Just got the following "instruction" from a Facebook friend:
"Rules: In your status line, list ten books that have stayed with you. Don't take more than a few minutes; don't think too hard. They don't have to be great works, just the ones that have touched you."
Here were eleven of mine (ordered from the time I read them onward, starting with GWTW at age 12):
Gone With the Wind
In Cold Blood
Nicholas and Alexandra
The Beatles Forever (Nicholas Schaffner)
The Bell Jar
1984
Catcher in the Rye
The Collected Poems of Sylvia Plath
Conversations with Joan Crawford
Two Girls, Fat and Thin (Mary Gaitskill)
Birthday Letters (Ted Hughes)
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Let me share lists from three others who shared:
1. J. R. R. Tolkien. The Lord of the Rings.
2. Walter Pater. The Renaissance: Studies in Art and Poetry.
3. Robert Graves. The White Goddess.
4. Carl Sagan. Cosmos.
5. William Morris. The Well at the End of the World.
6. Guest, Lady Charlotte (ed.). The Mabinogion.
7. Luigi Serafini. Codex Seraphinianus.
8. J.-K. Huysmans. Against the Grain.
9. Robert Bootzin. Bare Feet and Good Things to Eat.
10. Beowulf.
1. Complete Works of Shakespeare
2. Lord of the Rings
3. Aleister Crowley, Magick Book 4/Book of Thoth
4. Gogol, Dead Souls
5. Anthony Burgess Enderby Novels
6. Martin Amis, London Trilogy
7. JM Coetzee, Waiting for the Barbarians
8. Niccolo Machiavelli, The Prince & Discourses On Livy
9. Peter Kingsley, Works
10. Umberto Eco, Foucault's Pendulum
The Secret of Scent by Luca Turin
100 Years Of Solitude Gabriel Garcia Marquez
The Florence King Reader
The Roald Dahl Omnibus
Dune Frank Herbert
A Guide To The Good Life: The Ancient Art of Stoic Joy, William B Irvine
Candide, Voltaire
Little Dorrit, Dickens
Jane Eyre, Charlotte Bronte
Pride and Prejudice, Jane Austen
The Downtown Diaries, Jim Carroll
Wyrd Sisters by Terry Pratchett
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I 100% refuse to believe that 75% of what these people wrote actually "touched" them. Seems like they had an IDEA of what they were SUPPOSED TO like and be "touched by" and list in order to seem cool/intellectual for the public. (Seriously: "The Complete Works of Shakespeare" -- If you really love Shakespeare and pay attention to his works and are intellectually honest, then of course you don't love EVERYTHING he wrote and can recognize the lesser plays/poems.)
Tuesday, December 10, 2013
Saturday, December 07, 2013
My Rape Story
Jameis Winston, Florida State QB and Heisman candidate, was exonerated yesterday of charges that he'd raped a co-ed:
The alleged victim first went to Florida State Police on December 7, 2012, saying that she had been raped early that morning, but did not know the identity of her alleged attacker. Initially, according to the case file, she described the suspect as a black male with a "'short afro' that looked like it needed to be cut." Then, on January 10, 2013, she left a voicemail for the investigating detective saying that she believed her alleged attacker was Jameis Winston, and that he was in one of her classes.
As it turned out, DNA proved that Jameis Winston was indeed the rapist. (Other DNA -- aka "semen" -- found on the victim was from her boyfriend.)
I found myself in similar circumstances in May of 2000. I'd gone out by myself to one gay club, looking for my ex-girlfriend. Didn't find her, but did run into a couple of her gay guy friends (guys that I also knew from clubbing). They said they were headed to another club, and I should meet them there. I drove on over... Didn't immediately see the two guys, but, being a warm night, just sat on the hood of my car waiting for them, soaking up the ambience of people coming and going from the club. A male stranger approached me and said "hi" and how/what was I doing... ME: "Just hangin' out." He said he was a "dick dancer" at the club we were sitting outside of --- meaning a gay stripper. I told him that I was gay, and was waiting for some guy friends to show up. We sat on the hood of my car and chatted in a friendly way for nearly a half-hour. As it became clear that my gay-guy acquaintances weren't showing up, the "dick dancer" mentioned that he had some cocaine and did I want to do some with him? I did. What the hell. But I didn't want to do it right there on the street, being afraid of cops and all (!). So I asked the guy to come on over to my apartment.
I drove him to my home, 10 minutes away. As soon as he entered, he asked, "Do you have a dog?" No. And he asked if my neighbors were nosy. And then he asked that I close my balcony shades, which I always kept open. We then sat on my futon, at least 3 feet between us, and watched MTV for a bit --- I remember Christina Aguilera was one of the videos, and that he said he liked her. I served us beers and we snorted some coke while we watched TV. What we talked about mainly, I don't remember, other than the now-significant question that he asked me straight out: "Do you think you would ever date me?" I told him, no, I was gay, I liked women. (I'd said the same while sitting on the hood of the car outside the gay club; and, since he was a "dick dancer" from said club, I assumed that he wasn't that interested in women himself.)
After maybe an hour of chatting and drinking and doing 2 lines of coke, I had to go to the bathroom. While I was sitting on the toilet seat peeing, he pushed open the closed bathroom door and dragged me off the toilet and into the bedroom right outside. That's when the rape began. I was raped first on my bed. I remember being coherent and asking stupid questions like, "Why are you doing this?" And saying stupid things like, "No, I don't want this." As if those "affirmations" would make any difference. He stuck his dick into me multiple times, then, when finished coming, said to me: "Go clean yourself up." He watched while I washed out my vagina in the bathroom.
Post-vagina-cleaning, he and I sat in my living room while we both got our clothes back on. He actually said at this point, "I don't know what happened." And then, "I need a ride home."
I was a bit relieved that he wasn't a psychopathic rapist/murderer and that I wouldn't be dying this evening, but also shocked at his audacity: This guy had just raped me, and now he was asking me to take him home??? Which is exactly what I said to him. Which is when his eyes (literally) turned black and he lunged at me again.
(Another dumb thing: As he was on top of me, I was worried about my burning cigarette and told him so. He grabbed it out of my hand and snuffed it out on my nearby "Webster's New World College Dictionary." Still have that dictionary and that cigarette burn.)
As he raped me the second time, he said, "We're going to do this 10 times tonight." When I heard that, something inside of me turned utterly cold --- I'd been relatively passive up 'til this point: not physically violent toward him (because I didn't want to get killed), just saying "no," etc. After he watched me wash up the second time, I told him I needed to let my cat out for the evening... I was naked, with just a towel around me... As I opened the front door of my apartment to let my cat out, I also ran out to my nearest neighbor, banging on their door to help me...
That evening/early morning I called the police and told them I'd been raped. I spent the next 6 hours sitting in the lobby of a local hospital waiting for the local "rape specialist" to become available and administer the "rape kit" testing.
The very next day, I pressed charges, and the case went to a Grand Jury. (Which, I found out, consisted primarily of retired people.) Weeks later, after my testimony, the Grand Jury verdict came back: The guy that raped me would not be prosecuted, would not even be brought to trial.
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The worst parts about this for me are many and not all involving the rapist himself:
One, that I was raped at about 1am and had to sit in a hospital awaiting rape-kit testing until 7am.
Two, that the Grand Jury didn't even see fit to bring the case to trial.
Three, that, when I told my mother months later that I'd been raped, her first reaction was, "Had you been drinking?"
Four, my own real-life father would probably say, "You deserved it." (My father's actual take on the OJ Simpson trial: Nicole Simpson was "bought and paid for.")
Five: People I've told about this have been ridiculous. The ex-girlfriend I initially set out to meet that night: I did turn to her for comfort after that night. She came to the hospital, for which I was grateful, but then thought we should spend the next night "doing each other's makeup and hair." (Really, YOU FUCKING IDIOT? I was just RAPED.) Later, another woman I was in love with ignored my mention of the rape altogether. (Seriously -- how can one ignore it when someone mentions that they were raped?)
Where was/is my protector? Anyone?
The alleged victim first went to Florida State Police on December 7, 2012, saying that she had been raped early that morning, but did not know the identity of her alleged attacker. Initially, according to the case file, she described the suspect as a black male with a "'short afro' that looked like it needed to be cut." Then, on January 10, 2013, she left a voicemail for the investigating detective saying that she believed her alleged attacker was Jameis Winston, and that he was in one of her classes.
As it turned out, DNA proved that Jameis Winston was indeed the rapist. (Other DNA -- aka "semen" -- found on the victim was from her boyfriend.)
I found myself in similar circumstances in May of 2000. I'd gone out by myself to one gay club, looking for my ex-girlfriend. Didn't find her, but did run into a couple of her gay guy friends (guys that I also knew from clubbing). They said they were headed to another club, and I should meet them there. I drove on over... Didn't immediately see the two guys, but, being a warm night, just sat on the hood of my car waiting for them, soaking up the ambience of people coming and going from the club. A male stranger approached me and said "hi" and how/what was I doing... ME: "Just hangin' out." He said he was a "dick dancer" at the club we were sitting outside of --- meaning a gay stripper. I told him that I was gay, and was waiting for some guy friends to show up. We sat on the hood of my car and chatted in a friendly way for nearly a half-hour. As it became clear that my gay-guy acquaintances weren't showing up, the "dick dancer" mentioned that he had some cocaine and did I want to do some with him? I did. What the hell. But I didn't want to do it right there on the street, being afraid of cops and all (!). So I asked the guy to come on over to my apartment.
I drove him to my home, 10 minutes away. As soon as he entered, he asked, "Do you have a dog?" No. And he asked if my neighbors were nosy. And then he asked that I close my balcony shades, which I always kept open. We then sat on my futon, at least 3 feet between us, and watched MTV for a bit --- I remember Christina Aguilera was one of the videos, and that he said he liked her. I served us beers and we snorted some coke while we watched TV. What we talked about mainly, I don't remember, other than the now-significant question that he asked me straight out: "Do you think you would ever date me?" I told him, no, I was gay, I liked women. (I'd said the same while sitting on the hood of the car outside the gay club; and, since he was a "dick dancer" from said club, I assumed that he wasn't that interested in women himself.)
