uffffffffff.

so, i'm sick for the first time since this summer's allergy bout, and man, it's pretty brutal. i spent yesterday and last night rolling around with fever, and the only perky side would be that, in this semi-delusional state, i 'wrote' a novel, apparently about a girl, but with the main focus being the narrators who shift from first- to third-person in an all-out war regarding the supremacy of omniscience versus personal exploration. at least this made having a fever entertaining, although i didn't 'finish' the novel enough to see which narrator won.

i'm not looking forward to the mile hike from the bus stop to get to the class i'm teaching tonight. not at all.

whine, whine whinity whine, and if anyone has extra soup, you know where to bring it.

Well, I reckon I haven't given an uptodate account of my happenings for some time, perhaps because I'm not really sure why I would. Heh.

I've started to feel the question slide about re: why I keep a blog going anymore, or really why I started one in the first place. Originally, I think it started as the bastard offspring of being abroad and wanting to stay in touch, and an indirect method of correspondence with the ex whom I couldn't find any other means of healthily speaking with. Then, I think it evolved into a means of thinking, becoming more aware of the details, and developing my writing. And in its final evolution, perhaps simply a place to find audience.

But I'm not sure about my reasons anymore; the writing has slacked off, and I don't find my most creative ventures to be generated by bloggering. I feel a little sullenly without audience, and I can't rationalize that need as a compelling force anymore. Perhaps I am moving back to the idea that writing need be a solitary activity, and in order for me to really enjoy writing, I should seek pleasure from being myself with my ideas and typing fingers.

Which gets to the question I have been forced to look at, which is what are the benefits of solitude? It's a pressing question, as I am pretty much involved in the aloneness as a daily activity. I'm looking for jobs, which means forcing myself to write cover letters and resumes for jobs I really want but never hear back about, or jobs I don't want that I likewise don't hear back about. And in order to not become a ruddy alcoholic, I'm actively looking for methods of entertaining myself, and trying not to feel hugely lonely, or too dependent on lh since he's my main Chicago friend.

So, in between the job search I have started to:

*Take walks, although it's horribly cold around here and I fear frostbite constantly as my toes become more than ingrown in my three, yes, three pairs of socks. It's pretty nice to take walks, but not enough of my daily route to really distract me.

*Watch movies I shouldn't be renting from the expensive little local shop down the street. In particular, I've cultivated an enjoyment of TV-series films, and have now finished A) the fourth season of The L-word, which was less odious than the third season which means I actually finished watching it; secretly, I liked this season. B) The Tudors: although this show rather makes a spectacle of itself and enjoys wallowing in the absurdly contemporary lasciviousness of history, it also inspired me to sit down for four hours and read up on Henry VIII, Catherine I, Anne Boleyn, Mary I, Elizabeth I, Edward VI, Cromwell, Thomas More, Eramus, etc etc.

*Frolic on goodreads, maybe because I've been winging my way through a few books lately, enjoying reading again, including most recently Vernon God Little.

*Dance. It's about time I started doing this again, as I'm currently an out-of-shape blob. I had a great time dancing with Ms. B this past Monday - at Chances. The music was slow at first and I almost left - the two dj's were spending more time making-out than mixing, and I was entirely annoyed. Then a few other dj's joined in and funked it up, to my pleasure.

Yeah, so that's about it beyond applying and avoiding applying. Why doesn't some workplace just know all about me and want me automatically?

I've also started prepping for the one class I'm teaching. I went to a recent meeting they had for all their instructors, and ended up thinking that this school is what a college would look like if it were run by your friendly neighborhood grocery store. It ought to be interesting, and I'm looking forward to having something to do besides biting my nails.

Thoughts about dating again, now that I have time. Perhaps I'm too petrified to even know what to do anymore. Dating is not like riding a bicycle. I had dinner this week with a very, very young girl who was after me this summer, and I was halfway freaked out that she would hit on me, and halfway something else. Ultimately, it was a nice, relaxed dinner during which we re-affirmed that we are interested in vastly different things (me: casual dating; her: having babies). So, that's that.

I partially think that things will be a bit better when my new roommate finally moves in. She was supposed to move in last weekend, but came down with the flu and considering the negative-degree weather, it's probably a good thing she didn't have to move that weekend. But it means that the apartment is freakishly empty beyond my bedroom and office, which I've come to think makes the apartment cold, cold and really fucking cold. No furniture to capture the heat, or something like that. Also, there's other anxiety surrounding this, because I don't really know if we're going to like each other yet. I'm hoping so, but you never know.

