I see her again at the corner. Same purple coat, same rolling backpack and hand bag next to her. She walks back and forth, back and forth, never getting on a bus, never walking into an office. I ran into her the other night in the Cultural Center. I was marching toward some lecture, she was marching toward a warm seat. We show up in many of the same places, both of us in our long coats and toting worldly goods for the day. But the subtle differences make a world of difference. One of us looks like our steps have a purpose, the other actually has one.
On some days the differentiation is slim. I could dissect and twitter myself endlessly, trying to outline a life but find it to have been thin on purpose as I put head to pillow in the end. What goes through her head, I wonder? I notice her at her corner just after I finished playing chicken with a cabbie who proves to not possess the stones to send me into the afterlife. I'd like to stay with her, on that corner, pacing next to her, to see what it's like. I'm sure my head would not be empty at all but would soon fill with demons a-plenty. The tide of mental pollution I push away with purpose, a prayer and a job title would rise and flood my mind. The rush might drown reason but also cover a multitude of sad and sorry-smelling sins.
"I wish he'd just get off the pity pot, wipe his ass and live - plenty of people's father's get cancer. I hope he remembers to give me my book back.
I wonder how she is today. The furnace just go replaced, next the roof needs insulation, the well needs to be re-dug and the bathroom walls - shit the bathroom walls.
If that bitch bugs me about my weight again I'll scream! Don't people know how rude it is to comment about another person's weight? Jees!
I shouldn't have said that, or that or that. Shit it's 9 am and I haven't managed to do a single thing right today."
Soon enough my simple bag would also spill over with the detritus of life that must be carried around. What would the world look like? Would it be more frightening or would it in fact prove to be a simpler landscape of impressions and associations? Absent of the details of the day I could wander in a city of my own thoughts - lost. I want to know, for real, but don't have the time to find out.
Past purple coat lady I push up the street to the office building where I work. She didn't start out as the woman who wandered around downtown, I'm sure. Did she start like me and simply find the slippery tide of depression and confusion too tempting? Hard to say. That fall lands us all in different places somewhere between loss of appetite to loss of mind. I run into her at a corner sometimes. Out of habit or concern she looks both ways before crossing the street. Me, I've stopped bothering to look.
Thursday, January 29, 2009
Sunday, January 25, 2009
The dirt of winter
I don't much mind the dead of winter, it's the dirt of winter I take issue with. Snow, rock hard from days of varying temperature never getting quite warm enough to melt the lot but merely render it into a colder kind of concrete, is like a blank sheaf of paper. Each page dropped from the sky successively records the detritus of the day. A cross section, on view maybe against the glass wall of a bus stop, reveals the sedimentary layers of city in winter. Snow bergs rise from the dirt, the dusty chalk of Chicago air and snow frozen and refrozen into ice.
Its safe to go out with just shoes on for even though two feet of snow still lay upon the ground the works is packed down enough by feet that one can make a way down the street. It's not just the cold that restricts the motion, though. Jaywalking, straying and cutting corners are not options on sidewalks hemmed in by piles of snow yick. More and more the page is dotted with yellow-orange stains and dog poos left behind in favor of hurrying home out of the cold. Someday when the works melts it will liberate months worth of garbage, doggy do, and things long ago dropped and unable to locate in the snow. Someday the grit held in the snow will lie all over the grass, all over the sidewalk and street. It will be as if the sky had rained grit and poo. It will be worth it just to jay walk again.
Its safe to go out with just shoes on for even though two feet of snow still lay upon the ground the works is packed down enough by feet that one can make a way down the street. It's not just the cold that restricts the motion, though. Jaywalking, straying and cutting corners are not options on sidewalks hemmed in by piles of snow yick. More and more the page is dotted with yellow-orange stains and dog poos left behind in favor of hurrying home out of the cold. Someday when the works melts it will liberate months worth of garbage, doggy do, and things long ago dropped and unable to locate in the snow. Someday the grit held in the snow will lie all over the grass, all over the sidewalk and street. It will be as if the sky had rained grit and poo. It will be worth it just to jay walk again.
Saturday, January 24, 2009
How fortunate are we
When it comes in great torrents, it's so easy to confuse the blessing of fresh water falling with a curse. But the rain, each drop, is only in and of itself intending to bless. Its volume, its timing, merely makes us confused. What it washes away, the attachment and appearance of things hoped for, longed for, worked for, these are the curse we place rain upon our own heads.
But am I brave enough to hang there, let this rain flood my life, erode those things not anchored too tight in the truth? I'm afraid. But what does that prove? If fear constantly won over creativity we'd still live in caves.
How fortunate to have employment to loose, how fortunate to have the love that might relocate, how fortunate is the healthy body sweating its way through 2 hours of yoga. Being is the blessing - its appearance, whether in him, her, it, or that, merely changes shape and appearance as it reflects our life. It will always find some new circumstance in which to manifest, should one get washed away. Life reflects being like the raindrop falling, always falling, to ground.
But am I brave enough to hang there, let this rain flood my life, erode those things not anchored too tight in the truth? I'm afraid. But what does that prove? If fear constantly won over creativity we'd still live in caves.
How fortunate to have employment to loose, how fortunate to have the love that might relocate, how fortunate is the healthy body sweating its way through 2 hours of yoga. Being is the blessing - its appearance, whether in him, her, it, or that, merely changes shape and appearance as it reflects our life. It will always find some new circumstance in which to manifest, should one get washed away. Life reflects being like the raindrop falling, always falling, to ground.
