist dropped the moniker on me a ways back i didn't take it as terribly complimentary, nor for that matter do i think she meant it so. i can't recall the exact context of her exclamation but she was a subordinate of mine and i want to say it had to do with some kind of delegation of responsibilities. as it were, ms kim called me the exact same thing on saturday only (i assume) she was being complimentary. she asked how old i am now and was impressed by my relative youth.
so what exactly does it mean to be an old soul, and what does that say about either myself or the way i present myself to the world? there are very contrary ways of approaching these answers but i'm inclined to think it means a person is a mature or otherwise composed individual who gives off a kind of reserved or aloof or judicial veneer. on the other hand, an old soul could just be a curmudgeon, a beat-down man who's so depraved he's lost even the impression of innocence.
Thursday, November 1, 2007
let me tell you why i don't like parents. not my parents, of course, but people who have kids.
they are obscenely self-centered while assuming the air of a benevolent altruist, which invariably causes them to affect extreme defensive and superior attitudes when confronted with anything but pathetic admiration. this is hardly an attractive characteristic.
let's take me as an explanatory case. i'm single, 26, live alone, and would be considered irresponsible in just about every facet of life. the straight community would consider my demographic to be easily the most egocentric group out there. (by "straight community" here i mean all those people who are married with kids in the suburbs and go to church and watch oprah and the today show: that vast nebulous mass of people who think they're living the american dream.) the reason the straight community feels this way is that they consider my lifestyle to be unfulfilled, and that my void is filled by egocentric diversions or thoughts. i suppose i can't speak for all of my social class, but i think it's just the opposite: i think my lack of life fulfillment (in their eyes) frees me to be more open-minded and especially more sensitive toward others.
someone who has a kid has a one-track mind. the only thing that matters to that person is the health and happiness of their child. and, while anyone who's ever truly been in love with someone--or, let's be honest, simply in love with being in love with someone--will tell you that this is indeed a noble pursuit, it has absolutely nothing to do with the greater good.
it is not hard to love or to care immensely for someone. i believe it's what we're hard-wired to do; it comes natural to us and, logically then, we have an endless supply of it to give. so when a parent focuses all his energy on his child, he isn't sacrificing love for all in order to give more love to one, he's just neglecting and ignoring all but the one. he's taking an extreme stance of self-centrism and projecting it upon his child instead of himself. this doesn't make it any better or any less what it is.
so parents: don't ever act like you're better than me or my ilk simply because you exhalt another human being who also happens to share your dna. it's hypocritical and it's unbecoming. i love and respect everyone, except, at times, you.
they are obscenely self-centered while assuming the air of a benevolent altruist, which invariably causes them to affect extreme defensive and superior attitudes when confronted with anything but pathetic admiration. this is hardly an attractive characteristic.
let's take me as an explanatory case. i'm single, 26, live alone, and would be considered irresponsible in just about every facet of life. the straight community would consider my demographic to be easily the most egocentric group out there. (by "straight community" here i mean all those people who are married with kids in the suburbs and go to church and watch oprah and the today show: that vast nebulous mass of people who think they're living the american dream.) the reason the straight community feels this way is that they consider my lifestyle to be unfulfilled, and that my void is filled by egocentric diversions or thoughts. i suppose i can't speak for all of my social class, but i think it's just the opposite: i think my lack of life fulfillment (in their eyes) frees me to be more open-minded and especially more sensitive toward others.
someone who has a kid has a one-track mind. the only thing that matters to that person is the health and happiness of their child. and, while anyone who's ever truly been in love with someone--or, let's be honest, simply in love with being in love with someone--will tell you that this is indeed a noble pursuit, it has absolutely nothing to do with the greater good.
it is not hard to love or to care immensely for someone. i believe it's what we're hard-wired to do; it comes natural to us and, logically then, we have an endless supply of it to give. so when a parent focuses all his energy on his child, he isn't sacrificing love for all in order to give more love to one, he's just neglecting and ignoring all but the one. he's taking an extreme stance of self-centrism and projecting it upon his child instead of himself. this doesn't make it any better or any less what it is.
so parents: don't ever act like you're better than me or my ilk simply because you exhalt another human being who also happens to share your dna. it's hypocritical and it's unbecoming. i love and respect everyone, except, at times, you.
Thursday, October 25, 2007
hello there. i've got a couple things to mention today but first something quickly that i was made aware of thanks to the little tv/infoscreen in the elevator: transformers set a record for first day dvd sales this week and has already sold more than 8 million copies. this is proof that america is stupid. it's proof that we don't all deserve the right to select the leader of our country. (i'll circle back to this topic later.) now, i'm not merely passing this judgement upon america based on the quality of the transformers movie--i never saw it so it might be worth watching, though i highly doubt it--i'm passing judgement on the sheep-like nature of too many americans. transformers' dvd release has been incessantly hyped in the last few weeks. i don't pay too close attention to these things, but it's been promoted as heavily as any dvd i can remember. and this promotion, naturally, has resulted in the highest sales ever. one seems to reasonably follow the other right? maybe if you're in advertising. to me, it is sickening. because something is promoted does not mean it has value. because something is talked about does not mean it is worthy.
i'm not going to blame the people for all of this. of course it should be your duty to always operate with free will, and to exhibit reasonable doubt toward things. but at a certain point, you've got to look higher and put the blame on those who are making the desicions that lead to the lowest-common-denominator mode of american entertainment. everything is presented--even the supposedly staid news--to us in a way that ensures only the greatest absorption of the message, and unfortunately that message is almost always consumerist.
i like to see advertising campaigns fail. it means that the audience has digested the message, considered, and rejected it. if advertising succeeds, you only know that it has not been rejected, you don't know if it's actually been thoughtfully considered or digested. call me cynical, but i think far too often people simply accept what is given to them, and that is a shame.
ok then. game one of the world series was last night, and being the dutiful american-bred being that i am, i sat down to take it all in. after a couple innings it was painfully obvious that we're heading to yet another lackluster, anticlimactic world series. i think i'd just assume that they play it out in a vacuum somewhere and then just tell me who won after the fact, as it doesn't seem as though i'm going to have any joy in the process this year. we haven't had a remotely interesting series since 2003 actually and i can't even remember the last time i had a strong personal rooting interest. maybe the indians in the 90s. so what this is leading me to is the admission that i was channel surfing, reading a magazine, and doing a crossword as early as 9:30 last night, and that this freedom from being anchored to a sporting event allowed me to catch a particularly interesting edition of charlie rose.
in fact, if you'll excuse the obvious analogy, this is two nights in a row that the charlie rose show absolutely hit it out of the park. tuesday night he had a very well-prepared, knowledgable, and clear guest (sorry can't remember his name) speaking about the dynamics of the supreme court. he'd written a book about the "secrets" of the court or something and done some more personal profiles of the justices than you are used to seeing. i don't know why but i find the supreme court fascinating and i agree with the guest in that it is terribly important in today's world. an all-around excellent interview.
last night's show was even better, if for entirely different reasons. it featured guest tavis smiley and cornel west in a dual interview, followed by a short one-on-one with jim lehrer. the lehrer interview was short and ok but not extremely distinguishable (though i did learn that he has written 17 novels. how about that?). it was the smiley/west interview that was fascinating.
if you don't know, smiley hosts a fairly nondescript talk show that airs on channel 13 right after charlie rose, and west is a fairly well-known black intellectual. evidently they are close friends. on last night's show, smiley was in the best form i'd ever seen him: very intelligently presenting thoughtful, agenda-less ideas. i was very impressed with him. west, on the other hand, was much rougher. let's say he was lucid but erratic. rose seemed like he has having a hard time controlling him, as though he were struggling through a difficult interview with an unwieldy child. he more than once seemed to almost desperately gesture at smiley to cut in and bring the interview back under control. west would have none of it, though not because he was being insolent; instead, he seemed completely unaware of the capriciousness of his comments. so it was ridiculously entertaining to watch. and, when he actually got into making a point, west was positively excellent. as with smiley, but very differently, i was quite impressed with west. completely unaffected, completely unpretentious, and that is truly refreshing. plus, he's fun to look at: the huge gap tooth, the puffy nappy hair, the greyish beard, the black suit that seemed too big and the very long-armed, french-cuffed white sleeves sticking several inches out of the jacket sleeve. when he kept saying "my brother," it never seemed anything but natural to him. let's just say that i would be very happy to spend some time in his classroom at princeton.
smiley actually produced a quote of west's during the interview which he said has influenced the way he lives his life: "you can't lead if you don't love and you can't save if you don't serve." i'm with smiley on that one: it's a very nice epigram.
perhaps the most interesting moment of the interview came from smiley, in responding to rose's questions about the presidential campaign. i think he used the word "despicable" in describing how candidates twist and turn in the desperate attempt to get elected, that no one has any convictions. he used mitt romney as an example, how he could never have been massachusetts governor under the platform he currently endorses. and he's right. not just about romney, but everyone. all of them are like that and it's probably the number one thing that turns me off about politics in this country. a man cannot be a man (nor a woman be a woman, to keep things current).
a candidate is simply a manufactured being. manufactured to be what their promoters think "the people" want. but these people are the same ones who have been beaten down into sheep by a similar system of promotion to gobble up just what they are given. so now the ones who would presumably be in a position of power and leadership are beholden not just to "the people" but to "the people's" manufactured desire. do you see the futility of this process? it's like the whole world is nothing but a constructed bit of fanciful nothing, only existing as much as it is desired or as much as it is told to be desired. despicable is indeed the word to use.
i'm not going to blame the people for all of this. of course it should be your duty to always operate with free will, and to exhibit reasonable doubt toward things. but at a certain point, you've got to look higher and put the blame on those who are making the desicions that lead to the lowest-common-denominator mode of american entertainment. everything is presented--even the supposedly staid news--to us in a way that ensures only the greatest absorption of the message, and unfortunately that message is almost always consumerist.
i like to see advertising campaigns fail. it means that the audience has digested the message, considered, and rejected it. if advertising succeeds, you only know that it has not been rejected, you don't know if it's actually been thoughtfully considered or digested. call me cynical, but i think far too often people simply accept what is given to them, and that is a shame.
ok then. game one of the world series was last night, and being the dutiful american-bred being that i am, i sat down to take it all in. after a couple innings it was painfully obvious that we're heading to yet another lackluster, anticlimactic world series. i think i'd just assume that they play it out in a vacuum somewhere and then just tell me who won after the fact, as it doesn't seem as though i'm going to have any joy in the process this year. we haven't had a remotely interesting series since 2003 actually and i can't even remember the last time i had a strong personal rooting interest. maybe the indians in the 90s. so what this is leading me to is the admission that i was channel surfing, reading a magazine, and doing a crossword as early as 9:30 last night, and that this freedom from being anchored to a sporting event allowed me to catch a particularly interesting edition of charlie rose.
in fact, if you'll excuse the obvious analogy, this is two nights in a row that the charlie rose show absolutely hit it out of the park. tuesday night he had a very well-prepared, knowledgable, and clear guest (sorry can't remember his name) speaking about the dynamics of the supreme court. he'd written a book about the "secrets" of the court or something and done some more personal profiles of the justices than you are used to seeing. i don't know why but i find the supreme court fascinating and i agree with the guest in that it is terribly important in today's world. an all-around excellent interview.
last night's show was even better, if for entirely different reasons. it featured guest tavis smiley and cornel west in a dual interview, followed by a short one-on-one with jim lehrer. the lehrer interview was short and ok but not extremely distinguishable (though i did learn that he has written 17 novels. how about that?). it was the smiley/west interview that was fascinating.
if you don't know, smiley hosts a fairly nondescript talk show that airs on channel 13 right after charlie rose, and west is a fairly well-known black intellectual. evidently they are close friends. on last night's show, smiley was in the best form i'd ever seen him: very intelligently presenting thoughtful, agenda-less ideas. i was very impressed with him. west, on the other hand, was much rougher. let's say he was lucid but erratic. rose seemed like he has having a hard time controlling him, as though he were struggling through a difficult interview with an unwieldy child. he more than once seemed to almost desperately gesture at smiley to cut in and bring the interview back under control. west would have none of it, though not because he was being insolent; instead, he seemed completely unaware of the capriciousness of his comments. so it was ridiculously entertaining to watch. and, when he actually got into making a point, west was positively excellent. as with smiley, but very differently, i was quite impressed with west. completely unaffected, completely unpretentious, and that is truly refreshing. plus, he's fun to look at: the huge gap tooth, the puffy nappy hair, the greyish beard, the black suit that seemed too big and the very long-armed, french-cuffed white sleeves sticking several inches out of the jacket sleeve. when he kept saying "my brother," it never seemed anything but natural to him. let's just say that i would be very happy to spend some time in his classroom at princeton.
smiley actually produced a quote of west's during the interview which he said has influenced the way he lives his life: "you can't lead if you don't love and you can't save if you don't serve." i'm with smiley on that one: it's a very nice epigram.
perhaps the most interesting moment of the interview came from smiley, in responding to rose's questions about the presidential campaign. i think he used the word "despicable" in describing how candidates twist and turn in the desperate attempt to get elected, that no one has any convictions. he used mitt romney as an example, how he could never have been massachusetts governor under the platform he currently endorses. and he's right. not just about romney, but everyone. all of them are like that and it's probably the number one thing that turns me off about politics in this country. a man cannot be a man (nor a woman be a woman, to keep things current).
a candidate is simply a manufactured being. manufactured to be what their promoters think "the people" want. but these people are the same ones who have been beaten down into sheep by a similar system of promotion to gobble up just what they are given. so now the ones who would presumably be in a position of power and leadership are beholden not just to "the people" but to "the people's" manufactured desire. do you see the futility of this process? it's like the whole world is nothing but a constructed bit of fanciful nothing, only existing as much as it is desired or as much as it is told to be desired. despicable is indeed the word to use.
