So, tell me, should I be depressed? Worried? Grateful? Angry? In denial? Suspicious? Preoccupied? There seem to be a thousand things happening at once, many of them quite unrelated, and I'm having some trouble processing all of it; I don't know how I should feel or react. It's normally much simpler: yellow and blue make green, red and blue make purple, yellow and red make orange. But what do all the colors combined at once make? That's right: brown. And if you add another color on top of that? More brown. Well, that's where I am right now—the good, bad, and mediocre have been stirred into a giant stew together, and I can hardly make out the original ingredients, let alone figure out what that strange flavor is.
It's Halloween (my favorite holiday), and I can expect a full moon. I can also (potentially) expect another terrorist attack, and, according to Herrn Rumsfeld, there's rumor it might happen in the South (well, in the southern part of somewhere). My birthday's coming up (am I happy or sad about that?), this morning my boss gave me Halloween candy in a paper bag meant for "nap sacks" (a relatively new term for me and a refreshingly unconventional "trick"), and I feel good after having had eight hours of uninterrupted sleep last night, (something that hasn't happened since the last time I got sick). There's speculation that the anthrax attacks are being executed by American neo-Nazi extremists (which would, in some backward way, be a good thing, because then we'd be forced to deal with culprits in the court system, rather than with bombs). And, well, there are civilians dying and hospitals being bombed, in my name, and there are people who paint their SUVs like red, white, and blue clowns who cut me off in traffic and neglect to vote. There is so much going on that I don't know about—that I probably don't want to know about—and it makes me uneasy. The sky is blue, Richard just sent me a cool haiku, and I am the new owner of an Onionhead Monster painting. So?
***
Happy Halloween! [link courtesy of Tracy]
Yesterday I bought my first cookbook. Well, that's not exactly true. My mom gave me a couple my freshman year in college, but then somehow cooking oil got all over them and they were too sticky to hold comfortably and too illegible to be useful, the pages tanned and spottily transparent, words from opposite pages shining through and merging to form a new language. (Though I never had much chance to use them, I still have those cookbooks, because I am oddly compelled to keep things.) I also didn't buy the cookbook myself originally—Martin bought it, upon my suggestion, and it wasn't until later we determined that it suited my freakish tastes better than his, and he sold it to me. Anyway, I'm really excited about it, mainly because it makes me want to cook and experiment and try new foods and pay attention to presentation, none of which I've ever cared about before. Tonight I made a meal that looked complicated and attractive and it was healthy and good. I wonder how long I can keep this up.
As promised, I've put up some pictures from October/Halloween and from the farmers' market.
The campfire smell is out of my hair but deep in my pillow. The party last night was primarily outside in 35-degree weather, but there were sticks cooking in giant barrels to provide warmth and I huddled near them, collecting heat and smoke. Lots of good costumes underneath big, concealing coats, creatures speaking with visible breath while clustered around the glowing barrels, wringing hands, clutching cups of cold beer with gloves and paws and bloody fingers. Despite the weather, the party was really fun. I'll post some pictures tomorrow.
I don't really try to use every ounce of gasoline in my car before I refuel. It's just that putting petrol in my car is such a pain in the ass that I usually wait until the gauge is deep in the red, and the yellow glow of the gas light has been burning for days before I bother to do it. Of course when I notice that I desperately need gas, it's always morning, the time of day that I have zero expendable time for things like errands, so I usually decide to try and make the twenty-five mile drive to work on generous fumes. Then, at lunch, I roll to the gas station and leisurely fill my car, watching the numbers as they approach fifteen, the number of gallons my gas tank holds. For some silly reason, I'm always satisfied when I see that I was particularly close to being stranded; I don't know if it's relief that I feel, or if I'm just pleased with my own judgment of the gas gauge. When the numbers stop scrolling, sometimes I try to figure out how much further I could've gone before I would've had to make an embarrassing phone call (which has only happened once).