After maybe an hour of chatting and drinking and doing 2 lines of coke, I had to go to the bathroom. While I was sitting on the toilet seat peeing, he pushed open the closed bathroom door and dragged me off the toilet and into the bedroom right outside. That's when the rape began. I was raped first on my bed. I remember being coherent and asking stupid questions like, "Why are you doing this?" And saying stupid things like, "No, I don't want this." As if those "affirmations" would make any difference. He stuck his dick into me multiple times, then, when finished coming, said to me: "Go clean yourself up." He watched while I washed out my vagina in the bathroom.
Post-vagina-cleaning, he and I sat in my living room while we both got our clothes back on. He actually said at this point, "I don't know what happened." And then, "I need a ride home."
I was a bit relieved that he wasn't a psychopathic rapist/murderer and that I wouldn't be dying this evening, but also shocked at his audacity: This guy had just raped me, and now he was asking me to take him home??? Which is exactly what I said to him. Which is when his eyes (literally) turned black and he lunged at me again.
(Another dumb thing: As he was on top of me, I was worried about my burning cigarette and told him so. He grabbed it out of my hand and snuffed it out on my nearby "Webster's New World College Dictionary." Still have that dictionary and that cigarette burn.)
As he raped me the second time, he said, "We're going to do this 10 times tonight." When I heard that, something inside of me turned utterly cold --- I'd been relatively passive up 'til this point: not physically violent toward him (because I didn't want to get killed), just saying "no," etc. After he watched me wash up the second time, I told him I needed to let my cat out for the evening... I was naked, with just a towel around me... As I opened the front door of my apartment to let my cat out, I also ran out to my nearest neighbor, banging on their door to help me...
That evening/early morning I called the police and told them I'd been raped. I spent the next 6 hours sitting in the lobby of a local hospital waiting for the local "rape specialist" to become available and administer the "rape kit" testing.
The very next day, I pressed charges, and the case went to a Grand Jury. (Which, I found out, consisted primarily of retired people.) Weeks later, after my testimony, the Grand Jury verdict came back: The guy that raped me would not be prosecuted, would not even be brought to trial.
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The worst parts about this for me are many and not all involving the rapist himself:
One, that I was raped at about 1am and had to sit in a hospital awaiting rape-kit testing until 7am.
Two, that the Grand Jury didn't even see fit to bring the case to trial.
Three, that, when I told my mother months later that I'd been raped, her first reaction was, "Had you been drinking?"
Four, my own real-life father would probably say, "You deserved it." (My father's actual take on the OJ Simpson trial: Nicole Simpson was "bought and paid for.")
Five: People I've told about this have been ridiculous. The ex-girlfriend I initially set out to meet that night: I did turn to her for comfort after that night. She came to the hospital, for which I was grateful, but then thought we should spend the next night "doing each other's makeup and hair." (Really, YOU FUCKING IDIOT? I was just RAPED.) Later, another woman I was in love with ignored my mention of the rape altogether. (Seriously -- how can one ignore it when someone mentions that they were raped?)
Where was/is my protector? Anyone?
Friday, December 06, 2013
Your Fucking Horoscope
Oddly, broadly TRUE! :) The only listing I might personally disagree with is the one for Capricorns: I've known several over the years, and they've been almost uniformly solid and decent (as opposed to the "money-grubbing" and "poseur-ness" implied here). I also wouldn't call ANY of the many Leo men I've known "Egotistical Douchebags" --- I've liked every one of them!
Love, your Egotistical Douchebag blogger
Thursday, December 05, 2013
Wednesday, December 04, 2013
Continuum (New Yorker, 11/18/13)
"The human mind has changed very little in thousands of years, and basic desires and instincts remain the same, with certain societal patterns repeated endlessly. 'We're just a component of a much longer trajectory than we realize,' Adams said. 'We think that this moment is special, that everything has led to this point. But our here and now is just a blip along the continuum.'"
My note: This New Yorker article was about recent archaeological expeditions in Egypt, about looters over the millennia, the current state of Egyptian politics, etc. The quote above reminded me of viewing the extensive permanent Egyptian collection at the Metropolitan Museum in NYC in 2008 or so for the first time: As a younger person, with only surface knowledge of the (I youngly thought) dramatic, glamorous pharaohs, I'd always thought that the Egyptian civilization as a whole was magical, mystical... But upon viewing said exhibit: There was so much shitty, everyday detritus there! 2000-year-old shopping lists and graffiti and cheap trinkets... just like today!
My note: This New Yorker article was about recent archaeological expeditions in Egypt, about looters over the millennia, the current state of Egyptian politics, etc. The quote above reminded me of viewing the extensive permanent Egyptian collection at the Metropolitan Museum in NYC in 2008 or so for the first time: As a younger person, with only surface knowledge of the (I youngly thought) dramatic, glamorous pharaohs, I'd always thought that the Egyptian civilization as a whole was magical, mystical... But upon viewing said exhibit: There was so much shitty, everyday detritus there! 2000-year-old shopping lists and graffiti and cheap trinkets... just like today!
A sad story (from "Find the Bad Guy" by Jeffrey Eugenides in the 11/18 New Yorker)
"...In addition to finding the bad guy in every argument, couples do this thing called the Protest Polka. That's a dance where one partner seeks reassurance about the relationship and approaches the other, but because that person usually does this by complaining or being angry, the other partner wants to get the hell away, and so retreats."
"Back then, we weren't fleeing or chasing each other. We were just seeking, and, every time one of us went looking, there the other was, waiting to be found."
"Back then, we weren't fleeing or chasing each other. We were just seeking, and, every time one of us went looking, there the other was, waiting to be found."
Friday, November 29, 2013
Thanksgiving
Always feel re-charged after being around the nephews (ages 8 and 11). Learned to play washers yesterday, and, more importantly, listened to/really liked a couple of new songs that I probably wouldn't have otherwise heard. (The two were incredulous: "How have you not heard _____ ?" "Well, how do YOU hear them?" "On the car radio." "And... do you see your aunt with a car??!" "Oh.")
Was worn out after dancing with the boys to these:
And a neat thing, aside from dancing, was: The boys knew all of the lyrics! For instance, after listening to Lorde's song for maybe 30 seconds (and hearing from them that she was 16 or so), I ignorantly asked, "Well, what does SHE know about trashing hotel rooms?! She's only a kid!" The 11-year-old then had to patiently explain to me that I wasn't paying attention: the song was about people's REAL LIVES, not the lives of the rock stars and royals that they saw on TV and read about! Wow! I thought that was really cool (both of him and of the artist)...
Another Thanksgiving conversation: My mom (the boys' Oma) humorously reported that SOMEONE had been searching for "Miley Cyrus" on her computer! (She keeps the boys after school for 3 days a week and lets them take turns on her computer. And she apparently just figured out how to access the "History" function!) :) Nothing wrong with Miley Cyrus, but both boys funnily vehemently denied that they'd ever done any such search! :) I personally said to the older nephew that I had my STRONG SUSPICIONS that it was him, but after initial teasing, I let it go, "OK, OK, whatever..." About an hour later, though, while he was in another room, he inadvertently burst out with some song: "I came in like a wrecking ball..." MYSTERY SOLVED! :)
Was worn out after dancing with the boys to these:
And a neat thing, aside from dancing, was: The boys knew all of the lyrics! For instance, after listening to Lorde's song for maybe 30 seconds (and hearing from them that she was 16 or so), I ignorantly asked, "Well, what does SHE know about trashing hotel rooms?! She's only a kid!" The 11-year-old then had to patiently explain to me that I wasn't paying attention: the song was about people's REAL LIVES, not the lives of the rock stars and royals that they saw on TV and read about! Wow! I thought that was really cool (both of him and of the artist)...
Another Thanksgiving conversation: My mom (the boys' Oma) humorously reported that SOMEONE had been searching for "Miley Cyrus" on her computer! (She keeps the boys after school for 3 days a week and lets them take turns on her computer. And she apparently just figured out how to access the "History" function!) :) Nothing wrong with Miley Cyrus, but both boys funnily vehemently denied that they'd ever done any such search! :) I personally said to the older nephew that I had my STRONG SUSPICIONS that it was him, but after initial teasing, I let it go, "OK, OK, whatever..." About an hour later, though, while he was in another room, he inadvertently burst out with some song: "I came in like a wrecking ball..." MYSTERY SOLVED! :)
Wednesday, November 27, 2013
Saturday, November 23, 2013
Illusion never changed into something real.
A song for Sandra, for me, for everybody in the whole world.
Friday, November 22, 2013
Thursday, November 21, 2013
Happy Food Coma Day
I officially became an Adult today.
Austin, where I've lived and worked the majority of my adult life, is a pretty jeans-y kind of town, even in many workplaces. When I was in New York for 3 years, I did buy one complete business suit and a business blazer, but ended up wearing each maybe 3 times at the most... (the publishing places and midnight-shift law firms where I worked most while there turned out to be pretty casual, as well).
But now I'm (temporarily) in a place that REALLY wants me to look a little better than I'm used to looking at work! :) For instance, when I started a few weeks ago, the weather was in the 80s and so I wore a what-I-thought-was-nice linen shirt to work. Well, by noon, the linen had wrinkled horribly (as linen is wont to do) and... my new boss actually called me into her office to have a chat about the dress code there! I was mortified! And subsequently made a vow: "As god is my witness, I'll never look sloppy again!"
Luckily for me, the weather's since turned cooler and I can now rotate out my THREE Official Office Blazers during the week without sweating like a pig before I've ever arrived at the office. (Remember -- I take the bus and have to walk outdoors for at least a mile every day; no luxury of a nice, air-conditioned car to step into and out of!) And there's a one-day-a-week reprieve of a "Jeans Friday," thank god.
