Bubba rings.
"I heard you just got off the phone with YogaGirl," she says, excitedly. "You ready for the roller derby? Yeah!"
She is talking with the speed of giddy sleep deprivation.
Bubba, Bubba, Bubba... I say.
She issues forth a few musical beats, the porno soundtrack of her life. She begins to tell me about her hot, steamy affair. In detail.
In psychology, we often consider diagnoses in terms of the "intensity, frequency and duration" of the symptoms. This is, for my afternoon's delight apparently, also the nature of information Bubba decides to share. Some of Prince's music comes close to describing the situation.
When she rang, I was on the verge of falling into an oblivious nap, having been up until past 3 the night before and having awakend around 8:30 to help The Debutante move. So I am there, on the edge of sleep, having just read a Pablo Neruda poem that always makes me think of my unrequited loves ... and Bubba is pouring grease on the fire, shall we say.
Her story moves toward molten lava as she speaks about a particular point where you've had enough, but not quite enough, so you keep on going, "...and then my body just went limp. I mean, I could not lift my own arms and -- huh? oh, do I need to check in?Yeah, yeah. ... No, just an oil change. Oh ... UCM, I need to take care of this. I'll call you later."
With the background noise I'd been hearing, followed by the strange break in her conversation, it became clear to me that some of this molten lava had been oozing forth from our sweet friend while she was ... in the waiting room of a Jiffy Lube.
You all do know, right, that I could totally work *that* line over until it's raw. But why should I do all the work for you. Go forth and imagine nasty things on your own.
All I can say is: Bubba, Bubba, Bubba....
Heh.
.. So, earlier in the day I did something productive. I helped The Deb move. Back before XGF and I split, The Deb lived just down the street from me. When I moved out, I stayed in the neighborhood, so The Deb and I have periodically socialized, run into each other on the street or at the grocery store, gone to concerts in the local park together.
And now she's gone and moved across town, over near where several in this cast of characters I write about go to school.
I'm bummed to lose her from the 'hood, but she and her man-boy and little Bonnie Blue Butler needed a place of their own, rather than living in someone's basement.
And she's got a cute little place. Everything in the kitchen is brand new. Granite countertops, all these stainless steel appliances and a GAS stove. I am so jealous of that gas stove, man. I'm no culinary master or anything, but I do prefer cooking on gas.
After we unloaded the truck, The Deb and I spent a few minutes trying to figure out where to put the furniture. The space is *small,* but we came up with something that seems to work. And because BBB is just four and was away at school when we moved everything, we spent some time setting up her room in hopes it would make the rest of the chaos -- the move, the boxes, the strange new place -- all a little easier to take.
It's probably a good thing we did that, too. Because later, back at the old house after we'd had a bite of lunch, I went down into the basement to help clean up. BBB came down there and looked at the empty main room. Then she went to her old bedroom. I was standing nearby when she walked in, and I heard the little girl gasp at the shock of her empty bedroom. Instinctively, she clutched her chest.
We put all your things in your new bedroom at your new house, I told her. She turned and looked at me, wide-eyed. Your bed is there, your turtle chair is there, your chalkboard is there. Everything is there waiting for you. It's a nice new room.
As the look of shock subsided on her face, I thought: Well, it's about time I got *something* out of that Treatment Planning for Kids class.
'Cause, like, for two weeks, I've been reading about how to talk to children. And for a good 10 months, I've been watching, S2, a real master of making *useful* conversation with young kids, talking to her children.
My motto: Watch and learn. Read and learn. Then try it youself.
Seemed to work.
At least I've stopped making kids cry all the time.
Friday, September 29, 2006
Monday, September 25, 2006
Admissions
First: I discovered something about myself last week. I like ventriloquists.
Each night all week on Letterman, there was a ventriloquism act. One of them left me yawning, but several of them really tickled me.
On Friday night, when Mr. Shineyhead came to pick up his dog, there was a ventroloquist who was using a *live* dog as his dummy. It was really weird. There was some kind of lash that was forcing the dog's mouth open as if it was a dummy. The whole thing was so dissonant that Mr. Shineyhead and I started debating about whether the dog was real or not. Turned out it was.
It was also most peculiar for me to interpret the ventriloquism act into American Sign Language. My TV is old and doesn't have closed captioning, so without my signing, Mr. Shineyhead was out of the loop.
But I couldn't quite figure out how to explain the concept of throwing one's voice to a Deaf person. It seems a simple enough concept, but there was a real gap between what I was able to explain and actually understanding why ventriloquism is even the least bit amusing.
I'm sure, however, that it's not just the Deaf who don't get ventriloquism. Even though funny ones make me laugh, there's something kind of freaky about it. Something that, as S2 might say, makes some people feel very uncomfortable in their body and start squirming.
...
Now, on a different topic, to S2 and Dr. M, I make the following statement:
Hi, my name is UCM, and I'm a high-maintenance-aholic.
Following such an admission, I would like to say that, in the best traditions of recontextualizing, reframing and embracing better narratives about ourselves, I see my "high-maintenance" habits as:
-- a well-defined sense of self
-- being discerning, particular and/or discriminating (take your pick)
-- a result of my rather refined tastes (or perhaps just my disdain for weak drinks and lemon confections).
So even though I admit a certain truth to what you both, individually, pointed out -- lovingly, as friends do -- in the past few days, I sincerely doubt this aspect of my character will change anytime soon. It's a good thing you both are discerning women yourselves. ;-)
...
And, finally: A personality assessment test I took tonight showed me as being highly social, very inclined toward the arts and, at odds with both of those when it comes to career direction, very practical and good with my hands. (I should say that 10 out of 10 women agree: I *am* good with my hands. But I don't quite think that's what the assessment results meant.)
Naturally, these results do *not* suggest I work as a counseling psychologist. Surprise, surprise.
Instead, the top careers for your dear UCM are the following:
- Fashion designer (this made me snort!)
- Paintings restorer
- Exhibit builder
- Optical-effects-camera-operator
- Screen printing inspector (anyone know what the hell that is?)
- Pewterer
Rather peculiar, I'd say, that NONE of my previous careers, nor anything I've envisioned doing in the future, are on this list. Hmmmm.
However, Teacher said that the broader meaning behind my personality traits (a socializing, artistic realist -- and high score for investigative careers, of which psychology is one) indicates that I could very well make a suitable counselor, but that I probably ought to do my counseling *outside* or in some kind of challenging environment that has very little to do with sitting in a quiet office in the same chair all day.
So, like, my idea of opening a retreat center down in the Amazon or some other challenging wilderness where people can leave their regular routines and focus on major life transitions is actually what I *ought* to be doing? I asked.
"That seems very suited to you," Teacher replied.
And then I had a little daydream about opening such a place with The Debutante. Only problem is that she wants troubled people for her clientele (and wants to make them harvest lettuce all day or something), and my idea would be marketed to rich city folk who want to put their Patagonia fashions to practical use while having their souls challenged Outward Bound-style (albeit with a comfortable bed).
There'd be some group therapy and some individual or couples therapy, probably with a major focus on narrative because "the story" is what my perspective is all about.
Then my wealthy, navel-gazing clients would eat a lovely organic salad made of lettuce picked by The Deb's clients. (Heh. Sustainable psychotherapy!) And each day could end with a sauna (or for the more spirtually inclined, a "sweat lodge") with eucalyptus water.
How about that? For once, one of my dreams might actually be something to which I'm suited. Far more suited, in any case, than working as a fashion designer.
Each night all week on Letterman, there was a ventriloquism act. One of them left me yawning, but several of them really tickled me.
On Friday night, when Mr. Shineyhead came to pick up his dog, there was a ventroloquist who was using a *live* dog as his dummy. It was really weird. There was some kind of lash that was forcing the dog's mouth open as if it was a dummy. The whole thing was so dissonant that Mr. Shineyhead and I started debating about whether the dog was real or not. Turned out it was.
It was also most peculiar for me to interpret the ventriloquism act into American Sign Language. My TV is old and doesn't have closed captioning, so without my signing, Mr. Shineyhead was out of the loop.
But I couldn't quite figure out how to explain the concept of throwing one's voice to a Deaf person. It seems a simple enough concept, but there was a real gap between what I was able to explain and actually understanding why ventriloquism is even the least bit amusing.
I'm sure, however, that it's not just the Deaf who don't get ventriloquism. Even though funny ones make me laugh, there's something kind of freaky about it. Something that, as S2 might say, makes some people feel very uncomfortable in their body and start squirming.
...
Now, on a different topic, to S2 and Dr. M, I make the following statement:
Hi, my name is UCM, and I'm a high-maintenance-aholic.
Following such an admission, I would like to say that, in the best traditions of recontextualizing, reframing and embracing better narratives about ourselves, I see my "high-maintenance" habits as:
-- a well-defined sense of self
-- being discerning, particular and/or discriminating (take your pick)
-- a result of my rather refined tastes (or perhaps just my disdain for weak drinks and lemon confections).
So even though I admit a certain truth to what you both, individually, pointed out -- lovingly, as friends do -- in the past few days, I sincerely doubt this aspect of my character will change anytime soon. It's a good thing you both are discerning women yourselves. ;-)
...
And, finally: A personality assessment test I took tonight showed me as being highly social, very inclined toward the arts and, at odds with both of those when it comes to career direction, very practical and good with my hands. (I should say that 10 out of 10 women agree: I *am* good with my hands. But I don't quite think that's what the assessment results meant.)
Naturally, these results do *not* suggest I work as a counseling psychologist. Surprise, surprise.
Instead, the top careers for your dear UCM are the following:
- Fashion designer (this made me snort!)
- Paintings restorer
- Exhibit builder
- Optical-effects-camera-operator
- Screen printing inspector (anyone know what the hell that is?)
- Pewterer
Rather peculiar, I'd say, that NONE of my previous careers, nor anything I've envisioned doing in the future, are on this list. Hmmmm.
However, Teacher said that the broader meaning behind my personality traits (a socializing, artistic realist -- and high score for investigative careers, of which psychology is one) indicates that I could very well make a suitable counselor, but that I probably ought to do my counseling *outside* or in some kind of challenging environment that has very little to do with sitting in a quiet office in the same chair all day.
So, like, my idea of opening a retreat center down in the Amazon or some other challenging wilderness where people can leave their regular routines and focus on major life transitions is actually what I *ought* to be doing? I asked.
"That seems very suited to you," Teacher replied.
And then I had a little daydream about opening such a place with The Debutante. Only problem is that she wants troubled people for her clientele (and wants to make them harvest lettuce all day or something), and my idea would be marketed to rich city folk who want to put their Patagonia fashions to practical use while having their souls challenged Outward Bound-style (albeit with a comfortable bed).
There'd be some group therapy and some individual or couples therapy, probably with a major focus on narrative because "the story" is what my perspective is all about.
Then my wealthy, navel-gazing clients would eat a lovely organic salad made of lettuce picked by The Deb's clients. (Heh. Sustainable psychotherapy!) And each day could end with a sauna (or for the more spirtually inclined, a "sweat lodge") with eucalyptus water.
How about that? For once, one of my dreams might actually be something to which I'm suited. Far more suited, in any case, than working as a fashion designer.
Complete meltdown. Completed.
So I had this strange little meltdown over the weekend in which all my various and sundry psychological problems and not-problems-that-I-make-problems collided with some innocent comments about nurturing, loving, supportive people and my personal "strength" and turned into some really fucked up massive head trip that made me cry. A lot. Like a big baby. In front of two different friends, nonetheless.
I *hate* things like that.
But you know, if you can't find something funny in tragedy and stress, then you're just not looking hard enough.
So what did I find?
Turns out, you, too, can be invited to my Surprise Re-Birthing Party.
Don't even ask what the hell that is, because I can't tell you. It hasn't happened yet. But doesn't it just sound like one of the final circles of hell?
A Re-Birthing Party? And a SURPRISE one?
The Party Boy and I were out for drinks and chow tonight, and both of us nearly lost our beer through our nostrils over the idea. Especially as it seems to include some kind of shuttling of yours truly through the legs of a few friends who may (or may not) be into such rituals.
Suffice it to say, Uh, you know, this is really *not* me.
This is all about where The Good Witch is coming from. She's into rituals. And when she happened to call me this evening to talk to me about a few things, including a story about how she'd been bit by her *own dog,* she asked, about 30 minutes into the conversation, how my weekend had been.
I replied honestly, Well, it was really dreadful, actually, because I had some kind of meltdown that seemed to circle on my dad's spreading cancer, my sister's medical mystery, (this other thing I don't want to talk about), the recollection of several awful childhood memories that were ellicited by reading about ADHD *and* my upcoming birthday. Like, all at *once* in some hideous firestorm in which all I really wanted was someone to *take care of ME* and, like, I CRIED about that to one (OK, two) of my friends, but only one of them witnessed the full bore meltdown, and god bless her, she gave me a cup of tea and a hug in her satiny pajamas, and I realized I've never actually hugged anyone in satiny pajamas before and I thought, Well, the next GF needs to wear some of these....
To which The Good Witch replied, "Mmmmm. Silk pajamas are nice. But you know, I'm going to seize on this birthday thing because I happen to think birthdays are very important. But that's mainly because I really like to blow my own horn and think that the best damn thing that's ever happened in my life is my birth. So what I think I want you to do is ... OK, just think about this, would you?"
You know when there's a pause and someone says, "Just think about this..." that something weird is coming. So I tried not to hold my breath while she continued.
"I'm really into rituals. What do you say you give me some names of some of your friends who you would want to participate in this, and we have a ritual -- OK, I'm still working on it, but this would be the idea: Some kind of re-birthing experience. We could all push you -- or well, you could pass -- beneath our legs in some kind of--"
I don't think so! I replied.
"OK, not pass beneath our legs. Let's see. We could put a bunch of pillows on the floor. Or better yet, we could all get into that gorgeous bed of yours, and then we could start, you know ... uh, stroking you and expressing our love for you and...."
Elbow to the table, I covered my mouth with my hand and listened, feeling a bit horrified. The only way I could make it better was to envision said women all wearing little Playboy bunny outfits while *I* wore the satiny pajamas. Then, they could all be stroking me. But otherwise....
Finally, I cut her off. You know, I appreciate what you're suggesting here, but ... whoa ... just the thought of this has got me feeling really ... uh, uncomfortable.
The Good Witch is NOTHING if not persistent, though, so she replied, "Well, it can be whatever you like it to be. But you know, I think you should really consider some kind of ritual in which you get the power of everything that is the birth of UCM really anchored in *yourself.* You just think about it. It can be anytime in your birth season."
My birth *season*? I asked.
"Oh yes," The Good Witch replied. "Well, my ego is so big and wants so much feeding and birthdays are so important, that I've expanded it to a birth season. To an entire season. Mmm-hmm. We can do this anytime in your birth season. So listen, you just think about it, and then invite S2 to participate in whatever it is."
S2, huh? Oh dear....
Fortunately, at that moment, The Party Boy rang to tell me he was downstairs, so I had to hang up.
Later, at a brew pub, we were talking about our approaching birthdays, his Saturn Return, what my Saturn Return was like, etc., and my philosophy about suicide, which is, in short: You don't know whether *not* being is better or worse than being. If you're such a gambler that you're willing to risk finding out, why not gamble on *this* life?
To which The Party Boy said, "Yeah, there's so much here that I still don't know. I'm intrigued by *this* life and what might come next. What is there here that you don't want to try just once?"
Uh, I do think I have *something* on that list: a re-birthing party.
Then, chatting, we decided that the only thing more disturbing than a re-birthing party in which you're "passed" through your *FRIENDS'* legs as a metaphor for birth would be...
A Surprise Re-Birthing Party.
Like, "SURPRISE!" Care for some stir-fried placenta on grilled pita? And what might I find in *your* vagina tonight?
Now *that* would be fucked up, my friends. REALLY fucked up.
But not quite so fucked up as killing yourself.
In any case, my complete meltdown has apparently been completed. It took a few people to fish me out of it, one of whom offered chips, salsa and discussion about "community," and another who offered a satiny hug and cup of tea (not to mention a rather funny image of me standing on a scale, obsessively taking my temperature, getting my blood pressure checked and having my eyes examined all at the same fucking time).
There was also a third and a fourth friend who happened upon accident to turn over the rock beneath which I was hiding. And a fifth who, bless her soul, wants to "re-birth" me.
All I can say is that, thanks to the collective effort, part of me feels reborn already.
And the rest of me is thinking, Well, if it can be *any* ritual I choose, why not something that involves soaking in a hot tub, rubbing me down with frangrant oils, feeding me wine and braised lamb with raisins and then letting me drift to sleep, while being soothingly caressed by any one of the six or seven really beautiful women I know, between freshly laundered sheets?
Heh. Now *that* is my idea of a good time. By all means, make it into a ritual. And I shall be reborn ... as the hedonist to which I've long aspired.
I *hate* things like that.
But you know, if you can't find something funny in tragedy and stress, then you're just not looking hard enough.
So what did I find?
Turns out, you, too, can be invited to my Surprise Re-Birthing Party.
Don't even ask what the hell that is, because I can't tell you. It hasn't happened yet. But doesn't it just sound like one of the final circles of hell?
A Re-Birthing Party? And a SURPRISE one?
The Party Boy and I were out for drinks and chow tonight, and both of us nearly lost our beer through our nostrils over the idea. Especially as it seems to include some kind of shuttling of yours truly through the legs of a few friends who may (or may not) be into such rituals.
Suffice it to say, Uh, you know, this is really *not* me.
This is all about where The Good Witch is coming from. She's into rituals. And when she happened to call me this evening to talk to me about a few things, including a story about how she'd been bit by her *own dog,* she asked, about 30 minutes into the conversation, how my weekend had been.
I replied honestly, Well, it was really dreadful, actually, because I had some kind of meltdown that seemed to circle on my dad's spreading cancer, my sister's medical mystery, (this other thing I don't want to talk about), the recollection of several awful childhood memories that were ellicited by reading about ADHD *and* my upcoming birthday. Like, all at *once* in some hideous firestorm in which all I really wanted was someone to *take care of ME* and, like, I CRIED about that to one (OK, two) of my friends, but only one of them witnessed the full bore meltdown, and god bless her, she gave me a cup of tea and a hug in her satiny pajamas, and I realized I've never actually hugged anyone in satiny pajamas before and I thought, Well, the next GF needs to wear some of these....
To which The Good Witch replied, "Mmmmm. Silk pajamas are nice. But you know, I'm going to seize on this birthday thing because I happen to think birthdays are very important. But that's mainly because I really like to blow my own horn and think that the best damn thing that's ever happened in my life is my birth. So what I think I want you to do is ... OK, just think about this, would you?"