Anyhow. Here's the list of reasons why solitude might not be such a bad way to go:

1) It forces you into a space where you have to grow and change in order to keep yourself interested.

2) Plenty of reading time.

3) If you find yourself face-to-face with bullshit, you know it's only your own.

4) Stories begin to fill you.

5) You can startle yourself.

That's about it for right now. I could think of other things to put on there, but it would be dishonest since I don't particularly enjoy them (such as, nobody asking you to do too much for them).

"Republican presidential contenders depicted Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton as weak on Iraq and certain to raise taxes Thursday night, setting aside their own campaign debate squabbles long enough to agree that she is unworthy of the White House."

What a bloody shocker that is! As in, what a pile of retarded butt-min(d)ers. How is it even possible for a group of misogynistic swine-nuggets to think it's A-ok to get together and decide who is 'worthy' of the White House on the other side of the row? Or are they just trying to get women pissed off by shining a light behind their ballsacks?

Hmph. The least they could do would be to wear team boas while dancing the cancan together.

This is what my snow boots did to my feet this winter. Crazy stuff, huh? lh suggested that they look like mummy's feet and that they'd give any innocent children surfing the web nightmares should they wander onto my blog... All I know is that they gave me a strong reason to get a pair of waterproof snowboots.

why do they always feel like this:

*

Fabulous McExcellent
#1 N. Diva Ave, #1
1-800-ulo-veme
McExcellent.Fabulous@gmail.com

Dear Sir or Madam:

Looking at your splendid, gorgeous organization, I know I would be a marvelous, and indeed fabulous, addition to your spiritually magnificent, sublime team.

I'd like you to know I'm fabulous. In fact, I'm beyond fabulous, because I have been actively producing fabulous during my entire life. In particular, I have almost reached Uber-fabulous in my recent work being outwardly and directly fabulous. I have, in multiple instances, demonstrated my ease and facility at being fabulous. Among these demonstrations of personal fabulousness, I have also assisted others to become fabulous as we worked together, almost always without a hitch, as members of a spiritually magnificent, sublime team. In fact, I personally believe it impossible to fully express one's own fabulousness without uniting - using great multi-tasking, networking, innovative, self-motivated, graceful, organized, dedicated and yet flexible skills - with others to form a spiritually magnificent, sublime team. In this incredible and awe-inspiring process, I have been fabulous, and in fact will always be fabulous, as demonstrated by my infinite, yet moderated capacity for fabulous in the most unique and yet coordinated ways.

That is, my fabulousness will fit perfectly with your fabulousness. We could get together and make fabulous babies, metaphorically speaking of course, as I have the utmost ethical and honest habits in the literal world. But to be specific: typing, fabulous; program knowledge, fabulous; creativity, fabulous; phone skills, um... remarkable; language skills, fabulous in Spanish and English; past experience, meteorite fabulous; diplomacy skills, tremendously fabulous; writing skills, oh don't even get me started on my fabulousness in writing skills; making coffee, the most fabulous; salary requirements, call me your fabulous serf.

If you need further information on my fabulous magnificence, feel free to contact me at any time, at your leisure in fact. I will of course provide fabulous references from marvelous, sublime ethereal creatures upon request. And I would love to fly through the air on my strutted, fabulous angel wings to meet with you and discuss your splendid and indeed gorgeous organization. May the universe bless you for your time,

With incredible aptitude,

Fabulous McExcellent

George, on hearing "appendix," brightened. "I know how to take it out," he said. "That's why I kept this deer antler. You make a small hole and hook it out. That's how the Indians did it." I thanked but no-thanked him (178).

For some reason, 'thanked but no-thanked' tickled my funny bone as much as the idea of hooking out an appendix with a deer antler.

Most discovery is rediscovery. The best discoveries are personal, anyway, and not the kind commissioned by queens and scientific academies (174).

A hopeful perception, I think. Not the one generally held of heroic adventure.

When the great innovation appears, it will almost certainly be in a muddled, incomplete and confusing form. To the discoverer himself it will be only half-understood; to everybody else it will be a mystery. For any speculation which does not at first glance look crazy, there is no hope (quoting Freeman Dyson, 147).

'Great innovation' or no, it does make one feel better about playing with ideas, and also about trying to keep going when you're in a muddle.