So, I've finally had to wear "business attire" enough times (after 2 weeks) to warrant a dry-cleaning. I'm a big girl now! ;p
Wednesday, November 20, 2013
Stuck
Austin's been trendy now for a few years, leading to a constant increase in prices all the way around, ranging from food carts ($8 for crappy food from a cart? the original point was CHEAP crappy food) to rents.
I won't go too much into my paying $250 for a garage apartment in Hyde Park in the late '80s, or $310 for a Rainey Street duplex in the early '90s, or $825 for an 800-square-foot house on Poquito from 2000 to 2007.
Since I've been back from NYC (2010), I've lived in the same 375-sq-ft one-room apartment on the East Side (near Poquito). Started out in 2010 at $545. Just got a renewal notice today for $700. I've got until December 1 to decide whether I'm moving out by the end of my lease (January 30).
The thing is... I don't KNOW! I'm a temp. I have no steady ongoing source of income to show to any potential new landlord (who, in Texas, usually ask that you make 3 times your rent). And so I'm stuck where I am.
Years ago in Austin, prices weren't so prohibitive, and so people had more freedom of choice. You could always find a decent funky place to live on a low, random salary. Today, though, you're getting more and more strait-jacketed. If I take the soul-less executive-office job that pays decently, then I can afford a funky, formerly cheap place. If I decline the soul-less job, then all I can afford is a soul-less generic place on the outskirts of town.
I'm stuck.
I won't go too much into my paying $250 for a garage apartment in Hyde Park in the late '80s, or $310 for a Rainey Street duplex in the early '90s, or $825 for an 800-square-foot house on Poquito from 2000 to 2007.
Since I've been back from NYC (2010), I've lived in the same 375-sq-ft one-room apartment on the East Side (near Poquito). Started out in 2010 at $545. Just got a renewal notice today for $700. I've got until December 1 to decide whether I'm moving out by the end of my lease (January 30).
The thing is... I don't KNOW! I'm a temp. I have no steady ongoing source of income to show to any potential new landlord (who, in Texas, usually ask that you make 3 times your rent). And so I'm stuck where I am.
Years ago in Austin, prices weren't so prohibitive, and so people had more freedom of choice. You could always find a decent funky place to live on a low, random salary. Today, though, you're getting more and more strait-jacketed. If I take the soul-less executive-office job that pays decently, then I can afford a funky, formerly cheap place. If I decline the soul-less job, then all I can afford is a soul-less generic place on the outskirts of town.
I'm stuck.
Monday, November 18, 2013
Working in an important person's office: pros and cons
Pros:
It pays well.
You feel kind of important being there.
The décor is grand.
You get to see semi-famous people in person every few days.
Cons:
Many lifer-secretaries there have a highly inflated sense of self-importance and are rude to "newbies" as a result, placing far too much importance on, say, a (not incorrect) middle initial added to a name in a letter. (See "You feel kind of important being there" above.)
Just about everyone who visits is highly pumped up and hyper-perky, forcing you, who are there day-in and day-out, to constantly meet their levels of way-inflated exuberance -- which is tiring.
The dress-code is tiring to meet every day, especially when you have only 2 business blazers (and maybe 3-1/2 business-appropriate shirts) to your name.
The daily business conducted there is beyond inane. Almost entirely Form, hardly any Substance. (An example: A lengthy recommendation letter from an Important Man that I typed up in response to a low-level young, black employee's leaving after only a year: "In my 43 years of [blah-blah-blah] I have only met a few colleagues worthy of [blah-blah-blah]. _________ is one such colleague." (Really? In all of your 43 years? Another, older white employee is also leaving around this time; the same man's farewell letter wasn't nearly as effusive.)
I can hold out at least 'til past Thanksgiving. MAYBE 'til past Christmas.
It pays well.
You feel kind of important being there.
The décor is grand.
You get to see semi-famous people in person every few days.
Cons:
Many lifer-secretaries there have a highly inflated sense of self-importance and are rude to "newbies" as a result, placing far too much importance on, say, a (not incorrect) middle initial added to a name in a letter. (See "You feel kind of important being there" above.)
Just about everyone who visits is highly pumped up and hyper-perky, forcing you, who are there day-in and day-out, to constantly meet their levels of way-inflated exuberance -- which is tiring.
The dress-code is tiring to meet every day, especially when you have only 2 business blazers (and maybe 3-1/2 business-appropriate shirts) to your name.
The daily business conducted there is beyond inane. Almost entirely Form, hardly any Substance. (An example: A lengthy recommendation letter from an Important Man that I typed up in response to a low-level young, black employee's leaving after only a year: "In my 43 years of [blah-blah-blah] I have only met a few colleagues worthy of [blah-blah-blah]. _________ is one such colleague." (Really? In all of your 43 years? Another, older white employee is also leaving around this time; the same man's farewell letter wasn't nearly as effusive.)
I can hold out at least 'til past Thanksgiving. MAYBE 'til past Christmas.
Saturday, November 16, 2013
Friday, November 15, 2013
Me and the Farmer
Back on May 12, 2012, I posted here about the "Farmers Only" dating website (is it real? would I qualify? who wants just that?) -- For the past year and a half, I STILL get hits on this blog EVERY DAY from people led here by searches for "Farmers Only"!
Here's "Me and the Farmer" by the Housemartins, 1987:
Won't he let you go?
(Probably no)
Won't he let you go?
(Probably no)
Why does he treat you so?
(I just don't know)
Why does he treat you so?
(I just don't know)
Here's "Me and the Farmer" by the Housemartins, 1987:
Me and the farmer get on fine
Through stormy weather and bottles of wine
If I pull my weight he'll treat me well
But if I'm late he'll give me hell
Through stormy weather and bottles of wine
If I pull my weight he'll treat me well
But if I'm late he'll give me hell
And though it's all hard work, no play
Farmer is a happy crook
Jesus hates him everyday
Cause Jesus gave and farmer took, took
Farmer is a happy crook
Jesus hates him everyday
Cause Jesus gave and farmer took, took
Won't he let you go?
(Probably no)
Won't he let you go?
(Probably no)
Why does he treat you so?
(I just don't know)
Why does he treat you so?
(I just don't know)
Me and the farmer like brother, like sister
Getting on like hand and blister
Me and the farmer...
Getting on like hand and blister
Me and the farmer...
Thursday, November 14, 2013
What grownup should have to get up at 6:30 am...
...and take their lunch exactly from 12 to 1 if they don't want to.
Wednesday, November 13, 2013
Illusion never changed...
...into something real...
-----------------
I first loved this song in '97 when it came out. Didn't really think of it again 'til I heard it blaring from a storefront in 2009 while I was walking aimlessly on Union City's Bergenline, feeling utterly cold and lonely... It's technically a sad song, but it made me feel so good when I heard it then.
After Bergenline, I forgot about it again...until I just heard it playing in a hamburger joint in Austin last week; again, despite the loss in the lyrics, such a simultaneous surge of exhilaration and hopefulness I felt! For no reason at all! :)
(Listening to it again and again tonight... it's probably more of a Sandra-to-Jim song, lyrics-wise. It still means something to me alone, though.)
-----------------
I first loved this song in '97 when it came out. Didn't really think of it again 'til I heard it blaring from a storefront in 2009 while I was walking aimlessly on Union City's Bergenline, feeling utterly cold and lonely... It's technically a sad song, but it made me feel so good when I heard it then.
After Bergenline, I forgot about it again...until I just heard it playing in a hamburger joint in Austin last week; again, despite the loss in the lyrics, such a simultaneous surge of exhilaration and hopefulness I felt! For no reason at all! :)
(Listening to it again and again tonight... it's probably more of a Sandra-to-Jim song, lyrics-wise. It still means something to me alone, though.)
Monday, November 11, 2013
It's beginning to look a lot like KRAMPUS!
For Christmas and birthdays this past year, I've felt sluggish and unimaginative, just giving gift certificates to everyone. Not THIS Christmas!
Sunday, November 10, 2013
The Thought-Fox
Ted Hughes wrote this while at Cambridge studying Literature, after dreaming that a human-sized fox, with a human hand, placed a bloody print on his blank page, saying, "Stop this -- you are destroying us."
Hughes in a subsequent letter: "I connected the fox's commands to my own ideas about Eng. Lit. and the effect of the Cambridge blend of pseudo-critical terminology and social rancor on creative spirits and from that moment abandoned my efforts to adapt myself ... it seemed to me not only a foolish game, but deeply destructive of myself."
I've spent this weekend mentally grateful for surviving my new temp job this past week, which involved kowtowing to high-powered executives. I actually beamed with pleasure when one guy praised me for fetching him the right-sized binder-clips from the supply room.
"Stop this -- you are destroying us."
And yet: I can't live in a shed; nor do I have a Sylvia Plath to get me published, introduce me to her literarily/academically well-connected friends, and support me financially.
I imagine this midnight moment’s forest:
Something else is alive
Beside the clock’s loneliness
And this blank page where my fingers move.
Through the window I see no star:
Something more near
Though deeper within darkness
Is entering the loneliness:
Cold, delicately as the dark snow,
A fox's nose touches twig, leaf;
Two eyes serve a movement, that now
And again now, and now, and now
Sets neat prints into the snow
Between trees, and warily a lame
Shadow lags by stump and in hollow
Of a body that is bold to come
Across clearings, an eye,
A widening deepening greenness,
Brilliantly, concentratedly,
Coming about its own business
Till, with a sudden sharp hot stink of fox
It enters the dark hole of the head.
The window is starless still; the clock ticks,
The page is printed.
Hughes in a subsequent letter: "I connected the fox's commands to my own ideas about Eng. Lit. and the effect of the Cambridge blend of pseudo-critical terminology and social rancor on creative spirits and from that moment abandoned my efforts to adapt myself ... it seemed to me not only a foolish game, but deeply destructive of myself."