You know when there's a pause and someone says, "Just think about this..." that something weird is coming. So I tried not to hold my breath while she continued.
"I'm really into rituals. What do you say you give me some names of some of your friends who you would want to participate in this, and we have a ritual -- OK, I'm still working on it, but this would be the idea: Some kind of re-birthing experience. We could all push you -- or well, you could pass -- beneath our legs in some kind of--"
I don't think so! I replied.
"OK, not pass beneath our legs. Let's see. We could put a bunch of pillows on the floor. Or better yet, we could all get into that gorgeous bed of yours, and then we could start, you know ... uh, stroking you and expressing our love for you and...."
Elbow to the table, I covered my mouth with my hand and listened, feeling a bit horrified. The only way I could make it better was to envision said women all wearing little Playboy bunny outfits while *I* wore the satiny pajamas. Then, they could all be stroking me. But otherwise....
Finally, I cut her off. You know, I appreciate what you're suggesting here, but ... whoa ... just the thought of this has got me feeling really ... uh, uncomfortable.
The Good Witch is NOTHING if not persistent, though, so she replied, "Well, it can be whatever you like it to be. But you know, I think you should really consider some kind of ritual in which you get the power of everything that is the birth of UCM really anchored in *yourself.* You just think about it. It can be anytime in your birth season."
My birth *season*? I asked.
"Oh yes," The Good Witch replied. "Well, my ego is so big and wants so much feeding and birthdays are so important, that I've expanded it to a birth season. To an entire season. Mmm-hmm. We can do this anytime in your birth season. So listen, you just think about it, and then invite S2 to participate in whatever it is."
S2, huh? Oh dear....
Fortunately, at that moment, The Party Boy rang to tell me he was downstairs, so I had to hang up.
Later, at a brew pub, we were talking about our approaching birthdays, his Saturn Return, what my Saturn Return was like, etc., and my philosophy about suicide, which is, in short: You don't know whether *not* being is better or worse than being. If you're such a gambler that you're willing to risk finding out, why not gamble on *this* life?
To which The Party Boy said, "Yeah, there's so much here that I still don't know. I'm intrigued by *this* life and what might come next. What is there here that you don't want to try just once?"
Uh, I do think I have *something* on that list: a re-birthing party.
Then, chatting, we decided that the only thing more disturbing than a re-birthing party in which you're "passed" through your *FRIENDS'* legs as a metaphor for birth would be...
A Surprise Re-Birthing Party.
Like, "SURPRISE!" Care for some stir-fried placenta on grilled pita? And what might I find in *your* vagina tonight?
Now *that* would be fucked up, my friends. REALLY fucked up.
But not quite so fucked up as killing yourself.
In any case, my complete meltdown has apparently been completed. It took a few people to fish me out of it, one of whom offered chips, salsa and discussion about "community," and another who offered a satiny hug and cup of tea (not to mention a rather funny image of me standing on a scale, obsessively taking my temperature, getting my blood pressure checked and having my eyes examined all at the same fucking time).
There was also a third and a fourth friend who happened upon accident to turn over the rock beneath which I was hiding. And a fifth who, bless her soul, wants to "re-birth" me.
All I can say is that, thanks to the collective effort, part of me feels reborn already.
And the rest of me is thinking, Well, if it can be *any* ritual I choose, why not something that involves soaking in a hot tub, rubbing me down with frangrant oils, feeding me wine and braised lamb with raisins and then letting me drift to sleep, while being soothingly caressed by any one of the six or seven really beautiful women I know, between freshly laundered sheets?
Heh. Now *that* is my idea of a good time. By all means, make it into a ritual. And I shall be reborn ... as the hedonist to which I've long aspired.
Wednesday, September 20, 2006
Beside myself
OK. I have just finished the day after one of those days from hell. Which means that I spent all day doing the things I should've done yesterday and today -- and frankly, because I kicked ass, I also did some things I expected I would still be doing tomorrow (which, from the clock on my computer, I see is actually today. Fuck.)
See, this here girl doesn't like it when People of Meaning (some more than others) in her life pop in with disturbing or just plain old mysterious (and not in a good way) news or stories.
And the last couple of days have been full of that shit.
My dad told me on Sunday that the rather tenacious prostate cancer he's been dealing with has in fact spread. "To somewhere nearby." Obviously, there's something dad doesn't want to say. I'm just not sure what. (Something weird is definitely going on with him. When I asked him what he'd been up to lately, he said, "Watching TV," and it was only through a little bit more questioning that I learned he had, that very morning, been on a hot-air balloon ride, the first of his life. Hmmm.)
Then, my sister, Dr. HW landed in the hospital for the second time in a week. The first go-around, which she informed me of on Saturday in a joke-filled e-mail about living "48 hours of someone else's life," the MDs were inspecting her for congestive heart failure or a pulmonary embolism. They decided that wasn't the problem and sent her home.
And then on Sunday, she got a "really weird period" that ... hmmm ... today, having been admitted to the hospital again after passing out Monday in her doc's waiting room, the MDs gave her two units of blood and a spinal tap and scheduled her for an MRI on her head on Wednesday. She's been having shortness of breath for about a month. And she's got a fluttering heart. And massive dizziness that has caused her to fall down a couple times.
What the fuck does *that* all eqaul?
Unless you want me to describe the procedures for a Living-Related Bilateral Lung Transplant or a Pallidotomy or a host of other relatively novel or unusual medical procedures with which I've been acquainted in my role of Professional Observer of Unusual Things (a POUT), I can't even fathom to guess what the devil is wrong with Dr. HW.
Alas, one of the things it does seem to have equaled is the re-emergence of The Notorious M.O.M., who left the following voicemail for me: "UCM, this is mom. Dr. HW is in the hospital, and they don't know what's wrong with her. Thought you'd want to know. Bye."
What hospital? Where? (Considering Dr. HW lives in two different states, it's *useful information,* right?) But The Notorious M.O.M. has this really nasty habit of filtering all information in an attempt to give herself more power and, I think, in hopes of making me go to her for the news. (Not gonna happen.)
As a courtesy, I called back and told her I was driving into an area with bad cell coverage (so I could easily end the call) and she told me ... nothing useful.
This morning, wondering just what the hell was up, I started calling the hospitals in the city where my sister teaches college, and asked, Is Dr. HW there? It didn't take long. Thank god university towns tend to be small. This one only had three or four hospitals where one might reasonably go for mysterious ailments.
In between the medical news of my dad's "neighboring" cancer and my sister's medical mystery, there came a most curious, dramatic, entralling and highly disturbing story of survival from XGF. More details later. She reads this thing -- likes to torture herself, obviously -- and I can't imagine she wants to read about this just yet.
Perhaps when the spinach scare has died down and it's a slow news day, I'll get into it.
Having all this shit swirling around in my head -- wondering, as I am prone to under such circumstances, Who's gonna drop next? -- I've lost some precious sleep.
I've also been drowning under the weight of my reading assignments from the classes I'm taking this term. Well, really, it's only two of the classes that are giving me fits. The third seems to be sinfully easy in comparison.
So with worries abounding and with more than 100 pages to read in the next two days and three lightweight (but still THERE) paper-like things to write before Thursday, what does your UCM do to cope with the stress?
Sleep until 10:30? That's a given. ... But what else? Wine? No. Massage? No. Take two hours out of the middle of her precious afternoon reading time (which was blown all to hell on Monday with everyone talking story) to go shopping? YOU BET!
I needed some rain gear. But, as usual, I came out of the store with a big bag of something else. All I can say, though, is thank the heavens because my cold-weather wardrobe was in even worse shape than my warm-weather stuff. I'd managed to whittle myself down to ONE pair of full-length pants (jeans that used to belong to XGF), and my closet overfloweth with corduroy shirts that are too big and ... just say, "ug" OK? I needed some goddamned clothes.
And now, I must return to the store later this very day and buy the damn rain gear! Because he is appropriately groomed, my dog is waterproof; I, however, am not (on either point).
On the upside, however, I talked to my Tia L this evening -- to ask her when I should toss the shrimp into the jambalaya (as the recipe she dictated to me a couple weeks ago didn't include that information) -- and she informed me of her intent to visit the PNW sometime in the next few weeks. Cool!
And the jambalaya came out good. I shocked myself. But then, Tia L knows her cajun, and I was following her recipe (though I couldn't find Tony Chachere's around these parts). ... I miss New Orleans. But right now, I've got a little bit of her in my fridge, and with any luck, she'll spice up over night.
While I sleep. Presently.
See, this here girl doesn't like it when People of Meaning (some more than others) in her life pop in with disturbing or just plain old mysterious (and not in a good way) news or stories.
And the last couple of days have been full of that shit.
My dad told me on Sunday that the rather tenacious prostate cancer he's been dealing with has in fact spread. "To somewhere nearby." Obviously, there's something dad doesn't want to say. I'm just not sure what. (Something weird is definitely going on with him. When I asked him what he'd been up to lately, he said, "Watching TV," and it was only through a little bit more questioning that I learned he had, that very morning, been on a hot-air balloon ride, the first of his life. Hmmm.)
Then, my sister, Dr. HW landed in the hospital for the second time in a week. The first go-around, which she informed me of on Saturday in a joke-filled e-mail about living "48 hours of someone else's life," the MDs were inspecting her for congestive heart failure or a pulmonary embolism. They decided that wasn't the problem and sent her home.
And then on Sunday, she got a "really weird period" that ... hmmm ... today, having been admitted to the hospital again after passing out Monday in her doc's waiting room, the MDs gave her two units of blood and a spinal tap and scheduled her for an MRI on her head on Wednesday. She's been having shortness of breath for about a month. And she's got a fluttering heart. And massive dizziness that has caused her to fall down a couple times.
What the fuck does *that* all eqaul?
Unless you want me to describe the procedures for a Living-Related Bilateral Lung Transplant or a Pallidotomy or a host of other relatively novel or unusual medical procedures with which I've been acquainted in my role of Professional Observer of Unusual Things (a POUT), I can't even fathom to guess what the devil is wrong with Dr. HW.
Alas, one of the things it does seem to have equaled is the re-emergence of The Notorious M.O.M., who left the following voicemail for me: "UCM, this is mom. Dr. HW is in the hospital, and they don't know what's wrong with her. Thought you'd want to know. Bye."
What hospital? Where? (Considering Dr. HW lives in two different states, it's *useful information,* right?) But The Notorious M.O.M. has this really nasty habit of filtering all information in an attempt to give herself more power and, I think, in hopes of making me go to her for the news. (Not gonna happen.)
As a courtesy, I called back and told her I was driving into an area with bad cell coverage (so I could easily end the call) and she told me ... nothing useful.
This morning, wondering just what the hell was up, I started calling the hospitals in the city where my sister teaches college, and asked, Is Dr. HW there? It didn't take long. Thank god university towns tend to be small. This one only had three or four hospitals where one might reasonably go for mysterious ailments.
In between the medical news of my dad's "neighboring" cancer and my sister's medical mystery, there came a most curious, dramatic, entralling and highly disturbing story of survival from XGF. More details later. She reads this thing -- likes to torture herself, obviously -- and I can't imagine she wants to read about this just yet.
Perhaps when the spinach scare has died down and it's a slow news day, I'll get into it.
Having all this shit swirling around in my head -- wondering, as I am prone to under such circumstances, Who's gonna drop next? -- I've lost some precious sleep.
I've also been drowning under the weight of my reading assignments from the classes I'm taking this term. Well, really, it's only two of the classes that are giving me fits. The third seems to be sinfully easy in comparison.
So with worries abounding and with more than 100 pages to read in the next two days and three lightweight (but still THERE) paper-like things to write before Thursday, what does your UCM do to cope with the stress?
Sleep until 10:30? That's a given. ... But what else? Wine? No. Massage? No. Take two hours out of the middle of her precious afternoon reading time (which was blown all to hell on Monday with everyone talking story) to go shopping? YOU BET!
I needed some rain gear. But, as usual, I came out of the store with a big bag of something else. All I can say, though, is thank the heavens because my cold-weather wardrobe was in even worse shape than my warm-weather stuff. I'd managed to whittle myself down to ONE pair of full-length pants (jeans that used to belong to XGF), and my closet overfloweth with corduroy shirts that are too big and ... just say, "ug" OK? I needed some goddamned clothes.
And now, I must return to the store later this very day and buy the damn rain gear! Because he is appropriately groomed, my dog is waterproof; I, however, am not (on either point).
On the upside, however, I talked to my Tia L this evening -- to ask her when I should toss the shrimp into the jambalaya (as the recipe she dictated to me a couple weeks ago didn't include that information) -- and she informed me of her intent to visit the PNW sometime in the next few weeks. Cool!
And the jambalaya came out good. I shocked myself. But then, Tia L knows her cajun, and I was following her recipe (though I couldn't find Tony Chachere's around these parts). ... I miss New Orleans. But right now, I've got a little bit of her in my fridge, and with any luck, she'll spice up over night.
While I sleep. Presently.
Tuesday, September 19, 2006
Everybody stay where you are!
Sometimes, it feels like everyone around me is going to hell in a handbasket, and I am just ... watching it all happen.
If you are alive and healthy, have had no recent near-death experiences and are in good spirits as you read this (and if you also happen to know me), count yourself among the fortunate ones. And please, for the love of all that is sweet in life, STAY THAT WAY.
Nobody move!
Just chill.
And don't eat the spinach, people. For godssake, STAY AWAY FROM THE SPINACH!
If you are alive and healthy, have had no recent near-death experiences and are in good spirits as you read this (and if you also happen to know me), count yourself among the fortunate ones. And please, for the love of all that is sweet in life, STAY THAT WAY.
Nobody move!
Just chill.
And don't eat the spinach, people. For godssake, STAY AWAY FROM THE SPINACH!
Sunday, September 17, 2006
Speaking in tongues
I don't know what happened, exactly, to our little "get together," but in the end, Dr. M excused herself because of an early morning run, S2 went camping and The Debutante ... well, something happened with her that didn't sound so swell when we last talked. (Deb, if you read this: Soothing, empathetic thoughts coming your way. Chill, babe. Just chill.)
So Bubba came over, and she brought an attractive lady friend who clearly has the hots for our dear Bubba. But it's one of those "complicated" things. And we all know how that is. (Regardless of the particular complication.)
For the past six hours, we've been drinking, listening to music and talking about ... orgasms. It is my opinion that orgasms are a *completely* subjective experience. Impossible to compare woman to woman. And, frankly, even *within* the same woman (me), there are several different "types" of orgasms. None of which can adequately be compared to the other.
But we had a big old vigorous discussion about the topic. I have no idea what I said to warrant such a comment, but Bubba's lady friend pointed at me and said to Bubba, "This is a passionate woman! I mean, a woman of tremendous passion."
Heh.
Really, I hadn't even been drinking all that much, and I was just talking about something that happened to me last February and invoved NO ONE. Not even myself. Well, I mean, it did involve myself, but not in that "self-care" kind of way. It was just ... something. (Nevermind....)
Anyway, Bubba's gal is a lawyer. A Sarah-Lawrence-and-London-School-of-Economics (prior to law school) educated kind of woman. Very bright. And seriously good looking. (It's never *not* complicated with those beautiful, intelligent women, is it? Poor Bubba. I feel her pain.)
So it was as they were leaving a bit after 3 a.m. that I told the lawyerly hot chick -- who gave me some interesting counsel on a do-it-myself will -- about a really sad conversation I had with a woman earlier today. I never had any question I was right, but it was nice, even at 3 in the morning with intoxicants at play, to have myself confirmed.
This is the deal. There was an arts festival on my street today. I live near a studio named "Ex Machina," and as a bit of a word geek, I've always kind of liked seeing its sign in the window near my home.
Deus ex machina, for those unfamiliar, is basically an unlikely or improbable -- or even impossible -- resolution to a conflict in literature or plays. Like when something goes to hell and then the character in crisis awakens to reveal to all of us that it was just a dream (for those of you old enough to remember, think of Bobby's resurrection via the "shower scene" in "Dallas," in which we find out that his death and the entire last season was all a dream). Or when a god sweeps in at the last moment and saves everyone from certain death. (The Bible is full of stuff like that.)
But I was buying this little piece of art today, and it turned out to be from the woman who works in the Ex Machina studio. She says to me, "This is my studio here," and points at the building.
Ex Machina? I reply, pronouncing it "ex mock-ee-nah."
She nods but corrects my pronunciation with: "Ex Machine-ah. It means 'of the machine.' "
Oh, I say politely. That's an interesting little twist. I guess....
"What?" she asks.
Prounouncing it that way. Like "machine."
"That's how it's pronounced," she says.
Well, no..., I say, as polite as possible. In the Latin pronunciation -- which it *is* still Latin -- it's said, 'mock-ee-nah.'
She has a friend standing next to her who says, "I told you that the other day."
But this artist ignores her and is insistent with me. "In my classes, it was always, "ex machine-ah." You know, it's from 'deus (pron: duessss) ex machine-ah.' That's how you say it. And it means 'of the machine.' "
I got a little purturbed. Because you know what? THE CUSTOMER IS ALWAYS RIGHT! Hello! ... And so I said, No, actually, it's pronounced like 'day ex mock-ee-nah,' and it's a literary device that means something like, 'god in the machine.'
Faced with this knowledge of mine and the check I was handing her for her attractive little artwork, you know what she said? She said, "No, I'm pretty sure it's said, 'ex machine-ah.' "
Whatever.
But then, I'm somone who has recently gotten so annoyed with total strangers on the street referring to my Cairn terrier as a "Karen" terrier that I've started kind of snipping at them, Cairn. It's pronounced 'cairn.'
As if they care.
Don't even get me started on the pronunciation of "forte."
Well, it's late. I'm tired. That's enough of that.
To recap: It's "day ex mock-ee-nah." It's "Cairn," not "Karen." And your strong suit is your "fort," not your "fort-ay." The latter is an increase in volume during a musical performance.
And yes, I'm sure you all know how to pronounce "bitch." So go ahead....
So Bubba came over, and she brought an attractive lady friend who clearly has the hots for our dear Bubba. But it's one of those "complicated" things. And we all know how that is. (Regardless of the particular complication.)
For the past six hours, we've been drinking, listening to music and talking about ... orgasms. It is my opinion that orgasms are a *completely* subjective experience. Impossible to compare woman to woman. And, frankly, even *within* the same woman (me), there are several different "types" of orgasms. None of which can adequately be compared to the other.
But we had a big old vigorous discussion about the topic. I have no idea what I said to warrant such a comment, but Bubba's lady friend pointed at me and said to Bubba, "This is a passionate woman! I mean, a woman of tremendous passion."