Today at lunch I put 14.852 gallons in my tank, which, if I'm figuring correctly, means I could've gone a mere 5.25 miles before grinding to a halt. Ah, life on the edge.
***
Just now, a strange altercation at the I Love New York pizza place near my house, while I was picking up my dinner: lots of threats, some pushing, talk of shooting and knives and even terrorism, some ice thrown in the face and a call to the cops. Me, wedged in a corner blankly watching, uncomfortable and taking no one's side.
Go outside at lunch. Read 1984. Spend more time alone. (It doesn't always have to be legitimized by a companion for it to be good.) Do some form of exercise semi-regularly. Play that dusty instrument in the corner. Keep the empty Diet Coke can collection in check. (Today at work two older women came up to me together and asked, giggling, what happened to the Diet Coke cans?, referring to the fact I'd recycled them a few hours before.) Call the friends you never see. Spend less time with the computer. For once, do nothing.
— While on my way home from work today, I saw a girl picking purple flowers in an exit median on the Durham Freeway. I saw her hunched-over body before I saw her car, and it took me a moment to realize what she was doing and how she'd gotten there.
— Tonight Martin discovered his bike has been stolen; the chain that attached both of our bikes to a large printing press of sorts in the garage had been cut, and for some reason, my bike was left standing there, unguarded and defenseless. I guess its biggest defense is that it came from KMart.
— An hour ago I walked to the video store and rented Jesus' Son, a movie recommended to me by my late friend Rasheid.
My days are strings of unrelated events squished into seven-hour segments of free-time. Are anyone else's days any different?
I've finally had a chance to put up some pictures from my trip to Portland. Have a look.
Ever since I moved from my fourth floor office to my second floor office, I have lost the privilege of heating my lunch in a microwave so close that I don't actually have to leave my chair. These days I have to carry my lunch into the main dining area (which isn't all that far away), walk back to my desk to entertain myself for 4.5 minutes, and then run back to retrieve my lunch before a pouting, foot-tapping coworker snatches it out. Carrying a steaming plastic tray of squared-off portions of meat and vegetables down the hall is rather a humbling experience, not unlike wandering around the doctor's office with a specimen. I'm convinced no one can look cool doing it.
Yesterday I saw part of the Dark Crystal, the part where the Pod People get their "essence" sucked out by the Skeksis. Today my office is playing the part of the Skeksis, draining me of my essence to the hum of florescent lights. In retaliation, I've been pouring Diet Coke down my throat, but what I really think I need is sunlight.
"I dreamt that a gang of evil men with super-human powers had kidnapped my daughters. I ran for help, but no one believed me; they looked at me as if I were crazy. Then I started thinking, Maybe I really am crazy. I woke up feeling shaken. I realized that this is what so often happens when we come face to face with some unimaginable horror: we run for help, but no one believes us. No one believes how many species are disappearing, how many prisoners are being tortured, how many women are being broken by self-important men. Everything stops making sense. The weight of the world sits on our bony shoulders, and our bones snap."
—Sy Safransky, in the October issue of The Sun Magazine
Lack-of-sleep delirious energy is far superior to a nap hangover; somehow I let myself forget that fact yesterday evening when I crawled into bed at 8:30 and asked my alarm to wake me up an hour later. At 9:30 and again at every hour after that until 2:30, I told myself to get up and go to the party, or at least go take my contacts out and put on something more comfortable. At 2:30 I finally peeled my dry contacts from my eyes and washed my face and brushed my teeth and felt so much better until I realized I wasn't tired any more. For the next half hour or so, newly freed of guilt, I lay on my back and thought about the evening I didn't have until eventually I drifted off. Somehow I'm tired again today.
Tonight I'm going to something called The Barrister's Ball, an annual event at which everyone's required to dress as a cop, a robber, a pimp, a prostitute, or a Catholic school girl. Last year I went as a Catholic school girl; I'm still rifling through my closet to determine what I can become tonight. I don't feel much like any of those people at the moment.