I've spent this weekend mentally grateful for surviving my new temp job this past week, which involved kowtowing to high-powered executives. I actually beamed with pleasure when one guy praised me for fetching him the right-sized binder-clips from the supply room.
"Stop this -- you are destroying us."
And yet: I can't live in a shed; nor do I have a Sylvia Plath to get me published, introduce me to her literarily/academically well-connected friends, and support me financially.
I imagine this midnight moment’s forest:
Something else is alive
Beside the clock’s loneliness
And this blank page where my fingers move.
Through the window I see no star:
Something more near
Though deeper within darkness
Is entering the loneliness:
Cold, delicately as the dark snow,
A fox's nose touches twig, leaf;
Two eyes serve a movement, that now
And again now, and now, and now
Sets neat prints into the snow
Between trees, and warily a lame
Shadow lags by stump and in hollow
Of a body that is bold to come
Across clearings, an eye,
A widening deepening greenness,
Brilliantly, concentratedly,
Coming about its own business
Till, with a sudden sharp hot stink of fox
It enters the dark hole of the head.
The window is starless still; the clock ticks,
The page is printed.
Gin, I appreciate 'em now (pre-'81)
Glad you didn't live to see the below travesty (but then you still liked their later "These Dreams" and "What About Love," etc., which also sucked as badly as the below video...):
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
It kinda just now occurred to me that, since I was so attracted to her, I probably should have let Ginny pick the soundtrack to our evenings rather than subjecting her to terrible John/Yoko albums that I was so oddly intellectually excited about... Ya think?...
To Spirit Ginny: I haven't changed at all.
In the summer of '83, I discovered John Lennon's "Some Time in New York City" album at a Fort Worth mall record store. So impressed with my find, I could not let it go. Made Ginny listen to it with me at least 5 times one Friday night. "Fweedom O fweedom" she'd later sing-song to me at random moments.
Here's to you, honey! :) Yes, I'm still obnoxious! :)
Here's to you, honey! :) Yes, I'm still obnoxious! :)
Ginny Visitation
I was in love with Ginny my Senior year of high school. Between '83 and '87, after I'd come to UT for college, lots of random stuff happened (which I've written about on this blog many times before). In '88, I called her number; her father answered and told me she'd died.
Since that time, her spirit has come to me in dreams a few times. Nothing major, just to say "hi." Not recently at all. My general theory has always been that departed spirits had their own places to go to. When they're recently gone, they visit people on earth more; but as they acclimate to their new world (and as their earth friends get used to them being gone), they move on...
I can't remember the last time Ginny visited me --- it's been years. But last night, she appeared to me in a long, shiny grey satin dress with a black velvet collar. We stared at each other, and I gasped: "What are you doing?" She said she was dressed up for a world-wide singing tour with her choir; one of her next stops was Dortmund, Germany.
She pulled aside her dress, revealing a nipple --- it was small and undeveloped, like a child's. I licked it, then we kissed and made out a little. I, annoyingly, stopped the physical closeness to ask her what had happened since we'd parted: In a dream or two, she'd reappeared in my life then disappeared without notice --- I was asking her about what had happened in those dreams. (I knew about real life already.) No real answer. We then got in a car, her driving, and she bumped into a car ahead of us and I was agitated. End of dream.
Here's some kid poetry I wrote for her 30 years ago.
GINNY Q (July 29, 1983)
I see you, my funny friend
And my heart laughs
Glad to be close again
A soul-mate comes once in a lifetime
So I'll run with the chance
To smoke and dance and sing
And let you know
That nine out of ten are always there for the breaking!
---------------------------
RUNAWAY (March 15, 1985)
I was the bad one
And you, Mr. Suitcase-god-and-baggage
the ever-so addled
Hatless in Austin rain,
wondering how five dollars worth of tokens
could have bought so much goddamn trouble.
Yes, she's here
with excuses and a 6am taxi
The stain on her should where the
fat man slept, and a whole
lifetime of indecision still
unaccounted for
And you stand--
Sane Baptist eyes figuring (rightly)
that she is yours
with me too stupid
to see the lure of the middle class
the religion, sex, and TV
that will be hers for the asking
and home she goes (did you ever doubt?)
stoneage guilt riding low
and your hand on her arm
she is SAFE, by god, so safe...
With so much to offer
We should have all married
Men like you.
---------------------
GOODBYE (April 8, 1985)
Sitting still on your wind-rattled plank balcony
Cigarette in your hand, cloth-laid thigh warming me
Ever subtle we stretch, turning months into years
I could love you or leave you, provoke fractured fears
(In the smoke swirling 'round with the mist from her lips
We traced our initials with numbed fingertips
And laughed 'til our ice-faces threatened to crack
The wall etching lines in the small of our backs
And Daddy knock-knocking, an endless tattoo
Just what was it your Daddy wanted of you?
Our thoughts? Wedded secrets, more guarded by far
Than the battered wood door, kept unlocked, left ajar)
But I don't want to go with your face shadowed doubt
I could stay, pleading faith, heavy voice wearing out
Saying things far too desperate, too tangled to claim --
So I run from confusion, the taste of your name.
----------------------------------
MY DANGER (May 21, 1985)
What could I do?
There is no one to dress for
and I am saving water for the cause --
practice for the staunch defender
that I may well be...
And pride plays no part of your features, I fear
the neighbors near
on gauzy tiptoe, tripping when I stir
This caution -- for what?
Will I kill, with no gun?
Condemn, with no words to speak of?
What is my danger, cried the innocent
and what pity can collect
on shadowed doorstep, the shuttered window
so free of doubt?
Casual ties and the whimsy of faith --
A Sunday when you feel like
and conscience settles in fine easy slots
the finger faith we so often dream
in return for surrender, the oft-mentioned
difference in fortune.
-----------------------------------
(July 22, 1985)
Oh! to have you
on my doorstep
in the cloud
and through my hair
What fun
with you here!
the roaches for laughing
orange and green
the height of art décor
Come! and make me Picasso
these walls I tame
and will paint for no one else.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Since that time, her spirit has come to me in dreams a few times. Nothing major, just to say "hi." Not recently at all. My general theory has always been that departed spirits had their own places to go to. When they're recently gone, they visit people on earth more; but as they acclimate to their new world (and as their earth friends get used to them being gone), they move on...
I can't remember the last time Ginny visited me --- it's been years. But last night, she appeared to me in a long, shiny grey satin dress with a black velvet collar. We stared at each other, and I gasped: "What are you doing?" She said she was dressed up for a world-wide singing tour with her choir; one of her next stops was Dortmund, Germany.
She pulled aside her dress, revealing a nipple --- it was small and undeveloped, like a child's. I licked it, then we kissed and made out a little. I, annoyingly, stopped the physical closeness to ask her what had happened since we'd parted: In a dream or two, she'd reappeared in my life then disappeared without notice --- I was asking her about what had happened in those dreams. (I knew about real life already.) No real answer. We then got in a car, her driving, and she bumped into a car ahead of us and I was agitated. End of dream.
Here's some kid poetry I wrote for her 30 years ago.
GINNY Q (July 29, 1983)
I see you, my funny friend
And my heart laughs
Glad to be close again
A soul-mate comes once in a lifetime
So I'll run with the chance
To smoke and dance and sing
And let you know
That nine out of ten are always there for the breaking!
---------------------------
RUNAWAY (March 15, 1985)
I was the bad one
And you, Mr. Suitcase-god-and-baggage
the ever-so addled
Hatless in Austin rain,
wondering how five dollars worth of tokens
could have bought so much goddamn trouble.
Yes, she's here
with excuses and a 6am taxi
The stain on her should where the
fat man slept, and a whole
lifetime of indecision still
unaccounted for
And you stand--
Sane Baptist eyes figuring (rightly)
that she is yours
with me too stupid
to see the lure of the middle class
the religion, sex, and TV
that will be hers for the asking
and home she goes (did you ever doubt?)
stoneage guilt riding low
and your hand on her arm
she is SAFE, by god, so safe...
With so much to offer
We should have all married
Men like you.
---------------------
GOODBYE (April 8, 1985)
Sitting still on your wind-rattled plank balcony
Cigarette in your hand, cloth-laid thigh warming me
Ever subtle we stretch, turning months into years
I could love you or leave you, provoke fractured fears
(In the smoke swirling 'round with the mist from her lips
We traced our initials with numbed fingertips
And laughed 'til our ice-faces threatened to crack
The wall etching lines in the small of our backs
And Daddy knock-knocking, an endless tattoo
Just what was it your Daddy wanted of you?
Our thoughts? Wedded secrets, more guarded by far
Than the battered wood door, kept unlocked, left ajar)
But I don't want to go with your face shadowed doubt
I could stay, pleading faith, heavy voice wearing out
Saying things far too desperate, too tangled to claim --
So I run from confusion, the taste of your name.
----------------------------------
MY DANGER (May 21, 1985)
What could I do?
There is no one to dress for
and I am saving water for the cause --
practice for the staunch defender
that I may well be...
And pride plays no part of your features, I fear
the neighbors near
on gauzy tiptoe, tripping when I stir
This caution -- for what?
Will I kill, with no gun?
Condemn, with no words to speak of?
What is my danger, cried the innocent
and what pity can collect
on shadowed doorstep, the shuttered window
so free of doubt?
Casual ties and the whimsy of faith --
A Sunday when you feel like
and conscience settles in fine easy slots
the finger faith we so often dream
in return for surrender, the oft-mentioned
difference in fortune.
