Sunday, 30 September 2001

Today is my nephew's fourth birthday, yesterday the adult-half of the celebration. It's strange that at immediate family gatherings I can feel so out of my element, much more so than when I was younger. Pepperoni pizza and football on the television, a starred and striped cardigan, exaggerated faces made to get reactions from the baby, and lots of plastic—utensils, soda bottles, tiny firefighters and dump trucks, stools on which to stand to reach the sink. There were a couple new faces, unexpected faces, and I felt a little overwhelmed when I walked in. Can you say hi to aunt Lisa? This is my daughter, my sister, she's not been feeling well. My parents were anchors, though, and the day wasn't for me anyway.

After the party there were a few hours for me to spend back in the sick cave, and then I drove down old roads past caving-in barns, sitting cows, and old general stores to my parents' hometown and to EJ and Oliver's wedding. I expected to see about a the fifth of the people I ended up seeing—some, repeats from Clyda's wedding; some, friends whom I'm genuinely sorry I don't see more often; and, of course, some, people whose distance from my life (and vice versa) created awkward two-sentence life summaries and forced closures. I had fun and should've left at the end of the reception, rather than thinking that a sparse after-party was a good idea.

Thursday, 27 September 2001

You took the day off from work, and it's one of the prettiest days of the year. How would you choose to spend your day? (a) going for a long walk (b) reading a book on the back porch (c) cleaning the house (d) getting some work done on a freelance project, or (e) shivering under a few pounds of blankets on which the cat is delicately balanced, taking calls from telemarketers, and missing an opportunity to go to a Modest Mouse show? No, I wouldn't choose (e), either, but that's how it worked out. I hate being sick.

By the way, Leeches is back. Well, back and gone again. My voice isn't loud enough to call for her, and I don't want to go looking for her since discovering yesterday that there's a man living underneath my house. Still working on a solution to that one.

Wednesday, 26 September 2001

I've been thinking about Editha lately, as a consequence of current events and common opinion. I originally read it for a literature course and had actually forgotten about it, until recently. I find it eerie that something written in 1905 can be so distinctly relevant in 2001. What happened two weeks ago would've been impossible to imagine then, but our reactions are predictable as ever.

Leeches is missing and of course I'm worried. Incidentally, I'm also uncomfortably sick; the change in temperature is death to the sinuses. (Perhaps waiting by the screen door for a sign of Leeches hasn't helped.) So tonight, and possibly tomorrow, the cat who's not missing and I are going to spend some time together; me, feeling lifeless and pitiful; Jane, lifeless and lazy.

As I'm writing, I can hear Bob Marley repeating the phrase everything's gonna be alright; it's being hammered through the vents and the floorboards, courtesy of my downstairs neighbors. Optimistic words that prevent me from sleeping.

Tuesday, 25 September 2001

Another morning post-concert, another stamp-smudged face. Last night it was Built to Spill, a show I really enjoyed, even though none of the songs I was hoping to hear were played. That would've been OK, but then something happened: They ended their set with Freebird. And then they didn't play an encore (is that some sort of a trend these days?) to get the bad taste out of my mouth. Just when I needed a little stability in the world, Built to Spill had to go and play Freebird. When people request that song at shows, do they do it seriously?

***

Today Autumn landed on Raleigh. Maybe it did yesterday, but today the sky is blue, and for some reason that makes everything seem different. You know, if you look at the blue where it ends just above the treeline, and you watch the pigeons flutter from fire escapes, and you notice single strands of spiderwebs glistening in the grass, in those moments, the world seems peaceful.

***

Ah, sweet romance.

Sunday, 23 September 2001

I'm supposed to be working all day again today, but I figured it was worth it to sacrifice a couple of hours work for some sunshine and contact with things composed of molecules rather than pixels. So I stepped out of my house and into what felt something like America, something I guess I've been forced to notice in light of recent events. Martin and I took the old Cougar and drove to the farmer's market, windows down, the radio tuned to A Prairie Home Companion (turning to a new Garrison Keillor fix since Mr. Blue retired). We sampled local cherry tomatoes, apples, and cider, took pictures of the baskets of food and piles of gourds, and marveled at the enormous pumpkins and at the families decked out in unfortunate costumes of red, white, and blue.