At 4:30 this afternoon a local TV crew filmed my office, interviewing people about a September 11th-related charity bonus and taking shots of people sitting at their desks shuffling papers and sitting behind rectangular pieces of oak, moving around mice and pecking at keyboards, or whatever office people do in their individual scooped out spaces. At one point the camera was set up directly in front of my cubicle, at which time I was talking on the phone to Todd about an assignment while the other line was ringing and Steve was begging me to urgently print something out that couldn't be printed. I tried to sit so that my monitor was safely positioned between my head and the TV camera, trying to listen to Todd and Steve and mouth an explanation and perform one-handed charades, but I'm not sure I was entirely successful. The news comes on in 10 minutes; I plan to watch and find out whether I was effectively covert and made it to the cutting room floor.
Since I took this picture, two things have happened: (1) One of the creatures pictured has entirely disappeared, apart from a tail and the lower part of two back legs. (2) I bought a loud bell and attached it to the other creature.
Tonight at Stef and Matt's a few of us got together to work on Halloween costumes—to brainstorm, to sew and build, to bounce ideas off each other, to exchange material, to try things on, etc., etc. Both Stef and Matt always have incredible costumes, and they have baskets full of scraps of fabric and foam and piles of idea books, so they've instituted a sort-of costume workshop at their place this year. I've only just decided what it is I want to be, and now I have to figure out how the hell I'm going to transform myself into the image I have in my head. I'm gonna need an ocean of hair gel.
There's a restaurant I like and whenever I go I always order the same dish but sometimes, only rarely, that dish doesn't taste good on that particular day and I have no idea why, because there's nothing obviously wrong with it. Today was like that. Nothing particularly bad happened; I've heard worse news, I've driven through thicker traffic, I've had busier days, I've seen cloudier weather, I've gotten myself into more uncomfortable situations. But for some reason today felt bad around all the edges, and that cancerous feeling contaminated the things that on any other day would have been merely average, without any explanation whatsoever, besides the fact that it's Monday and I'm rather exhausted. At least with the absence of reason I can draw the conclusion that tomorrow will likely be better.
Apparently butterfly bushes are planted in the median of a highway in Eastern North Carolina. Yes, bushes that attract butterflies are planted in the median of a highway.
On my way back from hearing Richard's band play on Thursday, I drove the usual route past Central Prison, a red brick behemoth located half a mile from my house. Despite the building's size, it easily fades into background if you drive past it frequently enough. This time, though, the building caught my attention. First I saw a few police cars clustered together, then I saw candlelight, and then a sign sprouting through a group of people that confirmed my suspicions: Execution is Not the Solution. It was 1:30 a.m. as I drove by, thirty minutes to go. I purposely didn't look at the clock when it struck 2. I still don't know the details, but I feel like I should.
Friday night Suran Song in Stag, disguised as an Indian and two cowboys, played and danced and strummed and banged on a stage that became a canvas for five simultaneous slide shows. When the show was over, we went to Richard's so that Suran could wash the fake blood off before going to a party we never actually went to. Instead, they drove on to West Virginia, and I went home and slept ten hours.
Today I have Three Days stuck in my head after seeing Jane's Addiction play last night, a show that, unlike Friday's show, drowned in its own theatrics. Too produced, too many Apollo dancers, too much exploitation, too much gibberish coming from Perry Farrell's mic in between songs, too many advertisements everywhere you looked, out of every cup you drank, in every seat you sat. It felt like watching a (formerly?) subversive band in Corporation Disneyland. The tickets were free, and I'm glad I went, but I didn't stay for the whole thing. Instead, Martin and I rented Blue Velvet and ate some strange, sugary crap that made my teeth hurt.
I think there was a point, probably during late childhood, when we began to branch, when we became selective and critical and started to cluster in like-minded groups, divided by brand-names and neighborhoods, and, eventually, by pop culture and social politics. It's easy to forget about the others when you don't interact with them. It's easy for them to forget about me.