-----------------------------------
(July 22, 1985)
Oh! to have you
on my doorstep
in the cloud
and through my hair
What fun
with you here!
the roaches for laughing
orange and green
the height of art décor
Come! and make me Picasso
these walls I tame
and will paint for no one else.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Wednesday, November 06, 2013
Happy Birthday, Scorps
Vivien Leigh = November 5
Ongoing "obsession" = November 6
My first girlfriend = November 8
Anne Sexton and Hedy Lamarr = November 9
Grace Kelly = November 12
And, while I don't particularly find Hillary Clinton (Oct. 26) or Sylvia Plath (Oct. 27) "sexy," I do find them very interesting and intense. Plath, especially -- she was a major artistic influence (as was Sexton); I kept her Collected Poems by my bed for nearly 10 years after first discovering her work when I was 17.
I also find Fox news anchor Megyn Kelly attractive and TV-intense (November 18). And let's put the male Charles Manson (November 12) in the "interesting/intense" category for me, as well--though for quite different reasons than Hillary or Plath! No, I have no sexual interest in Manson (!) and I find his murderous impulses horrifying and psychotic, BUT... his thinking/philosophy is nonetheless psychologically interesting. [NOTE HERE: I've had a few readers of this blog over the years severely misinterpret some things they've read here: One famous instance is a blog post years ago where I wrote about yelling at my mother (which I'd never done before), then being horrified at myself afterwards -- the whole post was about my sadness at being unable to get along with my mother. One simple reader interpreted the post as me being an "elder abuser" (!). So here's a caveat for The Simple who might be reading now: "I don't condone the behavior of Charles Manson. I am merely intellectually interested in the man's psychology." 'kay?]
Speaking of "November 6" birthdays: I woke up today very aware of the birthday of someone I care about but simply cannot get along with. Felt mildly bummed that since we were not, as usual, speaking, I couldn't say "Happy Birthday" to her. (The "as usual" part has after 5 years turned the one-time "depression" over ongoing communication barriers into a more resigned sort of, "What else is new?") So while birthday awareness was atmospherically hovering this morning at my new temp job, my new boss walks in and pauses at the door to his office then turns around and bursts into a loud, zesty round of "Happy Birthday to ME, Happy Birthday to ME!..." :) He's a very high-powered, nattily besuited executive, and also a small, usually quiet intellectual man (PhD in music -- the classical kind) -- but here was the overt Scorp side of him saying to the world (or at least to we giggling pool of secretaries): "IT'S MY BIRTHDAY, y'all!!" :) It was cute. It made me feel happy about today's birthday -- maybe somewhere today the one that I love but can't get along with was belting out her own ode to herself! :)
Tuesday, November 05, 2013
Jonathan Martin = Sissy?
Here's the voice-mail that rookie Martin received from Miami Dolphins' teammate Richie Incognito that led to Martin's leaving the team (in tears?) and Incognito's subsequent suspension:
"Hey, wassup, you half n----- piece of s---. I saw you on Twitter, you been training 10 weeks. [I want to] s--- in your f---ing mouth. [I'm going to] slap your f---ing mouth. [I'm going to] slap your real mother across the face [laughter]. F--- you, you're still a rookie. I'll kill you."
Incognito's a cretin, for sure, but, hey, I've been called/done worse -- and I'm a girl who's travelled mostly in liberal, college-town circles. While a grad student at San Francisco State University, I saw "White trash" markered across George Strait's face in a record store; I got called a "frizzy-haired white bitch" at a movie theater where I worked because I busted some black girls for trying to get in without paying; a woman approached me at the same movie theater and, saying she could tell from my accent that I was from the South, proceeded to tell me that she loved the South but [wink, wink, nudge, nudge] -- "There are too many Mexicans"; my own graduate advisor at SF State called me and my family "Nazis" --- because I mentioned to her that my mother was German.
All of this in the supposedly "genteel" and "advanced" San Francisco. And the "Nazi" bit at a college by an intellectual mentor, no less (not just on the street in the heat of the moment).
Growing up in a small town in Texas and going to undergrad school at UT-Austin, I'd never heard such creepiness until I lived in San Francisco and went to grad school there for two years. I was horrified by the writing across Strait's face, by the scofflaws trying to break into the theater and calling ME names, by the smug woman knocking Mexicans, by my graduate advisor. I literally escaped that town the second after I turned in my graduate thesis.
Now... did I, after all of that shit, go 'round claiming "bullying"? I did not. San Francisco was supposed to be so cool. That it turned out so creepy I blamed on me -- why, I don't know. (I was new there, I didn't know.)
As for Jonathan Martin: What did you expect from being a rookie in the NFL? A much rougher crew than San Franciscan academics. If I got called a "Nazi" and a "white bitch" and didn't complain, why are you now whining about being called a "half nigger piece of shit"? That's what crude people do, call names. The slight difference being: I got called these names while in a supposedly safe environment of a liberal town and a university setting. You got called these names while a rookie in the NFL, where hazing of a much rougher order is pretty much a given.
I don't really feel sorry for you. (Learning from Wikipedia that you'd played high school football in North Hollywood and college ball at Stanford made me even less sorry for you -- toughen up, Dude.)
"Hey, wassup, you half n----- piece of s---. I saw you on Twitter, you been training 10 weeks. [I want to] s--- in your f---ing mouth. [I'm going to] slap your f---ing mouth. [I'm going to] slap your real mother across the face [laughter]. F--- you, you're still a rookie. I'll kill you."
Incognito's a cretin, for sure, but, hey, I've been called/done worse -- and I'm a girl who's travelled mostly in liberal, college-town circles. While a grad student at San Francisco State University, I saw "White trash" markered across George Strait's face in a record store; I got called a "frizzy-haired white bitch" at a movie theater where I worked because I busted some black girls for trying to get in without paying; a woman approached me at the same movie theater and, saying she could tell from my accent that I was from the South, proceeded to tell me that she loved the South but [wink, wink, nudge, nudge] -- "There are too many Mexicans"; my own graduate advisor at SF State called me and my family "Nazis" --- because I mentioned to her that my mother was German.
All of this in the supposedly "genteel" and "advanced" San Francisco. And the "Nazi" bit at a college by an intellectual mentor, no less (not just on the street in the heat of the moment).
Growing up in a small town in Texas and going to undergrad school at UT-Austin, I'd never heard such creepiness until I lived in San Francisco and went to grad school there for two years. I was horrified by the writing across Strait's face, by the scofflaws trying to break into the theater and calling ME names, by the smug woman knocking Mexicans, by my graduate advisor. I literally escaped that town the second after I turned in my graduate thesis.
Now... did I, after all of that shit, go 'round claiming "bullying"? I did not. San Francisco was supposed to be so cool. That it turned out so creepy I blamed on me -- why, I don't know. (I was new there, I didn't know.)
As for Jonathan Martin: What did you expect from being a rookie in the NFL? A much rougher crew than San Franciscan academics. If I got called a "Nazi" and a "white bitch" and didn't complain, why are you now whining about being called a "half nigger piece of shit"? That's what crude people do, call names. The slight difference being: I got called these names while in a supposedly safe environment of a liberal town and a university setting. You got called these names while a rookie in the NFL, where hazing of a much rougher order is pretty much a given.
I don't really feel sorry for you. (Learning from Wikipedia that you'd played high school football in North Hollywood and college ball at Stanford made me even less sorry for you -- toughen up, Dude.)
Sunday, November 03, 2013
Old
I've spent the past 2 months sharing a very small office with an office-lady who's been with the department for 34 years. Only 64, looking 79. (Not an exaggeration -- she's prematurely withered because of various illnesses.) Retiring unexpectedly because of health reasons on the very day that I left. She'll probably die within the next 6 months.
What's the point?
What's the point of ME at 48? Leeching onto my nephews at 8 and 11 because they're so full of hope at that age? (I called my brother to ask if he could please bring the nephews over on Halloween so I could see their costumes. He didn't even know, on Halloween day itself, what the boys were going as that evening.)
Fuck. Even people who have something don't seem to give a shit about it.
What's the point?
What's the point of ME at 48? Leeching onto my nephews at 8 and 11 because they're so full of hope at that age? (I called my brother to ask if he could please bring the nephews over on Halloween so I could see their costumes. He didn't even know, on Halloween day itself, what the boys were going as that evening.)
Fuck. Even people who have something don't seem to give a shit about it.
Loud
My neighbors' loud outdoor-party-with-band has been going on for 6 hours now. I called the police at 10:22pm, 10:55, 11:30, 11:47, 12:21 and 1:02. (The official Austin noise ordinance starts at 10pm.) During one of the phone calls when I was complaining, the young phone operator, supposed to be neutral, couldn't help herself when she heard the noise in the background of our phone-call: "Oh, that really IS loud!"
This kind of crap is exactly why some people go vigilante: You try to be a good citizen and go to an authority figure first to get the situation under control. (My "situation": I'd like to be able to hear my own TV or music. Not the music of someone 3 houses down for 6 hours straight. I've been listening to their shit since 7pm, didn't complain 'til after 10.) Sans help from an outside authority, what is someone to do? I myself am not going to go out there and say/do anything because I'm too wimpy to go fight with a crowd of 100. But would I begrudge any rougher personage than me who took it upon himself to go out and punch someone and/or shoot out a guitar amp? I would not. In fact, I'd laud the person. America's only a "Wild, Wild West" when there's no neutral authority figure to maintain control.
This kind of crap is exactly why some people go vigilante: You try to be a good citizen and go to an authority figure first to get the situation under control. (My "situation": I'd like to be able to hear my own TV or music. Not the music of someone 3 houses down for 6 hours straight. I've been listening to their shit since 7pm, didn't complain 'til after 10.) Sans help from an outside authority, what is someone to do? I myself am not going to go out there and say/do anything because I'm too wimpy to go fight with a crowd of 100. But would I begrudge any rougher personage than me who took it upon himself to go out and punch someone and/or shoot out a guitar amp? I would not. In fact, I'd laud the person. America's only a "Wild, Wild West" when there's no neutral authority figure to maintain control.