Wednesday, October 17, 2007
Let's Face It, Holidays Are Stupid
yeah you read that right. obviously i can enjoy a day off as much as anyone, but you've got to admit that taking a day off to celebrate christopher columbus' discovery of the new world over 500 years ago is just ridiculous. to make this even more absurd, venezuela celebrates the same occasion as the "day of indigenous resistance."
what's got this on my mind is someone here at work was asking for my assitance with his halloween costume. for a long time, i always considered halloween to the be dumbest and most contrived of the largely-observed holidays in this country. then i moved to new york, a place where no holiday is too small to celebrate (witness the puerto rican day parade or the rainbow of colors commemorating who knows what at the top of the empire state building). naturally, my participation in the halloween holiday became much more broad and looked-forward-to, but that's probably just because i'm an alcoholic.
anyway, right now--this year, i guess--i'm back to thinking halloween is stupid. but just how stupid? well, let's see where it ranks of 12 holidays i arbitrarily selected for their american popular impact (rankings however are all mine: biases definitely included):
1. thanksgiving. let's be honest, this one is just my favorite. it's not as big as christmas, it's not as relevant as independence day, and it's not even as nicely timed as memorial day, but let us count the ways it's great: turkey, football, that nice lull before "the holidays," binge eating, and friends but not necessarily family. this last factor is important. it's like what christmas would be without frills or obligations. compare to: me--what less awesome people would be without frills or obligations.
2. christmas. i hate it for all the same reasons you do, but it's christmas for christ's sake.
3. memorial day. this one barely beats #4. it's main strengths are just too strong: it is celebrated at basically the perfect time of year (labor day is similar sure, but by that time you're fed up with 80degree weather), and perhaps most importantly, it falls at the end of a pretty long holiday gap: the nearest day before it that a large amount of business close for is in mid-february. also, it pretty tactfully celebrates soldiers, and even a cynic like me can respect that every once in a while.
4. new year's day. this one is interesting. for one, it's more well-known for it's eve. for another, it would be much much more revered if it were situated a month later in the calendar. as it stands, it comprises the last gasps of "the holidays," and it's hangover lingers like a naive one night stand. it's the one night in the entire year when unbridled partying is not only expected but encouraged, for everyone. and you get to watch boatloads of college football games the next day.
5. halloween. here is where my nycitude gets me. not so much that it elevated this holiday, but that it sucks the life out of others. in a lot of ways, this day ranks #2 on the party-like-mad scale, and that's good. it's also just plain stupid. costumes? are you kidding me? pumpkins? ghosts? still, the main reason it sits so high on this list is that it gives people a good excuse to have fun and maybe let loose more than they normally would, which is only good.
6. independence day. call me unpatriotic, call me a commie, call me whatever you like. the fourth of july just aint what it used to be. consider: you get off work july 4, yet you also celebrate the evening of july 4. the key day off here is july 5. of course this will change as i get older and less alcoholic, but for now i'm just not seeing the logic. add to this the fact that it's uncomfortably hot by this time of year and you can't really set off fireworks in the city, and you don't have much left. (*big asterisk here--my ohio memories are keeping this one pretty high on the list. columbus in its infinite wisdom celebrates independence day on the evening of the 3rd. and fireworks are legal in west virginia.)
7. labor day. this and memorial day are like bookends for most people. i think it's like the difference between the first and last days of school when you're a kid. also, this holiday is centered around being outside and grilling, something infinitely harder in the concrete jungle. it is in a convenient spot on the calendar though, and frankly we're running out of servicable holidays at #7 already. told you they were stupid.
8. st patrick's day. a little piece of me just died. this holiday is completely repulsive in some ways, far moreso here in the c of ny. i can't even explain the filth of it; you've got to see for yourself. however (and that's a big "however"), the current incarnation of this holiday is 99% about drinking, specifically about drinking guinness. maybe if i had a little irish in me, or if i were a cop, or a douchebag, i'd rank this one higher. alas you never get off work for it.
9. columbus day/president's day/veteran's day. at this point in my life these are all the same: utterly nondescript unless we're getting a day off for work. i'd feel bad for veteran's day until you remember that it is actually "armistice" day and celebrates a peace but a peace that in a roundabout way kind caused the biggest war ever. it's almost irony and almost hypocrisy to celebrate that.
10. mother's/father's day. i love my mom and dad. you probably love your mom and dad. but can we all just stop the fuss and recognize these were invented just to sell cards? there's dirty, filthy capitalism, and then there's that.
11. martin luther king day. this is standing for all those holidays that are terribly important to some people but meaningless to others (there is probably a michael collins day in ireland, a castro day in cuba, a dean martin day in steubenville (oh, wait)). these aren't really holidays and shouldn't be considered such but rank higher than many legitimate ones because they do in fact mean something to some people.
12. valentine's day. i could give you a couple thousand words on why this is awful but i'll spare you that and instead direct you to #10 and additionally posit that if you need a holiday to make you do nice things for someone, or if you use a holiday to misplace agnst towards someone, then there is something dreadfully wrong. it's love. it's not hard. you feel it and you go with it. it doesn't require a calendar.
13. any religious holiday. you could say i'm not being fair here (or worse), that these should be lumped in with #11. you'd be right, except that most of the people who celebrate those in #11 aren't aloof or condescending about it. again, there is more to say, i'm just not going to say it. what i will say is that this includes easter, which once upon a time was probably one of the top 5 most-anticipated days of the year for me.
now i don't know about you, but i think hamsgiving would have to rank somewhere between #3 and #7. and it's only one year old. and we invented it, like festivus. congratulations us.
what's got this on my mind is someone here at work was asking for my assitance with his halloween costume. for a long time, i always considered halloween to the be dumbest and most contrived of the largely-observed holidays in this country. then i moved to new york, a place where no holiday is too small to celebrate (witness the puerto rican day parade or the rainbow of colors commemorating who knows what at the top of the empire state building). naturally, my participation in the halloween holiday became much more broad and looked-forward-to, but that's probably just because i'm an alcoholic.
anyway, right now--this year, i guess--i'm back to thinking halloween is stupid. but just how stupid? well, let's see where it ranks of 12 holidays i arbitrarily selected for their american popular impact (rankings however are all mine: biases definitely included):
1. thanksgiving. let's be honest, this one is just my favorite. it's not as big as christmas, it's not as relevant as independence day, and it's not even as nicely timed as memorial day, but let us count the ways it's great: turkey, football, that nice lull before "the holidays," binge eating, and friends but not necessarily family. this last factor is important. it's like what christmas would be without frills or obligations. compare to: me--what less awesome people would be without frills or obligations.
2. christmas. i hate it for all the same reasons you do, but it's christmas for christ's sake.
3. memorial day. this one barely beats #4. it's main strengths are just too strong: it is celebrated at basically the perfect time of year (labor day is similar sure, but by that time you're fed up with 80degree weather), and perhaps most importantly, it falls at the end of a pretty long holiday gap: the nearest day before it that a large amount of business close for is in mid-february. also, it pretty tactfully celebrates soldiers, and even a cynic like me can respect that every once in a while.
4. new year's day. this one is interesting. for one, it's more well-known for it's eve. for another, it would be much much more revered if it were situated a month later in the calendar. as it stands, it comprises the last gasps of "the holidays," and it's hangover lingers like a naive one night stand. it's the one night in the entire year when unbridled partying is not only expected but encouraged, for everyone. and you get to watch boatloads of college football games the next day.
5. halloween. here is where my nycitude gets me. not so much that it elevated this holiday, but that it sucks the life out of others. in a lot of ways, this day ranks #2 on the party-like-mad scale, and that's good. it's also just plain stupid. costumes? are you kidding me? pumpkins? ghosts? still, the main reason it sits so high on this list is that it gives people a good excuse to have fun and maybe let loose more than they normally would, which is only good.
6. independence day. call me unpatriotic, call me a commie, call me whatever you like. the fourth of july just aint what it used to be. consider: you get off work july 4, yet you also celebrate the evening of july 4. the key day off here is july 5. of course this will change as i get older and less alcoholic, but for now i'm just not seeing the logic. add to this the fact that it's uncomfortably hot by this time of year and you can't really set off fireworks in the city, and you don't have much left. (*big asterisk here--my ohio memories are keeping this one pretty high on the list. columbus in its infinite wisdom celebrates independence day on the evening of the 3rd. and fireworks are legal in west virginia.)
7. labor day. this and memorial day are like bookends for most people. i think it's like the difference between the first and last days of school when you're a kid. also, this holiday is centered around being outside and grilling, something infinitely harder in the concrete jungle. it is in a convenient spot on the calendar though, and frankly we're running out of servicable holidays at #7 already. told you they were stupid.
8. st patrick's day. a little piece of me just died. this holiday is completely repulsive in some ways, far moreso here in the c of ny. i can't even explain the filth of it; you've got to see for yourself. however (and that's a big "however"), the current incarnation of this holiday is 99% about drinking, specifically about drinking guinness. maybe if i had a little irish in me, or if i were a cop, or a douchebag, i'd rank this one higher. alas you never get off work for it.
9. columbus day/president's day/veteran's day. at this point in my life these are all the same: utterly nondescript unless we're getting a day off for work. i'd feel bad for veteran's day until you remember that it is actually "armistice" day and celebrates a peace but a peace that in a roundabout way kind caused the biggest war ever. it's almost irony and almost hypocrisy to celebrate that.
10. mother's/father's day. i love my mom and dad. you probably love your mom and dad. but can we all just stop the fuss and recognize these were invented just to sell cards? there's dirty, filthy capitalism, and then there's that.
11. martin luther king day. this is standing for all those holidays that are terribly important to some people but meaningless to others (there is probably a michael collins day in ireland, a castro day in cuba, a dean martin day in steubenville (oh, wait)). these aren't really holidays and shouldn't be considered such but rank higher than many legitimate ones because they do in fact mean something to some people.
12. valentine's day. i could give you a couple thousand words on why this is awful but i'll spare you that and instead direct you to #10 and additionally posit that if you need a holiday to make you do nice things for someone, or if you use a holiday to misplace agnst towards someone, then there is something dreadfully wrong. it's love. it's not hard. you feel it and you go with it. it doesn't require a calendar.
13. any religious holiday. you could say i'm not being fair here (or worse), that these should be lumped in with #11. you'd be right, except that most of the people who celebrate those in #11 aren't aloof or condescending about it. again, there is more to say, i'm just not going to say it. what i will say is that this includes easter, which once upon a time was probably one of the top 5 most-anticipated days of the year for me.
now i don't know about you, but i think hamsgiving would have to rank somewhere between #3 and #7. and it's only one year old. and we invented it, like festivus. congratulations us.
Tuesday, October 16, 2007
a (drinking) game
just about two and half months from now, the final die will have been cast. after an exhausting, eight-plus year run of underachievement, drunkenness, sloth, and general aimless drifting, i finally will have fully metamorphosed into the black sheep of the family.
on december 29, 2008 my younger sister is getting married. she is two and half years younger and blessed with appreciably fewer IQ points than me. she already has a house with a yard and a dog and a career plan. i have a sun-less, mice-infested 175 square feet and little office cubicle and a job that can best be described in the word "subordinate." and now she's getting married, in ohio, a place where that sort of thing is terribly important. meanwhile, in decadent new york, a place where nothing is ever romantically or non-materially significant, i'm glad that a certain someone whom i foolishly slept with will be out of town for a couple months thereby dissolving me of any need to interact with this person.
it wasn't always this way, of course. eight years ago i was in high school and was more or less effotlessly good at everything: academic, athletic, interpersonal. i didn't smoke, didn't drink, my flesh was pure, and i even went to church basically every sunday. i spent a lot of time being patted on the back. and my sister--my wonderful sister--without all of my obvious advantages, just sat there and watched all of this, and actually worked with her studies, and actually had to put some effort into her athletic pursuits, and sometimes went to parties where kids drank, and asked my parents for birth control and otherwise lived life like a relatively normal person of that age.
so now of course, like any normal person of her age, in her midwestern environment, she's getting married. and no, mom, though i'm mortified by your state's amendment against same-sex marriage, i am not, in fact, gay. i'm just a little fish in a big pond, trying to amuse myself, trying to stay moving so i don't die, and that's pretty much it.
but no, that's not it. this was meant to be a very upbeat, if ironic, post. because i've got my own set of pros and cons, my own ideas about success and happiness. i like to take it easy. i like to laugh about things. i like to make fun of people when they aren't aware of it. i like to have a few drinks. i like to not take things so seriously. and that's why, over two months in advance, i'm setting up a little drinking game for myself for this wedding reception. rules follow.
1. take one drink of beer anytime someone asks how i like new york.
2. take two drinks of beer anytime someone asks how long before i move back to ohio.
3. take three drinks of beer anytime someone remarks how they couldn't take living in a big city like that.
4. finish whatever's left of beer anytime someone asks if i'm worried about the eye-rack-ees.
5. take two shots of soco anytime someone asks how i manage to get along with all the minorities.
6. smile and do nothing anytime someone asks "what's it feels like for your little sister to get married before you."
7. smile and rip a nasty lingering fart anytime someone says "come on, there's got to be someone out there for you."
8. voraciously chug beer anytime someone says "whatever happened with that girl--what was her name--jocelyn, something?"
9. take one drink of beer anytime someone asks about the ohio state football team.
10. punch him in the face anytime my cousin from michigan says anything about them ruining our perfect season this year.
11. force smile, take shot of jameson, then look for another conversation anytime someone asks if i'm still running.
12. throw up in mouth anytime my mother says anything related to going back to school.
13. chug one glass of champagne, smash the glass against the floor, and say "quite clearly," anytime someone asks if i'm still writing.
14. raise entire punch bowl over head and pour over same anytime someone says "yeah, she was real nice. what was her name? blonde girl, cute, you met her at ohio state. what was her name? i thought you were going to move back to ohio?"
15. finish drink anytime someone asks if i'll enjoy being an uncle.
16. finish drink and ask bartender if they have mountain dew on hand anytime someone asks when i'm going to write the next great american novel.
17. take shot of wild turkey and then feign choking anytime i am sucked into any conversation involving the words: hillary, obama, abortion, god, bin laden, values, iraq, or taxes.
18. grab nearest champagne bottle and chug anytime someone asks where my date is.
19. smash champagne bottle and slit throat if the person follows up with "well, who was that one girl you were with, kinda quiet, whatever happened to her?"
20. say "you know, i think i might try homosexuality actually," when my mother absolutely insists i get my butt into the crowd of d-bags waiting to catch the garter belt.
21. take one tequila shot anytime a much younger girl catches me perving on her.
22. finish drink anytime someone randomly congratulates me.
23. take three drinks anytime someone calls me by my father's name.