Tonight I ate dinner with an unlikely group of people, most of whom I'd never met before. All of them were very friendly, and we got along fine. But one of us stayed quiet. A few of the things that I overheard: I'm a country boy. I would have a deer-head on the wall, if she'd let me. I love Bush! Did you hear Rosie O'Donnell say she's sorry that she ever said anything bad about him? That made me cry. I was lying in the tanning bed when the World Trade Center was struck. Yeah, we have to do these tedious EPA regulation things that really shouldn't be bothered with...
The meal was good but laughably expensive, and I felt out-of-place among the wealthy and frivolous. I was worried about the fork issue, and I couldn't help translating the cost of my meal into CDs and gasoline.
I don't have cable, but tonight I ate out and sat directly in front of a TV tuned to CNN. It's incredible, the amount of information that is squeezed into such a small space, one screen with a hundred little partitions, divided into neat red, white, and blue rectangles. The space at the bottom of the screen seems to be reserved for scrolling text, text that generally sums up the situation, if you can focus on it long enough to comprehend what it's telling you. The rest of the screen competes for your attention, screaming look at me! look at me!, flashing and morphing into weather reports and sports scores, historical facts, quotes without speakers, retaliation approval statistics, and, somewhere on the screen, a prominent "America Fights Back" logo. The largest portion of the screen devotes itself to blurry Afghanistan footage—dark sky and green lights reminiscent of early '80s video games—interlaced with crisp shots of aircraft carriers and sturdy missiles that have "NYPD" scratched on them. I found all of it ridiculously overwhelming; in fact, I can't process any of it—September 11th, my country's foreign policy, yesterday's attack, potential terrorist revenge, biological warfare, the perversion of the American flag, cheap slogans, and an onslaught of filtered news.
Still, that's not everything. Yesterday I learned how to make my own spring rolls and today I learned how to grease the suspension on my car. I also borrowed Martin's macro lens and took close-up pictures while he held a light bulb beside my head, I learned a new skill at work, corresponded with friends, and I listened (really listened) to some good music.
I set up my clock-radio next to the sink so I could listen to NPR while washing dishes, so I could listen to what's been prepared for me. I still don't feel like I know much of anything, even though the radio and TV were on all day. All day I drifted in and out, sometimes listening closely, sometimes just letting it wash over me as I thought about other things, allowing the information to seep in my head osmotically. At one point—I think it was when Donald Rumsfeld was speaking—both the radio and TV were broadcasting the same words by the same voice but with a split-second delay between them. Standing in between the two felt like being caught in an echo, making everything feel more surreal than it already did, making me feel like I had woken up in the world depicted in Bladerunner. I don't know what to think. I feel like the hope that welled up in me as a teenager has been filed down into an ugly, imperfect bead of cynicism. I'm afraid of losing the little bit of hope I have left.
Tomorrow I expect to get a flood of tacky inter-office e-mails, the kind with airbrushed eagles whose talons are clutching shredded turbans, or something of the sort. They're always worse than I imagine, not unlike the titles for the "operations." Such a sterile word for death.
On a related note, Ingo told me that "God Bless America" was stamped into the ground beef he bought at the grocery store. I laughed when he told me that, but it's worn off by now.
Last night on my way to the Stingray, making my way through the post-Rocky Horror Picture Show crowd that dotted the sidewalk, a guy stopped me to ask "Purple or blue?" "What?" I asked. "Purple or blue?" he repeated. "Uh...blue," I answered, and he handed me a blue rubber bracelet, one that is still hanging from my wrist. I've been eyeing it all day, putting my thumb under it and stretching, holding it under the light to see it sparkle. I wonder how many people got bracelets from that guy last night. Nicer than New Orleans' beads, because the jewelry comes for free.