"Wind chill advisory into Sunday morning. Wind chills through Saturday night from -12 to -26 degrees. Unprotected flesh freezes in 10 to 30 minutes in chills of -18 degrees or lower. Blustery, very cold despite sunshine. West-northwest winds 10 to 22 m.p.h. Bitter cold. Lows from -12 degrees far west to -2 along Lake Michigan."

My nose ring froze to the inside of my nostril as soon as I stepped outside. It made me feel that all is right with the world.

Mental Note: When I'm a little freaked out, I tend to do and say some really, really stupid shit. God, what a dumbass I can be.

Mental Note 2: When I'm a little freaked out, it's time to calm down, be reasonable and very very patient. Fretting makes more things impossible than anything else. Sheesh.

(this is vague, true)

I've been trying to catch up with what's going on in the elections - mostly because I don't have TV and I had been so intensely focusing on my art project that I got behind in world and national news. But watching my sister, brolaw and their friends get riled up at the cabin, and call in to a grandfather to find out about the Ohio elections, well, it reminded me that I need to understand more about what's going on.

It's some odd stuff. And here's the tracker I'm using, although it doesn't really help me understand the sway of things.

My overall response to the Republican candidates:

Romney, even though he's entirely creepy, seems the most likely to me to win the bid. Although I wouldn't be surprised if it's McCain either. But Romney somehow seems to have that "look" the folks do so love to get behind - young and slick. I hope he doesn't get it though. I disagree with almost everything he says unless it's healthcare options.

And I'd be surprised if Huckabee, who disgusts me in so very many ways, gets the bid; he seems too polarizing, and surely people will understand soon that he doesn't know anything about politics, only about the Lord and how He wants Things to Be. Jesus seems pretty despotic these days. But that Huckabee is even running scares me, because it indicates a further erosion of a principle tenet of our Constitution; duh, like division between State and Religion. How is it that people are forgetting how many of our original colonies were founded on outcasts seeking to get away from nationally condoned religious persecution? Is he getting the support he seems to be getting because he's running with Colbert on his ticket (ha)?

Giuliani married a cousin, and Ron Paul makes too much sense part of the time... so they don't really have a chance, I would guess.

So, my prediction is that Romney wins the primary, although McCain would be more hopeful for the U.S. future.

My overall response to the Democrat candidates:

I really hope that Obama gets it. If Clinton wins, I think there's just too much a legacy of hatred towards the Clintons and women for her to win the Presidency. My dad, who claims he's a feminist, said he won't vote Democrat if Clinton is the candidate, but he will for anyone else (he's really into Richardson, but I find Richardson too conservative, and also wobbly on economic topics like Social Security).

I don't really like Clinton very much either though, to tell you the truth - I've watched her in the debates, and she's evasive too frequently. She laughs at the criticisms others toss at her, but never satisfactorily answers the concerns they raise. That she signed the Iran bill is disgusting, and she simply does not seem like a consensus-builder. She is very smart though.

Kucinich is someone I truly admire, but like Ron Paul, he's too extreme within the party to be able to get anything done as President. He's too didactic in how he expresses the views that I inevitably agree with and sometimes embarrasses me because I agree with him but wish he could be firm and articulate and ethical without little spittles of saliva flying from the corners of his mouth. Anyhow, I'm glad he's running, and that he's on the stage to challenge the others, and raise some important questions about our election and debate practices.

I also find the others (I heard word that some dropped out?) compelling as well - Biden and Dodd are intelligent and firm. & I only recently stopped thinking of Edwards as a straight-shooter - again, I didn't like how he presented himself in the debates - very defensive, and also I could have sworn that he said "the greatest task of the president will be..." for four or five different topics. How can they all be the greatest task?

All around, I respect the way Obama presents himself. He's so piercing in how he answers questions - directly and intelligently, considering what others have actually said. He listens, and doesn't rampage. I know he's criticized on lack of experience, but I think he'd command a great deal of respect around the world and in the U.S.

Anyhow, I will vote hardcore Democrat no matter who gets the bid, because each and every one of them is better than the options on the other side of the table. And may God prevent us from Huckabee.

*

If anyone has any great, balanced and informative sites online for me to pay better attention to what's going on, I'd appreciate it though, as I recognize that most of my friends are better informed than I am right now. Sigh.

Labels: etchsketch

Phew.