Saturday, 22 September 2001

I spent all of my Saturday inside, with my neck craned, my eyes narrowed at the computer screen, and my right hand gripping the mouse at an awkward angle, causing what I'm told is my deltoid muscle to ache like mad. I both hate that I was trapped inside and wish that I could do this with the rest of my week (work at home, that is).

Friday, 21 September 2001

It's almost too easy for me to target my anger at one source, and maybe that's a common problem. Maybe we're all pointing fingers, perhaps with the understanding that assigning blame is complicated, yet we're still unable to focus on more than one culprit, the only difference being whom we choose to focus on. Some of us realize that the U.S. isn't guilt-free but learn to overlook those sins with the replaying of the flowering of fire, the loss of thousands of lives simultaneously.

Lately I've been doing just the opposite, allowing the events that happened just over a week ago to become fuzzy, and, instead, focusing on the failures of my government and what brought us to this point. I don't know if it's because I want to find solutions, or if I'm so used to feeling like I have the minority opinion that I'm actually unable to join the majority. In any case, I'm sorry. I don't want to dull my imagination or to stop asking the questions: what must it be like to walk past those missing posters every day? what must it have been like to have been blinded by the dust of metal and humans, tracing the walls of buildings, running in a vague direction in hopes of surviving what you don't yet understand? what must it have felt like to have been crushed by your office? or to have sped toward death with your hands bound? or to have been so desperate that you jump from the fiftieth floor?

I'm trying to find a balance, I really am. It's just that I'm not used to scripts that have parts only for bad guys and more bad guys, both guilty of turning innocent people into victims. Where are the good guys? Why are all the endings I see so unattractive?

I'm unable to reconcile things like this with things like this. Why can't both fit in my head at the same time?

Thursday, 20 September 2001

I've been trying unsuccessfully to quell my addiction to the news, to stop reading and feeling bad and getting anxious. But people keep sending me articles and I keep sending them articles, and then there are the news sites. I've even been watching news on TV, which is something I've long hated (and still do) but still can't get enough of. I feel powerless and angry—angry at the terrorists, at the media, and at my country—and the only thing I can think to do is talk about it, digest more, and try to inform others about what little I know. I'm going to post some links to articles that I think are important—read them if you want to—and then I'm going to make myself take a break and try to slow the futile circles being paved in my brain.

(1) No Challenge to U.S. (from South Africa's Daily Mail and Guardian)
(2) an interview with Noam Chomsky (from Independent Media Center)
(3) an article by Robert Fisk (from Independent.co.uk)
(4) An Afghan-American Speaks (from salon.com)

Wednesday, 19 September 2001

A few new things in my life: (1) I started a new job on Monday. Well, a new position, same private cubicle. I'm now a full-time copy-editor who does a few graphics, rather than the other way around. Or something like that. (2) I have a new web design assignment, which might mean that I'm going to get a lot less sleep than I'm currently getting. Somehow, though, I'm always able to sacrifice sleep. (3) I think my cat has some sort of obsessive-compulsive disorder. She's contantly cleaning herself, though I don't think she ever really gets dirty (she stays inside). I'm wondering if it's because of the stray's presence. Does that happen to cats? Are their little minds so complex that they channel feelings of inadequacy into obsession or addiction? Or is my apartment dirtier than I think it is? (4) I think I'm coming down with something.

Tuesday, 18 September 2001

This morning I woke up with blue ink stamped in three different places on my face, souvenirs transferred from my hand to my head from the concert I went to last night. Stef, Matt, Martin, Richard, and I had taken Richard's van to Chapel Hill to see The Faint, a show that made me want to have lived in the 80s all over again, this time in my twenties. "It's like Duran Duran, but this time we get to like it," Richard had said. Hm. I did like Duran Duran the first time.