Heh.
Really, I hadn't even been drinking all that much, and I was just talking about something that happened to me last February and invoved NO ONE. Not even myself. Well, I mean, it did involve myself, but not in that "self-care" kind of way. It was just ... something. (Nevermind....)
Anyway, Bubba's gal is a lawyer. A Sarah-Lawrence-and-London-School-of-Economics (prior to law school) educated kind of woman. Very bright. And seriously good looking. (It's never *not* complicated with those beautiful, intelligent women, is it? Poor Bubba. I feel her pain.)
So it was as they were leaving a bit after 3 a.m. that I told the lawyerly hot chick -- who gave me some interesting counsel on a do-it-myself will -- about a really sad conversation I had with a woman earlier today. I never had any question I was right, but it was nice, even at 3 in the morning with intoxicants at play, to have myself confirmed.
This is the deal. There was an arts festival on my street today. I live near a studio named "Ex Machina," and as a bit of a word geek, I've always kind of liked seeing its sign in the window near my home.
Deus ex machina, for those unfamiliar, is basically an unlikely or improbable -- or even impossible -- resolution to a conflict in literature or plays. Like when something goes to hell and then the character in crisis awakens to reveal to all of us that it was just a dream (for those of you old enough to remember, think of Bobby's resurrection via the "shower scene" in "Dallas," in which we find out that his death and the entire last season was all a dream). Or when a god sweeps in at the last moment and saves everyone from certain death. (The Bible is full of stuff like that.)
But I was buying this little piece of art today, and it turned out to be from the woman who works in the Ex Machina studio. She says to me, "This is my studio here," and points at the building.
Ex Machina? I reply, pronouncing it "ex mock-ee-nah."
She nods but corrects my pronunciation with: "Ex Machine-ah. It means 'of the machine.' "
Oh, I say politely. That's an interesting little twist. I guess....
"What?" she asks.
Prounouncing it that way. Like "machine."
"That's how it's pronounced," she says.
Well, no..., I say, as polite as possible. In the Latin pronunciation -- which it *is* still Latin -- it's said, 'mock-ee-nah.'
She has a friend standing next to her who says, "I told you that the other day."
But this artist ignores her and is insistent with me. "In my classes, it was always, "ex machine-ah." You know, it's from 'deus (pron: duessss) ex machine-ah.' That's how you say it. And it means 'of the machine.' "
I got a little purturbed. Because you know what? THE CUSTOMER IS ALWAYS RIGHT! Hello! ... And so I said, No, actually, it's pronounced like 'day ex mock-ee-nah,' and it's a literary device that means something like, 'god in the machine.'
Faced with this knowledge of mine and the check I was handing her for her attractive little artwork, you know what she said? She said, "No, I'm pretty sure it's said, 'ex machine-ah.' "
Whatever.
But then, I'm somone who has recently gotten so annoyed with total strangers on the street referring to my Cairn terrier as a "Karen" terrier that I've started kind of snipping at them, Cairn. It's pronounced 'cairn.'
As if they care.
Don't even get me started on the pronunciation of "forte."
Well, it's late. I'm tired. That's enough of that.
To recap: It's "day ex mock-ee-nah." It's "Cairn," not "Karen." And your strong suit is your "fort," not your "fort-ay." The latter is an increase in volume during a musical performance.
And yes, I'm sure you all know how to pronounce "bitch." So go ahead....
Friday, September 15, 2006
Tid bits
Alright. Today was a weird one. In a boring sort of way. Which is why it shall be reported in "tid bits" rather than with any sense-making narrative:
-- There was the Really Fucking Awful Traffic Jam.
All I was trying to do was buy some clothes. This is not something I normally go out of my way to do. In fact, I hate shopping for clothes. Clothiers rarely make duds I like for bodies like mine. But I was going shopping. Or I was *trying* to go shopping.
Which is when I ended up in the really fucking awful traffic jam. On a surface street that is normally my quick shot into downtown -- I was trying to go to the Columbia mothership to get some rain gear so I could walk the pup in relative comfort -- I found what I guess some would compare to a Boston gridlock. I was stuck there. Nothing was moving. Nothing was happening. Lots of time lapsed. I started getting hungry. I started thinking about the Donner Party and other humans who have run out of food and gotten desperately hungry.
I called S2, got her voice mail and left TWO explitive-filled voice mails about traffic and hunger and stupid drivers. In the middle of leaving the second one, S2 happened to call me from her cell phone on the way home from class. Somehow, traffic was moving where she was. She informed me of some kind of cataclysmic accident on the south-bound deck of a double-decker on I-5 that occurred about six hours prior, and it gave me some small shed of sense-making to hold onto while I undertook some dangerous maneurvers in my car and managed to etch my way into a drive-thru to get a turkey burger.
On the way, S2 got the front-seat version of my traffic woes, hearing me yell at some stranger, Don't honk at me you fucking bitch! You're in the wrong. Get the hell outta the way!
S2, with whom I periodically sigh in unison as we navigate the traffic on the way to school, laughed and said, "I see how it is with you today! Whoa!"
As this blog would suggest, eventually I made my way home. When I spoke to S2 six hours later, she said, "Well, I'm glad to see you made it home after all!"
And I replied, in not a terribly dishonest fashion, TEN MINUTES AGO! Because *that's* how bad the goddamned traffic jam was.
-- I walked about half the span of the St. John's bridge. And I apparently became a patron of the arts in the process.
Just as I was finally making my way out of that really fucking awful traffic jam, The One called me up and asked me if we were "still on."
Some time ago, when I was feeling rich, I told The One, who does really stunning paintings of all things industrial, that I would like him to do a painting of the St. John's Bridge for me. As artists tend to do, he waited for a while before following up. He waited, basically, until I was *not* feeling rich.
Well, whatever.
I still want the painting. The question is only whether I will feel like I can afford it. (One more reason to get a job!)
A week or so ago, The One rang me up and asked if I would accompany him out to the St. John's Bridge to talk with him about the piece I am ... uh, commissioning. (Excuse the hesitation. I'm not used to being a patron. Normally I'm just an observer.)
So we drove out to the bridge, and The One took a barrow-load of photos of it from every conceivable angle facing west. I particularly like the west-facing view because it contrasts the very Bat Man's Gotham-ness of the bridge against the backdrop of Forest Park, a solid swath of trees and nature. I simply love it.
In the process of getting these photos, The One and I walked about a third of the span from the East approach, getting to the first of the suspension arches. As with the Golden Gate, there's something of a thrill to being on a high suspension bridge with a stunning view. They are Jumping Off Places. I felt no desire to jump, but when The One pointed to a gaggle of geese flying past the gothic arch soaring above my head, I did get a touch of vertigo, to which I'm very susceptible.
So it was a modest thrill to walk along that bridge. All the more spectacular to go beneath it, to Cathedral Park, and observe the gracious gothic arches that support the bridge from beneath, in addition to those above. Really beautiful work. They don't make 'em like they used to.
It'll be interesting to see what materializes in the coming months from this project.
-- I finally got my duvet cover back.
Here's something creepy. When I was in Hawaii, S2 came into my home to do me a favor (thanks again, S2!). Her visit marked the first time that Getting To Yes, the 6 year old, had come into my place. Strangely, Getting To Yes asked S2 where my duvet cover was.
How would a 6-year-old girl know my duvet cover was missing? It's not like the white down comforter looked terribly out of place on my bed. ... She's very fashion conscious, I guess.
Anyway, WEEKS ago, I took it into the tailor to have it repaired, as it had been accidentally ripped, along a weak seem, by the enthusiastic bouncing of another young girl. The tailor took her lolly-gagging time with it, but she made up for the long delay in finishing it by reinforcing extra lengths of the seems in question.
It cost me $25 to get the duvet repaired. But given the fact that some kind of computer error resulted in me getting this $300 silk duvet for $9.99 in the first place, I'm coming out well ahead. I'd be especially pissed if I'd paid full price.
It was my trip to pick up the duvet from this tailor, before heading to buy clothes, that landed me in the Really Fucking Awful Traffic Jam in the first place. So that brings me full circle. Enough said.
-- There was the Really Fucking Awful Traffic Jam.
All I was trying to do was buy some clothes. This is not something I normally go out of my way to do. In fact, I hate shopping for clothes. Clothiers rarely make duds I like for bodies like mine. But I was going shopping. Or I was *trying* to go shopping.
Which is when I ended up in the really fucking awful traffic jam. On a surface street that is normally my quick shot into downtown -- I was trying to go to the Columbia mothership to get some rain gear so I could walk the pup in relative comfort -- I found what I guess some would compare to a Boston gridlock. I was stuck there. Nothing was moving. Nothing was happening. Lots of time lapsed. I started getting hungry. I started thinking about the Donner Party and other humans who have run out of food and gotten desperately hungry.
I called S2, got her voice mail and left TWO explitive-filled voice mails about traffic and hunger and stupid drivers. In the middle of leaving the second one, S2 happened to call me from her cell phone on the way home from class. Somehow, traffic was moving where she was. She informed me of some kind of cataclysmic accident on the south-bound deck of a double-decker on I-5 that occurred about six hours prior, and it gave me some small shed of sense-making to hold onto while I undertook some dangerous maneurvers in my car and managed to etch my way into a drive-thru to get a turkey burger.
On the way, S2 got the front-seat version of my traffic woes, hearing me yell at some stranger, Don't honk at me you fucking bitch! You're in the wrong. Get the hell outta the way!
S2, with whom I periodically sigh in unison as we navigate the traffic on the way to school, laughed and said, "I see how it is with you today! Whoa!"
As this blog would suggest, eventually I made my way home. When I spoke to S2 six hours later, she said, "Well, I'm glad to see you made it home after all!"
And I replied, in not a terribly dishonest fashion, TEN MINUTES AGO! Because *that's* how bad the goddamned traffic jam was.
-- I walked about half the span of the St. John's bridge. And I apparently became a patron of the arts in the process.
Just as I was finally making my way out of that really fucking awful traffic jam, The One called me up and asked me if we were "still on."
Some time ago, when I was feeling rich, I told The One, who does really stunning paintings of all things industrial, that I would like him to do a painting of the St. John's Bridge for me. As artists tend to do, he waited for a while before following up. He waited, basically, until I was *not* feeling rich.
Well, whatever.
I still want the painting. The question is only whether I will feel like I can afford it. (One more reason to get a job!)
A week or so ago, The One rang me up and asked if I would accompany him out to the St. John's Bridge to talk with him about the piece I am ... uh, commissioning. (Excuse the hesitation. I'm not used to being a patron. Normally I'm just an observer.)
So we drove out to the bridge, and The One took a barrow-load of photos of it from every conceivable angle facing west. I particularly like the west-facing view because it contrasts the very Bat Man's Gotham-ness of the bridge against the backdrop of Forest Park, a solid swath of trees and nature. I simply love it.
In the process of getting these photos, The One and I walked about a third of the span from the East approach, getting to the first of the suspension arches. As with the Golden Gate, there's something of a thrill to being on a high suspension bridge with a stunning view. They are Jumping Off Places. I felt no desire to jump, but when The One pointed to a gaggle of geese flying past the gothic arch soaring above my head, I did get a touch of vertigo, to which I'm very susceptible.
So it was a modest thrill to walk along that bridge. All the more spectacular to go beneath it, to Cathedral Park, and observe the gracious gothic arches that support the bridge from beneath, in addition to those above. Really beautiful work. They don't make 'em like they used to.
It'll be interesting to see what materializes in the coming months from this project.
-- I finally got my duvet cover back.
Here's something creepy. When I was in Hawaii, S2 came into my home to do me a favor (thanks again, S2!). Her visit marked the first time that Getting To Yes, the 6 year old, had come into my place. Strangely, Getting To Yes asked S2 where my duvet cover was.
How would a 6-year-old girl know my duvet cover was missing? It's not like the white down comforter looked terribly out of place on my bed. ... She's very fashion conscious, I guess.
Anyway, WEEKS ago, I took it into the tailor to have it repaired, as it had been accidentally ripped, along a weak seem, by the enthusiastic bouncing of another young girl. The tailor took her lolly-gagging time with it, but she made up for the long delay in finishing it by reinforcing extra lengths of the seems in question.
It cost me $25 to get the duvet repaired. But given the fact that some kind of computer error resulted in me getting this $300 silk duvet for $9.99 in the first place, I'm coming out well ahead. I'd be especially pissed if I'd paid full price.
It was my trip to pick up the duvet from this tailor, before heading to buy clothes, that landed me in the Really Fucking Awful Traffic Jam in the first place. So that brings me full circle. Enough said.
Changing seasons
Tonight I got home from class a little after 9 and took the pup on his evening walk. Two months ago, it was still daylight when I got home from class. The pup and I would enjoy a stroll in the waning sunlight, passing dozens of people on our way through the neighborhood. Tonight, it was cool, damp and dark.
Summer is gone. Fall is peeking through the thinning leaves on the trees. Two months hence, I'll be wearing gloves and turning my collar against a cold, wet wind.
But it's not just in this physical world that I can sense the changing seasons. My life itself seems to be on the cusp of one season and another.
I'd like to believe it's just a pensive mood. That the change in the weather is affecting my outlook. That the cold I've been trying to kick for two weeks has distorted my perspective.
But last night, on the way home from class, I told S2 that I kept hearing Fleetwood Mac's "Landslide" in my head, particularly the verse, "Can I sail through the changing ocean tides? Can I handle the seasons of my life?"
I said to S2, I feel like a season is changing.
We're the same age, S2 and I. And so I felt unsettled when she nodded and said, "I think you're probably right. I feel something changing, too."
But what the hell is it?
It can't be that my body is going to shit. My body went to shit a long time ago, and it's actually on its way back to something better. Nor do I think it's my approaching birthday: Number 38. Numerical age has never been a problem for me (though, upon turning 35, I did gulp rather hard when I realized I was half way to 70).
It can't be my gray hair. I've been dealing with that since 17, and for the past nine months of coloring it, I've looked more youthful than I have in a decade.
So I don't think it's physical. I'm not even sure it's about the loss of my youth. Except for the damnable cold I've had for nearly two weeks, I feel more energetic and more attractive than I can recall feeling in many, many years.
But there is something changing. Some phase, some season, is ending.
Was it the one in which I might have had children? Was it the one in which I might have seen career "success" if I'd stuck with something for long enough? Was it the one in which I might have been expected to be married? Was it the one in which, had I bothered to do *one fucking thing* in a traditional way, I might have ended up with a set of fine china or some real silverwear?
Or is it a season of discontent that is coming to an end? Is it the insecurity of youth that is falling by the wayside? Is it the part of my life in which I let others influence my choices too much, in which I worked on blending in (and failed!), in which I was more fearful of bold moves, that is now taking a backseat to something different?
I honestly couldn't tell you which is the case. I don't know which season is passing, and I don't know which is coming. But I feel something changing.
I suppose it doesn't matter. Life has its seasons. They change. We have no option of going back, so we go forward.
I told S2 the other night that I have no real goals; I've only ever wanted to be a hedonist. That is, essentially, true, but my particular brand of hedonism would go beyond your typical gluttony, sex free-for-all, draping myself in sensuously soft materials while naked, nubile nymphs place my feet between their breasts and rub me with delicious-smelling oils while Yo-Yo Ma plays Bach's cello suites nearby.
There would be all that, of course. Everyone has to have aspirations.
But my version of hedonism would include a lot of adventure and a fair amount of shameless risk-taking, in between which I would relax in the aforementioned manner (nymphs, Yo-Yo Ma and all). I would travel and explore relentlessly.
I can't figure what else there is to life than the knowing of as much of it as possible (comments made Monday to Dr. M about not wanting to learn certain topics notwithstanding -- it's a matter of focusing what I do with my precious bodily resources). I make the effort to keep my mind open and inquisitive, and I try to live my life thusly, whether or not I make the measure of hedonism.
Even so, it feels like a part of me is standing on Pacific cliff and seeing the curvature of the earth for the first time. Seeing the sun setting there, a voice within is saying, But wait a minute! Don't go just yet. I'm not ready to relinquish this.
As if I have a choice.
Each end begets a beginning. With any luck, it will be my favorite season of all.
Summer is gone. Fall is peeking through the thinning leaves on the trees. Two months hence, I'll be wearing gloves and turning my collar against a cold, wet wind.
But it's not just in this physical world that I can sense the changing seasons. My life itself seems to be on the cusp of one season and another.
I'd like to believe it's just a pensive mood. That the change in the weather is affecting my outlook. That the cold I've been trying to kick for two weeks has distorted my perspective.
But last night, on the way home from class, I told S2 that I kept hearing Fleetwood Mac's "Landslide" in my head, particularly the verse, "Can I sail through the changing ocean tides? Can I handle the seasons of my life?"
I said to S2, I feel like a season is changing.
We're the same age, S2 and I. And so I felt unsettled when she nodded and said, "I think you're probably right. I feel something changing, too."
But what the hell is it?
It can't be that my body is going to shit. My body went to shit a long time ago, and it's actually on its way back to something better. Nor do I think it's my approaching birthday: Number 38. Numerical age has never been a problem for me (though, upon turning 35, I did gulp rather hard when I realized I was half way to 70).
It can't be my gray hair. I've been dealing with that since 17, and for the past nine months of coloring it, I've looked more youthful than I have in a decade.
So I don't think it's physical. I'm not even sure it's about the loss of my youth. Except for the damnable cold I've had for nearly two weeks, I feel more energetic and more attractive than I can recall feeling in many, many years.
But there is something changing. Some phase, some season, is ending.
Was it the one in which I might have had children? Was it the one in which I might have seen career "success" if I'd stuck with something for long enough? Was it the one in which I might have been expected to be married? Was it the one in which, had I bothered to do *one fucking thing* in a traditional way, I might have ended up with a set of fine china or some real silverwear?
Or is it a season of discontent that is coming to an end? Is it the insecurity of youth that is falling by the wayside? Is it the part of my life in which I let others influence my choices too much, in which I worked on blending in (and failed!), in which I was more fearful of bold moves, that is now taking a backseat to something different?
I honestly couldn't tell you which is the case. I don't know which season is passing, and I don't know which is coming. But I feel something changing.
I suppose it doesn't matter. Life has its seasons. They change. We have no option of going back, so we go forward.
I told S2 the other night that I have no real goals; I've only ever wanted to be a hedonist. That is, essentially, true, but my particular brand of hedonism would go beyond your typical gluttony, sex free-for-all, draping myself in sensuously soft materials while naked, nubile nymphs place my feet between their breasts and rub me with delicious-smelling oils while Yo-Yo Ma plays Bach's cello suites nearby.