Thursday, January 22, 2009
Life in the balance
Thirteen miles of island packed with history and memory fills with strange ghosts. Generations of the artsy, eclectic, ancient and insane flood the night spaces between clatters of train, honk of cars, crackle of garbage and rustling of blanket to find two. Two of so many people on this old island, many doing much the same thing for so any variety different reasons. Two are lost. Lost to the world of honk, clatter and crackle their feeling bleeds them into the silent space of those ghosts who are left to watch. They’re lost in the fleeting touch and the elusive taste of consuming one another in reunion.
Our ancestors tried to kill each other, but here we’ve come to this. Not bad, not bad at all for human progress that, having fallen from the trees like some overripe fruit, to then prodigiously stand upright and now to dance. We dance the repose of drinking from each other is if both were the tap of the fountain of life. Not bad for human progress at all.
It’s taken us billions of years to get here, me and you. Through primordial ooze, ancient forests and burning skies; through lost on the subway and cold streets we’ve come to balance on a single strand of time. Here butterfly cheeks surrender to mammalian mouths and human hands each grasping, pulling, biting to sate our ancient hunger.
I always worry a bit that it won’t work.
Our ancestors tried to kill each other, but here we’ve come to this. Not bad, not bad at all for human progress that, having fallen from the trees like some overripe fruit, to then prodigiously stand upright and now to dance. We dance the repose of drinking from each other is if both were the tap of the fountain of life. Not bad for human progress at all.
It’s taken us billions of years to get here, me and you. Through primordial ooze, ancient forests and burning skies; through lost on the subway and cold streets we’ve come to balance on a single strand of time. Here butterfly cheeks surrender to mammalian mouths and human hands each grasping, pulling, biting to sate our ancient hunger.
I always worry a bit that it won’t work.
Tuesday, January 20, 2009
yet still, we dream
7 am & the express bus slowly fills its belly for the long haul downtown. Faces look tired & distant, it's an early morning after a long weekend. Some read papers while others dab on makeup. Then she gets on, this African-American woman, her faced wreathed by a scarf, wearing an incurable grin. It's not just a passing ray of sun through the clouds, this smile sustains her. Her face says it all, today changes everything.
Across from me a man holds up a paper upon whose front cover is a photo of Obama's head, from behind, against an American flag. Robbed of the personality and charisma that his smile commands, this picture lays out the simple facts. With nappy hair and tawny skin, with thicker lips and wider nose, this head is the man we have elected president. And the legions who have avoided playing in the sun so as to preserve "good color"; who have spent hours in the salon or barber submitting to heat and chemicals in the struggle for "good hair" or those who have pursed their fleshy lips can at last put down the mirror of self conscious inspection, look into their hearts and deem themselves "good".
Does this mean that the scale of justice has settled in perfect balance? No. I have a mother who still thinks "colored" is a polite word to use. She still identifies newscasters, singers, even friends of mine as "the BLACK one" each time saying "black" as if she'd just found a rodent in her larder. As long as words like "nigger" and "shwarster" exist, we have a way to go yet. As long as people avert their eyes from African American men they meet on the street lest he pose a danger; as long as little old ladies move their purses to their opposite side when a black person sits next to them on the bus, we are not done. As long as race is a measuring indicator of personality we are a long way from the goal. We who believe in freedom cannot yet rest while any single one of us remains in harm's way due to ignorance or prejudice.
Yet still, we dream. Today our dream is sweet because though we trudge the road of history and destiny, it's nice to be on a flatter stretch. We dream, still, because we know just a little more than yesterday about what we are capable of and where our attitudes come from. It's not enough to think different, or even to act different, it's a matter of understanding the assumptions of our past in a new way.
Five years ago I moved to Chicago from Boston. I left a job, an apartment, a full & good life. Packed it all up and moved 1500 miles to find myself in school, again. In those first days I needed so much. And, Yankee will power in hand, I was going to get it. Trips to the ID office took me to Accounts Payable which sent me to Financial Aid, then on to the Registrar, back to Financial Aid and over again to Accounts Payable before I had my card. Then it was time to get a train pass, which took me through a few more lines and offices and burocracy. Each point on the journey left me waiting and hoping yet suspecting that the person behind the counter didn't really understand what I was asking for. Finally, after three days of battling it all out, I went to grad student orientation and met the head of the department. I was greeted by a middle aged man with round, pink features and instantly felt a wave of relief. Then came the guilt. Looking back over my first few days I realized that part of the source of my stress was that no one in any of these offices, where I came knocking with my many needs, looked like me. Unlike monocultural Boston, Chicago is diverse and the office workers at SAIC are primarily African-American (a ratio that swings the other way when it comes to faculty and students). The undercurrent to all my discussions across desks and through glass was that I didn't think that person would take care of me or that they were judging me. Did any one of them fail to help me? NO. Was I fine? YES. Would I have consciously admitted that race was an underlying stress factor in any of those meetings? NO. But there's something about approaching a person in a position of power and influence, however small, and seeing visual cues of same-ness that put one at ease knowing he or she in power identifies with one's plight.
"Yes, we can" was Obama's campaign slogan of note. Well, many always knew, in an academic way, that they could. But that gut level understanding that "Yes, we MAY" remained elusive, lacking a symbol or a visual affirmation to match the words, until now. And so, yet still, we dream. We dream, now, just a little bigger than yesterday.