It was an excellent show, minus the lack of an encore, and it was the first time in a week I've been able to escape both TV and my pesky mind. I miss worrying about trivial things.

Monday, 17 September 2001

I wish I weren't suspicious of my government, that I trusted politicians, and that I didn't know what I know about our foreign policy. Then it would be easier to swallow everything the media tells me, to pin an American flag on my shirt, and to call for revenge. That's not really true. It would be easier, but that's not what I wish.

Let me start again. I wish that I could trust the media and the politicians, that my country didn't have so much blood on its hands and that so many of us refuse to learn or be bothered by things that don't seem to affect us directly. I wish we didn't commercialize and propagate, turning such a sad event into a slogan on a t-shirt and a reason to promote nationalism. I wish we could look at the events that led up to Tuesday's disaster critically and openly, honestly looking for reasons and solutions rather than becoming a lynch mob clutching our guns. I wish I knew what to do, how to put my frustration into words, how to make sense of what has happened and what is happening.

In New York they're selling t-shirts that say: "Attack on America: I survive [sic] the attack!," as if being spared from death were a ride at Busch Gardens. It reminds me a little of a t-shirt I saw worn at the State Fair during the days of the Gulf War. It said: "Let's kick some Saudi Arabian butt!" Even then, some of us didn't know who our "enemy" was. It seems we're content as long as we have a name (right or not) toward whom we can direct our anger. The solutions can be simplistic and emotional, as long as they make us feel better.

Sunday, 16 September 2001

Though I still feel a little removed from daily life, I'm learning to retrace my usual steps and to assimilate myself back into patterns and into Raleigh. Yesterday evening one of my best friends from pre-college days got married, an event that was refreshingly positive after this long, confused week. Somehow old friends find ways of making life feel more constant, reminding me that years have in fact changed little, and that we can still find threads of friendship without excessive searching. A group of us ended up talking in a back room until the house was empty, and then we persisted in different locations until some ridiculous hour, enough to last us until we find another reason to get together. [Congratulations Clyda]

Today I found the city that I've known since college, hiding in a rusty, relaxed bar disguised as familiar faces and live music and crisp evening air, a short walk from my house. It didn't matter to me that all of the people I recognized I don't know all that well or that I didn't speak to everyone whose name I know; just seeing the faces and sitting at an old picnic table covered in wax and hearing clean guitars as the sun faded made me happy to be where I was.

Friday, 14 September 2001

When I arrived last night, the airport was eerily quiet; counters were darkened, unused planes sat in rows behind fences lining the road, a lonely tow-truck circled past the front of the building, patroling for empty and suspicious automobiles. The only place where people were gathered was in front of the Delta counter, at the metal detector, and at the few gates from where planes would be taking off. People were quiet but seemed more relaxed than I expected. They certainly appeared to be more relaxed than I quietly felt. Maybe it was the lack of news coverage in the airport (ironically but understandably the one place you couldn't get updates about the hijackings). Martin and Nate and I had waited out a delay outside the airport, at a bar with a TV, where we were fed the first half of the story about the people arrested at New York airports for having knives and box cutters.

I'm in Raleigh now, rather than Wyoming (or whevever I would be, had I chosen to drive). By the time we flew the second leg of the trip Friday morning, the Atlanta airport seemed close to normal, and you could almost forget to be nervous.

***

Here's an interesting message from Michael Moore regarding Tuesday's mess (and the mess that will follow). It's difficult to move out of this. I can't imagine what it must be like for those who were really affected.

Thursday, 13 September 2001

This week I have an article in the Spectator. No, it's not about the World Trade Center or the Pentagon or terrorism. It's about a drive-in theater, and it seems really misplaced among the constant coverage of Tuesday's events, as does everything else that's not directly related. In fact, it came out yesterday, and I completely forgot to look for it until late today.