There would be all that, of course. Everyone has to have aspirations.
But my version of hedonism would include a lot of adventure and a fair amount of shameless risk-taking, in between which I would relax in the aforementioned manner (nymphs, Yo-Yo Ma and all). I would travel and explore relentlessly.
I can't figure what else there is to life than the knowing of as much of it as possible (comments made Monday to Dr. M about not wanting to learn certain topics notwithstanding -- it's a matter of focusing what I do with my precious bodily resources). I make the effort to keep my mind open and inquisitive, and I try to live my life thusly, whether or not I make the measure of hedonism.
Even so, it feels like a part of me is standing on Pacific cliff and seeing the curvature of the earth for the first time. Seeing the sun setting there, a voice within is saying, But wait a minute! Don't go just yet. I'm not ready to relinquish this.
As if I have a choice.
Each end begets a beginning. With any luck, it will be my favorite season of all.
Tuesday, September 12, 2006
Morning!
I awakened (alarm-assisted, no snooze) at 7:45 this morning, which is a good two hours (or so) before I normally bat my pretty little eyes at the daylight.
This is no feat for just about *everyone else* I know, but I've turned into the most absurd night owl since living on my own. So when I manage an early rising, I'm impressed with myself.
But only a little bit. Because what crosses my mind when I'm walking the dog in the lovely morning air with the sun coming into my eyes at angles to which I'm not accustomed, I always wonder: Why the hell don't I get up earlier?
It's because I like watching Letterman. And because my creative brain doesn't wake up until three or four in the afternoon (and never has, even when I rose every day at 6:45, which is the earliest I've ever woken consistently).
One year in high school, I had an art class first thing in the morning. Every day, I'd straggle in a bit late and silently work on the projects, rather lackluster in my approach, yawning yawning yawning.
One afternoon after school, I went to class to finish a project and I was ... well, the adolescent version of my normal self (which is still a bit adolescent). The teacher expressed great surprise at how I behaved, saying, "You really aren't a morning person, are you? You are a *totally* different person in the afternoon. It's amazing how much more personality you have."
I guess in retrospect, there are probably plenty of people who would prefer my morning persona. I would leave them alone, hardly talk to them at all, never say anything rude (because I'd hardly ever speak) and certainly would not cause so much transference.
Anyway. I'm awake now. I've driven across town and back to take the pup to the groomer prior to a hair appointment I have myself later this morning. (He goes to a fancier salon than I do. But then, his hair has special needs and mine just needs to not be gray.)
So, what I was thinking about when I signed on to blog was whether or not I'm alone in seeing an uncanny physical resemblance between Pink Martini founder Thomas Lauderdale and comedienne/singer Lea DeLaria? He seems to be a blond-haired male version of her. They are both short. Only he's got class, and she's rather crass.
That is the quality of my early morning thoughts. Nothing to write home about, but it didn't stop me from blogging in an attempt to wake up my brain.
This is no feat for just about *everyone else* I know, but I've turned into the most absurd night owl since living on my own. So when I manage an early rising, I'm impressed with myself.
But only a little bit. Because what crosses my mind when I'm walking the dog in the lovely morning air with the sun coming into my eyes at angles to which I'm not accustomed, I always wonder: Why the hell don't I get up earlier?
It's because I like watching Letterman. And because my creative brain doesn't wake up until three or four in the afternoon (and never has, even when I rose every day at 6:45, which is the earliest I've ever woken consistently).
One year in high school, I had an art class first thing in the morning. Every day, I'd straggle in a bit late and silently work on the projects, rather lackluster in my approach, yawning yawning yawning.
One afternoon after school, I went to class to finish a project and I was ... well, the adolescent version of my normal self (which is still a bit adolescent). The teacher expressed great surprise at how I behaved, saying, "You really aren't a morning person, are you? You are a *totally* different person in the afternoon. It's amazing how much more personality you have."
I guess in retrospect, there are probably plenty of people who would prefer my morning persona. I would leave them alone, hardly talk to them at all, never say anything rude (because I'd hardly ever speak) and certainly would not cause so much transference.
Anyway. I'm awake now. I've driven across town and back to take the pup to the groomer prior to a hair appointment I have myself later this morning. (He goes to a fancier salon than I do. But then, his hair has special needs and mine just needs to not be gray.)
So, what I was thinking about when I signed on to blog was whether or not I'm alone in seeing an uncanny physical resemblance between Pink Martini founder Thomas Lauderdale and comedienne/singer Lea DeLaria? He seems to be a blond-haired male version of her. They are both short. Only he's got class, and she's rather crass.
That is the quality of my early morning thoughts. Nothing to write home about, but it didn't stop me from blogging in an attempt to wake up my brain.
Monday, September 11, 2006
"Patriot Day"
Five years later, I still lack an adequate vocabulary to describe my feelings about what I witnessed, live on television, on the morning of Sept. 11. Heart-breaking horror, for example, doesn't come close. In the realm of human experience, I've never found justification for mass murder, which is what happened that day.
But in all this endless media coverage about what transpired five years ago today and what has occured in the intervening years -- a justifiable war in Afghanistan, an idiotic one in Iraq, making a mockery of "American values" in the eyes of the world and the erosion of our civil liberties for a false sense of security -- I still notice a valuable question is not being asked.
On "Patriot Day," I'm going to ask the "unpatriotic" question: How has this country been complicit in creating the geopolitical climate that gave birth to Islamic fundamentalism and terrorism? Although I'm not suggesting we "deserved" what happened on Sept. 11, why has our social and political discourse not examined the American foreign policy and corporate influence on the world stage that made us a target?
Why do we always look outward but so rarely look inward?
Almost exclusively, the conversations in the media about "what happened" on Sept. 11 stick to discussion of what went wrong with the FAA or with airport security, with immigration procedures and federal agencies that didn't talk to each other. Or they have focused on the emotional aspects: the horror of watching the planes hit the buildings, the people jumping, the efforts of Flight 93's passengers to stop the fourth hijacking, all those firefighters who died. There was even an hour-long program in which the air traffic controllers repeated their experience of watching the little blips of aircraft move across the radar screens until disappearing.
In one of those programs, I heard a member of the Bush Administration talk about the "values we are advancing" and how the "terrorists" are against our values. His comment was never explored, but I think it really gets to the crux of the matter.
I give no kudos to people who commit acts of terrorism. I don't care if it's the Irish Republican Army bombing a bus in London, Timothy McVeigh blowing up a building in Oklahoma City or some cult group popping sarin gas balloons in a Tokyo subway. But it's absurd to ignore the fact that all those people are acted out against social or governemental realities with which they had some kind of conflict.
Islamic fundamentalists, as well as many liberal practitioners of Islam, have different values than what is being promoted -- and "advanced around the world" -- by the United States of America and other western societies. As a woman, a feminist, an atheist and a whole host of other things opposed by Islam, I personally do not support their cause.
But I also don't think that the United States has much business "advancing" its values -- Chrisitianity, capitalism and crass commercialism (what curious bedfellows they are!) -- in other societies. We show no respect for other cultures; we want them to be all-American, all the time. We think our way of life, our customs and our laws are the best, and that everyone else ought to be like us and live like us. Or at least allow us to conduct our business in their countries as we see fit, not to mention sucking up their natural resources with as little compensation as possible.
From taking the oil out of Nigeria at great ecological costs and with no compensation to the people -- anyone remember Ken Saro-Wiwa? -- to the U.S. government's insistent pressure on South Korea that the country eliminate the requirement that its movie theaters show South Korean films at least 106 days a year, we are always pushing our big fat American bellies around, looking for a little more to grub-grub and fatten the coffers of our corporations.
It doesn't settle well with me and my values to see women being forced to wear burkhas under Taliban rule in Afghanistan. Nor does it settle well with me to see gay men in Egypt rounded up, harrassed and beaten by police. Nor to see women in this country being denied access to an abortion.
Even in this great United States, we don't share the same values uniformly. Alaska and Alabama can be at serious odds. So why on earth should we expect that what's being exported as "American values" will be embraced on other continents, by people who have radically different world views than is being "advanced" by our government's foreign policy and our corporations?
The Islamic fundamentalists who turn to terrorism should never be appeased. But Islamic societies, in and of themselves, should have a right to coexist on this planet and a right not to have American business and American culture shoved down their throats. Just as we were angered -- and rightfully fought back against Al Queda in Afghanistan -- when Islamic jihadists brought their campaign to our soil, so America has a tendancy to anger those who do not want our way of life overrunning theirs (in ways that sometimes seem just as outrageous to those cultures as what happened on Sept. 11).
This is far too complicated a issue for me to tackle in one blog and not something I want to make a habit of writing about, not in the least. But I did just want to weigh in, here on "Patriot Day," by suggesting that the most patriotic thing we might do in the NEXT FIVE YEARS is to reconsider our "war on terror" and take a closer look at what we're putting out into the world.
I've often heard it said that what we put out into the world, the world will give back to us. So that begs the question: Just what was it that came home to roost on Sept. 11?
But in all this endless media coverage about what transpired five years ago today and what has occured in the intervening years -- a justifiable war in Afghanistan, an idiotic one in Iraq, making a mockery of "American values" in the eyes of the world and the erosion of our civil liberties for a false sense of security -- I still notice a valuable question is not being asked.
On "Patriot Day," I'm going to ask the "unpatriotic" question: How has this country been complicit in creating the geopolitical climate that gave birth to Islamic fundamentalism and terrorism? Although I'm not suggesting we "deserved" what happened on Sept. 11, why has our social and political discourse not examined the American foreign policy and corporate influence on the world stage that made us a target?
Why do we always look outward but so rarely look inward?
Almost exclusively, the conversations in the media about "what happened" on Sept. 11 stick to discussion of what went wrong with the FAA or with airport security, with immigration procedures and federal agencies that didn't talk to each other. Or they have focused on the emotional aspects: the horror of watching the planes hit the buildings, the people jumping, the efforts of Flight 93's passengers to stop the fourth hijacking, all those firefighters who died. There was even an hour-long program in which the air traffic controllers repeated their experience of watching the little blips of aircraft move across the radar screens until disappearing.
In one of those programs, I heard a member of the Bush Administration talk about the "values we are advancing" and how the "terrorists" are against our values. His comment was never explored, but I think it really gets to the crux of the matter.
I give no kudos to people who commit acts of terrorism. I don't care if it's the Irish Republican Army bombing a bus in London, Timothy McVeigh blowing up a building in Oklahoma City or some cult group popping sarin gas balloons in a Tokyo subway. But it's absurd to ignore the fact that all those people are acted out against social or governemental realities with which they had some kind of conflict.
Islamic fundamentalists, as well as many liberal practitioners of Islam, have different values than what is being promoted -- and "advanced around the world" -- by the United States of America and other western societies. As a woman, a feminist, an atheist and a whole host of other things opposed by Islam, I personally do not support their cause.
But I also don't think that the United States has much business "advancing" its values -- Chrisitianity, capitalism and crass commercialism (what curious bedfellows they are!) -- in other societies. We show no respect for other cultures; we want them to be all-American, all the time. We think our way of life, our customs and our laws are the best, and that everyone else ought to be like us and live like us. Or at least allow us to conduct our business in their countries as we see fit, not to mention sucking up their natural resources with as little compensation as possible.
From taking the oil out of Nigeria at great ecological costs and with no compensation to the people -- anyone remember Ken Saro-Wiwa? -- to the U.S. government's insistent pressure on South Korea that the country eliminate the requirement that its movie theaters show South Korean films at least 106 days a year, we are always pushing our big fat American bellies around, looking for a little more to grub-grub and fatten the coffers of our corporations.
It doesn't settle well with me and my values to see women being forced to wear burkhas under Taliban rule in Afghanistan. Nor does it settle well with me to see gay men in Egypt rounded up, harrassed and beaten by police. Nor to see women in this country being denied access to an abortion.
Even in this great United States, we don't share the same values uniformly. Alaska and Alabama can be at serious odds. So why on earth should we expect that what's being exported as "American values" will be embraced on other continents, by people who have radically different world views than is being "advanced" by our government's foreign policy and our corporations?
The Islamic fundamentalists who turn to terrorism should never be appeased. But Islamic societies, in and of themselves, should have a right to coexist on this planet and a right not to have American business and American culture shoved down their throats. Just as we were angered -- and rightfully fought back against Al Queda in Afghanistan -- when Islamic jihadists brought their campaign to our soil, so America has a tendancy to anger those who do not want our way of life overrunning theirs (in ways that sometimes seem just as outrageous to those cultures as what happened on Sept. 11).
This is far too complicated a issue for me to tackle in one blog and not something I want to make a habit of writing about, not in the least. But I did just want to weigh in, here on "Patriot Day," by suggesting that the most patriotic thing we might do in the NEXT FIVE YEARS is to reconsider our "war on terror" and take a closer look at what we're putting out into the world.
I've often heard it said that what we put out into the world, the world will give back to us. So that begs the question: Just what was it that came home to roost on Sept. 11?
The high price of education
Only a few people actually create things, but everyone's a critic.
Acknowledging that, allow me to complain, for a moment, about the really stupid things I read in my very expensive textbooks sometimes.
I discussed this first one while dining with classmates (who are also friends) this morning, because I thought it particularly vapid, especially in a textbook on research and evaluation methods in psychology:
"Why get all tangled up in theory, philosophy and politics? Why not just explain the methods? Why bring in the viewpoints of feminists, ethnic minotiries and persons with disabilities regarding research practice? Because doing so is very important." (The italics are the textbook author's, not mine.)
The subsequent paragraphs do not necessarily elaborate what's so "very important," but the author notes that "there are a variety of viewpoints" on the matter.
Just when I thought I was going to get something for my money.
Another one of my pet peeves in writing is the use of inane commentary by the authors, as illustrated in the following tip from my textbook on treatment planning for children:
"It is recommended that therapists subscribe to journals such as Development and Psychopathology, Child Development, Developmental Psychology and the Journal of Research on Adolescence. Interestingly, all these journals regularly publish papers that examine clinical issues within a developmental context."
It's shocking, I tell you, SHOCKING! Considering that most journals publish papers and most psychology journals examine clinical issues, just how is it "interesting" that all these effin' journals with the word "development" (or in the one, "adolescence") in the *title* of the journal should discuss ... (hold onto your hats, folks!) ... development?
In a class where we've been assigned a heavier reading load than those stone tablets Moses brought down the mountain with him, the last thing I'm really interested in is wasting my time reading stupid sentences like that one starting, "Interestingly...." Because you know what? That was *not* interesting.
Although it seems to have made my blog.
Which either elevates that sentence to a particular interest level it did not deserve or it makes my blog terribly uninteresting. (Well, I've written this much and you've read this far, so no telling what it says about us, either.)
However, I would like to point out one turn of phrase that delighted me so much that my feet got a little hot the way they do when I'm about to orgasm. (And no, it's not from that Anias Nin erotica.)
It comes from a reading on the development of psychopathology in children. I've got all sorts of wonderful stuff underlined in this article, some of it with unfortunate personal meaning for yours truly. But in a section on cognitive development in school-age children, I found the following sentence:
"Later, a child is able to think of possibilities that do not exist in reality, to manipulate things mentally that are not actually present and to see that reality is just a special case of what is possible." (emphasis: mine)
As a constructivist (and a post-modern one at that), I was delighted by this description of reality: "just a special case of what is possible." ("Just!") That is, at once, the most diminutizing (and for some people, disturbing) commentary on the world we observe around us and also a beautifully turned phrase laden with meaning.
I'm so goddamned mad *I* didn't write it. But I'll tell you what: Even though I want to be cremated and my ashes scattered, I still think of stuff to etch on my tombstone, and it's getting more colorful. In part: Reality is just a special case of what's possible. 'Tis not too late to seek a newer world.
In the meantime, that shit is going on my business cards.
Acknowledging that, allow me to complain, for a moment, about the really stupid things I read in my very expensive textbooks sometimes.
I discussed this first one while dining with classmates (who are also friends) this morning, because I thought it particularly vapid, especially in a textbook on research and evaluation methods in psychology:
"Why get all tangled up in theory, philosophy and politics? Why not just explain the methods? Why bring in the viewpoints of feminists, ethnic minotiries and persons with disabilities regarding research practice? Because doing so is very important." (The italics are the textbook author's, not mine.)
The subsequent paragraphs do not necessarily elaborate what's so "very important," but the author notes that "there are a variety of viewpoints" on the matter.
Just when I thought I was going to get something for my money.
Another one of my pet peeves in writing is the use of inane commentary by the authors, as illustrated in the following tip from my textbook on treatment planning for children:
"It is recommended that therapists subscribe to journals such as Development and Psychopathology, Child Development, Developmental Psychology and the Journal of Research on Adolescence. Interestingly, all these journals regularly publish papers that examine clinical issues within a developmental context."
It's shocking, I tell you, SHOCKING! Considering that most journals publish papers and most psychology journals examine clinical issues, just how is it "interesting" that all these effin' journals with the word "development" (or in the one, "adolescence") in the *title* of the journal should discuss ... (hold onto your hats, folks!) ... development?
In a class where we've been assigned a heavier reading load than those stone tablets Moses brought down the mountain with him, the last thing I'm really interested in is wasting my time reading stupid sentences like that one starting, "Interestingly...." Because you know what? That was *not* interesting.
Although it seems to have made my blog.
Which either elevates that sentence to a particular interest level it did not deserve or it makes my blog terribly uninteresting. (Well, I've written this much and you've read this far, so no telling what it says about us, either.)
However, I would like to point out one turn of phrase that delighted me so much that my feet got a little hot the way they do when I'm about to orgasm. (And no, it's not from that Anias Nin erotica.)
It comes from a reading on the development of psychopathology in children. I've got all sorts of wonderful stuff underlined in this article, some of it with unfortunate personal meaning for yours truly. But in a section on cognitive development in school-age children, I found the following sentence:
"Later, a child is able to think of possibilities that do not exist in reality, to manipulate things mentally that are not actually present and to see that reality is just a special case of what is possible." (emphasis: mine)
As a constructivist (and a post-modern one at that), I was delighted by this description of reality: "just a special case of what is possible." ("Just!") That is, at once, the most diminutizing (and for some people, disturbing) commentary on the world we observe around us and also a beautifully turned phrase laden with meaning.
I'm so goddamned mad *I* didn't write it. But I'll tell you what: Even though I want to be cremated and my ashes scattered, I still think of stuff to etch on my tombstone, and it's getting more colorful. In part: Reality is just a special case of what's possible. 'Tis not too late to seek a newer world.
In the meantime, that shit is going on my business cards.