Across from me a man holds up a paper upon whose front cover is a photo of Obama's head, from behind, against an American flag. Robbed of the personality and charisma that his smile commands, this picture lays out the simple facts. With nappy hair and tawny skin, with thicker lips and wider nose, this head is the man we have elected president. And the legions who have avoided playing in the sun so as to preserve "good color"; who have spent hours in the salon or barber submitting to heat and chemicals in the struggle for "good hair" or those who have pursed their fleshy lips can at last put down the mirror of self conscious inspection, look into their hearts and deem themselves "good".
Does this mean that the scale of justice has settled in perfect balance? No. I have a mother who still thinks "colored" is a polite word to use. She still identifies newscasters, singers, even friends of mine as "the BLACK one" each time saying "black" as if she'd just found a rodent in her larder. As long as words like "nigger" and "shwarster" exist, we have a way to go yet. As long as people avert their eyes from African American men they meet on the street lest he pose a danger; as long as little old ladies move their purses to their opposite side when a black person sits next to them on the bus, we are not done. As long as race is a measuring indicator of personality we are a long way from the goal. We who believe in freedom cannot yet rest while any single one of us remains in harm's way due to ignorance or prejudice.
Yet still, we dream. Today our dream is sweet because though we trudge the road of history and destiny, it's nice to be on a flatter stretch. We dream, still, because we know just a little more than yesterday about what we are capable of and where our attitudes come from. It's not enough to think different, or even to act different, it's a matter of understanding the assumptions of our past in a new way.
Five years ago I moved to Chicago from Boston. I left a job, an apartment, a full & good life. Packed it all up and moved 1500 miles to find myself in school, again. In those first days I needed so much. And, Yankee will power in hand, I was going to get it. Trips to the ID office took me to Accounts Payable which sent me to Financial Aid, then on to the Registrar, back to Financial Aid and over again to Accounts Payable before I had my card. Then it was time to get a train pass, which took me through a few more lines and offices and burocracy. Each point on the journey left me waiting and hoping yet suspecting that the person behind the counter didn't really understand what I was asking for. Finally, after three days of battling it all out, I went to grad student orientation and met the head of the department. I was greeted by a middle aged man with round, pink features and instantly felt a wave of relief. Then came the guilt. Looking back over my first few days I realized that part of the source of my stress was that no one in any of these offices, where I came knocking with my many needs, looked like me. Unlike monocultural Boston, Chicago is diverse and the office workers at SAIC are primarily African-American (a ratio that swings the other way when it comes to faculty and students). The undercurrent to all my discussions across desks and through glass was that I didn't think that person would take care of me or that they were judging me. Did any one of them fail to help me? NO. Was I fine? YES. Would I have consciously admitted that race was an underlying stress factor in any of those meetings? NO. But there's something about approaching a person in a position of power and influence, however small, and seeing visual cues of same-ness that put one at ease knowing he or she in power identifies with one's plight.
"Yes, we can" was Obama's campaign slogan of note. Well, many always knew, in an academic way, that they could. But that gut level understanding that "Yes, we MAY" remained elusive, lacking a symbol or a visual affirmation to match the words, until now. And so, yet still, we dream. We dream, now, just a little bigger than yesterday.
Thursday, January 15, 2009
sick of it
The river pauses, completely frozen over. It's just a chalky line separating the north and south banks, now, unable to rush anywhere. Every building sits in the pink late afternoon light exhaling puffs of purple steam as if exhausted by the effort of keeping all inhabitants warm. I put my hand up to the glass, feeling the tingling chill of that smooth surface. Birds, rodents, raccoons and squirrels must find ways of protecting themselves from the bitter drop in temperatures. But, not us. From Home to bus to pedway to office and back, I really don't have to be confronted by these elements if I don't care to be. How ancestors survived in such temperatures, how I might survive were life suddenly to be stripped of all modern convenience, that's not something I really have to think about much. My hand rests on the glass, less than an inch from the bitterest of temperatures, in warm safety.
The bus I ride to and from downtown everyday has plenty of windows to view the passing scene. But while they are wonderful for leaking out heat, lately they let in no clue of the world outside. A thick, grey crust of dried on road spray and puge has turned these windows into walls. Passengers ride along, listening to ipods, reading, chatting on phones, collectively ignoring each other. Confined into this space for up to an hour out of our day, we try not to stare. This is what life in the city has become - a self contained echo chamber of humanity staring at itself while all bouncing down the road of time. Our egos bump and grate and get in each other's way such that I must wonder if, in fact, humans were truly meant to live in such massive, tight proximity to one another. Outside temperatures drop below zero and such cold makes snapping, snarling sounds in tree branches. Outside is a diminishing nature where species die off unnoticed.
I think I'm sick of living in the city. I'm sick of living in a people-scape rather than a landscape. I'm sick of the collective attitude which pushes nature to the perimeter of life. The earth is not seen as something which sustains us at all. I see how she's framed as a backdrop to busyness and doing-ness. She's ignored, beaten down, indentifiable only as a pigeon, park squirrel, or something in the produce section.
And now, people are so MAD at nature. They're quite annoyed with winter's interruption to routine and human flow. How dare the snow. Below zero? How dare the cold! But in the piles of snow, encumbering body wrappings, slippery surfaces and crunching cold I hear what she's trying to say.