I'm still worried about flying. I start to feel better, and then the news seeps in my ear, and it all becomes real again. I'm heading to the Portland airport in a couple of hours.

Wednesday, 12 September 2001

It was the first thing I thought of when I woke up; first came the images from TV, then came the recognition that my brain didn't invent this story in my sleep last night. And now I'm thinking of my own decision to fly on Thursday, the first day passenger flights resume. I considered driving back, and had even made all the arrangements to do so, mutedly excited about revisiting incredible countryside, watching strange colors and shapes and buffalo pass by my window, chatting about world news with old men and women in lost gas stations and Waffle Houses, rolling down the windows and turning up music, conversing and experiencing. Dreading the pressure to make it back in four days, switching drivers until muscles and eyes demand we pull over, unable to stop in Yellowstone or the Badlands or Chicago except to stretch or to sleep, spending money for gasoline and greasy food. Two outside votes for flying, claiming driving is irresponsible and emotional. Two outside votes for driving, claiming driving is smarter and safer. I hope I'm doing the right thing.

Yesterday I wandered around Portland with Martin and Nate, attempting to find some sort of community or explanation. No one seemed really sure what to do, everything too superficial and forced, yet doing nothing, helpless and pointless.

I've posted some comments about yesterday's events from friends in various places. Have a look.

Tuesday, 11 September 2001

When you're traveling, it's easy to remove yourself from the world, to get behind on the news, and to live in the moment rather than collectively. Maybe that's why it's so hard to make the transition from a trip back into day-to-day routine. This morning that happened with a jolt, a seven-thirty-a.m.-pacific-time phone call, a flick of the television switch and pictures of disaster, phone calls, conversations, are-you-OKs, and sleepy disbelief. I am stranded in Portland for the moment, watching everything from what feels like the wrong side of the country.

Saturday, 08 September 2001

I'd put three twenties in the front pocket of my jeans, which is all the money I have to spend on this trip. Somehow, though I still can't figure out how exactly, my 60 dollars—all of it—fell out of my pocket and onto the ground and rolled into a playful ball of tumbleweed into the street, the wind breathing life into my paper Andrew Jacksons. A car horn blew in staccato bursts behind me, and before I knew what was going on, Martin was in the middle of 21st Street grabbing at the twenties, running back to the sidewalk, slapping the twenties into my palm, and thanking the guy in the car for alerting us. Well, for alerting him, because until it was all over, I hadn't figured out what had happened. I was just watching it like a movie in slow motion, words registering in my brain but no meaning connecting them together. I'm glad Martin reacted as quickly as he did, because otherwise I would've missed all of it—the movie, the friendly man, and my money.

Yesterday we walked around Portland, downtown and by the river. Last night we went out in Portland, and afterwards Martin redyed my streaks while we both had the hiccups. Today five of us are taking tents to the San Juan Islands.

Wednesday, 05 September 2001

A little over a year ago, I reached the maximum capacity of my 6-megabyte Yahoo! e-mail account. For a while I tried to maintain the 6 MB by deleting messages with attachments, impersonal e-mail, etc. But to quote a favorite former professor of mine, it was obvious to me that I was merely "shoveling sand at the beach," and that my efforts were only being negated by more incoming e-mail. So I broke down and paid $20 for 25 megabytes of space, figuring it was a small price to keep all of my letters (written to and by me), the words and thoughts that documented different periods of my life and the lives of the people with whom I correspond.

Well, it's a year later, and I'm again shoveling. Unfortunately, I can't buy my way out of it this time—25 MB is all the space Yahoo! offers. I've written Yahoo! and asked friends' advice in order to find an easy way out of this predicament, but it appears that that's not going to happen. It seems the only way to save my messages and reduce the size of my account (aside from downloading, which is even less efficient) is to open each e-mail individually, copy and paste each one into a word processing program, and then delete the e-mail.