Saturday, September 09, 2006
See Deaf people? Speak in rhymes!
Even though I'm sick and all, my friend Mr. Shineyhead, who's Deaf, took me to a bar down the street this evening at about 11:30. I'd been watching his dog all day, and he wanted to thank me for doing so, as well as chat with me about his complicated love life.
I told him a couple stories about my trip to Hawaii, including my experience with the "shark creeps" and that whole body surfing fiasco. I'm in the middle of the body surfing story when the following incident occurs. I wil report it verbatim:
UCM (signing): The face of the waves were normally about three to four feet, and as they started to peak, I could feel them tugging at my legs like this....
A strange woman walks up and fingerspells, "h-i." She looks at me, not at Mr. Shineyhead, who is well-known in the local Deaf community and by many people who know sign in this area.
I wave back at her. She's interrupted my story, but I pause to see what she wants. There are chairs stacked up next to us, and I assume she's after one. But ... no. Instead, I swear to fucking god, she proceeds with the following, both signing and speaking:
"One fish, two fish."
She stops and thinks for a minute. Then continues:
"Red fish, blue fish."
She appears *very* pleased with herself. I smile and never let on for a second that I can hear her, because well ... this is so fucking absurd, I don't know what to say. I look over at Mr. Shineyhead. He's leaning back in his chair, a bemused look on his face. The woman has her back to him. She continues:
"Black," she says, and realizes she doesn't know the sign. She looks at me, leans into my face, speaks loudly and contorts her lips to EE-NUN-SEE-ATE her words: "BLLLAAAACK. WHAT. IS. THE. SIGN. FOR. BLACK?"
I show it to her.
And so she continues, now signing and speaking her rhyme loudly and DIS-TINCT-LY: "Black fish. Blue fish."
I nod, knowingly and in cadence, as she concludes: "Old fish. New fish."
Right.
So any of you who know me might be able to imagine the look on my face. Dr. M would probably refer to it as "the crazy Italians on a train smile," which is something I pretty much reserve for kooks ... and crazy Italians. I think I threw in a few blinks for good measure.
I sign, Thank you, to her. Because what the hell else am I gonna say? Stunning performance of Seuss, dear. Just grand! Did they teach you that in kindergarten or is that strictly a first-grade kind of thing?
I was rather tempted to speak to her, I can hear you. But I particularly appreciate you enunciating so well over the din of the music in this place.
Instead, I remain silent and smile. Which is pretty much what Deaf people do, in my experience. She was so pleased with herself when she walked away.
I looked over at Mr. Shineyhead.
"You notice, didn't you, that I didn't help you out there?" he asked. "You know why? Because this shit happens *all the time* to Deaf people. Hearing people come up, interrupt our conversations and say strange crap all the time. I thought you should know what it feels like, so I just stayed out of it. She thought you were Deaf! Ha! Ha! Ha!"
So I see, I replied. What the fuck is up with that? She must've been drunk, coming up and reciting a child's poem to me like that.
He shook his head.
"Most of the time people do that, they're not drunk."
Well, I almost spoke to her, I replied. But I figured she was already embarassing herself enough as it is.
I wonder, though: Should I have said something? Who was going to learn the more important lesson? Her by hearing me speak and realizing she was making a fool or herself? Or me by remaining silent and getting a little glimpse of something my friend deals with on a daily basis?
Whatever.
I resumed my body surfing story. ...But on this one wave, the face must have been five feet.... And from all corners of the bar, I could see people staring at me. Although I have signed in public -- in restaurants, in stores, while walking down the street, wherever -- for many years now, I have never felt so conspicuous as in that bar.
Most peculiar, momma.
I told him a couple stories about my trip to Hawaii, including my experience with the "shark creeps" and that whole body surfing fiasco. I'm in the middle of the body surfing story when the following incident occurs. I wil report it verbatim:
UCM (signing): The face of the waves were normally about three to four feet, and as they started to peak, I could feel them tugging at my legs like this....
A strange woman walks up and fingerspells, "h-i." She looks at me, not at Mr. Shineyhead, who is well-known in the local Deaf community and by many people who know sign in this area.
I wave back at her. She's interrupted my story, but I pause to see what she wants. There are chairs stacked up next to us, and I assume she's after one. But ... no. Instead, I swear to fucking god, she proceeds with the following, both signing and speaking:
"One fish, two fish."
She stops and thinks for a minute. Then continues:
"Red fish, blue fish."
She appears *very* pleased with herself. I smile and never let on for a second that I can hear her, because well ... this is so fucking absurd, I don't know what to say. I look over at Mr. Shineyhead. He's leaning back in his chair, a bemused look on his face. The woman has her back to him. She continues:
"Black," she says, and realizes she doesn't know the sign. She looks at me, leans into my face, speaks loudly and contorts her lips to EE-NUN-SEE-ATE her words: "BLLLAAAACK. WHAT. IS. THE. SIGN. FOR. BLACK?"
I show it to her.
And so she continues, now signing and speaking her rhyme loudly and DIS-TINCT-LY: "Black fish. Blue fish."
I nod, knowingly and in cadence, as she concludes: "Old fish. New fish."
Right.
So any of you who know me might be able to imagine the look on my face. Dr. M would probably refer to it as "the crazy Italians on a train smile," which is something I pretty much reserve for kooks ... and crazy Italians. I think I threw in a few blinks for good measure.
I sign, Thank you, to her. Because what the hell else am I gonna say? Stunning performance of Seuss, dear. Just grand! Did they teach you that in kindergarten or is that strictly a first-grade kind of thing?
I was rather tempted to speak to her, I can hear you. But I particularly appreciate you enunciating so well over the din of the music in this place.
Instead, I remain silent and smile. Which is pretty much what Deaf people do, in my experience. She was so pleased with herself when she walked away.
I looked over at Mr. Shineyhead.
"You notice, didn't you, that I didn't help you out there?" he asked. "You know why? Because this shit happens *all the time* to Deaf people. Hearing people come up, interrupt our conversations and say strange crap all the time. I thought you should know what it feels like, so I just stayed out of it. She thought you were Deaf! Ha! Ha! Ha!"
So I see, I replied. What the fuck is up with that? She must've been drunk, coming up and reciting a child's poem to me like that.
He shook his head.
"Most of the time people do that, they're not drunk."
Well, I almost spoke to her, I replied. But I figured she was already embarassing herself enough as it is.
I wonder, though: Should I have said something? Who was going to learn the more important lesson? Her by hearing me speak and realizing she was making a fool or herself? Or me by remaining silent and getting a little glimpse of something my friend deals with on a daily basis?
Whatever.
I resumed my body surfing story. ...But on this one wave, the face must have been five feet.... And from all corners of the bar, I could see people staring at me. Although I have signed in public -- in restaurants, in stores, while walking down the street, wherever -- for many years now, I have never felt so conspicuous as in that bar.
Most peculiar, momma.
Friday, September 08, 2006
From craigslist
One curiosity on CL here in PDX is the presence of some serious edit whores who flag the living crap out of the posts people put on the women-seeking-women site. (Mind you, I've never posted anything myself, but I read these things and witness the endless cycle of posters fighting flaggers.)
I suspect these Internet nazis believe they are doing a community service by flagging -- and thus removing -- posts that don't quite fit the w4w venue (by whose definition, I couldn't say). But in doing so, they impinge on the ways people express themselves. And you know, I'm all for freedom of expression.
Because it gives me funny shit to post and ridicule on my blog.
So what I have for you today are some attempts by posters to stave off the Flag Nazis.
butch seeking femme - 101
Seeking a woman that is just a woman! 100% woman! Don't care about labels, ect ! Must be a bitch and non caring attitude.. I'm soo insecure, I don't trust others... Beat me down and I will be yours forever!! Please,Please don't flag me, I need to be out here to find my abuse from that special woman!!!
UCM: How delightful. I hope she finds what she wants before her post is erased. Probably, she needs a flagger.
please don't flag me.... - 22
i am a woman seeking a woman..22 from portland, wanna know more email me, cause anymore time i spend here will be a waist. the flag monster will get it.
UCM: I feel like flagging sometimes based on grammar and spelling. But I don't. Not everyone has to live up to my standards. Unless we're going to fuck, that is. (But perhaps a version of "totally inappropriate" -- and thus ripe for sport dating -- should include women who can't spell.)
This will get flagged in about five minutes... - 19
[Discussion section] Just like an equally civil post of mine last night. But it should be said anyway that I'm pretty sure that there's no grand community censoring going on. Rather, it's a few individuals with nothing better to do than to flag perfectly acceptable posts and spam a board. I know I'm feeding the trolls with this, but I've been watching with bemused horror as this unfolds, so I thought I'd throw in my two cents. Any bets you want to make on how long it will take for this to be taken down are welcome. [/Discussion section]
Otherwise... I'm a busy college student, bi, reasonably intelligent and engaged with the world. I'm looking for friends, friends with benefits, maybe a relationship if I'm blown away (did I mention that I'm busy? But I suppose everyone needs some time off.) by you. So there's that.
UCM: This young lady has a future. She writes well. Quite a bit more civil than what bubbles up in the next post:
NO I am not sick of bi's and couples if they are looking for women - 100
Get over yourself and your dumb ass group. If a bi woman or a woman who also has a man she sees is looking for another WOMAN then what business is it of yours? None I say, NONE!!!!!!! If you don't like the post move on to the next one and quit thinking that you and your views are the way this forum should be run!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Or better yet, MOVE!
UCM: Oh, the RAGE! Look at all those exclamation marks. Interestingly, even though this one doesn't seem to be intent on getting a date of any sort, her post is still floating out there on the board. I guess that proves the randomness of this whole situation.
There's some freaky flagger out there. Is it a radical lesbian feminist who can't stand all the bisexual women, the ladies looking for threesomes with their dudes, the women who state a preference for femmes and reject the butch, the ones who are just looking for sex? Is it a freaky christian fundamentalist who's trying to interfere with women who would otherwise be happily getting along and getting it on? Or is it just someone randomly fucking with all these gals?
I'd like to see a profile on seriel flaggers, please. What do they do when they tire of this pursuit?
I suspect these Internet nazis believe they are doing a community service by flagging -- and thus removing -- posts that don't quite fit the w4w venue (by whose definition, I couldn't say). But in doing so, they impinge on the ways people express themselves. And you know, I'm all for freedom of expression.
Because it gives me funny shit to post and ridicule on my blog.
So what I have for you today are some attempts by posters to stave off the Flag Nazis.
butch seeking femme - 101
Seeking a woman that is just a woman! 100% woman! Don't care about labels, ect ! Must be a bitch and non caring attitude.. I'm soo insecure, I don't trust others... Beat me down and I will be yours forever!! Please,Please don't flag me, I need to be out here to find my abuse from that special woman!!!
UCM: How delightful. I hope she finds what she wants before her post is erased. Probably, she needs a flagger.
please don't flag me.... - 22
i am a woman seeking a woman..22 from portland, wanna know more email me, cause anymore time i spend here will be a waist. the flag monster will get it.
UCM: I feel like flagging sometimes based on grammar and spelling. But I don't. Not everyone has to live up to my standards. Unless we're going to fuck, that is. (But perhaps a version of "totally inappropriate" -- and thus ripe for sport dating -- should include women who can't spell.)
This will get flagged in about five minutes... - 19
[Discussion section] Just like an equally civil post of mine last night. But it should be said anyway that I'm pretty sure that there's no grand community censoring going on. Rather, it's a few individuals with nothing better to do than to flag perfectly acceptable posts and spam a board. I know I'm feeding the trolls with this, but I've been watching with bemused horror as this unfolds, so I thought I'd throw in my two cents. Any bets you want to make on how long it will take for this to be taken down are welcome. [/Discussion section]
Otherwise... I'm a busy college student, bi, reasonably intelligent and engaged with the world. I'm looking for friends, friends with benefits, maybe a relationship if I'm blown away (did I mention that I'm busy? But I suppose everyone needs some time off.) by you. So there's that.
UCM: This young lady has a future. She writes well. Quite a bit more civil than what bubbles up in the next post:
NO I am not sick of bi's and couples if they are looking for women - 100
Get over yourself and your dumb ass group. If a bi woman or a woman who also has a man she sees is looking for another WOMAN then what business is it of yours? None I say, NONE!!!!!!! If you don't like the post move on to the next one and quit thinking that you and your views are the way this forum should be run!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Or better yet, MOVE!
UCM: Oh, the RAGE! Look at all those exclamation marks. Interestingly, even though this one doesn't seem to be intent on getting a date of any sort, her post is still floating out there on the board. I guess that proves the randomness of this whole situation.
There's some freaky flagger out there. Is it a radical lesbian feminist who can't stand all the bisexual women, the ladies looking for threesomes with their dudes, the women who state a preference for femmes and reject the butch, the ones who are just looking for sex? Is it a freaky christian fundamentalist who's trying to interfere with women who would otherwise be happily getting along and getting it on? Or is it just someone randomly fucking with all these gals?
I'd like to see a profile on seriel flaggers, please. What do they do when they tire of this pursuit?
How I freak myself out
I'm just gonna put this out there: That picture of Brogan below is too effin' cute, but the whole bit of text that goes along with it gives me the creeps.
Yeah, I'm feaking myself out.
Here's why: I think it's CREEPY when people write things on behalf of their pets and/or on behalf of children who are not yet communicating anything meaningful. I also think it's creepy when people issue communications on behalf of humans who are in comas or persistant vegetative states.
Believe me when I tell you I have been the recipient of all of the above and that it's just TOO FUCKING WEIRD!
So what in the hell possessed me to write something on behalf of my dog?! Especially when it's clear he doesn't have a well-developed voice (in a literary sense), when he's threatening to reveal my secrets and ... oh jesus, it doesn't matter ... it's just messed up.
I should delete the post, but I think I'd rather just flay myself in public than silently slink off without really cursing myself.
But I do want to make some kind of excuse for myself. It's the illness. It's the crud in my lungs. It's the fact that my little dude has started trying to *gallop* on the end of his leash while I shuffle along behind him. Also, it was the cute photo and the fact that I just wanted to figure out how to post a picture in my blog, and I liked how this one maintained his anonymity while still revealing his essential cuteness.
None of that really matters, though. There's really no excuse for what I did, barring a psychotic break of some sort. My Catholic upbringing tells me there's only one sentence that can start to undo the general ewww-ewwwyness of this, and it begins, "Forgive me, father, for I have sinned...."
Yeah, I'm feaking myself out.
Here's why: I think it's CREEPY when people write things on behalf of their pets and/or on behalf of children who are not yet communicating anything meaningful. I also think it's creepy when people issue communications on behalf of humans who are in comas or persistant vegetative states.
Believe me when I tell you I have been the recipient of all of the above and that it's just TOO FUCKING WEIRD!
So what in the hell possessed me to write something on behalf of my dog?! Especially when it's clear he doesn't have a well-developed voice (in a literary sense), when he's threatening to reveal my secrets and ... oh jesus, it doesn't matter ... it's just messed up.
I should delete the post, but I think I'd rather just flay myself in public than silently slink off without really cursing myself.
But I do want to make some kind of excuse for myself. It's the illness. It's the crud in my lungs. It's the fact that my little dude has started trying to *gallop* on the end of his leash while I shuffle along behind him. Also, it was the cute photo and the fact that I just wanted to figure out how to post a picture in my blog, and I liked how this one maintained his anonymity while still revealing his essential cuteness.
None of that really matters, though. There's really no excuse for what I did, barring a psychotic break of some sort. My Catholic upbringing tells me there's only one sentence that can start to undo the general ewww-ewwwyness of this, and it begins, "Forgive me, father, for I have sinned...."
A dog's rant
Brogan here.I rather like this photo of me for use on the Internet. The dark shadow over my eyes preserves my anonymity, which is critical in these days of paranoid American imperialism in which *anyone* can be accused of terrorism. Let's get this straight once and for all, shall we? I'm a *terrier,* not a terrorist. I know some of you think there's not much difference -- and I know UCM has called me "Brogan Bin Laden" before -- but the fact remains: I wouldn't be caught dead wearing a turban. I'm all about tartan kilts, the occasional bow tie and a nice dry martini.
In any case, I'm not writing today's blog to discuss fashion, nor how much more civilized things are in my native Scotland. I'm writing because UCM has turned into a congested, coughing wheeze-bag and, as a result, has not been taking proper care of me.
I heard her complain to a friend on the phone today that one of the worst things about living alone is being sick. Let me tell you something: One of the worst things about being the dog of a sick woman who lives alone is ... being neglected.
I'm not getting the walks I need, OK? She's taking me "out" a couple times a day and all, but she starts our walks really late (we didn't begin our "morning walk" until 1:30!), it's not for very long (a few blocks at the most!) and she won't walk fast enough for me to burn off the energy I've got stored up in these restless legs of mine. This has been going on for days.
I could tell you things, people. There are things about UCM you would *not* believe. You humans seem to bank on the idea that dogs will never tell what goes on when no one else is looking, that we'll always be loyal. Well, for the time being, I will honor that deal. My lips are sealed.
But if this bitch doesn't take me out on a good long walk pretty soon, that covenant just might be broken.
I'm just sayin'.
Brogan, over and out.
Tuesday, September 05, 2006
What minivans scream
I'll say at the outset that I hate minivans. Hate them. Everything about them appalls me on a gut level: their design, the way they obscure visibility on the road, how they always seem to be in the fucking way.
I drove one once, and it was loaded with kids. Long story I don't want to get into right now. Aside from the van's clown car-like capacity for kids, I also hated the way it handled. Damned mushy if you ask me. But then, I drive a German car with nice tight steering.
So when a debate about minivans broke out this afternoon in S2's car, I was a willing participant on the "No Minivans" side. S2 was against the minivan, and her two children, 6-year-old Getting To Yes and 3-year-old Little Pea, were trying to demand that she buy one.
There was a curious tone of disgust in S2's voice when she said, "Minivans scream 'mom,' and I'm not having any part of one."
The argument coming from the kids in the backseat: "Minivans don't scream 'mom'; they don't scream anything."
Oh yes they do, I countered. They scream all sorts of things. And none of them are good.
Naturally, the kids were taking this literally, insisting minivans can't scream. But S2 was engaged, shaking her head and mumbling about things that "scream mom."
As an aside, I thought this rather strange because there's a *lot* about S2 that "screams mom." Mainly, the two little girls she's usually got with her. But that's something that can be explored later.
I wouldn't be commenting on this at all if not for a commercial I saw on television this evening. It showed what appeared to be a happy family -- mom, dad and two kids -- driving all over the place, looking at pastoral scenery and going to the beach, among other things. The voice-over announced that this Ford minivan was capable of 500 miles on a tank of gas.