"Slow down, you go to fast. Stop and look, you never regard each step enough. Ask for help, it's too cold for you to think this can be marched through alone. Go within, you're always running out. It's ok to have a season of stopping. All creatures and creation take this time to rest. They live off stored wealth and prepare for another chance to grow. You are such a creation. Stop. Wait. Be still and know that 'I am'."
But we don't have that anymore. We neither listen nor entertain the proposal that life has a cycle to be honored. Our routine is conveniently shortened to a daily treadmill of tasks. Sick of it.
The bus I ride to and from downtown everyday has plenty of windows to view the passing scene. But while they are wonderful for leaking out heat, lately they let in no clue of the world outside. A thick, grey crust of dried on road spray and puge has turned these windows into walls. Passengers ride along, listening to ipods, reading, chatting on phones, collectively ignoring each other. Confined into this space for up to an hour out of our day, we try not to stare. This is what life in the city has become - a self contained echo chamber of humanity staring at itself while all bouncing down the road of time. Our egos bump and grate and get in each other's way such that I must wonder if, in fact, humans were truly meant to live in such massive, tight proximity to one another. Outside temperatures drop below zero and such cold makes snapping, snarling sounds in tree branches. Outside is a diminishing nature where species die off unnoticed.
I think I'm sick of living in the city. I'm sick of living in a people-scape rather than a landscape. I'm sick of the collective attitude which pushes nature to the perimeter of life. The earth is not seen as something which sustains us at all. I see how she's framed as a backdrop to busyness and doing-ness. She's ignored, beaten down, indentifiable only as a pigeon, park squirrel, or something in the produce section.
And now, people are so MAD at nature. They're quite annoyed with winter's interruption to routine and human flow. How dare the snow. Below zero? How dare the cold! But in the piles of snow, encumbering body wrappings, slippery surfaces and crunching cold I hear what she's trying to say.
"Slow down, you go to fast. Stop and look, you never regard each step enough. Ask for help, it's too cold for you to think this can be marched through alone. Go within, you're always running out. It's ok to have a season of stopping. All creatures and creation take this time to rest. They live off stored wealth and prepare for another chance to grow. You are such a creation. Stop. Wait. Be still and know that 'I am'."
But we don't have that anymore. We neither listen nor entertain the proposal that life has a cycle to be honored. Our routine is conveniently shortened to a daily treadmill of tasks. Sick of it.
Wednesday, January 14, 2009
It's supposed to snow in January
"This is one of the worst years ever, don't you think?" She asks me as we both peal off our winter wear and disrobe at the gym.
"Well, no, it's just winter." I return. Granted, a conversation about the weather is right up there with a discussion about eyeball injuries on my list of interesting topics. I can be accused of trying to head off a needless, dramatic discussion with someone I'd prefer not to interact with. I'm here to exercise, not get wrapped up in any of those insipid "woman conversations". These often plague my ears during that margin of locker room time bookending my workout. But, much to my chagrin, my response necessarily sets of what she calls a "debate" in which she must find ways of making herself right. I do wonder how long it takes her to realize that there is only one person talking during this 'debate'. I finally stop her with "I grew up in Buffalo, anything less than four feet falling in one day is chicken shit."
It happens every year, starting in about December. The temperature drops below freezing, making occasional further descents into the single or negative digits. These dips last for a week or so. To boot, snow falls. Sometimes it falls down, sometimes it comes with a wind that makes it blow sideways. This snow fall will happen two to three times per week.
I look outside, I listen to the weather report, and I go to my closet to make appropriate decisions. Below freezing? No skirts. Below 20? down jacket, hat, leather gloves, earmuffs for over hat. Below 10? Silk long johns under clothing, thick socks, stuff leather gloves into wool mittens and wear both together, consider putting head scarf around head and neck. Around zero? use scarf to protect face, consider switching to long coat to protect legs. If there's snow, put on boots. If this weather didn't happen every damned year, if this year is so much worse than previous years, they why oh why do I have the gear and the routine already in place to deal with it?
When I first moved to Chicago, it snowed in December and, as was not normal for Boston, snow remained on the ground until March. Yay! a real winter! But, everyone said "Oh! this is so much worse than last year! This is a bad year!" But, that same weather came back the next year, and the next and the next. With each return of snow the complaints choir voices their continual refrain of 'how terrible this winter is". They persistently react with astonishment at the plummeting temperature and the sky's temerity to drop this white stuff upon them. They're shocked that nature refuses to restrict herself to that role of a pleasant background for their busy lives.
To all those people I hear on the bus or at the gym reacting to this weather, I have news. Snow is not a plague. It is not a curse. It does not mean that the gods are angry with you and it does not mean anything is going terribly wrong with the planet. This is supposed to happen. So it gets in your way, slows you down. Forces you to take public transportation. So what. There's nothing to fear. So, zip up your coat, get some decent boots, watch your step and knock off the dramatics.
I head through the falling & blowing snow to work, picking through the "yick" on the sidewalk for good footing. The lady in the purple coat with her rolling back pack and flowery hat is there, just like every day. She looks like she's going to work. Each day she stands at the corner of Lake and Upper Columbus with an expectant gesture of waiting for a bus or for the light to change so she can be on her way. In an hour or so I'll look down at this corner from my cubicle with a view and she'll still be here, waiting. To my friend running the news stand in the pedway, today is just another windowless day. Only the mastheads differentiate January from July.