Temp
My last temp job ended Thursday the 31st. Having 3 months of living-money saved up, I was hoping for a long respite, like until December or so, or even after the New Year. I had liked the income, but I did not like the utter inanity/mundanity. As fate has it, I was assigned to a new temp gig immediately, starting Monday. Again, thanks for the basic sustenance, but no thanks for what I suspect will be the same inanity -- i.e., no future at all, just the same constant keeping-head-above-water round-a-bout.
Also: Just read in the 10/28 issue of the New Yorker an essay by David Sedaris mentioning how his sister Tiffany had just killed herself this past May. The essay was primarily about David Sedaris's cute ideas for names for vacation homes. Oh, and how Tiffany's whole life fit into two boxes. (Me, glad to note that all of my stuff would fit into at least 50 boxes. Ha, motherfuckers!)
Here's a much more loving "In Memoriam" for Tiffany Sedaris from her hometown paper:
http://www.thesomervilletimes.com/archives/39327
Also: Just read in the 10/28 issue of the New Yorker an essay by David Sedaris mentioning how his sister Tiffany had just killed herself this past May. The essay was primarily about David Sedaris's cute ideas for names for vacation homes. Oh, and how Tiffany's whole life fit into two boxes. (Me, glad to note that all of my stuff would fit into at least 50 boxes. Ha, motherfuckers!)
Here's a much more loving "In Memoriam" for Tiffany Sedaris from her hometown paper:
http://www.thesomervilletimes.com/archives/39327
Saturday, November 02, 2013
Joan Crawford, 1950
Some dream of tits and/or ass. I, though, long to run my hands all over
Joan Crawford's back and shoulders...
Friday, November 01, 2013
coup de foudre ("Blue is the Warmest Color")
I can't explain adequately, but let me just say that I've had NO emotional support for the past 13 years, despite being in love with a couple of people. I've gone about my business, but it's been a relatively grim business: "Running on the rims."
In my current state of mind, I haven't seen a movie at a theater in over a year (the last, "The Artist" back in late 2011).
I used to love movies. As soon as I got my car at 16, I'd drive 45 minutes on Sundays into Fort Worth to see things I'd read about in the "Star-Telegram": "The Year of Living Dangerously," "Videodrome," "Frances." Once I was a college kid at UT-Austin, I'd see films every week at the 4 theaters around campus: the Jester Center theater, the Dobie Theater, the Union Theater, the Varsity... My first film at college was re-watching "Frances" at the Dobie. My second was "The Graduate" at Jester. I also saw "Clockwork Orange" and "Brazil" and "Betty Blue" and "8-1/2" and also my first Joan Crawford film on the big screen, "Grand Hotel," with Rex Reed a visiting host. (In response to my question of who was REALLY better in the film, Reed gave the traditional: "They were both good in different ways." Nah. Garbo was awful.)
All of this a preface to my reading a review of "Blue is the Warmest Color" by Anthony Lane in the 10/28/13 edition of the New Yorker.
I'd been feeling personally shitty and unattractive. Unable to conjure up any magic whatsoever. Unattracted to any movie whatsoever. Until I read this part of the review:
OK, I thought with a big sigh: You talked me into seeing a movie again. (Gee, how big of me!) What really got me, though: "There's a fabulous, half-second shot of Adele glancing aside, at a party, where people are droning on about the distinction between Schiele and Klimt..." --- GODDAMMIT! I EXACTLY want to throw in my two cents at a party where people are discussing Schiele and Klimt!! I LOVE Klimt, and I KNOW Schiele... I never get to talk about such things!
Long story short: My present to myself after the end of my 4-month temp assignment is a ticket to "Blue is the Warmest Color" at 1:30 tomorrow. I want to feel something again.
In my current state of mind, I haven't seen a movie at a theater in over a year (the last, "The Artist" back in late 2011).
I used to love movies. As soon as I got my car at 16, I'd drive 45 minutes on Sundays into Fort Worth to see things I'd read about in the "Star-Telegram": "The Year of Living Dangerously," "Videodrome," "Frances." Once I was a college kid at UT-Austin, I'd see films every week at the 4 theaters around campus: the Jester Center theater, the Dobie Theater, the Union Theater, the Varsity... My first film at college was re-watching "Frances" at the Dobie. My second was "The Graduate" at Jester. I also saw "Clockwork Orange" and "Brazil" and "Betty Blue" and "8-1/2" and also my first Joan Crawford film on the big screen, "Grand Hotel," with Rex Reed a visiting host. (In response to my question of who was REALLY better in the film, Reed gave the traditional: "They were both good in different ways." Nah. Garbo was awful.)
All of this a preface to my reading a review of "Blue is the Warmest Color" by Anthony Lane in the 10/28/13 edition of the New Yorker.
I'd been feeling personally shitty and unattractive. Unable to conjure up any magic whatsoever. Unattracted to any movie whatsoever. Until I read this part of the review:
How does the wish to be utterly alone with the loved one, and the dread of being alone when the loved one leaves, fit into that wider, more sociable vision? It takes two to tango, but many more to make a dance of life. Hence the unforgettable image of Adele in the sunshine, at a school gala, leading her pupils in a kind of shuffling conga. Dressed in bright ethnic costume, they are all smiles. but her smile is barely skin-deep; in the previous scene, we saw her in a blazing brawl with Emma -- a conflagration that left Adele stumbling along a nighttime street in feral moans of distress. Right now, a single closeup shows that, though encircled by young spirits, she wants to die.I've had many a morning-after, utterly sick but trying to function appropriately... But I've never read anyone talking about it. Much less talking about it in relation to two women. Writer Anthony Lane ends his review with: "From the moment when Adele first catches sight of Emma, on a busy crosswalk, the movie restores your faith in the power of the 'coup de foudre' [love at first sight] and yet redoubles your fear of its effect; love, like lightning, can both illuminate and scorch."
OK, I thought with a big sigh: You talked me into seeing a movie again. (Gee, how big of me!) What really got me, though: "There's a fabulous, half-second shot of Adele glancing aside, at a party, where people are droning on about the distinction between Schiele and Klimt..." --- GODDAMMIT! I EXACTLY want to throw in my two cents at a party where people are discussing Schiele and Klimt!! I LOVE Klimt, and I KNOW Schiele... I never get to talk about such things!
Long story short: My present to myself after the end of my 4-month temp assignment is a ticket to "Blue is the Warmest Color" at 1:30 tomorrow. I want to feel something again.
Tuesday, October 29, 2013
Monday, October 28, 2013
Sunday, October 27, 2013
Wednesday, October 23, 2013
At kids' pick-up soccer games you never want...
... a rah-rah Mom playing goalie and whooping constantly and inserting herself into the game.
... a weirdly passive/aggressive Dad inserting himself into the game.
I initially thought the Mom spunky until a couple of kids got nicked with a ball and doubled over in tears -- wherein the Mom repeatedly stopped the game to run over and administer to the crying WEENIE, oops, "child."
I initially thought the Dad a positive influence on his son until he took over the game with his fancy head/foot-work. (Congrats, 40-year-old Dad -- you just out-maneuvered a bunch of 8-year-olds!)
Does every damn thing have to be ruined by stupid adults? The kids were doing fine to begin with and were cute to watch --- until you creeps took over.
... a weirdly passive/aggressive Dad inserting himself into the game.
I initially thought the Mom spunky until a couple of kids got nicked with a ball and doubled over in tears -- wherein the Mom repeatedly stopped the game to run over and administer to the crying WEENIE, oops, "child."
I initially thought the Dad a positive influence on his son until he took over the game with his fancy head/foot-work. (Congrats, 40-year-old Dad -- you just out-maneuvered a bunch of 8-year-olds!)
Does every damn thing have to be ruined by stupid adults? The kids were doing fine to begin with and were cute to watch --- until you creeps took over.
Monday, October 21, 2013
Oklahoma was never like this
Paul McCartney is often fey and self-conscious (stop mugging for the camera and playing with your hair, man!), but... How cute and attractive is he here! :) Paul makes me happy.
Sunday, October 20, 2013
Couples
I've never known a couple that was better than the initial two individuals. A lot of times, what I've witnessed happening is that one or the other ends up kow-towing to the other's neuroses. With good intentions, because they love them and want to make them happy. And it keeps the peace. And yet, such reinforcing of neuroses is, to me, sick.
No, I won't give examples here! I've gotten in enough trouble here as it is!
Well, OK, I'll give you one example. (Because it's from a completely random person in my life, it's not going to cause any brouhaha!) 20 years ago, I was in a very inspiring writers' group that met every two weeks in a local restaurant for about 3 years before we disbanded. At one point, one of the guys in the group got married and had a kid. And then apparently his wife got suspicious about where he was going for hours on end every two weeks. And so she insisted on attending one of the writers' group meetings. WITH THE BABY. Which was fine at the very beginning, since she just sat there dumbly while we all talked about our writing, until the baby started fussing. She took the baby out of the room to begin with. But then came back in and SHOVED THE CRYING BABY AT THE GUY and left the room!
WHAT THE FUCK?!
I can see getting mad at a mate who insists on going bar-hopping or to a strip club. I can even see, if you're extremely suspicious, not believing that it's really a WRITERS' GROUP that your mate is going off to every two weeks. BUT... Once you're THERE at the writers' group and see that everyone is, indeed, talking about writing? And then making a scene with the baby?
I've witnessed this kind of thing at least 5 times. It's bizarre to me. I know that everyone in a relationship must put up with the peccadillos of the other. But to this extent? Because you're THAT desperate for companionship?
No, I won't give examples here! I've gotten in enough trouble here as it is!
Well, OK, I'll give you one example. (Because it's from a completely random person in my life, it's not going to cause any brouhaha!) 20 years ago, I was in a very inspiring writers' group that met every two weeks in a local restaurant for about 3 years before we disbanded. At one point, one of the guys in the group got married and had a kid. And then apparently his wife got suspicious about where he was going for hours on end every two weeks. And so she insisted on attending one of the writers' group meetings. WITH THE BABY. Which was fine at the very beginning, since she just sat there dumbly while we all talked about our writing, until the baby started fussing. She took the baby out of the room to begin with. But then came back in and SHOVED THE CRYING BABY AT THE GUY and left the room!