It ends with the dad hugging the two kids. The camera pans back to reveal him in a driveway as he says, "Thanks for inviting me along" to the mom, who remains in the driver's seat from which she nods solemnly at him. Then, to the kids, he says, "I'll see you next weekend."
That there minivan -- technically, a "crossover" vehicle that is somewhere between a minivan, a stationwagon and an SUV -- is a divorcemobile!
I'm not sure what to make of this commercial. It seems to be tapping into the vein of "reality" television, as if we will somehow give this car or Ford itself more street cred because it represents some authentic "story" about its target market.
The woman in the driver's seat does *not* look happy. In fact, when the dad thanks her, she looks teary and dreary. To make things worse, the door comes up too high, rendering her little more than an unhappy head.
The whole thing left me with mixed feelings. The pleasant images of the family in the minivan went essentially ignored by me. Just your regular commercial fodder. But when it turns to that solemn nod given by the woman and we see this "happy" family is actually a busted one, I felt a little depressed. Not exactly the emotion one normally tries to evoke while selling a car.
I guess this is Ford's attempt to be edgy.
It kind of reminds me of those insurance commercials a few years ago in which a couple was divorcing, and viewers were privvy to their kitchen conversation about who was going to have to break the news to the kids. That one left me feeling totally sticky. I don't want to see commercials showing people fighting over emotionally tense material.
But I'm also not sure I want to see commercials depicting some kind of cotton-candy version of divorce. How many divorced moms take the dad on a weekend getaway with the kids? That's something *lesbians* might do, but straight people? I don't feel convinced.
In any case, it seems a car can scream not just "mom" but "divorced mom," as well. It doesn't matter who's in the damn thing, though, because whenever I see a minivan, something within *me* screams, even if it's a silent one.
I hope S2 never bends to the whims of her children on this one. No matter what you're wearing, a minivan makes your clothes look dumpy. It's a fact. And S2 could never live with that.
I drove one once, and it was loaded with kids. Long story I don't want to get into right now. Aside from the van's clown car-like capacity for kids, I also hated the way it handled. Damned mushy if you ask me. But then, I drive a German car with nice tight steering.
So when a debate about minivans broke out this afternoon in S2's car, I was a willing participant on the "No Minivans" side. S2 was against the minivan, and her two children, 6-year-old Getting To Yes and 3-year-old Little Pea, were trying to demand that she buy one.
There was a curious tone of disgust in S2's voice when she said, "Minivans scream 'mom,' and I'm not having any part of one."
The argument coming from the kids in the backseat: "Minivans don't scream 'mom'; they don't scream anything."
Oh yes they do, I countered. They scream all sorts of things. And none of them are good.
Naturally, the kids were taking this literally, insisting minivans can't scream. But S2 was engaged, shaking her head and mumbling about things that "scream mom."
As an aside, I thought this rather strange because there's a *lot* about S2 that "screams mom." Mainly, the two little girls she's usually got with her. But that's something that can be explored later.
I wouldn't be commenting on this at all if not for a commercial I saw on television this evening. It showed what appeared to be a happy family -- mom, dad and two kids -- driving all over the place, looking at pastoral scenery and going to the beach, among other things. The voice-over announced that this Ford minivan was capable of 500 miles on a tank of gas.
It ends with the dad hugging the two kids. The camera pans back to reveal him in a driveway as he says, "Thanks for inviting me along" to the mom, who remains in the driver's seat from which she nods solemnly at him. Then, to the kids, he says, "I'll see you next weekend."
That there minivan -- technically, a "crossover" vehicle that is somewhere between a minivan, a stationwagon and an SUV -- is a divorcemobile!
I'm not sure what to make of this commercial. It seems to be tapping into the vein of "reality" television, as if we will somehow give this car or Ford itself more street cred because it represents some authentic "story" about its target market.
The woman in the driver's seat does *not* look happy. In fact, when the dad thanks her, she looks teary and dreary. To make things worse, the door comes up too high, rendering her little more than an unhappy head.
The whole thing left me with mixed feelings. The pleasant images of the family in the minivan went essentially ignored by me. Just your regular commercial fodder. But when it turns to that solemn nod given by the woman and we see this "happy" family is actually a busted one, I felt a little depressed. Not exactly the emotion one normally tries to evoke while selling a car.
I guess this is Ford's attempt to be edgy.
It kind of reminds me of those insurance commercials a few years ago in which a couple was divorcing, and viewers were privvy to their kitchen conversation about who was going to have to break the news to the kids. That one left me feeling totally sticky. I don't want to see commercials showing people fighting over emotionally tense material.
But I'm also not sure I want to see commercials depicting some kind of cotton-candy version of divorce. How many divorced moms take the dad on a weekend getaway with the kids? That's something *lesbians* might do, but straight people? I don't feel convinced.
In any case, it seems a car can scream not just "mom" but "divorced mom," as well. It doesn't matter who's in the damn thing, though, because whenever I see a minivan, something within *me* screams, even if it's a silent one.
I hope S2 never bends to the whims of her children on this one. No matter what you're wearing, a minivan makes your clothes look dumpy. It's a fact. And S2 could never live with that.
Monday, September 04, 2006
The making of a "passion whore"
Dr. M and I were finishing up breakfast at the Tin Shed when I said something -- I won't bother repeating what -- that prompted her to ask about the intersection, in my mind, between passion, fighting (or lack thereof) and sexual appetite. This is one of my little "issues," shall we say. Her questions caught me off-guard, as they usually do, and my stuffy ears -- thanks to all the sand that must be in them -- made me think she'd called me a "passion whore."
Suffice it to say, the conversation quickly degenerated into a fit of name-calling that went, basically, Shut up, bitch. "I'd rather be a bitch than a whore." Something like that. When she wasn't looking, I wiped my runny nose with my bare hand and then rubbed the rim of her coffee cup.
OK. Nothing in that second paragraph happened. But it sounds good. I mean, what else do you do when someone calls you a "passion whore"? (Which she did not say but probably wishes she had.)
Here's the truth, though: I kind of am one.
I'm a woman of passionate experiences in many respects. Anxiety? I've got that down pat. Anger? Boy howdy! Sadness and grief? Let's just say I can claim expertise in this one -- and even so, I fear the pain of losing my aunt (see previous blog entries) down the road. Love and compassion? My friends, quite a few of you have affected me in tremendous ways over the years, and one or two of you really take the cake.
But where, oh where, is the sexual passion?
The absence of it with XGF was one of those factors that doomed the relationship. Part of it came from her inability -- or unwillingness -- to express her emotions, especially anger. As my old friend Les says, "No one spends more than seven days with UCM without getting pissed at her, much less seven years." I know XGF must have been pissed at me now and then, but it wasn't something she felt comfortable acknowledging, perhaps at times not even to herself.
Dr. M asked if I equate passion with fighting. The answer is no. In my estimation, fighting now and then is part and parcel to a relationship of equals. I don't want to be in a relationship that's riddled with fighting, but I can't have enduring passion -- sexual or otherwise -- for a relationship that lacks integrity in its communication. (When I said this to Dr. M, she replied, "That's why you and Brogan [my *dog*] are so well matched." Can you people believe the nerve of that woman? *sigh*)
Now, I'm not blaming XGF for the lack of passion in our relationship. In truth, I blame myself. I mean: How could I go on six years or so -- well beyond the "honeymoon phase" -- without questioning the absence of fighting and without expecting more va-voom in my sex life?
Get this first: I'm not one of those people who thinks that sex, especially in a long-term relationship, is always supposed to have that sense of wanting to rip off your partner's clothes, throw her down on the bed and totally consume her. But if you don't have that *some of the time* -- or, in the case with XGF, if you never quite had than and then any traces of it disappear completely after about a month -- that is *not good.*
Go ahead and cringe if you need to, but I'm gonna say it: In my perspective, you should, at times, want like hell to fuck the living daylights out of your partner and have the feeling that she wants to -- and tries to -- do the same to you. This is what I mean by the aforementioned "va-voom."
But let's take a look at UCM, why don't we? Because I have been giving this a lot of thought in recent months. Some of my thinking has centered on the question: What the hell was I doing? That wasn't fair to me or to XGF. But then I realized, "fairness" was really not at issue because I was a bit too unconcious about what was going on with me.
I'm really good at being unconscious, especially on matters sexual. It's a specialty I developed back when my crushes on girls were completely unacceptable (to me and to society), and so I learned to sublimate those feelings. Sublimation is an attempt to divert feelings into something of a higher cultural order (such as being a loyal friend instead of a sexual partner), but it is also a damnable pursuit when it is done without acknowledging the feelings for what they are and without awareness of the consequences. Alas, with XGF, I tried to switch it around and turn friendship into something bigger.
Doesn't really work either way. I've since learned that either you become aware of the feelings you have and accept them -- doesn't mean any action is required -- or you lie lie lie to yourself about the situation and create an ulcer farm in your stomach, become an alcoholic, turn yourself into a nasty uptight Republican/Christian fundamentalist or ... whatever.
So for years, I was into that lie lie lie thing. Fortunately, I never became Republican or Christian fundamentalist (there are some things to which I will not stoop), but I did almost kill myself over the matter. Eventually, I wised up. But it was a LONG process in undoing the mental constructs and defenses I developed in my youth and young adulthood while trying to persuade myself that I was *not* attracted to women.
At first, I had all sorts of self-loathing to sort through. Then, I had to learn how to attend to my feelings of sexual attraction and how I expressed them. A great bit of this growth occurred during my relationship with XGF, mainly in that I finally became fully comfortable with my sexual orientation.
Given my passionate experience of other feelings, it was only a matter of time before the sleeping giant of my sexuality itself -- different than my sexual orientation -- awakened. There were peeps of it during the years I was with XGF, but because I was in a committed relationship, I shooed them away. Then, I decided to stop doing that and simply allow myself to feel whatever it was that came along.
This developmental delay, if you will, means that things other people did in high school, I am *still* doing. As S2 has noted -- and bless her for being so observant -- the torturous thing for me now is that, while teens are hormonally freaky and don't have a clue just how screwy their behavior gets, *I* am an adult who is quite aware of how irrational my thoughts can be at times, thus making me wonder if I am, in Dr. M's vernacular, "barking mad."
All I can say is: Woof. Woof.
A while ago, I met a woman I found outrageously attractive, both physically and mentally. (The latter is a given, though. Only smart women ever stir my passions.) I could describe what this was like, but some things are better left to mystery -- or until I pen some page-turning smut. Although any compare-contrast exercises are fraught with complexities too numerous to properly sort, I was struck by something profound: *This* is what my libido feels like when it's jacked up. *This* is what I have been missing in my intimate relationships. *This* is the part of me I turned off a long time ago; what a gift to have it back. And when it gets released, holy mutha-fuckin' jesus shit, WATCH OUT! Va-VOOM!
Now, it so happens gaining this awareness has been highly useful and a bit vexing. Vexing in that, on accounts of unavailability and several other factors which might be succintly summed up as, "Uh, UCM, do not molest the wildlife...", my libido has found no outlet for expression, and I have had to temper it. Or try to, anyway. But I can live with doing so given how useful it's been to learn what my libido feels like after all those years of being so frightened by it that I squelched the living hell out of it.
If history is any teacher, my taste in women ... well, I'm probably too picky for my own good and also tend to be attracted to women who can make me pull out my hair ... means it will be a while before I come across one who captures my attention so powerfully. (Don't tell me to lower my standards!) But somewhere along the line, some woman (who, let's get specific, I'm attracted to and who actually *wants* this attention from me) is going to light up my radar. When that happens, all hell is going to break loose. (God help that woman, she'd better be up for it.)
And *then* you may call me a "passion whore." Until that happens, I'm just a lady-in-waiting.
Suffice it to say, the conversation quickly degenerated into a fit of name-calling that went, basically, Shut up, bitch. "I'd rather be a bitch than a whore." Something like that. When she wasn't looking, I wiped my runny nose with my bare hand and then rubbed the rim of her coffee cup.
OK. Nothing in that second paragraph happened. But it sounds good. I mean, what else do you do when someone calls you a "passion whore"? (Which she did not say but probably wishes she had.)
Here's the truth, though: I kind of am one.
I'm a woman of passionate experiences in many respects. Anxiety? I've got that down pat. Anger? Boy howdy! Sadness and grief? Let's just say I can claim expertise in this one -- and even so, I fear the pain of losing my aunt (see previous blog entries) down the road. Love and compassion? My friends, quite a few of you have affected me in tremendous ways over the years, and one or two of you really take the cake.
But where, oh where, is the sexual passion?
The absence of it with XGF was one of those factors that doomed the relationship. Part of it came from her inability -- or unwillingness -- to express her emotions, especially anger. As my old friend Les says, "No one spends more than seven days with UCM without getting pissed at her, much less seven years." I know XGF must have been pissed at me now and then, but it wasn't something she felt comfortable acknowledging, perhaps at times not even to herself.
Dr. M asked if I equate passion with fighting. The answer is no. In my estimation, fighting now and then is part and parcel to a relationship of equals. I don't want to be in a relationship that's riddled with fighting, but I can't have enduring passion -- sexual or otherwise -- for a relationship that lacks integrity in its communication. (When I said this to Dr. M, she replied, "That's why you and Brogan [my *dog*] are so well matched." Can you people believe the nerve of that woman? *sigh*)
Now, I'm not blaming XGF for the lack of passion in our relationship. In truth, I blame myself. I mean: How could I go on six years or so -- well beyond the "honeymoon phase" -- without questioning the absence of fighting and without expecting more va-voom in my sex life?
Get this first: I'm not one of those people who thinks that sex, especially in a long-term relationship, is always supposed to have that sense of wanting to rip off your partner's clothes, throw her down on the bed and totally consume her. But if you don't have that *some of the time* -- or, in the case with XGF, if you never quite had than and then any traces of it disappear completely after about a month -- that is *not good.*
Go ahead and cringe if you need to, but I'm gonna say it: In my perspective, you should, at times, want like hell to fuck the living daylights out of your partner and have the feeling that she wants to -- and tries to -- do the same to you. This is what I mean by the aforementioned "va-voom."
But let's take a look at UCM, why don't we? Because I have been giving this a lot of thought in recent months. Some of my thinking has centered on the question: What the hell was I doing? That wasn't fair to me or to XGF. But then I realized, "fairness" was really not at issue because I was a bit too unconcious about what was going on with me.
I'm really good at being unconscious, especially on matters sexual. It's a specialty I developed back when my crushes on girls were completely unacceptable (to me and to society), and so I learned to sublimate those feelings. Sublimation is an attempt to divert feelings into something of a higher cultural order (such as being a loyal friend instead of a sexual partner), but it is also a damnable pursuit when it is done without acknowledging the feelings for what they are and without awareness of the consequences. Alas, with XGF, I tried to switch it around and turn friendship into something bigger.
Doesn't really work either way. I've since learned that either you become aware of the feelings you have and accept them -- doesn't mean any action is required -- or you lie lie lie to yourself about the situation and create an ulcer farm in your stomach, become an alcoholic, turn yourself into a nasty uptight Republican/Christian fundamentalist or ... whatever.
So for years, I was into that lie lie lie thing. Fortunately, I never became Republican or Christian fundamentalist (there are some things to which I will not stoop), but I did almost kill myself over the matter. Eventually, I wised up. But it was a LONG process in undoing the mental constructs and defenses I developed in my youth and young adulthood while trying to persuade myself that I was *not* attracted to women.
At first, I had all sorts of self-loathing to sort through. Then, I had to learn how to attend to my feelings of sexual attraction and how I expressed them. A great bit of this growth occurred during my relationship with XGF, mainly in that I finally became fully comfortable with my sexual orientation.
Given my passionate experience of other feelings, it was only a matter of time before the sleeping giant of my sexuality itself -- different than my sexual orientation -- awakened. There were peeps of it during the years I was with XGF, but because I was in a committed relationship, I shooed them away. Then, I decided to stop doing that and simply allow myself to feel whatever it was that came along.
This developmental delay, if you will, means that things other people did in high school, I am *still* doing. As S2 has noted -- and bless her for being so observant -- the torturous thing for me now is that, while teens are hormonally freaky and don't have a clue just how screwy their behavior gets, *I* am an adult who is quite aware of how irrational my thoughts can be at times, thus making me wonder if I am, in Dr. M's vernacular, "barking mad."
All I can say is: Woof. Woof.
A while ago, I met a woman I found outrageously attractive, both physically and mentally. (The latter is a given, though. Only smart women ever stir my passions.) I could describe what this was like, but some things are better left to mystery -- or until I pen some page-turning smut. Although any compare-contrast exercises are fraught with complexities too numerous to properly sort, I was struck by something profound: *This* is what my libido feels like when it's jacked up. *This* is what I have been missing in my intimate relationships. *This* is the part of me I turned off a long time ago; what a gift to have it back. And when it gets released, holy mutha-fuckin' jesus shit, WATCH OUT! Va-VOOM!
Now, it so happens gaining this awareness has been highly useful and a bit vexing. Vexing in that, on accounts of unavailability and several other factors which might be succintly summed up as, "Uh, UCM, do not molest the wildlife...", my libido has found no outlet for expression, and I have had to temper it. Or try to, anyway. But I can live with doing so given how useful it's been to learn what my libido feels like after all those years of being so frightened by it that I squelched the living hell out of it.
If history is any teacher, my taste in women ... well, I'm probably too picky for my own good and also tend to be attracted to women who can make me pull out my hair ... means it will be a while before I come across one who captures my attention so powerfully. (Don't tell me to lower my standards!) But somewhere along the line, some woman (who, let's get specific, I'm attracted to and who actually *wants* this attention from me) is going to light up my radar. When that happens, all hell is going to break loose. (God help that woman, she'd better be up for it.)
And *then* you may call me a "passion whore." Until that happens, I'm just a lady-in-waiting.
A writer, alas
Note: I wrote this the other week but did not edit and publish it until today. I am not *that* prolific, nor that fast, of a writer to pen these two entries for Sept. 4 in the short span the post times would seem to indicate. -- Yours always, UCM, advocate for truth in advertising
There is a part of my identity that troubles me, even though I regularly indulge it and even do so publically. I am a writer.
People always ask me when I'm going to "write something." This has been one of the most frequently asked questions of me for the past 20 years. Nearly every friend and acquaintance of substance I've known has asked me this question in one way or another, whether they've read my personal writings (such as this public bog) or my professional work.
"When are you going to write something?"