It's all just normal. If you don't like it then, next time July roles around, pop your busy head out of your ass long enough to enjoy the sunshine.
"Well, no, it's just winter." I return. Granted, a conversation about the weather is right up there with a discussion about eyeball injuries on my list of interesting topics. I can be accused of trying to head off a needless, dramatic discussion with someone I'd prefer not to interact with. I'm here to exercise, not get wrapped up in any of those insipid "woman conversations". These often plague my ears during that margin of locker room time bookending my workout. But, much to my chagrin, my response necessarily sets of what she calls a "debate" in which she must find ways of making herself right. I do wonder how long it takes her to realize that there is only one person talking during this 'debate'. I finally stop her with "I grew up in Buffalo, anything less than four feet falling in one day is chicken shit."
It happens every year, starting in about December. The temperature drops below freezing, making occasional further descents into the single or negative digits. These dips last for a week or so. To boot, snow falls. Sometimes it falls down, sometimes it comes with a wind that makes it blow sideways. This snow fall will happen two to three times per week.
I look outside, I listen to the weather report, and I go to my closet to make appropriate decisions. Below freezing? No skirts. Below 20? down jacket, hat, leather gloves, earmuffs for over hat. Below 10? Silk long johns under clothing, thick socks, stuff leather gloves into wool mittens and wear both together, consider putting head scarf around head and neck. Around zero? use scarf to protect face, consider switching to long coat to protect legs. If there's snow, put on boots. If this weather didn't happen every damned year, if this year is so much worse than previous years, they why oh why do I have the gear and the routine already in place to deal with it?
When I first moved to Chicago, it snowed in December and, as was not normal for Boston, snow remained on the ground until March. Yay! a real winter! But, everyone said "Oh! this is so much worse than last year! This is a bad year!" But, that same weather came back the next year, and the next and the next. With each return of snow the complaints choir voices their continual refrain of 'how terrible this winter is". They persistently react with astonishment at the plummeting temperature and the sky's temerity to drop this white stuff upon them. They're shocked that nature refuses to restrict herself to that role of a pleasant background for their busy lives.
To all those people I hear on the bus or at the gym reacting to this weather, I have news. Snow is not a plague. It is not a curse. It does not mean that the gods are angry with you and it does not mean anything is going terribly wrong with the planet. This is supposed to happen. So it gets in your way, slows you down. Forces you to take public transportation. So what. There's nothing to fear. So, zip up your coat, get some decent boots, watch your step and knock off the dramatics.
I head through the falling & blowing snow to work, picking through the "yick" on the sidewalk for good footing. The lady in the purple coat with her rolling back pack and flowery hat is there, just like every day. She looks like she's going to work. Each day she stands at the corner of Lake and Upper Columbus with an expectant gesture of waiting for a bus or for the light to change so she can be on her way. In an hour or so I'll look down at this corner from my cubicle with a view and she'll still be here, waiting. To my friend running the news stand in the pedway, today is just another windowless day. Only the mastheads differentiate January from July.
It's all just normal. If you don't like it then, next time July roles around, pop your busy head out of your ass long enough to enjoy the sunshine.
Monday, January 12, 2009
Change at the door
The cold has crept through my bones and no longer feels like a stranger bumping into me as I walk out the door. It's twenty degrees and my coat is open. I start to wonder why I bother with the down jacket. Gloves? Those are for the single digits.
Stepping through what is technically known as "yick" forces me to shoe gaze as I pick my way down the sidewalk. I remember this is a cursed gesture to all those insisting we don't raise our eyes and allow some inspiration in more often. So, I look up. Sky like a marble quarry, urban world like a grey canyon, every thing and everyone stiffened in the cold and encumbered by snow and clothing to protect from snow. So this is January and we choose to live with it and manage to not jump clean out of our skins or move south once and for all. I joke with coworkers in Atlanta that this is the subtle fee we pay for living in the best city in the world.
January. Comes from "Janus", a figure guarding the doorway; the two faced god who looks both ways. And in this passage we do need some guard, some guidance. We are split wholly over the mistakes and culpability of what was, the anxiety and hope for what will be, leaving only a strange and rootless excitement over now.
I listened to Bush give his final press conference and felt a bit bad for him. If he'd been elected in a less complicated time, say, 1892, he might have drifted into history as one of our less controversial presidents. If he had managed to surround himself with people of a more trustworthy and less power-hungry caliber, he might have done fine - slipping into history as a name fifth graders must memorize on a list. He's not a bad man at all. I'm sure everyone of us could find in him a friend were we to sit down and chat. But, at the turn of the twentieth century, America didn't need a buddy. It needed a miracle. And now he's leaving, taking his mixed record with him and leaving the "yick" behind. There really are people on the planet who are better off for George W. Bush having stepped up to the plate and found a way to do what is right on occasion. But no one will forget his surprising role as the shoe target.
On Bush's heels, history sweeps into the oval office. The wind doesn't get me much but this, just thinking of it still gives me a chill. I still worry that an alternate universe where the election turned out differently will push forward into my experience. But no, this is real, it's safe to open my eyes and believe, for once, that the dream of american freedom is a reality. For a minute we are launched beyond the reach of gravity. We step from the nasty known onto a sweet dream of future. And in that doorway lies the danger. It is a dangerous moment where we surpass the ability to be defined with words because we will step through the other side changed. But into what only heaven knows.