24. lie down homer simpson-style under open beer tap and say "it's hard to say" anytime someone asks how many drinks i've had.
25. shit my pants anytime someone asks where my wife is.
on december 29, 2008 my younger sister is getting married. she is two and half years younger and blessed with appreciably fewer IQ points than me. she already has a house with a yard and a dog and a career plan. i have a sun-less, mice-infested 175 square feet and little office cubicle and a job that can best be described in the word "subordinate." and now she's getting married, in ohio, a place where that sort of thing is terribly important. meanwhile, in decadent new york, a place where nothing is ever romantically or non-materially significant, i'm glad that a certain someone whom i foolishly slept with will be out of town for a couple months thereby dissolving me of any need to interact with this person.
it wasn't always this way, of course. eight years ago i was in high school and was more or less effotlessly good at everything: academic, athletic, interpersonal. i didn't smoke, didn't drink, my flesh was pure, and i even went to church basically every sunday. i spent a lot of time being patted on the back. and my sister--my wonderful sister--without all of my obvious advantages, just sat there and watched all of this, and actually worked with her studies, and actually had to put some effort into her athletic pursuits, and sometimes went to parties where kids drank, and asked my parents for birth control and otherwise lived life like a relatively normal person of that age.
so now of course, like any normal person of her age, in her midwestern environment, she's getting married. and no, mom, though i'm mortified by your state's amendment against same-sex marriage, i am not, in fact, gay. i'm just a little fish in a big pond, trying to amuse myself, trying to stay moving so i don't die, and that's pretty much it.
but no, that's not it. this was meant to be a very upbeat, if ironic, post. because i've got my own set of pros and cons, my own ideas about success and happiness. i like to take it easy. i like to laugh about things. i like to make fun of people when they aren't aware of it. i like to have a few drinks. i like to not take things so seriously. and that's why, over two months in advance, i'm setting up a little drinking game for myself for this wedding reception. rules follow.
1. take one drink of beer anytime someone asks how i like new york.
2. take two drinks of beer anytime someone asks how long before i move back to ohio.
3. take three drinks of beer anytime someone remarks how they couldn't take living in a big city like that.
4. finish whatever's left of beer anytime someone asks if i'm worried about the eye-rack-ees.
5. take two shots of soco anytime someone asks how i manage to get along with all the minorities.
6. smile and do nothing anytime someone asks "what's it feels like for your little sister to get married before you."
7. smile and rip a nasty lingering fart anytime someone says "come on, there's got to be someone out there for you."
8. voraciously chug beer anytime someone says "whatever happened with that girl--what was her name--jocelyn, something?"
9. take one drink of beer anytime someone asks about the ohio state football team.
10. punch him in the face anytime my cousin from michigan says anything about them ruining our perfect season this year.
11. force smile, take shot of jameson, then look for another conversation anytime someone asks if i'm still running.
12. throw up in mouth anytime my mother says anything related to going back to school.
13. chug one glass of champagne, smash the glass against the floor, and say "quite clearly," anytime someone asks if i'm still writing.
14. raise entire punch bowl over head and pour over same anytime someone says "yeah, she was real nice. what was her name? blonde girl, cute, you met her at ohio state. what was her name? i thought you were going to move back to ohio?"
15. finish drink anytime someone asks if i'll enjoy being an uncle.
16. finish drink and ask bartender if they have mountain dew on hand anytime someone asks when i'm going to write the next great american novel.
17. take shot of wild turkey and then feign choking anytime i am sucked into any conversation involving the words: hillary, obama, abortion, god, bin laden, values, iraq, or taxes.
18. grab nearest champagne bottle and chug anytime someone asks where my date is.
19. smash champagne bottle and slit throat if the person follows up with "well, who was that one girl you were with, kinda quiet, whatever happened to her?"
20. say "you know, i think i might try homosexuality actually," when my mother absolutely insists i get my butt into the crowd of d-bags waiting to catch the garter belt.
21. take one tequila shot anytime a much younger girl catches me perving on her.
22. finish drink anytime someone randomly congratulates me.
23. take three drinks anytime someone calls me by my father's name.
24. lie down homer simpson-style under open beer tap and say "it's hard to say" anytime someone asks how many drinks i've had.
25. shit my pants anytime someone asks where my wife is.
Friday, October 12, 2007
Book Review: The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test
The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test (1968), Tom Wolfe.
This is my first book review in this space and it's an odd one because I have mixed feelings about it. The first thing you need to know is that it is a very famous "nonfiction novel." In fact, this might even be the father of the nonfiction novel. If you're truly interested I'd suggest you look it up yourself, I'm sure there is a nice story there somewhere. What I know is that Mr Wolfe was in cahoots around this time with a writer I am much more familiar with, Hunter S Thompson, in creating what was known as New Journalism, wherein the journalist was not the venerable impartial, fly-on-the-wall observer, but actually just the opposite. Thompson called it Gonzo Journalism and unabashedly not only inserted himself in the story but usually made himself the centerpiece. It's in this spirit that Wolfe wrote TEK-AAT.
Of course, it's far too simple to merely say that this book is a longer example of New Journalism. No, this is indeed a book, an artistic work of Wolfe's not just memory but also imagination. He is chronicling the story but he's also telling it in his own words through his own filter. What I'm trying to say is that there is no pretense towards journalism here, as there would be in a Thompson piece in Rolling Stone. This is important. The freedom from word counts and deadlines and the need to be clear and concise and coherent opened Wolfe up to expand his prose into to the unique voice he found for TEK-AAT, a voice that truly elevated the story into something timeless and artistic and valuable, something you perhaps can not say about the subjects he was describing.
For those uninitiated, this book is about the acid culture around San Francisco in the mid 1960s, in particular Ken Kesey and a group of his followers/admirers called the Merry Pranksters. Kesey was evidently a kind of messianic living legend at the time, and his Pranksters famous in their own right. He/they had the ambition to reach a higher form of mutual/group consciousness, which they facilitated through copious consumption of acid and intense openness and sharing of ideas and experiences. To be blunt, these people were the absolute stereotype of the drugged-up hippie, flower children to the extreme, covered in big ridiculous colored clothing and touring around the country in a converted school bus painted psychadelically in Day-Glo and totally amped for sound.
At one moment, I was sucked into the allure of this pursuit of a higher consciousness, but in the next, I was completely turned off by the its hypocrisy and ignorance. This represents a large part of why I have mixed feelings about TEK-AAT. Because it's a "nonfiction" novel, after all, you can't really fully extract the message from the "message." Being a proudly spontaneous actor, I am very much intrigued by the idea of the "Now trip," where everyone comes out front and almost unconsciously experiences the whole world around them in that exact moment. It's similar to how I feel about writing poetry: that it just comes and you sense it and feel it and don't think or edit just let it float and write itself. I believe in the power of the muse. However, I also appreciate that the muse cannot always be a-musing or else what's the point, what's yin without yang? And there was a somewhat telling moment toward the middle of the book (how do you like that for thorough and precise scholarly criticism?) when one of the Pranksters is admonishing someone else for being too intellectual, that they themselves are stridently anti-intellectual. Not that I consider myself any kind of highbrow intellectual, but isn't it almost cowardice that have this stance? Intelligent and mature thinking is what separates us from the animals, you know. Cognition alone isn't enough. I just don't find it terribly easy to admire something that strives towards ignorance, even if it's a willful or mutual ignorance. (Even more of a digression now, but this is probably a large reason why their movement more or less died, and why a book like TEK-AAT is more historical than philosophical today. In another part of the book a man is chastised for reading, because reading isn't contributing to the group experience. Nice thought, but what happens when the group gets a little bigger and too many voices are speaking at once. Their approach to life can work in doses amongst a group of friends but not really anywhere else.)
As with any book strongly associated with an idea, it's hard to dissociate your reactions to that idea from your reactions to the book itself. This caused me to put the book down for a week at a time more than once. I likely wouldn't have finished it at all were it not for the generally good quality of the writing, as well as the undeniable fact that it's quite an original book especially given it's context.
It's to Wolfe's credit that through much of the book he doesn't tip you towards sympathy or revulsion to the lifestyle he's describing. Mostly, he's simply leading you through Kesey's world, showing you what it's like both through his mode of description and the descriptions themselves. But I do think there is a chapter late in the book called "The Red Tide" where the POV shifts to the Mexicans, who are looked down upon by basically everyone (Wolfe included) as worthless, dirty ignoramouses. Through this lens the veil of bullshit seems to be lifted above Kesey et al to reveal the relatively pathetic and pitiful truths of their existence. There are other smaller bits where it seems we get a glimpse of the phony romanticism of the Prankster life, but this chapter cements it. After The Red Tide, the dream and the romance are over. Kudos to Wolfe for holding out so long. He made a good read for us.
(Sorry if this is disjointed/unintelligent/incoherent. I'm at work and have been distracted. Shame on you, work.)
This is my first book review in this space and it's an odd one because I have mixed feelings about it. The first thing you need to know is that it is a very famous "nonfiction novel." In fact, this might even be the father of the nonfiction novel. If you're truly interested I'd suggest you look it up yourself, I'm sure there is a nice story there somewhere. What I know is that Mr Wolfe was in cahoots around this time with a writer I am much more familiar with, Hunter S Thompson, in creating what was known as New Journalism, wherein the journalist was not the venerable impartial, fly-on-the-wall observer, but actually just the opposite. Thompson called it Gonzo Journalism and unabashedly not only inserted himself in the story but usually made himself the centerpiece. It's in this spirit that Wolfe wrote TEK-AAT.
Of course, it's far too simple to merely say that this book is a longer example of New Journalism. No, this is indeed a book, an artistic work of Wolfe's not just memory but also imagination. He is chronicling the story but he's also telling it in his own words through his own filter. What I'm trying to say is that there is no pretense towards journalism here, as there would be in a Thompson piece in Rolling Stone. This is important. The freedom from word counts and deadlines and the need to be clear and concise and coherent opened Wolfe up to expand his prose into to the unique voice he found for TEK-AAT, a voice that truly elevated the story into something timeless and artistic and valuable, something you perhaps can not say about the subjects he was describing.
For those uninitiated, this book is about the acid culture around San Francisco in the mid 1960s, in particular Ken Kesey and a group of his followers/admirers called the Merry Pranksters. Kesey was evidently a kind of messianic living legend at the time, and his Pranksters famous in their own right. He/they had the ambition to reach a higher form of mutual/group consciousness, which they facilitated through copious consumption of acid and intense openness and sharing of ideas and experiences. To be blunt, these people were the absolute stereotype of the drugged-up hippie, flower children to the extreme, covered in big ridiculous colored clothing and touring around the country in a converted school bus painted psychadelically in Day-Glo and totally amped for sound.
At one moment, I was sucked into the allure of this pursuit of a higher consciousness, but in the next, I was completely turned off by the its hypocrisy and ignorance. This represents a large part of why I have mixed feelings about TEK-AAT. Because it's a "nonfiction" novel, after all, you can't really fully extract the message from the "message." Being a proudly spontaneous actor, I am very much intrigued by the idea of the "Now trip," where everyone comes out front and almost unconsciously experiences the whole world around them in that exact moment. It's similar to how I feel about writing poetry: that it just comes and you sense it and feel it and don't think or edit just let it float and write itself. I believe in the power of the muse. However, I also appreciate that the muse cannot always be a-musing or else what's the point, what's yin without yang? And there was a somewhat telling moment toward the middle of the book (how do you like that for thorough and precise scholarly criticism?) when one of the Pranksters is admonishing someone else for being too intellectual, that they themselves are stridently anti-intellectual. Not that I consider myself any kind of highbrow intellectual, but isn't it almost cowardice that have this stance? Intelligent and mature thinking is what separates us from the animals, you know. Cognition alone isn't enough. I just don't find it terribly easy to admire something that strives towards ignorance, even if it's a willful or mutual ignorance. (Even more of a digression now, but this is probably a large reason why their movement more or less died, and why a book like TEK-AAT is more historical than philosophical today. In another part of the book a man is chastised for reading, because reading isn't contributing to the group experience. Nice thought, but what happens when the group gets a little bigger and too many voices are speaking at once. Their approach to life can work in doses amongst a group of friends but not really anywhere else.)
As with any book strongly associated with an idea, it's hard to dissociate your reactions to that idea from your reactions to the book itself. This caused me to put the book down for a week at a time more than once. I likely wouldn't have finished it at all were it not for the generally good quality of the writing, as well as the undeniable fact that it's quite an original book especially given it's context.
It's to Wolfe's credit that through much of the book he doesn't tip you towards sympathy or revulsion to the lifestyle he's describing. Mostly, he's simply leading you through Kesey's world, showing you what it's like both through his mode of description and the descriptions themselves. But I do think there is a chapter late in the book called "The Red Tide" where the POV shifts to the Mexicans, who are looked down upon by basically everyone (Wolfe included) as worthless, dirty ignoramouses. Through this lens the veil of bullshit seems to be lifted above Kesey et al to reveal the relatively pathetic and pitiful truths of their existence. There are other smaller bits where it seems we get a glimpse of the phony romanticism of the Prankster life, but this chapter cements it. After The Red Tide, the dream and the romance are over. Kudos to Wolfe for holding out so long. He made a good read for us.
(Sorry if this is disjointed/unintelligent/incoherent. I'm at work and have been distracted. Shame on you, work.)
Tuesday, October 9, 2007
Odds and Ends from the Vault
i feel like i should apologize for the lack of pictures or links in this blog, but that would disingenuous because there won't be any of either in this post.
last night i was moving some things around on my bookshelf and came across three old notebooks. so of course i cracked a couple open and had a look. i should first say that it's been over a year since i've touched these, the most recent entry of any kind was from our west coast trip last august. but the most recent notebook was positively full of great nuggets of all sorts. and i thought i'd post some of them here, not all right now necessarily but as it's convenient. (i really start a lot of sentences with conjunctions.) most of what's in the notebooks is journal-y, but i'll try to only post stuff here that is interesting independent of my contextual feelings or doings. where possible, i'll try to relate when it was written since i date stuff almost by habit.
oddly now, the first one wasn't dated but must have been written sometime between may and november of 2005:
The idea, most usually, is to let the art in you become real, and not to create new art. It's a postpostmodern world. Every artist has at some point done everything, frequently as well as it can be expected to be done. However, no one has ever been you and no one knows you as well as yourself. Let the art bake into you like cancer into skin and revel in the melanomic masterpiece.