That question confounds me, because as far as I'm concerned, I've been doing just that. I worked as a journalist for about 10 years, created (on my better days) what could be called "literary marketing" for four years, keep a private journal, write this blog and periodically pen a really awful poem. I am also an enthusiastic e-mail writer. There was also a gut-wrenching 350-page book that could've been titled, An Autobiography of Shame, readership of which was mercifully very limited.
And yet I am still asked when I'm going to "write something." I interpret this as an assumption that the asker expects me to create a single gigantic work, such as a novel. Some of the people who ask this question have implied -- sometimes directly -- that I'm "not living up to my potential" or am otherwise an underachiever. Others are a little more flattering and less judgmental about some supposed "lack" of meaningful productivity on my part and simply say they'd be curious to see me put my mind to a novel or a book.
I've never been terribly comfortable with these expectations or desires. I've always felt that my writing just is what it is: I was a journalist, a columnist, a person who simply opens my hands as anyone else might open their mouth. To me, that describes a writer.
Why is something more, something bigger, something different than the writing I've done and currently do ... why is *something else* expected? Why can't I be just the kind of writer I am?
People say the art of letter-writing is lost. That's bullshit. I write letters all the time. They just happen to be delivered electronically in e-mail. While they're hardly the work of Thomas Jefferson or Hunter S. Thompson, both prolific letter writers, I can reasonably say, based on my own experience, that they are not your typical e-mails, nor your typical letters. They are a mash of the colorful details of my daily life, reflections on conversations and the occasional political rant or emotional expression mixed with mundane questions for or replies to questions asked by the recipients.
And my blog? Well, what the hell is this thing? Sometimes it's a big open public letter, sometimes a creative non-fiction short story, sometimes a little opinion piece, sometimes an aimless journal, sometimes a small work of humor.
Here's the thing: It's writing. And as far as I'm concerned, I'm writing "something."
For a while, I got so tired of The Question that I wanted to deny I was a writer. I do not see a traditional "work of substance" forthcoming, and I have started to feel very tired of the suggestion that I'm not really a writer until I create such a piece.
But the truth is, I *am* a writer. I enjoy writing. I made my living by it one way or another for 15 years. Now I do it for pleasure and for the personal insight it provides. It is a way in which I give order to a very small fraction of my thoughts, put them down in fixed form somewhere, engage my friends in dialogue (or attempt to do so but sometimes fail miserably), and even a way in which I relax.
Last week on a flight to Hawaii, I wrote 15 pages in my private journal, much of it about two conversations I had just before I left town. A woman on the plane commented about the time I took to write, told me she and her mother had been watching me "burn up the pages," and asked if I was a writer. I told her yes, and yet at the same time, I wondered if we had the same understanding of that term.
Sometimes when I think about the expectations people have so persistantly voiced about my writing over the years, I see that scene from "As Good As It Gets" in which Jack Nicholson walks into his psychiatrist's waiting room and asks of the people waiting there: "What if this is as good as it gets?"
My writing is what it is. I write this blog, my private journals, e-mails and the rare handwritten note. I don't know if there will ever be anything more, unless these ramblings of mine are someday published in a thematic piece, ala Thompson's "Fear and Loathing in America." Here's what I often feel like saying to people who ask when I'll "write something:" This *is* something, and maybe this is as good as it gets. I can live with that. Why can't you?
There is a part of my identity that troubles me, even though I regularly indulge it and even do so publically. I am a writer.
People always ask me when I'm going to "write something." This has been one of the most frequently asked questions of me for the past 20 years. Nearly every friend and acquaintance of substance I've known has asked me this question in one way or another, whether they've read my personal writings (such as this public bog) or my professional work.
"When are you going to write something?"
That question confounds me, because as far as I'm concerned, I've been doing just that. I worked as a journalist for about 10 years, created (on my better days) what could be called "literary marketing" for four years, keep a private journal, write this blog and periodically pen a really awful poem. I am also an enthusiastic e-mail writer. There was also a gut-wrenching 350-page book that could've been titled, An Autobiography of Shame, readership of which was mercifully very limited.
And yet I am still asked when I'm going to "write something." I interpret this as an assumption that the asker expects me to create a single gigantic work, such as a novel. Some of the people who ask this question have implied -- sometimes directly -- that I'm "not living up to my potential" or am otherwise an underachiever. Others are a little more flattering and less judgmental about some supposed "lack" of meaningful productivity on my part and simply say they'd be curious to see me put my mind to a novel or a book.
I've never been terribly comfortable with these expectations or desires. I've always felt that my writing just is what it is: I was a journalist, a columnist, a person who simply opens my hands as anyone else might open their mouth. To me, that describes a writer.
Why is something more, something bigger, something different than the writing I've done and currently do ... why is *something else* expected? Why can't I be just the kind of writer I am?
People say the art of letter-writing is lost. That's bullshit. I write letters all the time. They just happen to be delivered electronically in e-mail. While they're hardly the work of Thomas Jefferson or Hunter S. Thompson, both prolific letter writers, I can reasonably say, based on my own experience, that they are not your typical e-mails, nor your typical letters. They are a mash of the colorful details of my daily life, reflections on conversations and the occasional political rant or emotional expression mixed with mundane questions for or replies to questions asked by the recipients.
And my blog? Well, what the hell is this thing? Sometimes it's a big open public letter, sometimes a creative non-fiction short story, sometimes a little opinion piece, sometimes an aimless journal, sometimes a small work of humor.
Here's the thing: It's writing. And as far as I'm concerned, I'm writing "something."
For a while, I got so tired of The Question that I wanted to deny I was a writer. I do not see a traditional "work of substance" forthcoming, and I have started to feel very tired of the suggestion that I'm not really a writer until I create such a piece.
But the truth is, I *am* a writer. I enjoy writing. I made my living by it one way or another for 15 years. Now I do it for pleasure and for the personal insight it provides. It is a way in which I give order to a very small fraction of my thoughts, put them down in fixed form somewhere, engage my friends in dialogue (or attempt to do so but sometimes fail miserably), and even a way in which I relax.
Last week on a flight to Hawaii, I wrote 15 pages in my private journal, much of it about two conversations I had just before I left town. A woman on the plane commented about the time I took to write, told me she and her mother had been watching me "burn up the pages," and asked if I was a writer. I told her yes, and yet at the same time, I wondered if we had the same understanding of that term.
Sometimes when I think about the expectations people have so persistantly voiced about my writing over the years, I see that scene from "As Good As It Gets" in which Jack Nicholson walks into his psychiatrist's waiting room and asks of the people waiting there: "What if this is as good as it gets?"
My writing is what it is. I write this blog, my private journals, e-mails and the rare handwritten note. I don't know if there will ever be anything more, unless these ramblings of mine are someday published in a thematic piece, ala Thompson's "Fear and Loathing in America." Here's what I often feel like saying to people who ask when I'll "write something:" This *is* something, and maybe this is as good as it gets. I can live with that. Why can't you?
Saturday, September 02, 2006
Pounding sand
Right. So when I mentioned as how the surf at Magic Sands had pounded me into the ocean's floor and that I had sand covering me through and through, I wasn't exaggerating.
I cannot get rid of the effing sand from my swimsuit. As mentioned previously, I showered at the beach. Then, I showered again at my cousin Spitfire's house. That time, I rinsed the suit out two or three times in the shower. I really worked it over. Lots of sand came out of it.
Last night, I pulled the damp swimsuit from the bag I'd packed it in and went about rinsing and shaking and wrining out the suit several more times and gave it two long baths. Quite a bit of sand washed down the drain.
This morning, heading out for a day at the lake, I noticed it still had sand all over it. As it was dry, I took it outside and shook it and brushed it and even beat it against a chair several times, wiping a lot of sand off. But when I went to put it on, I could still feel a layer of grit.
I swam for extended periods twice in the lake, out in deep, clear water. I used the cover of water to try to brush more sand out of my suit and flood it out. Didn't have much luck there, because when I came home, I removed the suit and found I was covered with fine white sand.
Again, I brushed off the suit, then took it in the shower with me and rinsed it a few times. Lo and behold, that goddamned sand is *still* there. The washing machine is my move of last resort, but I may have to use it.
You ever heard that saying, "Go pound sand up your ass?" ... That's what I managed to do to myself when bodysurfing out at Magic Sands. I've long since showered off and have a stiff neck from the pounding I took. But my swimsuit seems bent on providing a reminder with a little more sticking power.
Also, I seem to be coming down with some kind of ailment. I never manage to travel without getting ill, especially when I go to the tropics. And school is starting Wednesday -- perfect timing.
Perhaps I'll show up first night of class and blow sand out my nose. I'm sure there's quite a bit of it hiding in my sinuses, too.
I cannot get rid of the effing sand from my swimsuit. As mentioned previously, I showered at the beach. Then, I showered again at my cousin Spitfire's house. That time, I rinsed the suit out two or three times in the shower. I really worked it over. Lots of sand came out of it.
Last night, I pulled the damp swimsuit from the bag I'd packed it in and went about rinsing and shaking and wrining out the suit several more times and gave it two long baths. Quite a bit of sand washed down the drain.
This morning, heading out for a day at the lake, I noticed it still had sand all over it. As it was dry, I took it outside and shook it and brushed it and even beat it against a chair several times, wiping a lot of sand off. But when I went to put it on, I could still feel a layer of grit.
I swam for extended periods twice in the lake, out in deep, clear water. I used the cover of water to try to brush more sand out of my suit and flood it out. Didn't have much luck there, because when I came home, I removed the suit and found I was covered with fine white sand.
Again, I brushed off the suit, then took it in the shower with me and rinsed it a few times. Lo and behold, that goddamned sand is *still* there. The washing machine is my move of last resort, but I may have to use it.
You ever heard that saying, "Go pound sand up your ass?" ... That's what I managed to do to myself when bodysurfing out at Magic Sands. I've long since showered off and have a stiff neck from the pounding I took. But my swimsuit seems bent on providing a reminder with a little more sticking power.
Also, I seem to be coming down with some kind of ailment. I never manage to travel without getting ill, especially when I go to the tropics. And school is starting Wednesday -- perfect timing.
Perhaps I'll show up first night of class and blow sand out my nose. I'm sure there's quite a bit of it hiding in my sinuses, too.
Friday, September 01, 2006
Magic Sands
I got home this morning from spending nine days with my uncle and aunt, El Capitan and Tia L, down on the Kona coast of the Big Island. The only word I can think to summarize the trip is bittersweet.
Tia L was sick the day I arrived, and for a few nights in a row, she suffered chills and fever that interrupted her sleep and made her a little lethargic. Tia L has always been a highly energetic woman -- she calls herself "hyper" -- so she was a little frustrated. But she made the best of it during the days, still finding the energy to head down to the beach for a snorkel and a swim or a sunset barbecue, as well as quite a few shopping trips.
It also didn't stop her from attending her water aerobics class and taking me along. Nothing quite like Sweating with the Oldies in a pool surrounded by a deck so hot that your dear UCM burnt the bottoms of her tender Oregonian feet on it. Those old folks are GOSSIPY, man. They carried on through the entire class, chat chat chatting about the arcane details of island life and the infirmities of old age, not the least of which is the necessity of returning to the mainland for medical procedures they don't trust the local doctors to do.
One day, my youngest cousin, Spitfire, who's 22, a surfer and a certified pilates instructor, joined Tia L and me for the water aerobics class. As was the case with me, all the old people kept telling her, "If those floaties (used for resistance training) are too much for you, you can use these lighter ones." Spitfire and I kept exchanging smiles and laughs over the situation because those old folks were so convinced this rather tame water aerobics class would overwhelm us. What's up with that?
Tia L had a rash of doctor's appointments during my visit, but I suspect this is a regularly occuring thing. Not only did she have a "touch of walking pneumonia," according to the docs, she may also have some secondary cancers popping up. It is, I tell you, an OBSCENITY to see this vibrant 58-year-old woman being laid low like this. In my version of the story, she was supposed to live to be a really old woman, her long, luscious, curly black hair gradually graying and her loving and wise nature growing only more so to the point that she'd become some kind of sage. (In truth, she is very wise already, but I was thinking she would get really effing old, and she certainly was not suposed to lose that incredible hair of hers from chemo treatments.)
As has been the case throughout my adult life, we sat around some evenings -- she and Spitfire and I -- and smoked a little of the green goddess and "talked story," as the Hawaiians say. I love Southerners. They have the gift of chewing the fat as I have experienced with no other regional American culture. Tia L and Spitfire were both bred and born in New Orleans, and the "memorial day" (because Tia L refuses to call it an "anniversary") of Hurricane Katrina really revved up the conversation at times. So did any mention of The Notorious M.O.M.
I asked Tia L about doing a "life story interview," and she readily agreed. Her time has more distinct limits on it than the rest of us believe we have, and she is a consummate and colorful storyteller. So we agreed to videotape some of our conversations toward the end of my visit.
On Sunday, I took off on my own and tooled around the island in candy apple red Mustang convertible. Headed up to Hawi, then on to Hilo for the night by way of the north shore and its lush, dramatic coastline. (El Capitan notes that "lush" in Hawaii requires a prolonged pronunciation, dragging out the "ssshhh." One place I stopped, Luenpohoehoe, is what he calls "30-second lussssshhhhhh.") The next day, I spent a few hours with my cousin, MiniMimi, at her home in Puna, then headed to Waimea, where I passed the night in such decadent splendor that, had they served the breakfast in bed, would've made Dr. M think she'd died and found some kind of Four Seasons version of the afterlife (if the Four Seasons were all into ornate Edwardian furniture and chandaliers, that is).
In the shadow of Mauna Kea, on which the observatories are built, Waimea is about 2,500 feet in elevation, and the cloudless skies that night afforded a view of the heavens so startingly dark and clear that I was stunned to speechlessness. The Big Island is intentionally underlit -- and those streetlights which exist are those hideous sodium vapor ones -- to protect the night sky from light pollution. Even without taking the 20 minutes or so necessary for my eyes to fully adjust to the darkness, I had a view of the heavens that is unlike any I have ever witnessed, including my travels to secluded places like the Amazon or the Chiriqui highlands of Panama. It's more than just light pollution at play in Hawaii; there must be something to layers of atmosphere. The stars weren't twinkling like they normally do. They were eye-popping points of lights on a black canvass. Really stunning.
When I returned to Kona on Tuesday, Tia L and I began the interview. It took place in three settings over two days, and I taped a good five hours of stories. She touched on everything from her experience as the second of five (or six?) children born to alcoholic first cousins to her years working in a mental hospital in Seyschelles with the Peace Corps and the three years she, El Capitan, Spitfire and MiniMimi spent sailing around the Caribbean and South America while my cousins were a pre- and menstrual teens and Tia L was going through menopause (something El Capitan says no man should have to endure on a 45-foot sailboat). I feel like I have given myself a gift -- and created a "living" memory for my family -- in conducting this interview. Tia L is a fabulous subject, a woman who has lived life at full-tilt, a trait for which she highly credits my free-spirited, adventurous uncle.
Speaking of my uncle, throughout my visit, he was up to his regular hijinks, although my aunt's illness seems to have tempered his behavior a bit. In keeping with his insistence that I try new things (an insistence I share enthusiastically), he bought me a big coconut bowl full of kava juice, claiming it was a good "narcotic." The shit made my lips and throat numb, but otherwise did nothing to my mood. He also introduced me to passionfruit, and my aunt introduced me to dragonfruit.
One day, we went to Spencer beach on the Kohola coast for an afternoon of snorkeling and a sunset barbecue. El Capitan and I were exploring the coral reef in an area where the bottom was perhaps 20 or so feet deep. Given the depth and the turbidity caused by the surf, I had the distinct feeling of being in open water. It was mostly overcast that day, as well, and I found the limited visibility at the surface -- which did not persist when I would dive down to the reef -- to be a bit disturbing. At times, I could not see El Capitan even when he was 10 or 15 feet away.
Presently, I started to get what I call "the shark creeps." This doesn't happen to me often. In fact, it was the only time it happened on the entire trip. I had the distinct experience of being watched, of danger lurking nearby. But I couldn't see jack shit aside from the reef and fish immediately below me, and when I would surface from a dive, I saw nothing on the water's surface that would concern me. I would scan for El Capitan, see his snorkel 25 yards or so away and go back to my business. But I found myself consciously spreading my arms and legs wide and thinking, I am a human. You don't want to eat me. This here white meat won't taste too good to you. Shoo, shark, shoo!
After maybe 40 minutes of this, the shark creeps were simply too intense for me to enjoy the reef anymore. I told El Capitan I was swimming back to shore. When we got to the shallows, El Capitan said, "Well, now that we're near shore, I guess I can tell you: See that Hale (Hawaiian archeological site) over there? The Hawaiians used to sacrafice people to sharks there. I guess they must have cut them up some first or something. But they'd toss them in over there." He was pointing to an area just north of where we'd been snorkeling.
They were sacraficing people to *reef* sharks? I asked, a bit incredulous.
"Well, there are probably some reef sharks around here," he replied, "but mainly that's seems to be a nesting place for hammerheads and tiger sharks."
TIGER SHARKS?! ... Your UCM was not pleased. She did not tell El Capitan of the shark creeps she'd been having, though, because she knows what El Capitan's response would be: "There are sharks everywhere." UCM, however, was not thrilled about having been lolling about, unaware, in the surf near an area where tiger sharks nest with their young.
Later, I told Tia L about my shark creeps. She said, "Oh, you were probably picking up on all the spirits of the people who were sacraficed there." She's very mystic. I was not persuaded.
When I was in Waimea, I had a phone conversation with S2, and when she asked whether El Capitan had found a way to put me in harm's way again (because last visit, he tried to get me to jump out of a lava tube and over a cliff into the sea, when there was no obvious way out of the ocean), I said, Well, I was totally getting these shark creeps at Spencer, and then he told me there was a nesting ground nearby.
This wouldn't be a story worth mentioning if it weren't for the headlines on my last day on the island. Turns out Spencer, as well as three other beaches on the Kohola Coast, were closed because of "numerous" daylight spottings of tiger sharks in the shallows, as close as 25 feet from the shore, for several days in a row. Tiger sharks are notorious for being scavengers -- in other words, they'll sample *anything* from surfboards to pigeons to your dear UCM -- but it is highly unusual for them to be lurking so close to shore, and broad daylight is a strange time for them to be on the prowl. They are very dangerous, and the only responsible thing is to close the beach to swimming and surfing when they are hanging out in the vacinity.
Of course, I can't empirically prove that my case of the shark creeps had anything to do with an actual predator giving me the eye, but ... ugh .. that's just creepy.