And this is why our gate needs a guard, a Janus, someone to look both ways while we forget ourselves for a minute and step out into blinding light or gusting wind. Someone to call our names and help us to find a road back home through fear and doubt, through hope and change.
Stepping through what is technically known as "yick" forces me to shoe gaze as I pick my way down the sidewalk. I remember this is a cursed gesture to all those insisting we don't raise our eyes and allow some inspiration in more often. So, I look up. Sky like a marble quarry, urban world like a grey canyon, every thing and everyone stiffened in the cold and encumbered by snow and clothing to protect from snow. So this is January and we choose to live with it and manage to not jump clean out of our skins or move south once and for all. I joke with coworkers in Atlanta that this is the subtle fee we pay for living in the best city in the world.
January. Comes from "Janus", a figure guarding the doorway; the two faced god who looks both ways. And in this passage we do need some guard, some guidance. We are split wholly over the mistakes and culpability of what was, the anxiety and hope for what will be, leaving only a strange and rootless excitement over now.
I listened to Bush give his final press conference and felt a bit bad for him. If he'd been elected in a less complicated time, say, 1892, he might have drifted into history as one of our less controversial presidents. If he had managed to surround himself with people of a more trustworthy and less power-hungry caliber, he might have done fine - slipping into history as a name fifth graders must memorize on a list. He's not a bad man at all. I'm sure everyone of us could find in him a friend were we to sit down and chat. But, at the turn of the twentieth century, America didn't need a buddy. It needed a miracle. And now he's leaving, taking his mixed record with him and leaving the "yick" behind. There really are people on the planet who are better off for George W. Bush having stepped up to the plate and found a way to do what is right on occasion. But no one will forget his surprising role as the shoe target.
On Bush's heels, history sweeps into the oval office. The wind doesn't get me much but this, just thinking of it still gives me a chill. I still worry that an alternate universe where the election turned out differently will push forward into my experience. But no, this is real, it's safe to open my eyes and believe, for once, that the dream of american freedom is a reality. For a minute we are launched beyond the reach of gravity. We step from the nasty known onto a sweet dream of future. And in that doorway lies the danger. It is a dangerous moment where we surpass the ability to be defined with words because we will step through the other side changed. But into what only heaven knows.
And this is why our gate needs a guard, a Janus, someone to look both ways while we forget ourselves for a minute and step out into blinding light or gusting wind. Someone to call our names and help us to find a road back home through fear and doubt, through hope and change.
Thursday, January 1, 2009
You say goodbye, I say hello
Dec 31 2008
How long does a day last? Twenty four hours wherever it lays its head. And it crawls across the globe for a full twenty four, testing the pillows and mattresses of every new country it passes. It rests on straw, on hay, on water, on sealy and certa. That day, once it’s done, take most of 48 hours to finish its work. Take a year of such days? Could last for damn near like forever.
This is the day to say ‘goodbye’ to a year that has lasted far too long and what many folks blame for dragging them through the mud of economic chaos and the constant exposée of worsening revelations. Folks just couldn’t seem to dig low enough this year. Will someone please just get out a gun and shoot that damned bear? Will someone please just tell 2008 to go the fuck away?
Well, today is also my mom’s birthday. Slowly, sadly, I realize that I’m bidding adieu to the powerhouse, the fierce hen, the mother that I once knew. The mom I watched go to battle with school teachers, bus drivers and whole fleets of nurses fades into a woman who’s imagination and worry now operate on too feeble a set of inputs from eyes and ears. She hears people at the back door when no car is in the driveway. She can’t see a cell phone screen that goes into screensaver mode. She hears “green” when I say “Prius”. Less and less is she the steward of her own story and I worry that the details, the facts, will be stirred into a stew of confusion where hidden fears are treated as real events and the reality of her life slips into truncated anecdotes that really, really do not capture who she is and what she has meant to the people she’s touched. My mom is not some great woman. But, she’s my mom. My god but hasn’t she put up with whatever it takes to make sure her family came through. I worry that people like that just don’t get made no more – that the tough gets Nintendo-ed and Tivo-ed and made in China affordably priced out of us all way too young. Now, now especially we need those people like my mom who won’t throw away glass jars, deli containers, rubber bands, plastic bags or tinfoil because deep in the folds of their brain is an indelible memory of the Great Depression. My god, where has the tough side of America gone when we are so unconsciously preoccupied with measuring up to some social policy of “thou must have xyz stuff” that we fail to honestly stick our necks out for the truth? We’ve subconsciously cheated OURSELVES out of our first amendment rights.
Jan 1, 2009
The radio is filled with happy hellos for a new year. Things will get better. We will have our shiny new president. The economy will recover. A new day dawns.
Do we want the economy to recover? I don’t. I don’t wish to see us move back into that place where the livelihood of many floats on the surface of a balloon of speculative fantasy. That balloon always pops and the folks suffering the explosion are never those whose hot air blew it up in the first place. I would wish that a country of consumer culture addicted to cheap goods from China where there are no manufacturing jobs and where we spend and spend and spread and get fatter beyond belief would not return. We could stand to tighten our belts –WE’RE FAT. I think we should bid the whole lot a firm good-bye, slam the casket shut and say hello to a more rational and honest means of operating. That economy we had? I don’t wish to see it bounce back at all. I’d like to see us move on to something better – better for ALL of us.