WHAT THE FUCK?!
I can see getting mad at a mate who insists on going bar-hopping or to a strip club. I can even see, if you're extremely suspicious, not believing that it's really a WRITERS' GROUP that your mate is going off to every two weeks. BUT... Once you're THERE at the writers' group and see that everyone is, indeed, talking about writing? And then making a scene with the baby?
I've witnessed this kind of thing at least 5 times. It's bizarre to me. I know that everyone in a relationship must put up with the peccadillos of the other. But to this extent? Because you're THAT desperate for companionship?
Saturday, October 19, 2013
Thursday, October 17, 2013
Motivation
What's going to get me out of my one-room apartment quicker than anything...
I just bought this shower curtain on eBay for an exorbitant price. So exorbitant was the price but so excited was I by the image that I had to call two conservative office-ladies over to my computer to come look at it and give me buying advice. They both know I'm really into Joan, but I expected both of them, when they saw how much it was and knowing that I was a temp with no money, to say, "No, that's not really worth it." Their reactions instead: "That's REALLY beautiful!" "That's YOU." "If I were younger and single and saw a Scarlett O'Hara shower curtain for that price, I'd buy it." They tipped me over the edge! :)
(p.s. It's Joan Crawford as painted by "sad-eyed-waif" artist Margaret Keane; JC had this same painting on the wall behind her couch in NYC. This works for me on many a level!) :)
And it's waaaay too good for a bathroom in a one-room apartment.
(Someone also pointed out to me that I could hang it on my wall... That's a GREAT idea!)
Tuesday, October 15, 2013
Can't make up my fuckin' mind!
One calendar is the norm. I decided to allow myself two (thinking optimistically: one for the home, one for the office). And now I can't delete one of these three!
Old Hollywood: Because I feel I'll be going to LA in 2014. And I like especially the old "Hollywoodland" sign from 1923 and the Hollywood Bowl silhouette from 1926. And the '40s street shots are kinda cool, though I'm not that interested in '40s H'wood.
NYC in B/W: The view from the Chelsea Hotel, the library lion, the arc of the Central Park trees.
NYC in color: The color verve of Times Square and the above-shot of the skyline.
I sat there for 45 minutes trying to pick two. And I could not! (Though, upon just reading my above descriptions, I'd probably delete the NYC color --- but Times Square! and the pretty approach to the Battery... and snowy Central Park...)
Yeah, yeah. Who the fuck cares. What calendar I pick does not determine my future... But I so want to FEEL my two 2014 calendars! ;p
Good Times Coming / Feel the Sun
I loved this song from the second I heard it; from the 1986 McCartney "Press to Play" album, which I bought as an actual album when it first came out. (Where is that album, physically, now? I think in a crate at my mom's house.) Every single other song on the album is not so good (!), which I just rediscovered on iTunes; but this one has such a good, happy, hopeful vibe that I've remembered for the past 27 years... Glad to officially add to my repertoire of musical "likes" upon downloading it to my iPod just now.
I especially like the second part, "Feel the Sun," which is segued into at 3:27.
"All the beauty, all the pain
Will it ever be the same again..."
p.s. Though this came out in '86, six years after John Lennon's death, hearing this beautiful song (and, also recently, the whole 1978 "London Town" album) pisses me off when I think of John's ongoing derogatory comments about Paul in the late '70s and in 1980, as in: Paul was busy pumping out kids and pumping out music, that kind of thing. Insinuating that he himself was somehow "deeper" because he'd withdrawn. When in fact, Lennon was having a hard time conceiving either a child or much music, and he was having problems with his marriage. He was dried up. He could have admitted that and didn't have to be a bitch toward the much more naturally fecund Paul about it.
I say that as someone who worshipped Lennon as a teenager -- I discovered the Beatles at 15 in 1980, in the summer before Lennon was shot. After hearing "Rubber Soul" and "Revolver" and "Sgt. Pepper" and the White Album, Lennon was definitely my favorite Beatle because of his musical soulfulness and honesty; and I typed up the words to his solo songs like "Working Class Hero" and "God" and hung them on my high school walls. In my teenaged angst, Paul was dismissively "pleasant"; John was somehow "TRUE"...
Solo, the true measure of each man came out. John's "Plastic Ono Band" in 1970 and "Imagine" in 1971 were intense, as was his 1974 "Walls and Bridges." But they were all about his own neuroses and psychological problems. Initially brave psychologically to sing about said neuroses, but by the time 1980's "Double Fantasy" came out after a 5-year absence, Lennon was clearly tapped out creatively. Apparently, all his intellectual/creative energy had gone into stabilizing his marriage. A huge effort that he blatantly tried to sell to the rock press as being some sort of "artistic dream union." When in fact, I think he was just trying to re-create, re-live his art-college buddy Stu Sutcliffe's leaving the Beatles to be with his artist-girlfriend Astrid in Germany in the early 1960s while the band was in Hamburg. What Sutcliffe did to Lennon (unintentionally), Lennon tried (intentionally) to do to Paul.
Only... the artistic bond between John/Yoko wasn't as organic as the bond between Stu/Astrid. John and Yoko's work never meshed, though he continued to, annoyingly, try to pretend that it did until the very end.
And Paul wasn't nearly as weak psychologically upon being left as Lennon had been in the early '60s. McCartney was, on the surface, more fluid and willing to bend. But he wasn't any less talented or egotistical. And he was much more musically, creatively driven, with a deep, true unpretentiously creative core that I don't think Lennon, too reliant on the image rather than reality of Yoko as his muse, had.
I especially like the second part, "Feel the Sun," which is segued into at 3:27.
"All the beauty, all the pain
Will it ever be the same again..."
p.s. Though this came out in '86, six years after John Lennon's death, hearing this beautiful song (and, also recently, the whole 1978 "London Town" album) pisses me off when I think of John's ongoing derogatory comments about Paul in the late '70s and in 1980, as in: Paul was busy pumping out kids and pumping out music, that kind of thing. Insinuating that he himself was somehow "deeper" because he'd withdrawn. When in fact, Lennon was having a hard time conceiving either a child or much music, and he was having problems with his marriage. He was dried up. He could have admitted that and didn't have to be a bitch toward the much more naturally fecund Paul about it.
I say that as someone who worshipped Lennon as a teenager -- I discovered the Beatles at 15 in 1980, in the summer before Lennon was shot. After hearing "Rubber Soul" and "Revolver" and "Sgt. Pepper" and the White Album, Lennon was definitely my favorite Beatle because of his musical soulfulness and honesty; and I typed up the words to his solo songs like "Working Class Hero" and "God" and hung them on my high school walls. In my teenaged angst, Paul was dismissively "pleasant"; John was somehow "TRUE"...
Solo, the true measure of each man came out. John's "Plastic Ono Band" in 1970 and "Imagine" in 1971 were intense, as was his 1974 "Walls and Bridges." But they were all about his own neuroses and psychological problems. Initially brave psychologically to sing about said neuroses, but by the time 1980's "Double Fantasy" came out after a 5-year absence, Lennon was clearly tapped out creatively. Apparently, all his intellectual/creative energy had gone into stabilizing his marriage. A huge effort that he blatantly tried to sell to the rock press as being some sort of "artistic dream union." When in fact, I think he was just trying to re-create, re-live his art-college buddy Stu Sutcliffe's leaving the Beatles to be with his artist-girlfriend Astrid in Germany in the early 1960s while the band was in Hamburg. What Sutcliffe did to Lennon (unintentionally), Lennon tried (intentionally) to do to Paul.
Only... the artistic bond between John/Yoko wasn't as organic as the bond between Stu/Astrid. John and Yoko's work never meshed, though he continued to, annoyingly, try to pretend that it did until the very end.
And Paul wasn't nearly as weak psychologically upon being left as Lennon had been in the early '60s. McCartney was, on the surface, more fluid and willing to bend. But he wasn't any less talented or egotistical. And he was much more musically, creatively driven, with a deep, true unpretentiously creative core that I don't think Lennon, too reliant on the image rather than reality of Yoko as his muse, had.
Happiness is...
... first real cold front comin' this evening and 4 new sweatshirts to choose from! ;p
Last year was a depressing non-new-sweatshirt year, alternating between two old standbys (maroon and dark green)... but this year -- Got my burnt-orange Longhorns sweatshirt for Saturdays, my blue Cowboys sweatshirt for Sundays, and my happy red and pink sweatshirts for all the other times. I'm set! :)
Sunday, October 13, 2013
Humble
Ha! I've tried it for the past few years and am now officially sick of it.
Here's the thing:
There's nothing wrong with being a secretary. Except for the dumb-speak of fellow secretaries in the office ("Thank yewwww!"). And the condescension of the bosses (until you make it clear to them that you have a Master's in English and can discuss anything with them at or above their level).
There's nothing wrong with taking a bus for transportation. Except for the thugs who yell at the top of their lungs about who they're busy fucking and how they just got their "old lady" pregnant again so she could get more government aid while the thugs are in jail. Except for the state hospital guys up front jacking off in front of everyone. Except for the homeless guys/gals who reek and, like the hookers with their johns, constantly talk "I ain't gonna lie!" nonsense at the top of their lungs.
There's nothing wrong with living in a one-room apartment. Except for the 20-year-old neighbors around you blasting their music or having loud sex or stomping home in your shared hallway at 3am or running a buzz-saw in the adjoining backyard all day.
Hey, if I could be a secretary, take a bus, and live in a one-room apartment -- all in a vacuum -- I'd have no problem with that.
In reality, though: I'm sick of pretending to be humble and that the utter idiocy of the people I've been around for the past 3 years is OK. None of this dumb bullshit has been OK. I've just been too lazy/tired to try to get back out of it. I need to get off my ass.