So, I've been offered one teaching gig (a night class) at a Chicago bilingual college, and have taken it. It remains to be seen what it'll be like, as it involves a longish but do-able commute, and I winced badly when the interviewer / chairperson told me that the basic idea is to teach the 5-paragraph essay (it's a Composition I class, wherein I usually spend one day teaching the 5PE, and the rest of the semester snidely insulting the 5PE while offering far more taxing and fun alternative structures). Plus, the whole syllabus is laid out, with the reader and resource-book chosen for me, so it's pretty limited as far as these Comp classes go, but accomplishes what I want, which is to keep my foot in the teaching door while I figure out what's going to happen after this six-month figuring period is up.

However... I also need a day job. & badly, as those loans are going to be interest-ting my life for some time, and I would ideally like to pay them back quickly, or at least build up a savings account, so I can look into alternating between jobbies, being abroad, looking into press work, applying for residencies, and yes... writing.

Hmmmmm. Day job that pays okay: what will you be?

But the new 'problem' is that this college just offered me a second class in Comp II, but this class is a morning gig once a week... so, it could potentially disrupt the day job possibilities I would be looking at. So hard to decide this kind of stuff. When you're jobless and panicking, the first instinct is to jump on everything and anything that comes along, but teaching is a total commitment - not just like I can change my mind if I find something more lucrative.

Nonetheless, I'm relieved at having found a start. And I think I'll enjoy working with the college's students, who are composed of mostly latino upper-twenties peoples.

so, ballyhooo.

Well, I'm back in Chicago after a lovely and too-brief visit back to Washington that filled me up with the knowledge that I'm too much of a West Coast girl to last long here, even if I love Chicago. And I'm still a little too freaked out about being cast out bareass alone into the world for good this time (although my pops informed me this visit that he sees a PhD as being part of my "destiny," which made me guffaw and nearly shoot beer through my left ventricle on its way to my nostril) to really form coherent sentences with words.

I did get a haircut today, so maybe that will help. I think it's cute, but I have to wait a few days to be sure.

And I put together my office yesterday, and my room the day before... threw out about 1,000,000 pages of schlock and managed to excavate vast mountain-range photocopies of articles and stories and poems and such (most from you, jw), which I have stored for two years and now have time to read. So, I'll be okay, but if any of you folks are in town in the next month, I could use some serious cuddling and snuzzling... as evidenced by my waking up this morning clinging to my only stuffed animal - Harry Mammothy, who is... I'll give you three guesses... yes, a Hairy Mammoth. See how witty I was even as a child? And yes, he's cute, but not as cute as a real live buddy, yep?

So. Well. End of Sentences. But here are some pictures of reclasserfying via palimpsests:






*



Oh, and I've also vowed to primarily read Nonfiction books (mainly science, history, and political stuffs rather than the memoir side) for the next three months, so if you have any suggestions, that would be great. I am currently reading a brolaw pick called The Starship & the Canoe, which at the rate I'm going, will be done within the week. It's good, by the way. But not helping with the Pac-NW homesickness.

later gaters.

Labels: etchsketch

The sound of grey cloud cover no longer gets me down. Especially when we sit back in the rain and compare phosphorescence upon the treetops from all those cars jetting on past the house and on up to Canada. Only the cars heading to Canada pass our skyline, each one reaching out with their lights and tweaking us via the naked dripping limbs that stand like lone stories around us.

We pay attention to language, the five of us. Then eleven of us. The nineteen, twenty-seven connected strings trailing from within my old hair. I hear the words pass to my roots, and imagine flying back to Chicago and finding something newer than I found before, perhaps a blue egg tucked among yellow stalks in the twenty square-foot estuary located within long walking distance of my home.

My Home. Already the phrase dissolves, and as I look out at the grey cloud cover, its hidden brute, the dark thumps on my wide open eyes, and I realize its sound no longer hurts, even or especially when the old hairs pass words through.

I hear more repetition from friends than I hear inside myself, and the patterns settle like the jitter in a puddle as it follows itself and then hits mud, never realizing that goddamn, you haven't even hit the ocean yet. You're within a puddle, man, and you'll have to cycle again and then maybe again to make it on over to the huddle, the grave reservoir. Nothing more elegant than the ocean, which is actually why the sky agreed and rain falls.