This is from the same unknown mid-2005 time period and i think could be labeled a poem (it was written as a paragraph but let's see how it looks now in line form.):
Sit and sniff.
Murky cool drear air,
Sprinkles and whiffs,
Heat created never related.
Heavy breath and slight drip ooze of regret,
Tender and passive and yet--there.
Head rocks like a shifting fishbowl,
Coated and dry, alternating sublime
Until drug-filled breaths mimic sand-filled steps.
Time stops slowly making trivial tics into tortuous tocs.
A need to release like a cannonball arises,
Panicky searching standing scratching for the fire,
Too much sleepy head make body dead,
Slouch and pout wring what's left from your hands.
Grit and grin and bear it,
Wear it on your sleeve,
Pet peeves give reality
Some sense penance and patience as I stay tense.
This is marked Nov 28 2005:
Do I need to synthesize my reality with any "real" reality? If not, is there anything "real" that exists? Perhaps the end evolution of existential philosophical thinking is thta all existence is mere idea. All that we will ever see is imagination. All we experience we create. We each are God. And why not? We all live our own lives completely within our ideas and imaginations, and all human actions interconnect in a quantum relationship. I can punch a person in the face in my reality but instantaneously that same person can punch me in his reality. We both have personal experiences, but in the dimension of myself, what I see and feel is a function of my idea and my brain.
Time, as an invention of man, is the single most effective means of control of these infinite dimensions of hyperrealism. It allows everyone to synchronize and grasp their own innate senses of connectivity and "shared" experiences. It is the subjugation of the personal existence to the will of the drumbeat.
Last one for today, this is from an undated time between 11/30/05 and 1/8/06, and it's the most contemporarily interesting one so far:
I hide my emtions mostly and then I burst in an oddly unprovoked supernova, confusing the unfortunate soul who picked the wrong time or place to nudge me.
I like to think about myself and how great I am, how intelligent and witty, how intriguing, how generally infallible, how charming and magnetic to strangers and acquaintances alike. Am I the actor or the rememberer? Am I the writer? Am I the misfit mute? I don't like using "I" so much.
Albuquerque. Amanda Natalie Pike. Reality is out there somewhere but I haven't found it yet. I don't want to find it, but I want to look.
last night i was moving some things around on my bookshelf and came across three old notebooks. so of course i cracked a couple open and had a look. i should first say that it's been over a year since i've touched these, the most recent entry of any kind was from our west coast trip last august. but the most recent notebook was positively full of great nuggets of all sorts. and i thought i'd post some of them here, not all right now necessarily but as it's convenient. (i really start a lot of sentences with conjunctions.) most of what's in the notebooks is journal-y, but i'll try to only post stuff here that is interesting independent of my contextual feelings or doings. where possible, i'll try to relate when it was written since i date stuff almost by habit.
oddly now, the first one wasn't dated but must have been written sometime between may and november of 2005:
The idea, most usually, is to let the art in you become real, and not to create new art. It's a postpostmodern world. Every artist has at some point done everything, frequently as well as it can be expected to be done. However, no one has ever been you and no one knows you as well as yourself. Let the art bake into you like cancer into skin and revel in the melanomic masterpiece.
This is from the same unknown mid-2005 time period and i think could be labeled a poem (it was written as a paragraph but let's see how it looks now in line form.):
Sit and sniff.
Murky cool drear air,
Sprinkles and whiffs,
Heat created never related.
Heavy breath and slight drip ooze of regret,
Tender and passive and yet--there.
Head rocks like a shifting fishbowl,
Coated and dry, alternating sublime
Until drug-filled breaths mimic sand-filled steps.
Time stops slowly making trivial tics into tortuous tocs.
A need to release like a cannonball arises,
Panicky searching standing scratching for the fire,
Too much sleepy head make body dead,
Slouch and pout wring what's left from your hands.
Grit and grin and bear it,
Wear it on your sleeve,
Pet peeves give reality
Some sense penance and patience as I stay tense.
This is marked Nov 28 2005:
Do I need to synthesize my reality with any "real" reality? If not, is there anything "real" that exists? Perhaps the end evolution of existential philosophical thinking is thta all existence is mere idea. All that we will ever see is imagination. All we experience we create. We each are God. And why not? We all live our own lives completely within our ideas and imaginations, and all human actions interconnect in a quantum relationship. I can punch a person in the face in my reality but instantaneously that same person can punch me in his reality. We both have personal experiences, but in the dimension of myself, what I see and feel is a function of my idea and my brain.
Time, as an invention of man, is the single most effective means of control of these infinite dimensions of hyperrealism. It allows everyone to synchronize and grasp their own innate senses of connectivity and "shared" experiences. It is the subjugation of the personal existence to the will of the drumbeat.
Last one for today, this is from an undated time between 11/30/05 and 1/8/06, and it's the most contemporarily interesting one so far:
I hide my emtions mostly and then I burst in an oddly unprovoked supernova, confusing the unfortunate soul who picked the wrong time or place to nudge me.
I like to think about myself and how great I am, how intelligent and witty, how intriguing, how generally infallible, how charming and magnetic to strangers and acquaintances alike. Am I the actor or the rememberer? Am I the writer? Am I the misfit mute? I don't like using "I" so much.
Albuquerque. Amanda Natalie Pike. Reality is out there somewhere but I haven't found it yet. I don't want to find it, but I want to look.
Friday, October 5, 2007
Film Review - Inland Empire
Inland Empire, 2006, David Lynch. This is not a movie, it's a piece of modern art. It's also not technically a film, as Mr Lynch shot it using digital video. It's rather like an experiemental or very artistic short film, except it goes on for nearly three hours. It's not epic, but it's ambitiously and majestically grandiose.
Briefly, so as to get it out of the way, here are just some of the things this film is "about," and which I will not mention again in this post: quantum physics, the intangibility of time, the unreliability of memory and the paradoxical concept of consequence, inevitability, free-will/self-control, metavoyuerism, metafilm, metaPOV, meta-everything, and the overlapping of the obvious, the abstract, the surreal, and the imagined or assumed "facts" within the existence of both actors, characters, humans (both dead and alive), ghosts, and--of course--the audience.
You could probably spend an infinite amount of time trying to parse through the plot lines and various themes and levels of reality in this film, but, as with most of Lynch's oeuvre, I don't think that's really the point. It should be absorbed as a whole and not broken mercilessly into bits; it's about the totality of the emotive and mental experience and not the banality of it's details.
Of course, if you've seen this film, you could probably say, well, Josh, that's just a cop-out because you don't understand the details because they're too complex. To that, I would say--exactly. There is a lot going on here and surely quite a bit of it is important in the micro sense, but I really have to believe that a greater portion is just expansive expository canvas onto which we are meant to paint our own pictures. I read in an interview that Lynch didn't have a complete script while filming, that instead he would write out a scene and then film it, never quite intending to produce a 175-minute opus, but that along the way, he would think of something else, and then write and film that, and then sense some vague connection to what he'd already filmed and so write and film some more, and so on. In the hands of a lesser man, this would likely be no more than an onanistic mess. Though I suppose this point is open for debate, as no doubt many people who are not fans of Mr Lynch would say exactly that about this film.
I disagree. This is the most grandly artistic film I've seen released in quite some time. My own filmic experiences are far from comprehensive, of course, but people just don't make films like this. This should be shown at MoMA or the Guggenheim, not Loews or AMC.
Briefly, so as to get it out of the way, here are just some of the things this film is "about," and which I will not mention again in this post: quantum physics, the intangibility of time, the unreliability of memory and the paradoxical concept of consequence, inevitability, free-will/self-control, metavoyuerism, metafilm, metaPOV, meta-everything, and the overlapping of the obvious, the abstract, the surreal, and the imagined or assumed "facts" within the existence of both actors, characters, humans (both dead and alive), ghosts, and--of course--the audience.
You could probably spend an infinite amount of time trying to parse through the plot lines and various themes and levels of reality in this film, but, as with most of Lynch's oeuvre, I don't think that's really the point. It should be absorbed as a whole and not broken mercilessly into bits; it's about the totality of the emotive and mental experience and not the banality of it's details.
Of course, if you've seen this film, you could probably say, well, Josh, that's just a cop-out because you don't understand the details because they're too complex. To that, I would say--exactly. There is a lot going on here and surely quite a bit of it is important in the micro sense, but I really have to believe that a greater portion is just expansive expository canvas onto which we are meant to paint our own pictures. I read in an interview that Lynch didn't have a complete script while filming, that instead he would write out a scene and then film it, never quite intending to produce a 175-minute opus, but that along the way, he would think of something else, and then write and film that, and then sense some vague connection to what he'd already filmed and so write and film some more, and so on. In the hands of a lesser man, this would likely be no more than an onanistic mess. Though I suppose this point is open for debate, as no doubt many people who are not fans of Mr Lynch would say exactly that about this film.
I disagree. This is the most grandly artistic film I've seen released in quite some time. My own filmic experiences are far from comprehensive, of course, but people just don't make films like this. This should be shown at MoMA or the Guggenheim, not Loews or AMC.
Tuesday, October 2, 2007
somewhat superficial post about eyes
something rather large has occurred in my life just recently that has very literally changed the way i view the world, so i really ought to address it here. there is a picture of myself on the right side of this page (no not the beach-jumping one). it's my profile image and i used to feel like it described me perfectly: wife-beater, pirates hat, guinness, "what the fuck you want" gesture, and the almost-silly moustache and glasses-dominated face. well, lately i haven't really like that picture much, and have in fact a couple times tried to change it but unfortunately i'm an idiot and my attempts failed. so it's still there. but one of the essentials of that photograph is now very misleading: i no longer wear glasses. (yes i do drink guinness, yes i am still bound to the eptless pirates, but now that the weather has changed i've begun to forsake the beater for my ties, and finally i'd like to think i'm more pleasant lately. weird.)
so yeah, i don't wear glasses anymore. i don't wear contacts either though for the last three days it's constantly felt like my eyes have been covered by very dried-out or slept-in contacts. see, i had LASIK last friday. (yeah, i know i just punned.) and since it's only been a few days now and i've not reached that thoughtless level of comfort, i'm not quite sure how to react to it all.
(sorry but i just realized this is a boring post. blame that on all the people i've seen since the surgery and delivered breathless descriptions of the procedure and the simple exhilaration of seeing upon waking up in the morning. i'm just about tapped out of that vibe now, though maybe in the next couple days i'll try to share in the most descriptive verbiage i can muster the details of the procedure--at least verbally it seemed to raise hairs of listeners.) (i promise i'll give a more metaphysical written reaction to this whole experience soon. just not in the proper mood for that now.)
one thing i can say definitively: i can't wait until i can rub my eyes again. you can't appreciate how much you take for granted the ability to rub your eyes, and how comforting that sensation can be. it's extremely involuntary. and with the semi-constant dryness i'm dealing with, it's unbelievably tempting. so that's one freakishly tormenting aspect.
aha. shit. there is one semi-interesting tidbit related to this whole experience: the sunglasses. first, it should be explained that i have a rather large pet peeve (actually it's more than a pet peeve) relating to people wearing sunglasses inappropriately, such as on subways, at night, or when carrying on a conversation with someone when it's not necessary to wear them. i find this to the be one of the most self-centered, asshole, annoying habits. wearing sunglasses does not make you cool. wearing sunglasses while talking to another person does not give you a psychological edge. wearing sunglasses at night does not make you more interesting or mysterious. it makes you a stupid fuck. and sorry if this makes me even a sliver prudish, but i think it's terribly rude.
so of course i've been forced to wear sunglasses outside, at any and all times of the day, since the surgery last friday, in order to protect from gusts of wind of any flying dirt or debris in the air. for the last 4 days, i have been the giant douchebag. one of my friends said i looked like jack nicholson while inside watching a football game saturday night (this is maybe the only time that comparison is ever negative). another day i walked right by a former coworker on the sidewalk unnoticed because of the celebrity-ish large sunglasses-and-pulled-down-tight-hat combo. on the subway saturday i could sense the discomfort of those seated across from me, especially the females. and i felt shame. not-my-fault shame, but still.
also, on this same theme: today i ventured for some lunch and actually forgot to put on my trusty free plastic big-ass sunglasses. so my one block trek for food, on this windy early fall day, turned into a superbly paranoic experience. suddenly i felt a kinship with hunter s thompson and his drug-addled waltz through the cocktail lounge in Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas, the one where he thought the people were lizards and there is the awesome Ralph Steadman illustration. well, every person i walked by i flinched at, and every time someone turned around i expected them to claw my eyes out and don't even ask me what was going through my mind as i strolled, head-down, through the smoky foul mist drifting downwind of the kebab cart.
so yeah, i don't wear glasses anymore. i don't wear contacts either though for the last three days it's constantly felt like my eyes have been covered by very dried-out or slept-in contacts. see, i had LASIK last friday. (yeah, i know i just punned.) and since it's only been a few days now and i've not reached that thoughtless level of comfort, i'm not quite sure how to react to it all.