The difference is in the story that we hold forth about ourselves. Are we crumbling with fear and panic and age? Or are we merely drawing in, reevaluating this new stage of life that greets us with a big bear hug, and deciding what the next chapter of our story is to be? It’s in our hands. It’s in our hands to punish politicians and ponzi schemers. It’s in our hands to be angry; to blame the players of financial instruments, the mortgage brokers or the people who shouldn’t have had drivers licenses much less have owned homes. It’s in our hands to admit our collective guilt – that we all enjoyed the fruits of dishonesty and bloat in our lifestyle no matter what our personal choices of consumerism. We are the stewards of this story.
How long does a day last? Twenty four hours wherever it lays its head. And it crawls across the globe for a full twenty four, testing the pillows and mattresses of every new country it passes. It rests on straw, on hay, on water, on sealy and certa. That day, once it’s done, take most of 48 hours to finish its work. Take a year of such days? Could last for damn near like forever.
This is the day to say ‘goodbye’ to a year that has lasted far too long and what many folks blame for dragging them through the mud of economic chaos and the constant exposée of worsening revelations. Folks just couldn’t seem to dig low enough this year. Will someone please just get out a gun and shoot that damned bear? Will someone please just tell 2008 to go the fuck away?
Well, today is also my mom’s birthday. Slowly, sadly, I realize that I’m bidding adieu to the powerhouse, the fierce hen, the mother that I once knew. The mom I watched go to battle with school teachers, bus drivers and whole fleets of nurses fades into a woman who’s imagination and worry now operate on too feeble a set of inputs from eyes and ears. She hears people at the back door when no car is in the driveway. She can’t see a cell phone screen that goes into screensaver mode. She hears “green” when I say “Prius”. Less and less is she the steward of her own story and I worry that the details, the facts, will be stirred into a stew of confusion where hidden fears are treated as real events and the reality of her life slips into truncated anecdotes that really, really do not capture who she is and what she has meant to the people she’s touched. My mom is not some great woman. But, she’s my mom. My god but hasn’t she put up with whatever it takes to make sure her family came through. I worry that people like that just don’t get made no more – that the tough gets Nintendo-ed and Tivo-ed and made in China affordably priced out of us all way too young. Now, now especially we need those people like my mom who won’t throw away glass jars, deli containers, rubber bands, plastic bags or tinfoil because deep in the folds of their brain is an indelible memory of the Great Depression. My god, where has the tough side of America gone when we are so unconsciously preoccupied with measuring up to some social policy of “thou must have xyz stuff” that we fail to honestly stick our necks out for the truth? We’ve subconsciously cheated OURSELVES out of our first amendment rights.
Jan 1, 2009
The radio is filled with happy hellos for a new year. Things will get better. We will have our shiny new president. The economy will recover. A new day dawns.
Do we want the economy to recover? I don’t. I don’t wish to see us move back into that place where the livelihood of many floats on the surface of a balloon of speculative fantasy. That balloon always pops and the folks suffering the explosion are never those whose hot air blew it up in the first place. I would wish that a country of consumer culture addicted to cheap goods from China where there are no manufacturing jobs and where we spend and spend and spread and get fatter beyond belief would not return. We could stand to tighten our belts –WE’RE FAT. I think we should bid the whole lot a firm good-bye, slam the casket shut and say hello to a more rational and honest means of operating. That economy we had? I don’t wish to see it bounce back at all. I’d like to see us move on to something better – better for ALL of us.
The difference is in the story that we hold forth about ourselves. Are we crumbling with fear and panic and age? Or are we merely drawing in, reevaluating this new stage of life that greets us with a big bear hug, and deciding what the next chapter of our story is to be? It’s in our hands. It’s in our hands to punish politicians and ponzi schemers. It’s in our hands to be angry; to blame the players of financial instruments, the mortgage brokers or the people who shouldn’t have had drivers licenses much less have owned homes. It’s in our hands to admit our collective guilt – that we all enjoyed the fruits of dishonesty and bloat in our lifestyle no matter what our personal choices of consumerism. We are the stewards of this story.
You say goodbye, I say hello
Dec 31 2008
How long does a day last? Twenty four hours wherever it lays its head. And it crawls across the globe for a full twenty four, testing the pillows and mattresses of every new country it passes. It rests on straw, on hay, on water, on sealy and certa. That day, once it’s done, take most of 48 hours to finish its work. Take a year of such days? Could last for damn near like forever.
This is the day to say ‘goodbye’ to a year that has lasted far too long and what many folks blame for dragging them through the mud of economic chaos and the constant exposée of worsening revelations. Folks just couldn’t seem to dig low enough this year. Will someone please just get out a gun and shoot that damned bear? Will someone please just tell 2008 to go the fuck away?
Well, today is also my mom’s birthday. Slowly, sadly, I realize that I’m bidding adieu to the powerhouse, the fierce hen, the mother that I once knew. The mom I watched go to battle with school teachers, bus drivers and whole fleets of nurses fades into a woman who’s imagination and worry now operate on too feeble a set of inputs from eyes and ears. She hears people at the back door when no car is in the driveway. She can’t see a cell phone screen that goes into screensaver mode. She hears “green” when I say “Prius”. Less and less is she the steward of her own story and I worry that the details, the facts, will be stirred into a stew of confusion where hidden fears are treated as real events and the reality of her life slips into truncated anecdotes that really, really do not capture who she is and what she has meant to the people she’s touched. My mom is not some great woman. But, she’s my mom. My god but hasn’t she put up with whatever it takes to make sure her family came through. I worry that people like that just don’t get made no more – that the tough gets Nintendo-ed and Tivo-ed and made in China affordably priced out of us all way too young. Now, now especially we need those people like my mom who won’t throw away glass jars, deli containers, rubber bands, plastic bags or tinfoil because deep in the folds of their brain is an indelible memory of the Great Depression. My god, where has the tough side of America gone when we are so unconsciously preoccupied with measuring up to some social policy of “thou must have xyz stuff” that we fail to honestly stick our necks out for the truth? We’ve subconsciously cheated OURSELVES out of our first amendment rights.