So on my last day, I'm showing El Capitan the newspaper and going, Uh, I was totally having the shark creeps when we were snorkeling at Spencer, and El Capitan was replying with his usual, "There are sharks everywhere," whe he says to me, "So are you afraid to go in the water now?" I replied, truthfully, No, but I'm not going to Spencer or Hapuna. He suggests an afternoon swim at Magic Sands to play in the surf (another one of my favorite things).
For a long time, El Capitan, Tia L and I are out bobbing in the surf at Magic Sands. Most of the waves are breaking with two- or three-foot faces, but we are out beyond the break, riding the swells. El Capitan swims off, comes back making some funny shark gestures with his arm and tells me a story about how once, when he was in the Seyschelles, he and Tia L and a bunch of friends dropped acid and went snorkeling. One of them made her arm look like a shark fin sillouetted in the sun, and everyone else freaked out and "started crying like babies because we all thought we were toast," El Capitan said as he bobbed in the swells. Tia L announces that she is done swimming and will be going to shore. El Capitan and I stay in the ocean.
Then he says to me, "Hey, UCM-i (this part of the family still calls me by a diminutive childhood nickname), we haven't done anything dangerous while you've been here. Let's say we find some trouble right now."
What do you propose? I ask.
"Let's mix it up with the boogie boarders and bodysurf some of the bigger waves," he says. "You can't go home without a little rough action. If there's not a chance you'll break your neck, you can't say you've had fun."
So swimming with the tiger sharks doesn't count, huh? I ask, noticing that the surf has become larger in the time we've been out bobbing around. There are now large swells and waves with faces up to five feet or so, and I haven't bodysurfed in years because the Oregon coast is too fucking cold to do that.
"You didn't *see* the shark, did you?" he asks. When I shake my head no, he says, "Then it doesn't count."
So we swim closer to shore and start catching some of the waves. Most of them are two or three feet, which is a decent-size wave for bodysurfing, especially when you're competing for space with a bunch of gung-ho boogie boarders. I'm having a little trouble at times catching the waves just right. I push off too late and the wave breaks as I'm launching. I push off too late and I can't get the full ride. Sometimes, they seem like they will be a good ride but the wave fizzles.
Then, I see this wall of water rising above me. I feel the strong pull of the current on my legs, dragging me out to sea. El Capitan, who is a foot taller than me, yells, "This is gonna be a hot one! Be careful!" just as a decide to lauch myself up into it. The face must be about five feet and for a minute, I bodysurf the sucker. Then it breaks on top of me like a ton of bricks. In a flash, my head is pushed down so forcefully into the sand that I am totally upended, ass over kilt, and I'm flipped by the wave, smacked down on my back and trapped beneath the surf.
Having nearly drowned once before while whitewater rafting, the rushing foamy whiteness that's throwing me around like a rag feels a bit too familiar for comfort. Stuck under the water and pinned against the sand, I feel the tow dragging me out to sea, and I know another wave is about to break on top of me. I scramble to find my footing and get it just as the next wave comes roaring in, giving me the second saltwater nose enema in as many weeks. I shake my head, which is matted in sand, and El Capitan, who's about 15 feet closer to shore than I made, surfaces, laughs and yells, "Now *that's* more like it!"
We ride the waves for another 5 or 10 minutes, until a cramp in the front of my shin becomes too bothersome for me to continue. We hit the showers on the beach, and sand is pouring out of every edge my suit has to offer. My crotch is so full of it that there's no getting clean.
Spitfire is having a party that night. I go to her place and shower and put on dry, clean clothes for my evening flight home. We are celebrating a little girl's birthday. The house is populated by a cast of characters I've come to know over the past week, the endless parade of interesting people who compose El Capitan's and Tia L's social circle, some of whom they've known for 30 years. They have more friends -- and keep them longer -- than anyone I've ever known. People who get to know El Capitan and Tia L are usually quite taken by their enthusiastic living.
Which is why I have to call the trip bittersweet. Because as the time for me to leave for the airport approached, there was a growing sense that I may not again cross paths with Tia L, who has been such a powerful influence in my life -- someone who inspired my dreams, my wanderlust and reflected for me the most positive image of myself that I have ever known (she told me the other day, "To me, you were always the most interesting, gregarious and fun member of your family, even at age 8 or 9"). Three tiimes, we shared a prolonged hug, and as I was walking out of the party with El Capitan, she gave me the fiercest look and said simply, "I love you."
At that moment, I felt doubly blessed. Not just for having known and shared life with such an incredible, loving and strong woman since childhood, but also for the presence of so many others at that party. Had there not been a lively birthday party underway, had Spitfire not been commenting on the flavor balance of her potato salad, had Forest not been smiling meekly as I thanked him for the palm bowl he wove for me, had Spitfire's boyfriend not been tending to the chicken and lamenting the short time we had to visit, had the woman who's moving to Panama not been shouting across the lanai, "Farewell UCM-i!", I would've been unable to divert my eyes from that fierce look of Tia L's and would have burst into the most outrageous display of tears over the unfairness of that wretched cancer.
Instead, I met her eyes with whatever look it is that love and admiration and sadness at parting manages to etch on my face, and I replied, "I love you, too."
I certainly hope it's not the last time I see her. But if I have to have a parting memory, this would be it. With death lurking on her horizon, Tia L was sipping a beer, enjoying a party and still radiating a love of life and everything in it.
Tia L was sick the day I arrived, and for a few nights in a row, she suffered chills and fever that interrupted her sleep and made her a little lethargic. Tia L has always been a highly energetic woman -- she calls herself "hyper" -- so she was a little frustrated. But she made the best of it during the days, still finding the energy to head down to the beach for a snorkel and a swim or a sunset barbecue, as well as quite a few shopping trips.
It also didn't stop her from attending her water aerobics class and taking me along. Nothing quite like Sweating with the Oldies in a pool surrounded by a deck so hot that your dear UCM burnt the bottoms of her tender Oregonian feet on it. Those old folks are GOSSIPY, man. They carried on through the entire class, chat chat chatting about the arcane details of island life and the infirmities of old age, not the least of which is the necessity of returning to the mainland for medical procedures they don't trust the local doctors to do.
One day, my youngest cousin, Spitfire, who's 22, a surfer and a certified pilates instructor, joined Tia L and me for the water aerobics class. As was the case with me, all the old people kept telling her, "If those floaties (used for resistance training) are too much for you, you can use these lighter ones." Spitfire and I kept exchanging smiles and laughs over the situation because those old folks were so convinced this rather tame water aerobics class would overwhelm us. What's up with that?
Tia L had a rash of doctor's appointments during my visit, but I suspect this is a regularly occuring thing. Not only did she have a "touch of walking pneumonia," according to the docs, she may also have some secondary cancers popping up. It is, I tell you, an OBSCENITY to see this vibrant 58-year-old woman being laid low like this. In my version of the story, she was supposed to live to be a really old woman, her long, luscious, curly black hair gradually graying and her loving and wise nature growing only more so to the point that she'd become some kind of sage. (In truth, she is very wise already, but I was thinking she would get really effing old, and she certainly was not suposed to lose that incredible hair of hers from chemo treatments.)
As has been the case throughout my adult life, we sat around some evenings -- she and Spitfire and I -- and smoked a little of the green goddess and "talked story," as the Hawaiians say. I love Southerners. They have the gift of chewing the fat as I have experienced with no other regional American culture. Tia L and Spitfire were both bred and born in New Orleans, and the "memorial day" (because Tia L refuses to call it an "anniversary") of Hurricane Katrina really revved up the conversation at times. So did any mention of The Notorious M.O.M.
I asked Tia L about doing a "life story interview," and she readily agreed. Her time has more distinct limits on it than the rest of us believe we have, and she is a consummate and colorful storyteller. So we agreed to videotape some of our conversations toward the end of my visit.
On Sunday, I took off on my own and tooled around the island in candy apple red Mustang convertible. Headed up to Hawi, then on to Hilo for the night by way of the north shore and its lush, dramatic coastline. (El Capitan notes that "lush" in Hawaii requires a prolonged pronunciation, dragging out the "ssshhh." One place I stopped, Luenpohoehoe, is what he calls "30-second lussssshhhhhh.") The next day, I spent a few hours with my cousin, MiniMimi, at her home in Puna, then headed to Waimea, where I passed the night in such decadent splendor that, had they served the breakfast in bed, would've made Dr. M think she'd died and found some kind of Four Seasons version of the afterlife (if the Four Seasons were all into ornate Edwardian furniture and chandaliers, that is).
In the shadow of Mauna Kea, on which the observatories are built, Waimea is about 2,500 feet in elevation, and the cloudless skies that night afforded a view of the heavens so startingly dark and clear that I was stunned to speechlessness. The Big Island is intentionally underlit -- and those streetlights which exist are those hideous sodium vapor ones -- to protect the night sky from light pollution. Even without taking the 20 minutes or so necessary for my eyes to fully adjust to the darkness, I had a view of the heavens that is unlike any I have ever witnessed, including my travels to secluded places like the Amazon or the Chiriqui highlands of Panama. It's more than just light pollution at play in Hawaii; there must be something to layers of atmosphere. The stars weren't twinkling like they normally do. They were eye-popping points of lights on a black canvass. Really stunning.
When I returned to Kona on Tuesday, Tia L and I began the interview. It took place in three settings over two days, and I taped a good five hours of stories. She touched on everything from her experience as the second of five (or six?) children born to alcoholic first cousins to her years working in a mental hospital in Seyschelles with the Peace Corps and the three years she, El Capitan, Spitfire and MiniMimi spent sailing around the Caribbean and South America while my cousins were a pre- and menstrual teens and Tia L was going through menopause (something El Capitan says no man should have to endure on a 45-foot sailboat). I feel like I have given myself a gift -- and created a "living" memory for my family -- in conducting this interview. Tia L is a fabulous subject, a woman who has lived life at full-tilt, a trait for which she highly credits my free-spirited, adventurous uncle.
Speaking of my uncle, throughout my visit, he was up to his regular hijinks, although my aunt's illness seems to have tempered his behavior a bit. In keeping with his insistence that I try new things (an insistence I share enthusiastically), he bought me a big coconut bowl full of kava juice, claiming it was a good "narcotic." The shit made my lips and throat numb, but otherwise did nothing to my mood. He also introduced me to passionfruit, and my aunt introduced me to dragonfruit.
One day, we went to Spencer beach on the Kohola coast for an afternoon of snorkeling and a sunset barbecue. El Capitan and I were exploring the coral reef in an area where the bottom was perhaps 20 or so feet deep. Given the depth and the turbidity caused by the surf, I had the distinct feeling of being in open water. It was mostly overcast that day, as well, and I found the limited visibility at the surface -- which did not persist when I would dive down to the reef -- to be a bit disturbing. At times, I could not see El Capitan even when he was 10 or 15 feet away.
Presently, I started to get what I call "the shark creeps." This doesn't happen to me often. In fact, it was the only time it happened on the entire trip. I had the distinct experience of being watched, of danger lurking nearby. But I couldn't see jack shit aside from the reef and fish immediately below me, and when I would surface from a dive, I saw nothing on the water's surface that would concern me. I would scan for El Capitan, see his snorkel 25 yards or so away and go back to my business. But I found myself consciously spreading my arms and legs wide and thinking, I am a human. You don't want to eat me. This here white meat won't taste too good to you. Shoo, shark, shoo!
After maybe 40 minutes of this, the shark creeps were simply too intense for me to enjoy the reef anymore. I told El Capitan I was swimming back to shore. When we got to the shallows, El Capitan said, "Well, now that we're near shore, I guess I can tell you: See that Hale (Hawaiian archeological site) over there? The Hawaiians used to sacrafice people to sharks there. I guess they must have cut them up some first or something. But they'd toss them in over there." He was pointing to an area just north of where we'd been snorkeling.
They were sacraficing people to *reef* sharks? I asked, a bit incredulous.
"Well, there are probably some reef sharks around here," he replied, "but mainly that's seems to be a nesting place for hammerheads and tiger sharks."
TIGER SHARKS?! ... Your UCM was not pleased. She did not tell El Capitan of the shark creeps she'd been having, though, because she knows what El Capitan's response would be: "There are sharks everywhere." UCM, however, was not thrilled about having been lolling about, unaware, in the surf near an area where tiger sharks nest with their young.
Later, I told Tia L about my shark creeps. She said, "Oh, you were probably picking up on all the spirits of the people who were sacraficed there." She's very mystic. I was not persuaded.
When I was in Waimea, I had a phone conversation with S2, and when she asked whether El Capitan had found a way to put me in harm's way again (because last visit, he tried to get me to jump out of a lava tube and over a cliff into the sea, when there was no obvious way out of the ocean), I said, Well, I was totally getting these shark creeps at Spencer, and then he told me there was a nesting ground nearby.
This wouldn't be a story worth mentioning if it weren't for the headlines on my last day on the island. Turns out Spencer, as well as three other beaches on the Kohola Coast, were closed because of "numerous" daylight spottings of tiger sharks in the shallows, as close as 25 feet from the shore, for several days in a row. Tiger sharks are notorious for being scavengers -- in other words, they'll sample *anything* from surfboards to pigeons to your dear UCM -- but it is highly unusual for them to be lurking so close to shore, and broad daylight is a strange time for them to be on the prowl. They are very dangerous, and the only responsible thing is to close the beach to swimming and surfing when they are hanging out in the vacinity.
Of course, I can't empirically prove that my case of the shark creeps had anything to do with an actual predator giving me the eye, but ... ugh .. that's just creepy.
So on my last day, I'm showing El Capitan the newspaper and going, Uh, I was totally having the shark creeps when we were snorkeling at Spencer, and El Capitan was replying with his usual, "There are sharks everywhere," whe he says to me, "So are you afraid to go in the water now?" I replied, truthfully, No, but I'm not going to Spencer or Hapuna. He suggests an afternoon swim at Magic Sands to play in the surf (another one of my favorite things).
For a long time, El Capitan, Tia L and I are out bobbing in the surf at Magic Sands. Most of the waves are breaking with two- or three-foot faces, but we are out beyond the break, riding the swells. El Capitan swims off, comes back making some funny shark gestures with his arm and tells me a story about how once, when he was in the Seyschelles, he and Tia L and a bunch of friends dropped acid and went snorkeling. One of them made her arm look like a shark fin sillouetted in the sun, and everyone else freaked out and "started crying like babies because we all thought we were toast," El Capitan said as he bobbed in the swells. Tia L announces that she is done swimming and will be going to shore. El Capitan and I stay in the ocean.
Then he says to me, "Hey, UCM-i (this part of the family still calls me by a diminutive childhood nickname), we haven't done anything dangerous while you've been here. Let's say we find some trouble right now."
What do you propose? I ask.
"Let's mix it up with the boogie boarders and bodysurf some of the bigger waves," he says. "You can't go home without a little rough action. If there's not a chance you'll break your neck, you can't say you've had fun."
So swimming with the tiger sharks doesn't count, huh? I ask, noticing that the surf has become larger in the time we've been out bobbing around. There are now large swells and waves with faces up to five feet or so, and I haven't bodysurfed in years because the Oregon coast is too fucking cold to do that.
"You didn't *see* the shark, did you?" he asks. When I shake my head no, he says, "Then it doesn't count."
So we swim closer to shore and start catching some of the waves. Most of them are two or three feet, which is a decent-size wave for bodysurfing, especially when you're competing for space with a bunch of gung-ho boogie boarders. I'm having a little trouble at times catching the waves just right. I push off too late and the wave breaks as I'm launching. I push off too late and I can't get the full ride. Sometimes, they seem like they will be a good ride but the wave fizzles.
Then, I see this wall of water rising above me. I feel the strong pull of the current on my legs, dragging me out to sea. El Capitan, who is a foot taller than me, yells, "This is gonna be a hot one! Be careful!" just as a decide to lauch myself up into it. The face must be about five feet and for a minute, I bodysurf the sucker. Then it breaks on top of me like a ton of bricks. In a flash, my head is pushed down so forcefully into the sand that I am totally upended, ass over kilt, and I'm flipped by the wave, smacked down on my back and trapped beneath the surf.
Having nearly drowned once before while whitewater rafting, the rushing foamy whiteness that's throwing me around like a rag feels a bit too familiar for comfort. Stuck under the water and pinned against the sand, I feel the tow dragging me out to sea, and I know another wave is about to break on top of me. I scramble to find my footing and get it just as the next wave comes roaring in, giving me the second saltwater nose enema in as many weeks. I shake my head, which is matted in sand, and El Capitan, who's about 15 feet closer to shore than I made, surfaces, laughs and yells, "Now *that's* more like it!"
We ride the waves for another 5 or 10 minutes, until a cramp in the front of my shin becomes too bothersome for me to continue. We hit the showers on the beach, and sand is pouring out of every edge my suit has to offer. My crotch is so full of it that there's no getting clean.
Spitfire is having a party that night. I go to her place and shower and put on dry, clean clothes for my evening flight home. We are celebrating a little girl's birthday. The house is populated by a cast of characters I've come to know over the past week, the endless parade of interesting people who compose El Capitan's and Tia L's social circle, some of whom they've known for 30 years. They have more friends -- and keep them longer -- than anyone I've ever known. People who get to know El Capitan and Tia L are usually quite taken by their enthusiastic living.
Which is why I have to call the trip bittersweet. Because as the time for me to leave for the airport approached, there was a growing sense that I may not again cross paths with Tia L, who has been such a powerful influence in my life -- someone who inspired my dreams, my wanderlust and reflected for me the most positive image of myself that I have ever known (she told me the other day, "To me, you were always the most interesting, gregarious and fun member of your family, even at age 8 or 9"). Three tiimes, we shared a prolonged hug, and as I was walking out of the party with El Capitan, she gave me the fiercest look and said simply, "I love you."
At that moment, I felt doubly blessed. Not just for having known and shared life with such an incredible, loving and strong woman since childhood, but also for the presence of so many others at that party. Had there not been a lively birthday party underway, had Spitfire not been commenting on the flavor balance of her potato salad, had Forest not been smiling meekly as I thanked him for the palm bowl he wove for me, had Spitfire's boyfriend not been tending to the chicken and lamenting the short time we had to visit, had the woman who's moving to Panama not been shouting across the lanai, "Farewell UCM-i!", I would've been unable to divert my eyes from that fierce look of Tia L's and would have burst into the most outrageous display of tears over the unfairness of that wretched cancer.
Instead, I met her eyes with whatever look it is that love and admiration and sadness at parting manages to etch on my face, and I replied, "I love you, too."
I certainly hope it's not the last time I see her. But if I have to have a parting memory, this would be it. With death lurking on her horizon, Tia L was sipping a beer, enjoying a party and still radiating a love of life and everything in it.
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