(sorry but i just realized this is a boring post. blame that on all the people i've seen since the surgery and delivered breathless descriptions of the procedure and the simple exhilaration of seeing upon waking up in the morning. i'm just about tapped out of that vibe now, though maybe in the next couple days i'll try to share in the most descriptive verbiage i can muster the details of the procedure--at least verbally it seemed to raise hairs of listeners.) (i promise i'll give a more metaphysical written reaction to this whole experience soon. just not in the proper mood for that now.)
one thing i can say definitively: i can't wait until i can rub my eyes again. you can't appreciate how much you take for granted the ability to rub your eyes, and how comforting that sensation can be. it's extremely involuntary. and with the semi-constant dryness i'm dealing with, it's unbelievably tempting. so that's one freakishly tormenting aspect.
aha. shit. there is one semi-interesting tidbit related to this whole experience: the sunglasses. first, it should be explained that i have a rather large pet peeve (actually it's more than a pet peeve) relating to people wearing sunglasses inappropriately, such as on subways, at night, or when carrying on a conversation with someone when it's not necessary to wear them. i find this to the be one of the most self-centered, asshole, annoying habits. wearing sunglasses does not make you cool. wearing sunglasses while talking to another person does not give you a psychological edge. wearing sunglasses at night does not make you more interesting or mysterious. it makes you a stupid fuck. and sorry if this makes me even a sliver prudish, but i think it's terribly rude.
so of course i've been forced to wear sunglasses outside, at any and all times of the day, since the surgery last friday, in order to protect from gusts of wind of any flying dirt or debris in the air. for the last 4 days, i have been the giant douchebag. one of my friends said i looked like jack nicholson while inside watching a football game saturday night (this is maybe the only time that comparison is ever negative). another day i walked right by a former coworker on the sidewalk unnoticed because of the celebrity-ish large sunglasses-and-pulled-down-tight-hat combo. on the subway saturday i could sense the discomfort of those seated across from me, especially the females. and i felt shame. not-my-fault shame, but still.
also, on this same theme: today i ventured for some lunch and actually forgot to put on my trusty free plastic big-ass sunglasses. so my one block trek for food, on this windy early fall day, turned into a superbly paranoic experience. suddenly i felt a kinship with hunter s thompson and his drug-addled waltz through the cocktail lounge in Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas, the one where he thought the people were lizards and there is the awesome Ralph Steadman illustration. well, every person i walked by i flinched at, and every time someone turned around i expected them to claw my eyes out and don't even ask me what was going through my mind as i strolled, head-down, through the smoky foul mist drifting downwind of the kebab cart.
Monday, October 1, 2007
A Poem Draft
I don't normally do this but I'm going to post a poem in the roughest form possible. I woke from a 3hr nap last night, sat up in bed, picked up pen and notebook, and let these words come out. I promise I'll return to it and revise or whatever is necessary and I think maybe it will be interesting to see how it changes.
Every so often a cool breeze rushes in through the sliver of my bedside window.
Not quite sure where it comes from or why it arrives here,
But it's nice.
The air shaft is not just a shaft: it's full of air, and sometimes life.
On these odd moments, it finds and kisses me.
It's not easy to write--scratch that--it's not easy to write maturely.
4, 5, 6. Six lines sit back relax and smile. It's pretty, it's an emotion--most importantly it's truth.
But it is only what it is and nothing more.
Therefore hardly public merely onanistic,
My few pretty lines.
If my words are inchoate then so too am I.
One score and seven years (no shoot actually still only six),
And it seems always only an open door to an empty room.
--To ruminate and marinate in those soft simple draughts of air beyond the door,
Filling nothing with nothing. Lear-ish recognition.
Ah but is that something?--Snobbery, likely.
Self-satisfied. Hot air.
It's getting warm now next to the window where has my breeze gone--
Out.......Drifting into another's window.
The music is personal and private--often neglected and misunderstood.
It tickled me, briefly.
But that is enough, for I am no glutton.
Pathetic, perhaps, but that's my lot.
Again, it's hard to compose for mature consumption.
Every so often a cool breeze rushes in through the sliver of my bedside window.
Not quite sure where it comes from or why it arrives here,
But it's nice.
The air shaft is not just a shaft: it's full of air, and sometimes life.
On these odd moments, it finds and kisses me.
It's not easy to write--scratch that--it's not easy to write maturely.
4, 5, 6. Six lines sit back relax and smile. It's pretty, it's an emotion--most importantly it's truth.
But it is only what it is and nothing more.
Therefore hardly public merely onanistic,
My few pretty lines.
If my words are inchoate then so too am I.
One score and seven years (no shoot actually still only six),
And it seems always only an open door to an empty room.
--To ruminate and marinate in those soft simple draughts of air beyond the door,
Filling nothing with nothing. Lear-ish recognition.
Ah but is that something?--Snobbery, likely.
Self-satisfied. Hot air.
It's getting warm now next to the window where has my breeze gone--
Out.......Drifting into another's window.
The music is personal and private--often neglected and misunderstood.
It tickled me, briefly.
But that is enough, for I am no glutton.
Pathetic, perhaps, but that's my lot.
Again, it's hard to compose for mature consumption.
Another Very Short Story
Blows
We went to MoMA to see the Serras. I called him a sensationalist hack; she cried; I apologized. We went to the Film Forum to see a Truffaut film. She called him a derivative hack; I bit my tongue--hard. We don't talk about art anymore. She left me, simply. I cried, breathlessly.
We went to MoMA to see the Serras. I called him a sensationalist hack; she cried; I apologized. We went to the Film Forum to see a Truffaut film. She called him a derivative hack; I bit my tongue--hard. We don't talk about art anymore. She left me, simply. I cried, breathlessly.
Thursday, September 27, 2007
oh, oregon
i just used the restroom. here at work in the "client" bathroom, the cleaning crew stocks a particular types of the little thin paper toilet seat covers. i say particular because in my extensive life experience, i've noticed two types: one with the center hole unattached from the outer ring, and one with the center hole attached in three places (12 o'clock, 3 o'clock, and 9 o'clock, if you are looking at the cover with the front facing down) by about a half-inch of paper that you have to rip before use. the "client" restroom has this latter type. almost every other restroom i've visited uses the former. with one memorable exception, and exception which causes me a reminiscence every time i use the "client" restroom: the whole state of oregon. i should say "seemingly" the whole state of oregon. why this is, i can't begin to wonder.
of course, as a well-adjusted human being, the question you are probably wont to ask is not "why oregon?" but instead "why do you remember oregon?" well, one day during my west coast trip last summer, i was stricken by a case of looseness, starting at the conclusion of a run and continuing several hours into the day. of course, this precipitated multiple trips to multiple restrooms--sometimes in a state of urgency--during which i wasn't terribly thrilled to have to take the extra three seconds to detach the middle hole of the toilet seat cover. you could say, then, that the oregon-style seat cover made a bit of an impression on me. any impression which continues to this day, thanks to the cleaning staff that stocks our "client" restroom with the damnable attached variety of toilet seat cover.
it's not all bad though: every time i use this restroom, i think of oregon, and by extension, of the whole trip. and it was an excellent trip indeed. and fortunately i remember the totality of the trip's excellence and not usually the specificity of the discomfort of that partial day in eugene, oregon.
so there might be a point in here somewhere. is it weird that i just brought up this silly semi-daily memory-jog? i don't really think so. for me, going to the bathroom is something that reminds me of a very nice vacation i took last year. non sequitor, perhaps, but it's a personal connection not an inherent one. people do this all the time. no, not shit. our lives today are just compilations of our experiences from yesterdays. i don't mean like deja vu or some kind of post-modern orginiality-is-dead thing, i only mean that everything we experience is necessarily founded in, or "biased" by (to use a loaded word in a nicely loaded way), everything in our past experiences. and this is good. this, from one perspective, is the essence of individuality, the essence of who we are as opposed to who they are. this is why we have and keep friends: they share and have shared so many past experiences with us, and so they tend to relate to us as we traipse our way through the world every day that we live in it.
at least, that's one way to look at it.
(as far as the weirdness question though: yeah, i'll give it to you that maybe it is weird in the sense that i've chose this many words to share the memory of my many loose movements in eugene in late august of 2006. i suppose that kind of forthrightness could be considered a little weird.)
of course, as a well-adjusted human being, the question you are probably wont to ask is not "why oregon?" but instead "why do you remember oregon?" well, one day during my west coast trip last summer, i was stricken by a case of looseness, starting at the conclusion of a run and continuing several hours into the day. of course, this precipitated multiple trips to multiple restrooms--sometimes in a state of urgency--during which i wasn't terribly thrilled to have to take the extra three seconds to detach the middle hole of the toilet seat cover. you could say, then, that the oregon-style seat cover made a bit of an impression on me. any impression which continues to this day, thanks to the cleaning staff that stocks our "client" restroom with the damnable attached variety of toilet seat cover.
it's not all bad though: every time i use this restroom, i think of oregon, and by extension, of the whole trip. and it was an excellent trip indeed. and fortunately i remember the totality of the trip's excellence and not usually the specificity of the discomfort of that partial day in eugene, oregon.
so there might be a point in here somewhere. is it weird that i just brought up this silly semi-daily memory-jog? i don't really think so. for me, going to the bathroom is something that reminds me of a very nice vacation i took last year. non sequitor, perhaps, but it's a personal connection not an inherent one. people do this all the time. no, not shit. our lives today are just compilations of our experiences from yesterdays. i don't mean like deja vu or some kind of post-modern orginiality-is-dead thing, i only mean that everything we experience is necessarily founded in, or "biased" by (to use a loaded word in a nicely loaded way), everything in our past experiences. and this is good. this, from one perspective, is the essence of individuality, the essence of who we are as opposed to who they are. this is why we have and keep friends: they share and have shared so many past experiences with us, and so they tend to relate to us as we traipse our way through the world every day that we live in it.
at least, that's one way to look at it.
(as far as the weirdness question though: yeah, i'll give it to you that maybe it is weird in the sense that i've chose this many words to share the memory of my many loose movements in eugene in late august of 2006. i suppose that kind of forthrightness could be considered a little weird.)
Lynch
Pathetic: I fell asleep while watching David Lynch's most recent film last night.
The excuses: 1) it's nearly a 3hr film, 2) I got through over two hours of it so it's not like I flaked twenty minutes in or something, and 3) I generally go to sleep around 12:30am every night, and the shameful act took place at approx 12:30am last night.
Even if I would have completed it last night, I would still not be writing about it to you now. You see, a Lynch film is not something that you watch and then make judgments about; you experience it, you dive in headfirst and then you wade around and soak in it for a while. You've got to give it time to fully marinate into you.
Anyway, I was thinking about this and it occurred to me that I never mentioned that I finally finished Lynch's short film collection a couple weeks ago. While there's not really much to say other than that if you like the man's work, you'll like his shorts. It's all about what you'd expect, including a good one called "The Grandmother" that is stylistically very reminiscent of Eraserhead. (Here's a question: do you italicize the names of short films, or do they only get quotes? I answer my own question in the previous sentence--I think shorts only get quotes--but by no means am I certain of this.)
In my opinion, there is one short in the small collection specifically worth mentioning, though: "The Amputee." This consists of a woman with both legs amputated above the knee sitting and writing while a nurse changes her dressings. There is a voice-over that we are to assume is the woman reading what she's written. As the nurse fumbles with the bandages, one of the stumps starts to more or less erupt with blood; it's a characteristically Lynchian disturbing image. But it interests me, as a sometime writer, in the way that it combines two separately disturbing sensory experiences: seeing the stump spew blood, and hearing the woman's letter-reading (the content of the letter is very spiteful, regretful, angry, accusatory, and basically any other kind of uncomfortable kind of human interactive state that you can think of). It takes these independent emotions and multiplies their intensity in a way that two more related emotions might not. Hearing the woman's pitiful letter is uncomfortable enough, but when complemented by the nurse's futile attempts, it becomes a very intense experience.
This personally interests me because when I write, or--more often--when I think about writing something, my seeming default mode of storytelling is to have a story intercut with sometimes disjointed or topically unrelated bits of story. So thanks, Mr Lynch, for helping to show my dense self the proper way to use multiple overlapping emotive triggers to escalate the overall feeling of a story.
And sorry both for failing to finish your film in one sitting and for failing to get myself to a theater to see it in the first place, even though it was playing for probably three months just three blocks from my apartment.
The excuses: 1) it's nearly a 3hr film, 2) I got through over two hours of it so it's not like I flaked twenty minutes in or something, and 3) I generally go to sleep around 12:30am every night, and the shameful act took place at approx 12:30am last night.
Even if I would have completed it last night, I would still not be writing about it to you now. You see, a Lynch film is not something that you watch and then make judgments about; you experience it, you dive in headfirst and then you wade around and soak in it for a while. You've got to give it time to fully marinate into you.
Anyway, I was thinking about this and it occurred to me that I never mentioned that I finally finished Lynch's short film collection a couple weeks ago. While there's not really much to say other than that if you like the man's work, you'll like his shorts. It's all about what you'd expect, including a good one called "The Grandmother" that is stylistically very reminiscent of Eraserhead. (Here's a question: do you italicize the names of short films, or do they only get quotes? I answer my own question in the previous sentence--I think shorts only get quotes--but by no means am I certain of this.)
In my opinion, there is one short in the small collection specifically worth mentioning, though: "The Amputee." This consists of a woman with both legs amputated above the knee sitting and writing while a nurse changes her dressings. There is a voice-over that we are to assume is the woman reading what she's written. As the nurse fumbles with the bandages, one of the stumps starts to more or less erupt with blood; it's a characteristically Lynchian disturbing image. But it interests me, as a sometime writer, in the way that it combines two separately disturbing sensory experiences: seeing the stump spew blood, and hearing the woman's letter-reading (the content of the letter is very spiteful, regretful, angry, accusatory, and basically any other kind of uncomfortable kind of human interactive state that you can think of). It takes these independent emotions and multiplies their intensity in a way that two more related emotions might not. Hearing the woman's pitiful letter is uncomfortable enough, but when complemented by the nurse's futile attempts, it becomes a very intense experience.
This personally interests me because when I write, or--more often--when I think about writing something, my seeming default mode of storytelling is to have a story intercut with sometimes disjointed or topically unrelated bits of story. So thanks, Mr Lynch, for helping to show my dense self the proper way to use multiple overlapping emotive triggers to escalate the overall feeling of a story.
And sorry both for failing to finish your film in one sitting and for failing to get myself to a theater to see it in the first place, even though it was playing for probably three months just three blocks from my apartment.
Thursday, September 20, 2007
Film Review: Down By Law
i should call this "impressions of a film," because i'm not really doing anything academic or responsibly critical. and it's certainly not terribly thorough.
but before i get to last night's feature, i'd like to bum you out by sharing the utterly depressing observation i made last night: the sun is setting around 7:00pm now. in another short month, it will be 6:00, and then, god save us, on november 4th, it will be dark before 5:00. you go to hell, nature. you go straight to hell.
Down By Law, 1986, Jim Jarmusch. Fairly early in this film I decided that the visual style was decidedly Japanese, at least so far as I am familiar with Japanese. The long sideways tracking shots of the opening and the almost always excellent composition of the people within the frames, usually just sitting and talking, reminded me of everything that I like so much about older Japanese films. Of course the fact that this film is shot in black and white only serves to heighten the recognition.