Jan 1, 2009
The radio is filled with happy hellos for a new year. Things will get better. We will have our shiny new president. The economy will recover. A new day dawns.
Do we want the economy to recover? I don’t. I don’t wish to see us move back into that place where the livelihood of many floats on the surface of a balloon of speculative fantasy. That balloon always pops and the folks suffering the explosion are never those whose hot air blew it up in the first place. I would wish that a country of consumer culture addicted to cheap goods from China where there are no manufacturing jobs and where we spend and spend and spread and get fatter beyond belief would not return. We could stand to tighten our belts –WE’RE FAT. I think we should bid the whole lot a firm good-bye, slam the casket shut and say hello to a more rational and honest means of operating. That economy we had? I don’t wish to see it bounce back at all. I’d like to see us move on to something better – better for ALL of us.
The difference is in the story that we hold forth about ourselves. Are we crumbling with fear and panic and age? Or are we merely drawing in, reevaluating this new stage of life that greets us with a big bear hug, and deciding what the next chapter of our story is to be? It’s in our hands. It’s in our hands to punish politicians and ponzi schemers. It’s in our hands to be angry; to blame the players of financial instruments, the mortgage brokers or the people who shouldn’t have had drivers licenses much less have owned homes. It’s in our hands to admit our collective guilt – that we all enjoyed the fruits of dishonesty and bloat in our lifestyle no matter what our personal choices of consumerism. We are the stewards of this story.
How long does a day last? Twenty four hours wherever it lays its head. And it crawls across the globe for a full twenty four, testing the pillows and mattresses of every new country it passes. It rests on straw, on hay, on water, on sealy and certa. That day, once it’s done, take most of 48 hours to finish its work. Take a year of such days? Could last for damn near like forever.
This is the day to say ‘goodbye’ to a year that has lasted far too long and what many folks blame for dragging them through the mud of economic chaos and the constant exposée of worsening revelations. Folks just couldn’t seem to dig low enough this year. Will someone please just get out a gun and shoot that damned bear? Will someone please just tell 2008 to go the fuck away?
Well, today is also my mom’s birthday. Slowly, sadly, I realize that I’m bidding adieu to the powerhouse, the fierce hen, the mother that I once knew. The mom I watched go to battle with school teachers, bus drivers and whole fleets of nurses fades into a woman who’s imagination and worry now operate on too feeble a set of inputs from eyes and ears. She hears people at the back door when no car is in the driveway. She can’t see a cell phone screen that goes into screensaver mode. She hears “green” when I say “Prius”. Less and less is she the steward of her own story and I worry that the details, the facts, will be stirred into a stew of confusion where hidden fears are treated as real events and the reality of her life slips into truncated anecdotes that really, really do not capture who she is and what she has meant to the people she’s touched. My mom is not some great woman. But, she’s my mom. My god but hasn’t she put up with whatever it takes to make sure her family came through. I worry that people like that just don’t get made no more – that the tough gets Nintendo-ed and Tivo-ed and made in China affordably priced out of us all way too young. Now, now especially we need those people like my mom who won’t throw away glass jars, deli containers, rubber bands, plastic bags or tinfoil because deep in the folds of their brain is an indelible memory of the Great Depression. My god, where has the tough side of America gone when we are so unconsciously preoccupied with measuring up to some social policy of “thou must have xyz stuff” that we fail to honestly stick our necks out for the truth? We’ve subconsciously cheated OURSELVES out of our first amendment rights.
Jan 1, 2009
The radio is filled with happy hellos for a new year. Things will get better. We will have our shiny new president. The economy will recover. A new day dawns.
Do we want the economy to recover? I don’t. I don’t wish to see us move back into that place where the livelihood of many floats on the surface of a balloon of speculative fantasy. That balloon always pops and the folks suffering the explosion are never those whose hot air blew it up in the first place. I would wish that a country of consumer culture addicted to cheap goods from China where there are no manufacturing jobs and where we spend and spend and spread and get fatter beyond belief would not return. We could stand to tighten our belts –WE’RE FAT. I think we should bid the whole lot a firm good-bye, slam the casket shut and say hello to a more rational and honest means of operating. That economy we had? I don’t wish to see it bounce back at all. I’d like to see us move on to something better – better for ALL of us.
The difference is in the story that we hold forth about ourselves. Are we crumbling with fear and panic and age? Or are we merely drawing in, reevaluating this new stage of life that greets us with a big bear hug, and deciding what the next chapter of our story is to be? It’s in our hands. It’s in our hands to punish politicians and ponzi schemers. It’s in our hands to be angry; to blame the players of financial instruments, the mortgage brokers or the people who shouldn’t have had drivers licenses much less have owned homes. It’s in our hands to admit our collective guilt – that we all enjoyed the fruits of dishonesty and bloat in our lifestyle no matter what our personal choices of consumerism. We are the stewards of this story.
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