I've been putting off this task for a long time, which, of course, is no surprise. I finally started the project today after deciding exactly how I was going to go about making the transfer. Not only has it not been as bad as I'd suspected, but it's actually been fun. I've started with the folder in which I keep Stef's messages, pacing myself, copying, pasting, formatting, and reading. It feels like I'm going through a box of old toys and books, items I'd forgotten existed but that look instantly familiar and warm, items that make my mind wander and sometimes make me laugh. Of course I can't just throw these things away. I can't understand how anyone could.

***

Tomorrow I'm gone again. I'm going to Portland, Oregon until Tuesday. (Yes, it's my own fault that I'm broke.) This time I should have Internet access, so I hope to write more than I was able to last weekend. If you care to write me, there should be some more room in my Yahoo! account...

Also: Happy Birthday, Dad!

Tuesday, 04 September 2001

The only time I don't notice is when I sit perfectly still. Otherwise, which is most of the time, I can feel the unoiled creek of my sore muscles complaining about my Labor Day weekend. We (my muscles) walked around New York for hours without taking a break. (I didn't have any money on me, really, and stopping meant I had to buy a beverage or something, so I kept going.) We carried shelves and books and chairs up narrow stairs, loaded, unloaded, lifted, set down. We dragged suitcases full of unnecessary items through the Newark airport, bags on the left shoulder, switched to the right, and back again. We sat cramped on planes, trains, and automobiles, hunched over, awkward, and unhappy.

I had a much better trip to New York than my muscles did. On Saturday I helped Ingo move from a one-room efficiency into a two-story apartment carved out of a newly renovated 19th century house. On Sunday we took the train into the city, wove patterns in the streets, ducked in shops, and drank coffee. On Monday we unpacked and organized and drove to the beach and looked out of more train windows.

Monday, 03 September 2001

There were a lot of things that could've gone wrong during my trip today, as I took three trains, one bus, and one airplane to get from Islip, New York to Raleigh, North Carolina. It happened to be the bus, which was probably the most difficult of the three for me to complicate. Somehow I missed both terminals A and B (A is what I wanted) and ended up getting off at C, a mistake that I paid for by having to lug three overstuffed bags down a long labrynth of hallways that tirelessly pointed me in the direction of the monorail. Prior to that, I'd sort-of paired up with an awkward but friendly man from Munich who was going to the same place, in an attempt to add two confused heads together to form one able and on-course head. He got off at terminal A without a word, apparently thinking I was following him, and I thought to myself, poor guy. I guess he'll figure out soon enough that he's disembarked at the wrong spot. Two terminals later I figured out who the poor soul really was.

The plane ride itself was good in that it took off and landed when it was supposed to. I was put in the front row, and, just after I'd gotten settled, an airport worker brought a seven-year-old boy on the plane, and asked him if he wanted to sit by me. We looked at each other, and I tried to look friendly, but he just said "um..." quietly (like the girl on the phone), making it clear he didn't want to sit there but that he didn't want to say no. The man said yes, that'll be fine, sit right there, and the boy quietly obeyed. I remember thinking, good, no small talk on this flight. I soon learned how wrong I was.

First he asked me what the little white bag was in the pocket in front of him. It's in case you get sick, I said. I'm gonna play with it!, he answered, and began using it as a puppet, demanding in a garbled voice that I open the door. He told me about his friend Charlie who drank water and made it come out of his nose. He kept a book in his lap called The Icky Sticky Frog which had a sticky elastic tongue tipped with a paper fly that was suspended from a picture of a frog on the front. Throughout the flight, he repeatedly pulled the tongue back and watched as it recoiled and snapped the frog in the face. When the pretzels came, he chewed the edges to form different letters of the alphabet. I know, because he showed me each one. Look! I made a Q. See this one? I made an I. Look! I made another Q. This one is an X, but if you turn it sideways, it can be a T.

The flight was only slightly over one hour, but my clock was moving very slowly.

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