You could also say that the film is gritty, but it's not necessarily shot that way; I think the grittiness comes almost solely from the settings: the swamps of Louisiana and the run-down streets of New Orleans. These settings are so rich though that they really do serve as another character, never fading into the distance or simply serving as a canvas. For instance, the escapees are almost constantly wading through the swamp, or along the water, or in a boat, making comments about their surroundings. Or earlier in the film, Tom Waits is shown for a fairly long time outside in the street sitting on the garbage-(his garbage)-strewn curb. To me, this stuff was obviously put in on purpose, to make this film not just about the story but about the place, and to pit the characters not just against themselves but against the world around them. There is not anything abstract or even metaphorical about these settings.
To me, this film seems like a particular snapshot of Americana, and within that, it gives an odd kind of perverse sense of the American Dream. I say "perverse" because it's not really the cliched American Dream, more the Outsider's American Dream (in fact, it's anti-cliche in another way: you could also call this a buddy movie but the two buddies in this film spend the whole time antagonizing each other and refusing ever to acknowledge their buddy-ness. They want only to separate and at the end that's exactly what they do, without any melodrama or sentimentality). The two protagonists don't want any kind of domestic happiness or social acceptance or comfort; all they seem to want is freedom. Freedom from the law, freedom from money, freedom from women. Actually--freedom from what would traditionally be considered the American Dream.
When Tom Waits's girlfriend is yelling at him and telling him it's finished, he is silent. It doesn't seem to bother him that she's leaving, or even that all his possessions are scattered on the street. He simply picks up his shoes and goes. Similarly, when John Lurie's prostitute (girlfriend?) is giving him a dissertation on his failed life, he is unconcerned and isn't even paying attention, relieved when the phone rings.
I haven't yet mentioned who I consider the antagonist of this film--Roberto Benigni's character--but he plays a very important role. (This is the same Roberto Benigni of Life is Beautiful and Oscar-speech fame.) See, this character is pining for the traditional American Dream: in the middle of their fugitive run, he decides to settle down, get married, run a restaurant with his wife, and generally live happily ever after in his own personal slice of heaven. He's also the catalyst for the friendship of the two protagonists. And he rather obviously helps to prove my earlier point when the protagonists refuse his offers to stay with him and quite literally walk away from his American Dream. Beyond all that, he's just damned entertaining. You've heard it before, but you really can't take your eyes off of him while he's on screen. Let's just say I was very impressed.
I've said a lot of bad things about American film of the 1980s, so this might not be much coming from me, but I'd have to put this fairly high on my list of best 80s movies. It's only my second Jarmusch film, but it's quite a lot better than Broken Flowers.
but before i get to last night's feature, i'd like to bum you out by sharing the utterly depressing observation i made last night: the sun is setting around 7:00pm now. in another short month, it will be 6:00, and then, god save us, on november 4th, it will be dark before 5:00. you go to hell, nature. you go straight to hell.
Down By Law, 1986, Jim Jarmusch. Fairly early in this film I decided that the visual style was decidedly Japanese, at least so far as I am familiar with Japanese. The long sideways tracking shots of the opening and the almost always excellent composition of the people within the frames, usually just sitting and talking, reminded me of everything that I like so much about older Japanese films. Of course the fact that this film is shot in black and white only serves to heighten the recognition.
You could also say that the film is gritty, but it's not necessarily shot that way; I think the grittiness comes almost solely from the settings: the swamps of Louisiana and the run-down streets of New Orleans. These settings are so rich though that they really do serve as another character, never fading into the distance or simply serving as a canvas. For instance, the escapees are almost constantly wading through the swamp, or along the water, or in a boat, making comments about their surroundings. Or earlier in the film, Tom Waits is shown for a fairly long time outside in the street sitting on the garbage-(his garbage)-strewn curb. To me, this stuff was obviously put in on purpose, to make this film not just about the story but about the place, and to pit the characters not just against themselves but against the world around them. There is not anything abstract or even metaphorical about these settings.
To me, this film seems like a particular snapshot of Americana, and within that, it gives an odd kind of perverse sense of the American Dream. I say "perverse" because it's not really the cliched American Dream, more the Outsider's American Dream (in fact, it's anti-cliche in another way: you could also call this a buddy movie but the two buddies in this film spend the whole time antagonizing each other and refusing ever to acknowledge their buddy-ness. They want only to separate and at the end that's exactly what they do, without any melodrama or sentimentality). The two protagonists don't want any kind of domestic happiness or social acceptance or comfort; all they seem to want is freedom. Freedom from the law, freedom from money, freedom from women. Actually--freedom from what would traditionally be considered the American Dream.
When Tom Waits's girlfriend is yelling at him and telling him it's finished, he is silent. It doesn't seem to bother him that she's leaving, or even that all his possessions are scattered on the street. He simply picks up his shoes and goes. Similarly, when John Lurie's prostitute (girlfriend?) is giving him a dissertation on his failed life, he is unconcerned and isn't even paying attention, relieved when the phone rings.
I haven't yet mentioned who I consider the antagonist of this film--Roberto Benigni's character--but he plays a very important role. (This is the same Roberto Benigni of Life is Beautiful and Oscar-speech fame.) See, this character is pining for the traditional American Dream: in the middle of their fugitive run, he decides to settle down, get married, run a restaurant with his wife, and generally live happily ever after in his own personal slice of heaven. He's also the catalyst for the friendship of the two protagonists. And he rather obviously helps to prove my earlier point when the protagonists refuse his offers to stay with him and quite literally walk away from his American Dream. Beyond all that, he's just damned entertaining. You've heard it before, but you really can't take your eyes off of him while he's on screen. Let's just say I was very impressed.
I've said a lot of bad things about American film of the 1980s, so this might not be much coming from me, but I'd have to put this fairly high on my list of best 80s movies. It's only my second Jarmusch film, but it's quite a lot better than Broken Flowers.
Wednesday, September 19, 2007
A Very Short Story
Life to b4
John had just been castled: scorned and sent away by his friends. His queen had long since flown the coop; fate had sent her along with a dashing and daring young knight. John was afraid and disconsolate. He decided to lie down and take a nap. When he awoke his queen--indeed his whole kingdom--had returned to how it had always been. He was confused. And extremely disappointed.
John had just been castled: scorned and sent away by his friends. His queen had long since flown the coop; fate had sent her along with a dashing and daring young knight. John was afraid and disconsolate. He decided to lie down and take a nap. When he awoke his queen--indeed his whole kingdom--had returned to how it had always been. He was confused. And extremely disappointed.
Read This
http://www.houghtonmifflinbooks.com/catalog/titledetail.cfm?textType=excerpt&titleNumber=689793
i hope that link works for you. i'll admit that i was first tipped off to the existence of this in New York Magazine's Approval Matrix. however, seeing as Mr David Foster Wallace is both my favorite and most in-awe-of living writer, i would surely have stumbled across this fairly soon anyway.
sometimes you read something and it's less that the words on the page (or screen) project your eyes forward through the piece, but more that your almost mystic recognition of the idea and its presentation is so innate that it's as if you're looking in a mirror--not really seeing anything particular because it's always been there--but instead swimming around in it, comprehending all of it at once.
here is the conclusion, because he's a better communicator than myself:
".......the revelation that most of what you’ve believed and revered turns out to be self-indulgent crap.
That [idea]’s of especial value, I think. As exquisite verbal art, yes, but also as a model for what free, informed adulthood might look like in the context of Total Noise: not just the intelligence to discern one’s own error or stupidity, but the humility to address it, absorb it, and move on and out there from, bravely, toward the next revealed error. This is probably the sincerest, most biased account of ‘Best’ [I] can give: these pieces are models — not templates, but models — of ways I wish I could think and live in what seems to me this world."
i hope that link works for you. i'll admit that i was first tipped off to the existence of this in New York Magazine's Approval Matrix. however, seeing as Mr David Foster Wallace is both my favorite and most in-awe-of living writer, i would surely have stumbled across this fairly soon anyway.
sometimes you read something and it's less that the words on the page (or screen) project your eyes forward through the piece, but more that your almost mystic recognition of the idea and its presentation is so innate that it's as if you're looking in a mirror--not really seeing anything particular because it's always been there--but instead swimming around in it, comprehending all of it at once.
here is the conclusion, because he's a better communicator than myself:
".......the revelation that most of what you’ve believed and revered turns out to be self-indulgent crap.
That [idea]’s of especial value, I think. As exquisite verbal art, yes, but also as a model for what free, informed adulthood might look like in the context of Total Noise: not just the intelligence to discern one’s own error or stupidity, but the humility to address it, absorb it, and move on and out there from, bravely, toward the next revealed error. This is probably the sincerest, most biased account of ‘Best’ [I] can give: these pieces are models — not templates, but models — of ways I wish I could think and live in what seems to me this world."
Tuesday, September 18, 2007
Film Review
i was watching the NewsHour last night and they had an interview with a guy who wrote a book about how the internet is destroying our culture, mainly because blogs and the like are cluttering our consciousness with mindless crap, unfortunately taking the place of more traditional cultural mainstays. i think i agree with his point; however, one point that i do not agree with him on: he thinks that people should be passive consumers or absorbers of culture rather than having a hand in it's production. i might be taking his view very slightly out of context but that's the nut and quite obviously i don't share that viewpoint.
nonetheless, to respond to his first point, i'd like to provide you with a review of the film i watched last night, The Man With the Movie Camera. to be honest, this isn't completely a response to the interviewee whose name i can't now recall, but actually a longstanding idea i've had that was catalyzed by him. i tend to watch a lot of movies, and read a fair share of books, so why not share my thoughts? also, i'm terribly presumptuous and, worse, sometimes pretentious. can't think of better qualifiers to produce "cultural" reviews.
so, the first thing to know about this film (snobs don't watch "movies." (pathetic irony how that word appears in the title of this particular film--yes)) is that it was made in 1929. the second thing to know is that, in spite of its status as a silent film, it should be considered quite a bit ahead of its time. the third is that i always like to play the commentary track of a film and rewatch the whole thing right after completing it sans-commentary the first time, but in this instance i was dead tired and fell asleep right at the beginning of a delightful frenchman's thoughts on the film; therefore, whatever i say here has no reference point and might be way off base.
anyway, i'd heartily recommend this to anyone who appreciates editing or notices camerawork. the director, Dziga Vertov, states very plainly at the opening credits that this is an "experiment" in filmmaking, and the results are suitably excellent. i don't know how much mr Vertov produced prior to this but i got the feeling that he was simply fascinated by the ability to film things moving. there is a small section in the middle of the film where he stops and goes through a procession of still images, then loops back through and puts those images into motion. this played to me as some kind of exhilaratory action by the director, and probably reinforced to the audiences at the time just how amazing what they were watching was.
in fact, regarding the audience in 1929: i can't help but imagine that for them, watching this film must have been akin to sitting through a high-tech magic show--images constantly flashing across the screen, trains seemingly running into each other, buildings moving kaleidoscopically--all set to a rather rousing if disorienting soundtrack. not to offend mr internet-blathering-is-bad, but i've got to say my favorite scene is one where the camera is mounted on a moving car and filming another cameraman shooting mounted on another moving car at people riding in a third moving car. it's excellent and as good as anything you see even today.
the film is only just over an hour but feels longer thanks to the almost infinite amount of things happening on the screen and the very very short length of most of the shots. there is much to see and not much time to see it so you end up becoming more passive and giving up looking for plot or themes or emotion and you see the film only as what it is and what it is intended to be: an experiment in a then-relatively-new artistic medium.
there is a lot more to say but i don't feel like boring you, but generally don't think too hard about this one and just appreciate the craft. if you're into this sort of thing, it will be very hard not to want to go get your own camera and have at it like mr Vertov.
nonetheless, to respond to his first point, i'd like to provide you with a review of the film i watched last night, The Man With the Movie Camera. to be honest, this isn't completely a response to the interviewee whose name i can't now recall, but actually a longstanding idea i've had that was catalyzed by him. i tend to watch a lot of movies, and read a fair share of books, so why not share my thoughts? also, i'm terribly presumptuous and, worse, sometimes pretentious. can't think of better qualifiers to produce "cultural" reviews.
so, the first thing to know about this film (snobs don't watch "movies." (pathetic irony how that word appears in the title of this particular film--yes)) is that it was made in 1929. the second thing to know is that, in spite of its status as a silent film, it should be considered quite a bit ahead of its time. the third is that i always like to play the commentary track of a film and rewatch the whole thing right after completing it sans-commentary the first time, but in this instance i was dead tired and fell asleep right at the beginning of a delightful frenchman's thoughts on the film; therefore, whatever i say here has no reference point and might be way off base.
anyway, i'd heartily recommend this to anyone who appreciates editing or notices camerawork. the director, Dziga Vertov, states very plainly at the opening credits that this is an "experiment" in filmmaking, and the results are suitably excellent. i don't know how much mr Vertov produced prior to this but i got the feeling that he was simply fascinated by the ability to film things moving. there is a small section in the middle of the film where he stops and goes through a procession of still images, then loops back through and puts those images into motion. this played to me as some kind of exhilaratory action by the director, and probably reinforced to the audiences at the time just how amazing what they were watching was.
in fact, regarding the audience in 1929: i can't help but imagine that for them, watching this film must have been akin to sitting through a high-tech magic show--images constantly flashing across the screen, trains seemingly running into each other, buildings moving kaleidoscopically--all set to a rather rousing if disorienting soundtrack. not to offend mr internet-blathering-is-bad, but i've got to say my favorite scene is one where the camera is mounted on a moving car and filming another cameraman shooting mounted on another moving car at people riding in a third moving car. it's excellent and as good as anything you see even today.
the film is only just over an hour but feels longer thanks to the almost infinite amount of things happening on the screen and the very very short length of most of the shots. there is much to see and not much time to see it so you end up becoming more passive and giving up looking for plot or themes or emotion and you see the film only as what it is and what it is intended to be: an experiment in a then-relatively-new artistic medium.
there is a lot more to say but i don't feel like boring you, but generally don't think too hard about this one and just appreciate the craft. if you're into this sort of thing, it will be very hard not to want to go get your own camera and have at it like mr Vertov.