The repetition from friends. When we tell ourselves, who are we trying to convince, and what are we trying to understand? Lately, I've become a talker, I tell one of the twenty-seven old hairs as I walk out across a land that begs me. It begs me, and I talk and talk and talk to my hairs just to stop hearing, just to enjoy love, just to empty the corridors to make room for that book, that book I'm going to read when I get back, then one I will write new new, the space I will restalk, the blue egg. Yes, I talk to empty the nest.

"You damn yourself," says a grey one. "You make your own damning."

And I don't speak down but up to the phosphorescence in the trees and the tips of each finger turns yellow and cold, dusts itself off for the plane. I want to say: I do not damn myself. But... I am a writer. A writer who can't imagine skin anymore. I will make and make and make and each time, a little sprig of green moss will bust out of an old pink house sitting on the land that begs me, and its green spongeness with be so green and spongy, so sprig and spritely, even as it tears up the roof. Nobody understands what damned means, least of all the believers.

Damned with blessing, the blessings you have to leave behind.

I want to sit on your lap forever. I want to buy a book with you. I want to rush back to Chicago because you are in this with me. I want to see you one last time & understand that you're not a monster. I want to parade down the street naked with you, maybe painted blue. I want to walk your back daily, if not with my feet, then my fingertips. I want to talk to you in person and not always on the phone. I want to throw plastic darts with you and watch them explode against a blank wall. I want to blow up animal balloons with you, and then pass them out to only adults (if children ask, we'll pat them on the shoulder and give them sharpies instead). I want you to decide that I was worth more to you, this time. I want to sleep on your couch and hear you yell at the cat in the morning. I want to send postcards back and forth with you and make up outrageous names for each other. I want us to both lift our faces to a 27-degree angle without agreeing outloud first. I want to be renewed by your voice and not just hear your repetitions. I would like it, it would be nice, would you think about, is it possible, how wrong to want you to take me along.

This sky that causes so much whining and mewling. This rain hard hit and dripping like rain. This green which begs and begs and begs and rides up through my limbs like infestation, an infestation that, for a change, makes one hurt. The old hairs you are pulling, twenty-seven hairs, sprouting like sky from my head. It makes me believe again, it is so bright and illumed by my (or your) passing love.

There are no ghosts in the world that compare to our own bodies.

Symmetries





Brief and Boring Note

Happy New Years, my friends!

Not only do I not have a great wifi connection available around here for bloggering, but I've also felt like being quiet and thinking, as I mentioned before. I know how I have, in the past, tended to react to after graduating, so I'm working to come up with lovely delicious thoughts about where my life might be going now. Which is, in fact, my New Years Resolution: to keep my mind open, bright, finding a path to make and see better, more full of dreamlust than even when I was in school. Which as resolutions go, includes quite a bit else that is tentative - such as exercise and reading and traveling and thinking of adventurous job options plus trying new ventures & collaborations and so forth - ideas I won't pin down exactly and precisely with precision because I want them to float. Float, I tell you!

Anyhow. I'm sure I have stuff to say, but I have my best friend waiting inside the main house for me and we're going to gather sleds and warm woolies and then head up to the mountains to meet my sister, brolaw, and their friends at a cabin with a hottub where we're going to hole up and sled, snowboard, ski, write, and whatnot for the next two days. It will be my last treat, I think, before I start looking furiously for jobs and get busy with goalslike, and all that.

Oh, I decided not to go to AWP this year - I had partial funding, but the thought of paying the rest still had me in a panic, and I rather think that the b.s. probably swished around in conferences of that type might irritate me even more for it being the first gathering attended outside of school; I'd rather start with something more avant, and less with people nosing and whining. I also missed MLA in Chicago, which I can't say I'm sad about, as everyhing I've done in the past two weeks has been so incredible and soggy and full of snow, rain, mud, birds, animals, family, friends, and goodstuff, and I hear they read their papers at MLA instead of interacting. Also, I heard word that I might have run into a few folks whom might have been a bit too much to see and see together, me thinks. True true, it might have been a good "professional" move, but I'm not sure what I'm going to be professing yet, so there you go.

Ah Well. It has been peaceful here... and now I get to go to a cabin with Nat. Ballyhoo, and maybe I will find some poetics there to occupy...

Madame 08, Mistress of the Years, Vibrant Number, Naughty Temptress and Fertile Conversing Conversation Between and of Next Anythings

Looking Through to this Heart



Christmas Whites




The Herd


Nee Puha, Nee Para (Neither Fluff Nor Feathers... or, "Good Luck")