So I saw art and a million people, all in different social groups gathering here or there, but always migrating. I wonder how many of those people moved out of those groups and into others last night, like I did. Tonight the move between groups will be more distinct.
a) I finally got the Doubletake Film Festival brochure in yesterday's mail and I was happy to see that some of the pictures I took last May were included; one even made it to the cover. I also received an unexpected mixed CD from a friend in California.
b) An old best friend sent me an e-mail that turned yesterday into a warm day September 1995—the day I met him—and made me want to relive, to go to class again, to ride around in his car aimlessly while listening to Crass, take pictures of power lines, share a PBR, get coffee somewhere, talk, laugh, talk. We see each other sometimes and make promises neither of us believes anymore. This weekend, however, we're going out. I can't wait.
c) First Friday, downtown, which means there's art everywhere and people crawling around like ants rather than driving around like bees. It's refreshing, having plans, because that means I can look forward, rather than scrambling to figure out what I'm going to do. I generally don't like planning ahead, probably because I hate waiting.
d) It was a lie, the weather forecast. It's hot and pretty.
e) I re-read this story, called Things I Like About America, which is nothing like it probably sounds. (Unfortunately the online version is only an excerpt.)
All good things.
I had almost exactly one hour to spend in the dwindling summer warmth before the sun disappeared; tomorrow we're promised colder weather. I walked around in a nearby forest, one that is progressively getting narrowed by yellow clawed machines that scoop and displace and make room for pavement. I saw a still brown water snake and a hissing beetle, a spider web but it was too late, and a few barrel-shaped cows. The air felt perfect, soft and warm, and the sky was striped with pink. It was the first time I'd been in a forest since I was in the Hoh Rain Forest in Washington a few weeks ago; it wasn't until today I appreciated the enormity of the rain forest.
I haven't seen the Man Under the House for a couple days now, so I'm wondering if he's packed up and moved on. He did say hi to me the other day, just before closing the door to his space, so at least he's a friendly neighbor. I'm not all that comfortable with him there, though, so (any day now) I'm going to buy a lock and reclaim my house. I guess while I'm at it, I could also reclaim my driveway, the garage, and the stretch of road outside my house, but those won't be as easy as purchasing a lock. That's because legitimate neighbors take those things.
The driveway and the garage are supposed to be shared between my house and the house behind mine. That wouldn't be a problem, except that the people who live in that house and almost every other person who visits those people park either perpendicular to the entrance of the driveway directly in front of it, or parks with the front tires in the driveway and the back tires on the street, so that no one can get in or out of the driveway. I don't know if that's their mission exactly, but I can't figure out why else they would try to park there. The worst part is that this usually happens when there's a car parked in the driveway (mine, for example), and when there's plenty of room to park on the street. (Once Ingo witnessed a guy block the driveway horizontally, have a conversation with a cop, and then move his car so that he was blocking it vertically.)
The neighbors to my left take care of the street. Collectively, they own probably thirteen Volkswagens, all of which are parked in their front yard and on the street in front and beside my house (except for one they stealthily keep in my garage). Every morning at 7:30 the souped-up Karmann-Ghia gets its accelerator flattened as it sits motionless, bubbly purrs spitting out of its flared exhaust pipe. And those are the good neighbors. Just beyond the Volkswagens are two frat houses that have bi-weekly parties with microphones, lots of whooooo! whooooo! and they own large trucks that can be driven in tight circles in the Y parking lot. Underneath my place the neighbors pump bass and shoot off fireworks and make my floor throb. (During one downstairs party, everything sitting on top of Martin's [silent] speakers gradually vibrated to the floor.) Across the street the neighbors regularly set their large speakers in the windows of their house, facing out, so that everyone within a square mile can enjoy Danzig. Their cat, Hobbes, an orange fellow, spends a lot of time on my back porch making my cats hiss and growl.
I guess the man down under is the least offensive of all. Think I should let him stay? (I expect only my parents to respond to that question.)