Monday, September 17, 2007
damnit. i'm a moody son of a bitch. lately.
yesterday i was scribbling in my little notebook for some reason about how i felt like i was on acid and everything was perfectly obvious and slow and peaceful. i felt completely content but yet simultaneously there was a profound sense of disappointment and emptiness. i was experiencing seemingly diametric emotions at the same time. i'd taken moodiness into some higher level. over-moodiness. over-emotion. over-loaded.
i wrote a few little bits over the weekend but i don't really feel like posting them here so blugh, blah, bleggghh.
while i was jotting some random crap down saturday night a fairly cute girl sat down with a friend next to me on the ledge against the window. she seemed curious and started talking to me at odd intervals. she was intrigued by something: me, evidently. i was polite and returned words then excused myself when it was time to leave by declaring the pleasantness of the slight conversation and then kissing her hand like someone in an awful Jane Austen novel. i should just say "Jane Austen novel" as the adjective there is superfluous. but the gesture wasn't chivalric; it was perfectly natural. and now i wonder if i should have done more.
also saturday night: i caught a girl "checking me out" and then overheard her tell her friend that she thought i had an "awesome outfit." that is both terrible and great and i am same for thinking it is so. this one didn't come up and talk to me like the one in the last paragraph did. probably for the best.
i should be at the gym now or at least running but i just don't feel like it. i don't think i'm simply having a weekend hangover now either, as is usually the case on mondays. my life is quite full three days out of a week.
i feel like a dandelion that a five year old just blew to pieces. it was quite a rush but now there's nothing left, nothing but seeds drifting floating lonely out across the world perhaps never to take root at all. but perhaps yes. who knows? i'm sick of metaphors for now and don't much care anyway.
yesterday i was scribbling in my little notebook for some reason about how i felt like i was on acid and everything was perfectly obvious and slow and peaceful. i felt completely content but yet simultaneously there was a profound sense of disappointment and emptiness. i was experiencing seemingly diametric emotions at the same time. i'd taken moodiness into some higher level. over-moodiness. over-emotion. over-loaded.
i wrote a few little bits over the weekend but i don't really feel like posting them here so blugh, blah, bleggghh.
while i was jotting some random crap down saturday night a fairly cute girl sat down with a friend next to me on the ledge against the window. she seemed curious and started talking to me at odd intervals. she was intrigued by something: me, evidently. i was polite and returned words then excused myself when it was time to leave by declaring the pleasantness of the slight conversation and then kissing her hand like someone in an awful Jane Austen novel. i should just say "Jane Austen novel" as the adjective there is superfluous. but the gesture wasn't chivalric; it was perfectly natural. and now i wonder if i should have done more.
also saturday night: i caught a girl "checking me out" and then overheard her tell her friend that she thought i had an "awesome outfit." that is both terrible and great and i am same for thinking it is so. this one didn't come up and talk to me like the one in the last paragraph did. probably for the best.
i should be at the gym now or at least running but i just don't feel like it. i don't think i'm simply having a weekend hangover now either, as is usually the case on mondays. my life is quite full three days out of a week.
i feel like a dandelion that a five year old just blew to pieces. it was quite a rush but now there's nothing left, nothing but seeds drifting floating lonely out across the world perhaps never to take root at all. but perhaps yes. who knows? i'm sick of metaphors for now and don't much care anyway.
Wednesday, September 12, 2007
on love
who's in a good mood today? josh folger, that's who. the weather this morning walking to the subway was just perfect: no wind, no humidity, sun, maybe just over 60 degrees. just a sublime pre-fall morning. makes someone like me wish he were running--fast, feeling the vacant hollow air as he creates his own headwind, getting warm, sweating a little but not ridiculously, only so much that the manufactured breeze just slightly chills his clammy skin. just perfect.
someone here at work spilled a cup of coffee in front of the reception desk and i was helping clean it up and now the fingertips of my right hand smell like gingerbread cookies. i'm not going to wash them until absolutely necessary.
a girl came into the F train this morning and occupied the seat directly below where i was standing and reading a printed six-page article concerning the poor season of Atlanta Braves centerfielder Andruw Jones. even within the glaze of usual morning fogginess, the subway blank stare phenomenon, and the absorption of reading materials, a man can always instinctively recognize exactly when a very attractive woman boards a train in his vicinity. he is always thus instantly snapped out of meditation into anticipation. i can't really compare this to anything else; quite surely nature is full of analagous involuntary events, what with the universal dispossession of large swaths of minutae-filled, distracted human brain power. anyway, this girl/woman was certainly attractive, and she chose to sit right in front of me, directly behind my studious (you can "study" baseball) field of vision.
more about the girl now: she was maybe 5'8" or 9" in normal heels, she had short very black very smooth hair that fell around her face like parentheses, she was on the skinny side but not annoyingly so, she had smallish facial features, beautifully lush lips, and a mouth that didn't quite seem to close all the way as she read, and she had a marvellously dark and textured skin, as if the richness of the color produced the smoothness of its texture. all in all, but mostly judging on the skin color, she had the look of a Thai or Vietnamese or even New Guinean person. somewhere southeast asian, most likely. actually her skin had definite olive tones as well, and so maybe she could be Egyptian or Persian or that type. i'm not sure. the important thing to know is that the sum of her was beauty--reserved, graceful, dignified, effortless, and comfortable beauty.
why do i now spend so much time on this girl (it's now been longer in the recounting than the actual time spent admiring this morning)? because she taught me something about love.
when your senses are attuned correctly, it's very easy to fall in love. i suppose i'm cheating by adding that qualifier, but it's really much easier to fall for someone than nearly everyone in this world would have you believe.
i think i fell in love with that girl this morning in just the five to ten minutes we shared a piece of physical existence. i think that this could happen relatively often, and i don't think there is any shame in this, or that it renders more meaningless any previous emotional relationships you or i or anyone may have had. the difference is in the next step: the communication; if you can carry over that initial burst of emotive joy into discussion with a person, then you're starting to go places. and if that then carries over into physicality, and then into comfort, and then into some kind of effortless mutual existence, and so on, well then you've got all you need, the only person you'll ever need (i won't say "wife" cause marriage is silly and arbitrary). so of course all those progressive steps are important, but perhaps the first step, not simply the attraction but the production of love, is the most important. and it's the easiest to achieve, by far. isn't that wonderful?
thank you girl on the subway. thank you whatever put me in the right status of being. thank you to all the numerous future Aphrodites in my life.
someone here at work spilled a cup of coffee in front of the reception desk and i was helping clean it up and now the fingertips of my right hand smell like gingerbread cookies. i'm not going to wash them until absolutely necessary.
a girl came into the F train this morning and occupied the seat directly below where i was standing and reading a printed six-page article concerning the poor season of Atlanta Braves centerfielder Andruw Jones. even within the glaze of usual morning fogginess, the subway blank stare phenomenon, and the absorption of reading materials, a man can always instinctively recognize exactly when a very attractive woman boards a train in his vicinity. he is always thus instantly snapped out of meditation into anticipation. i can't really compare this to anything else; quite surely nature is full of analagous involuntary events, what with the universal dispossession of large swaths of minutae-filled, distracted human brain power. anyway, this girl/woman was certainly attractive, and she chose to sit right in front of me, directly behind my studious (you can "study" baseball) field of vision.
more about the girl now: she was maybe 5'8" or 9" in normal heels, she had short very black very smooth hair that fell around her face like parentheses, she was on the skinny side but not annoyingly so, she had smallish facial features, beautifully lush lips, and a mouth that didn't quite seem to close all the way as she read, and she had a marvellously dark and textured skin, as if the richness of the color produced the smoothness of its texture. all in all, but mostly judging on the skin color, she had the look of a Thai or Vietnamese or even New Guinean person. somewhere southeast asian, most likely. actually her skin had definite olive tones as well, and so maybe she could be Egyptian or Persian or that type. i'm not sure. the important thing to know is that the sum of her was beauty--reserved, graceful, dignified, effortless, and comfortable beauty.
why do i now spend so much time on this girl (it's now been longer in the recounting than the actual time spent admiring this morning)? because she taught me something about love.
when your senses are attuned correctly, it's very easy to fall in love. i suppose i'm cheating by adding that qualifier, but it's really much easier to fall for someone than nearly everyone in this world would have you believe.
i think i fell in love with that girl this morning in just the five to ten minutes we shared a piece of physical existence. i think that this could happen relatively often, and i don't think there is any shame in this, or that it renders more meaningless any previous emotional relationships you or i or anyone may have had. the difference is in the next step: the communication; if you can carry over that initial burst of emotive joy into discussion with a person, then you're starting to go places. and if that then carries over into physicality, and then into comfort, and then into some kind of effortless mutual existence, and so on, well then you've got all you need, the only person you'll ever need (i won't say "wife" cause marriage is silly and arbitrary). so of course all those progressive steps are important, but perhaps the first step, not simply the attraction but the production of love, is the most important. and it's the easiest to achieve, by far. isn't that wonderful?
thank you girl on the subway. thank you whatever put me in the right status of being. thank you to all the numerous future Aphrodites in my life.
Monday, September 10, 2007
A Lyrical Log
Friday, September 7, 2007
9:05pm
Words and noise
Poets everywhere but I'm square.
The blacks do it best,
I don't know why, they rise and fly.
Under a tree,
Disappointed?--No, unannointed.
Tuck away my pipe,
Unable to think, may need a drink.
I'm a poet?
But don't know it?
I think it's best
to live and love--live laugh bleed cry and love love love.
1:20am
So now I'm left alone,
Fifth of a Guinness
Staring at me like a gnome.
I'm terrified.
It can cause me great joy,
A fifth of a Guinness,
Or at least a pining for a sharp Rob Roy.
I'm excited.
The solitude lets me hear things,
Jealousy of my Guinness.
Everyone else wants to have wings.
I'm confused.
Consensus here states I'm awesome.
Respect for the Guinness.
Women expect me to make them come.
I'm transcendent.
3:58am
Ooooooooooohhh jeez.
Walking home, just perved a beav.
Hot hot bitch she's smokin.
I don't know whether she's jokin,
But she smiled at me--
--with her mouth--
And I took my time,
But I made her a rhyme.
Now she's more than just a smiling crotch,
She's a friend, a lover,
Enough to make you cut a notch
Into your bed..........stead.
Ya I'm loving this wild one,
She's a smiling quiet one,
A jezebel in a striped dress,
Makes me sit like a ruined mess.
But it's love, love,
Some weird kind of love.
I can't stop staring into the depths of that mouth.
You got to have it,
Not just a habit.
Older ladies crying shames mysterious games jealous flames.
Saturday, September 8, 2007
Time unknown
Sitting on a chair thank you stranger.
Looking at Doc's I'll get there eventually.
Can't write straight--regrets--drinking--
Not entirely me.
I think I'm a hack but what do I know,
Just sitting here watching the hos.......
Pass by.........my face.
Not interested.
E Village artists are impressing my senses,
Much more than this G-2 can present it.
Sorry.
Wish I were a natural.
Would jot and scratch my way to an immortal--
--ity. On my knee. Give it to me. With glee.
Unknown vibrations,
Waiting, searching, for the essential libations.
Stop. Here.
I'll be back in a minute.
Got to pee then
Happenstance will finish it.
1:51am
In the window at Doc's.
Asian chicks with crocs.
AC dripping on my cock.
Wish that i were a grandfather clock.
No stop.
I'm going to flip the switch,
To be the muse
To project the music
And not to hear it.
Fuck you.
2:20am
Now I've stopped being the jester.
Over in the crack-ho seat
Feeling light as a feather.
Goddamn you goddamn
I'm a fucking poet
I just can't sit here and ignore it.
Sometimes life takes you by the hand
Sometimes life take you by the balls
Sometimes life takes you up up up up and a-fucking-way.
I'm gone--
Beyond, flown on.
Shit happens.
Sometimes I happen to you.
Sometimes you happen to me.
It's free.
It's quietly astronomy
I don't believe in voodoo
But you do
And since I love you
I guess I do too.
9:05pm
Words and noise
Poets everywhere but I'm square.
The blacks do it best,
I don't know why, they rise and fly.
Under a tree,
Disappointed?--No, unannointed.
Tuck away my pipe,
Unable to think, may need a drink.
I'm a poet?
But don't know it?
I think it's best
to live and love--live laugh bleed cry and love love love.
1:20am
So now I'm left alone,
Fifth of a Guinness
Staring at me like a gnome.
I'm terrified.
It can cause me great joy,
A fifth of a Guinness,
Or at least a pining for a sharp Rob Roy.
I'm excited.
The solitude lets me hear things,
Jealousy of my Guinness.
Everyone else wants to have wings.
I'm confused.
Consensus here states I'm awesome.
Respect for the Guinness.
Women expect me to make them come.
I'm transcendent.
3:58am
Ooooooooooohhh jeez.
Walking home, just perved a beav.
Hot hot bitch she's smokin.
I don't know whether she's jokin,
But she smiled at me--
--with her mouth--
And I took my time,
But I made her a rhyme.
Now she's more than just a smiling crotch,
She's a friend, a lover,
Enough to make you cut a notch
Into your bed..........stead.
Ya I'm loving this wild one,
She's a smiling quiet one,
A jezebel in a striped dress,
Makes me sit like a ruined mess.
But it's love, love,
Some weird kind of love.
I can't stop staring into the depths of that mouth.
You got to have it,
Not just a habit.
Older ladies crying shames mysterious games jealous flames.
Saturday, September 8, 2007
Time unknown
Sitting on a chair thank you stranger.
Looking at Doc's I'll get there eventually.
Can't write straight--regrets--drinking--
Not entirely me.
I think I'm a hack but what do I know,
Just sitting here watching the hos.......
Pass by.........my face.
Not interested.
E Village artists are impressing my senses,
Much more than this G-2 can present it.
Sorry.
Wish I were a natural.
Would jot and scratch my way to an immortal--
--ity. On my knee. Give it to me. With glee.
Unknown vibrations,
Waiting, searching, for the essential libations.
Stop. Here.
I'll be back in a minute.
Got to pee then
Happenstance will finish it.
1:51am
In the window at Doc's.
Asian chicks with crocs.
AC dripping on my cock.
Wish that i were a grandfather clock.
No stop.
I'm going to flip the switch,
To be the muse
To project the music
And not to hear it.
Fuck you.