Here's the thing:
There's nothing wrong with being a secretary. Except for the dumb-speak of fellow secretaries in the office ("Thank yewwww!"). And the condescension of the bosses (until you make it clear to them that you have a Master's in English and can discuss anything with them at or above their level).
There's nothing wrong with taking a bus for transportation. Except for the thugs who yell at the top of their lungs about who they're busy fucking and how they just got their "old lady" pregnant again so she could get more government aid while the thugs are in jail. Except for the state hospital guys up front jacking off in front of everyone. Except for the homeless guys/gals who reek and, like the hookers with their johns, constantly talk "I ain't gonna lie!" nonsense at the top of their lungs.
There's nothing wrong with living in a one-room apartment. Except for the 20-year-old neighbors around you blasting their music or having loud sex or stomping home in your shared hallway at 3am or running a buzz-saw in the adjoining backyard all day.
Hey, if I could be a secretary, take a bus, and live in a one-room apartment -- all in a vacuum -- I'd have no problem with that.
In reality, though: I'm sick of pretending to be humble and that the utter idiocy of the people I've been around for the past 3 years is OK. None of this dumb bullshit has been OK. I've just been too lazy/tired to try to get back out of it. I need to get off my ass.
Friday, October 11, 2013
Paul in Times Square Wednesday!
(John Lennon's birthday, BTW.)
I could've been there, man! :) (Used to work in the Morgan Stanley building, right next to the flashing Hershey store -- could've popped right down for my lunch break!)
I found these pix on the UK Daily Mail site -- where commenters were giving Paul (in the photo below WALKING back to his nearby hotel with wife Nancy Shevell) shit for DYING HIS HAIR BROWN! ("You're 71, Paul, be real," etc.)
Paul has a new album out October 15 called "New." And a single with the same name was released a couple of weeks ago. The single was really bad. That said, though: I do have a huge problem with people mocking him for dying his hair! It's not like he's your grand-dad who just retired from the local shop and is now supposed to (in your mind) spend all of his free time babysitting your kids. When Paul McCartney was 25, he looked nothing like, and was doing nothing like, your now-grand-dad. When he was 45, he looked nothing like and was doing nothing like your grand-dad.
Same with Paul at 71: If the fucking LEGENDARY ROCK STAR wants to dye his hair brown and then strut across Fifth Avenue after an impromptu concert... Don't hold him to your grand-dad's hair (or any other aesthetic or behavioral) standards, is all I ask.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------
I've been listening to Paul's 1978 "London Town" album for a month now. Tonight, here's "Don't Let It Bring You Down":
Friday, October 04, 2013
Wednesday, October 02, 2013
Hermit Crab by Stephen Burt
That shell is pretty, but that shell is too small for me.
Each home is a hideout; each home is a secret; each home
is a getaway under the same hot lamp, a means
to a lateral move at low velocity.
I live in a room in the room
of a boy I barely see.
Sometimes the boy & his talkative friends raise
too-warm hands & try to set me free
& I retreat into myself, hoping they place
me back in my terrarium, & they
do, with disappointed alacrity.
Scatter patterns in sand, adnates, cancellates, gaping
whelk husks, a toy tractor-trailer, cracked
and dinged, beside the spine of a plastic tree,
the helmet-shaped shelter of a shadow cast
by a not-quite-buried wedge of pottery . . .
if I have a body that's wholly my own
then it isn't mine. For a while I was
protected by what I pretended to be.
--The New Yorker, 8/5/13
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
Was hem-hawing through a back issue (8/5/13) of the New Yorker today and came across this poem, intending just to glance over just to tell myself I'd read it... The first stanza was inviting. The second stanza bunged me up: especially disliked the way-too-blatant "each home is a secret." Was prepared to yawn and flip on. But... the THIRD STANZA! "I live in a room in the room / of a boy I barely see." Experience through a scrim (either physically or metaphysically) is something seemingly simple, but I don't see it a lot; Ted Hughes does it regularly, which is one reason I like him so. For instance, in his "A Short Film" from "Birthday Letters," the ending:
And how that explosion would hurt
Is not just an idea of horror but a flash of fine sweat
Over the skin-surface, a bracing of nerves
For something that has already happened.
Hughes's overlapping of time is more complicated than what Burt is doing in his simple lines indicating overlapping physical circumstances, but the effect is similar. (The Hughes poem that most exemplifies what I'm thinking of... I can't think of! The speaker is a falconer. I can't find the darn poem anywhere!)
Anyway, Burt's 3rd stanza made me immediately get over the clunky beginning (and the follow-up 4th and 5th stanzas, which are pleasant but not magnificent -- the "disappointed" hands putting him back is interesting; I first read "disappointed" as "disappointing"-- maybe even MORE interesting, the speaker's desires dual that way, both wanting and not wanting to be engaged).
With the "Scatter patterns..." stanza, the poem takes off. I don't normally like show-offy-ness like "adnates" and "cancellates," and I still don't know what these words mean, but it doesn't matter. From here to the stunning "For a while I was protected / by what I pretended to be" end, the poem's taken on a brilliant life of its own.
I've been through a long dry stretch of limbo for the past few months. Not in psychic pain, not scrapping after jobs. (Nothing like the hell of 2 years ago.) But also a pleasure-less stretch. Burt's poem gave me a THRILL for the first time in ages. And shook something up. I read it this morning when I had nothing to do at work. And right after, left for lunch, with this in my head:
Time as tantra, as tribute, as taunt
Mantra in memory of dances not taught
Now, that's nothing but a ditty. But a ditty that's also a portal. (I walked around for the rest of the day thinking about Place and Black Holes and Hourglass and such. Which is way better than thinking about how irritatingly stupid students are...) AKA: Burt's poem got me briefly back in touch with my soul.
Each home is a hideout; each home is a secret; each home
is a getaway under the same hot lamp, a means
to a lateral move at low velocity.
I live in a room in the room
of a boy I barely see.
Sometimes the boy & his talkative friends raise
too-warm hands & try to set me free
& I retreat into myself, hoping they place
me back in my terrarium, & they
do, with disappointed alacrity.
Scatter patterns in sand, adnates, cancellates, gaping
whelk husks, a toy tractor-trailer, cracked
and dinged, beside the spine of a plastic tree,
the helmet-shaped shelter of a shadow cast
by a not-quite-buried wedge of pottery . . .
if I have a body that's wholly my own
then it isn't mine. For a while I was
protected by what I pretended to be.
--The New Yorker, 8/5/13
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
Was hem-hawing through a back issue (8/5/13) of the New Yorker today and came across this poem, intending just to glance over just to tell myself I'd read it... The first stanza was inviting. The second stanza bunged me up: especially disliked the way-too-blatant "each home is a secret." Was prepared to yawn and flip on. But... the THIRD STANZA! "I live in a room in the room / of a boy I barely see." Experience through a scrim (either physically or metaphysically) is something seemingly simple, but I don't see it a lot; Ted Hughes does it regularly, which is one reason I like him so. For instance, in his "A Short Film" from "Birthday Letters," the ending:
And how that explosion would hurt
Is not just an idea of horror but a flash of fine sweat
Over the skin-surface, a bracing of nerves
For something that has already happened.
Hughes's overlapping of time is more complicated than what Burt is doing in his simple lines indicating overlapping physical circumstances, but the effect is similar. (The Hughes poem that most exemplifies what I'm thinking of... I can't think of! The speaker is a falconer. I can't find the darn poem anywhere!)
Anyway, Burt's 3rd stanza made me immediately get over the clunky beginning (and the follow-up 4th and 5th stanzas, which are pleasant but not magnificent -- the "disappointed" hands putting him back is interesting; I first read "disappointed" as "disappointing"-- maybe even MORE interesting, the speaker's desires dual that way, both wanting and not wanting to be engaged).
With the "Scatter patterns..." stanza, the poem takes off. I don't normally like show-offy-ness like "adnates" and "cancellates," and I still don't know what these words mean, but it doesn't matter. From here to the stunning "For a while I was protected / by what I pretended to be" end, the poem's taken on a brilliant life of its own.
I've been through a long dry stretch of limbo for the past few months. Not in psychic pain, not scrapping after jobs. (Nothing like the hell of 2 years ago.) But also a pleasure-less stretch. Burt's poem gave me a THRILL for the first time in ages. And shook something up. I read it this morning when I had nothing to do at work. And right after, left for lunch, with this in my head:
Time as tantra, as tribute, as taunt
Mantra in memory of dances not taught
Now, that's nothing but a ditty. But a ditty that's also a portal. (I walked around for the rest of the day thinking about Place and Black Holes and Hourglass and such. Which is way better than thinking about how irritatingly stupid students are...) AKA: Burt's poem got me briefly back in touch with my soul.
Tuesday, October 01, 2013
Don Draper on Joan Crawford
Betty Draper walks into the bedroom, where Don is reading a paperback copy of Rona Jaffee’s The Best of Everything.
DON This is fascinating.
BETTY It’s better than the Hollywood version.
DON It’s certainly dirtier.
BETTY Joan Crawford is not what she was. You know, honestly, I found her eyebrows completely unnerving. Like a couple of caterpillars pasted there. Her standing next to Suzy Parker as if they were the same species.
DON Well, some men like eyebrows, and all men like Joan Crawford. Salvatore couldn’t stop talking about her.
DON This is fascinating.
BETTY It’s better than the Hollywood version.
DON It’s certainly dirtier.
BETTY Joan Crawford is not what she was. You know, honestly, I found her eyebrows completely unnerving. Like a couple of caterpillars pasted there. Her standing next to Suzy Parker as if they were the same species.
DON Well, some men like eyebrows, and all men like Joan Crawford. Salvatore couldn’t stop talking about her.
-----------------------------------------
From this mid-century design website:
(This page also includes great photos of the sets of "Best of Everything" and "Torch Song.")
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