2:20am
Now I've stopped being the jester.
Over in the crack-ho seat
Feeling light as a feather.
Goddamn you goddamn
I'm a fucking poet
I just can't sit here and ignore it.
Sometimes life takes you by the hand
Sometimes life take you by the balls
Sometimes life takes you up up up up and a-fucking-way.
I'm gone--
Beyond, flown on.
Shit happens.
Sometimes I happen to you.
Sometimes you happen to me.
It's free.
It's quietly astronomy
I don't believe in voodoo
But you do
And since I love you
I guess I do too.
Wednesday, September 5, 2007
Drunk log
Friday, August 31, 2007
11:55pm - Well we've made it out this evening and the recovery of me seems fairly legit at the moment. God Bless Dave. That's all I'll say about that.
Times are so far good. I feel bad about Ellie. Here she is, always asking us to hang out with her on her early-off day (which is Monday) and lo and behold we were partying hard this very Monday but nowhere near her place. Sorry, legitimately. Better foresight next time.
Natalie, my former fiancee, seems very much disinterested. I don't blame her: I'm a disinteresting person sometimes. It's okay though--we weren't really right for each other anyway. You gotta try though, you gotta try. Alack and alas.
Saturday, September 1, 2007
12:20pm - I just can't say no right now. Can't say no to the events of my life as they unfold organically in front of my face and over my head.
12:23pm - I'm thinking the 'boats against the currents' line from Gatsby now but not quite morose--or douche--enough to transcribe it fully.
12:28pm - On from Camelot, for love, for fear, with regret or not, The Lady of Shalott.
There's some fucking morosity for you. Probably some Double-D Douche, too.
I spite myself in sickness and in health.
5:17pm - So what did we learn from the OSU bar earlier?
1. I am not, in fact, a poet.
2. Semi-hot waitresses like to hit on Hudik and I.
3. I'm so awesome that I didn't even solicit a number.
7:05pm - Well shit. A wonderfully attractive African Queen has been making eyes at me here at Rudy's. Believe it or not but I might actually be a little embarrassed. First I thought she was alone so I eye-d back at her and was 10 seconds from walking over and making it happen. Then I noticed the second beer at her table. She was not ashamed and kept the intoxicatingly obvious distance-flirt going. Then I noticed the ridiculously thuggish dude finally appear at her table. Then I pondered what it would be like to get in a fight at 7 on a Saturday afternoon in Hell's Kitchen. With a thug. Then I enlisted Tony to take out his legs for me. Of course, because she's a woman and I'm a man, she kept up the game. God bless her. So it's fun.
7:12pm - D-bags just questioned my write-itude. Called my shit "chicken scratch." I said no it's my very own kind of Chinese characters.
7:20pm- I just was talking to Tony about his nice New Balance kicks. He's proud of the blue on them. I thought they looked suspiciously big so I put my thumb on the toe like a guy at Foot Locker.....and........what do you fucking know but he's cheating by a good inch. I don't think I blame him what with those freakishly tiny feet.........but, lo............here's the rub.........he takes off the shoe...........and he's cheating in a SIZE SEVEN. God Bless Tony. It's nice to know a (fully grown) human being who has to cheat his way into a size 7.
11:26pm - dba pony tail john lennon glasses good luck with life. I've been feeling much more asshole-ish in the last couple hours. I guess that's a bad thing. People aren't necessarily reacting poorly yet.
11:33pm - You know I've been having some seriously f-ed up dreams lately. Can't even transcribe the one from last night. Suffice to say I was acting unconsciously obnoxious and seriously seriously angering a few people whom I would reall really not want to anger. So it's weird cause it didn't actually happen but it felt real so still I feel bad. Shame, I suppose.
Time unknown - Thank goodness for Ellie, that wonderful SOB. If it weren't for her, I'd still be bleeding like a madman, unconsciously waiting for others to say hell yeah. Ellie allows me to be totally drunk in an E Village park, twixt 1st and A. Good luck to you. I used to barf in here, but thankfully not tonight. My shame tonight is that I might start bleeding like a fountain any moment. Good Luck, Go Drunk my dad is off his tree right now.
Time unknown - I fight and beg to be within the line. I wrote a poem for the girl at Tonic. Love happens.
Sunday, September 2, 2007
9:38pm - Feeling.............I'm definitely-------------feeling the Sweater Song now.
Ode to Snatch incarnating itself. Supagood. I yearn for a flowering cornucopia of cunt.
11:55pm - Well we've made it out this evening and the recovery of me seems fairly legit at the moment. God Bless Dave. That's all I'll say about that.
Times are so far good. I feel bad about Ellie. Here she is, always asking us to hang out with her on her early-off day (which is Monday) and lo and behold we were partying hard this very Monday but nowhere near her place. Sorry, legitimately. Better foresight next time.
Natalie, my former fiancee, seems very much disinterested. I don't blame her: I'm a disinteresting person sometimes. It's okay though--we weren't really right for each other anyway. You gotta try though, you gotta try. Alack and alas.
Saturday, September 1, 2007
12:20pm - I just can't say no right now. Can't say no to the events of my life as they unfold organically in front of my face and over my head.
12:23pm - I'm thinking the 'boats against the currents' line from Gatsby now but not quite morose--or douche--enough to transcribe it fully.
12:28pm - On from Camelot, for love, for fear, with regret or not, The Lady of Shalott.
There's some fucking morosity for you. Probably some Double-D Douche, too.
I spite myself in sickness and in health.
5:17pm - So what did we learn from the OSU bar earlier?
1. I am not, in fact, a poet.
2. Semi-hot waitresses like to hit on Hudik and I.
3. I'm so awesome that I didn't even solicit a number.
7:05pm - Well shit. A wonderfully attractive African Queen has been making eyes at me here at Rudy's. Believe it or not but I might actually be a little embarrassed. First I thought she was alone so I eye-d back at her and was 10 seconds from walking over and making it happen. Then I noticed the second beer at her table. She was not ashamed and kept the intoxicatingly obvious distance-flirt going. Then I noticed the ridiculously thuggish dude finally appear at her table. Then I pondered what it would be like to get in a fight at 7 on a Saturday afternoon in Hell's Kitchen. With a thug. Then I enlisted Tony to take out his legs for me. Of course, because she's a woman and I'm a man, she kept up the game. God bless her. So it's fun.
7:12pm - D-bags just questioned my write-itude. Called my shit "chicken scratch." I said no it's my very own kind of Chinese characters.
7:20pm- I just was talking to Tony about his nice New Balance kicks. He's proud of the blue on them. I thought they looked suspiciously big so I put my thumb on the toe like a guy at Foot Locker.....and........what do you fucking know but he's cheating by a good inch. I don't think I blame him what with those freakishly tiny feet.........but, lo............here's the rub.........he takes off the shoe...........and he's cheating in a SIZE SEVEN. God Bless Tony. It's nice to know a (fully grown) human being who has to cheat his way into a size 7.
11:26pm - dba pony tail john lennon glasses good luck with life. I've been feeling much more asshole-ish in the last couple hours. I guess that's a bad thing. People aren't necessarily reacting poorly yet.
11:33pm - You know I've been having some seriously f-ed up dreams lately. Can't even transcribe the one from last night. Suffice to say I was acting unconsciously obnoxious and seriously seriously angering a few people whom I would reall really not want to anger. So it's weird cause it didn't actually happen but it felt real so still I feel bad. Shame, I suppose.
Time unknown - Thank goodness for Ellie, that wonderful SOB. If it weren't for her, I'd still be bleeding like a madman, unconsciously waiting for others to say hell yeah. Ellie allows me to be totally drunk in an E Village park, twixt 1st and A. Good luck to you. I used to barf in here, but thankfully not tonight. My shame tonight is that I might start bleeding like a fountain any moment. Good Luck, Go Drunk my dad is off his tree right now.
Time unknown - I fight and beg to be within the line. I wrote a poem for the girl at Tonic. Love happens.
Sunday, September 2, 2007
9:38pm - Feeling.............I'm definitely-------------feeling the Sweater Song now.
Ode to Snatch incarnating itself. Supagood. I yearn for a flowering cornucopia of cunt.
Tuesday, September 4, 2007
Too Much
yesterday, Sept 3rd, at 1:48pm i received a text from dave, bless his crooked little heart: "Hey you alright bud? That was a creepy text to send after leaving you bleeding on the street."
out of it's context, the mind reels at this. and it presented me with what my infinite naivete allows me to accept as a fine idea: the textblog. my phone autosaves my 50 most recently sent messages. i don't know if you ever think about going back through them but you should some time, at least out of curiosity.
at any rate, it was quite a week in this boy's life. ups and downs, strikes and gutters, sometimes you eat the b'ar............
so i've got a little bit of the drunklog from the weekend as well and i'll get around to posting it later. i guess you can consider this textlog the gutter.
one final note: i've got an odd perverse sadomasochistic delight in publicly glorying in my depravity, so i'm no stranger to emotional/vulnerable exhibitionism, but i've got to say that in rereading these texts it strikes even me as very intensely personal. maybe it's too much. but then that's really just keeping with the theme. too. much.
Tues Aug 28, 12:21pm - You ready to head in yet
12:28pm - Were meeting at prospect ave r stop no later than one
12:29pm - Got to be one thirty
12:32pm - One you degenerate
2:07pm - Im an animal i cant help it
3:15pm - Hey i took a sick day an were drinkin outside
3:21pm - White horse for a bit more
3:25pm - Ta-da! Sick day!
6:06pm - Wtf you at
6:09pm - Hey dude. Sick day. Drunk. Awesome.
6:37pm - At the half pint then heading east
7:38pm - Dont know where it is
Thur Aug 30, 12:19pm - Im out tonight. Doing a thing at work this eve then going home and going to sleep
8:59pm - Haha thanks. Actually i checked it and that is the french spelling
Fri Aug 31, 4:54pm - Ill be home by five thirty at latest
9:33pm - Come to manhattan a hole
9:47pm - Going to tile bar now
9:50pm - Come on out tonight
10:05pm - Were out in the village
10:13pm - Hows the party?
11:14pm - In the village
11:30pm - E. Lunasa currently
12:30am - Wtf you at were at blue and gold in five min
12:35am - Fuck it were at blue and gold in five min
1:32am - Only the coolest cats
2:27am - Tell dave the idiot he left his phone
Sat Sept 1, 11:35am - Come to times sq and booze. Dont know when it starts ask dave for real info
11:39am - When we meeting for this game
12:36pm - Bastard
7:27pm - Dude were out
7:29pm - Whats up today kiddo? Were out of course
8:20pm - Well we'll be rockin out in hells kitchen for a while longer if yer around yer place
8:25pm - Ok
8:26pm - No but for the love of god we will do all we can to make it happen
11:20pm - Where you at
12:20am - At ace bar now prob for the night
Sun Sept 2, 1:57pm - Jus woke up elbow hurts
2:08pm - Go fuck yourself im hitting the chivas now getting in the shower tell me where to go
2:25pm - d u n
3:25pm - You want me to bring anything
1:35am - My Rothko . . . . .
2:19am - I am love-drunk and i hate the world. sorry
Mon Sept 3, 11:47am - i'm terribly in love with you. i'm sorry josh
1:54pm - No. Im in love. Miserably.
2:59pm - Dont know. Kinda bummin
3:02pm - I dont know
out of it's context, the mind reels at this. and it presented me with what my infinite naivete allows me to accept as a fine idea: the textblog. my phone autosaves my 50 most recently sent messages. i don't know if you ever think about going back through them but you should some time, at least out of curiosity.
at any rate, it was quite a week in this boy's life. ups and downs, strikes and gutters, sometimes you eat the b'ar............
so i've got a little bit of the drunklog from the weekend as well and i'll get around to posting it later. i guess you can consider this textlog the gutter.
one final note: i've got an odd perverse sadomasochistic delight in publicly glorying in my depravity, so i'm no stranger to emotional/vulnerable exhibitionism, but i've got to say that in rereading these texts it strikes even me as very intensely personal. maybe it's too much. but then that's really just keeping with the theme. too. much.
Tues Aug 28, 12:21pm - You ready to head in yet
12:28pm - Were meeting at prospect ave r stop no later than one
12:29pm - Got to be one thirty
12:32pm - One you degenerate
2:07pm - Im an animal i cant help it
3:15pm - Hey i took a sick day an were drinkin outside
3:21pm - White horse for a bit more
3:25pm - Ta-da! Sick day!
6:06pm - Wtf you at
6:09pm - Hey dude. Sick day. Drunk. Awesome.
6:37pm - At the half pint then heading east
7:38pm - Dont know where it is
Thur Aug 30, 12:19pm - Im out tonight. Doing a thing at work this eve then going home and going to sleep
8:59pm - Haha thanks. Actually i checked it and that is the french spelling
Fri Aug 31, 4:54pm - Ill be home by five thirty at latest
9:33pm - Come to manhattan a hole
9:47pm - Going to tile bar now
9:50pm - Come on out tonight
10:05pm - Were out in the village
10:13pm - Hows the party?
11:14pm - In the village
11:30pm - E. Lunasa currently
12:30am - Wtf you at were at blue and gold in five min
12:35am - Fuck it were at blue and gold in five min
1:32am - Only the coolest cats
2:27am - Tell dave the idiot he left his phone
Sat Sept 1, 11:35am - Come to times sq and booze. Dont know when it starts ask dave for real info
11:39am - When we meeting for this game
12:36pm - Bastard
7:27pm - Dude were out
7:29pm - Whats up today kiddo? Were out of course
8:20pm - Well we'll be rockin out in hells kitchen for a while longer if yer around yer place
8:25pm - Ok
8:26pm - No but for the love of god we will do all we can to make it happen
11:20pm - Where you at
12:20am - At ace bar now prob for the night
Sun Sept 2, 1:57pm - Jus woke up elbow hurts
2:08pm - Go fuck yourself im hitting the chivas now getting in the shower tell me where to go
2:25pm - d u n
3:25pm - You want me to bring anything
1:35am - My Rothko . . . . .
2:19am - I am love-drunk and i hate the world. sorry
Mon Sept 3, 11:47am - i'm terribly in love with you. i'm sorry josh
1:54pm - No. Im in love. Miserably.
2:59pm - Dont know. Kinda bummin
3:02pm - I dont know
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