Smackshanks.
Um, everybody look at the cool picture I recently shot! Ahh.,... haha. hahhhhh...? Yeah um, this is Lake Erie. Cause I was up there the other day. And there was this seagull. And I shot this picture. QUIT LOOKING AT ME.
Wednesday, July 27, 2005
Um, everybody look at the cool picture I recently shot! Ahh.,... haha. hahhhhh...? Yeah um, this is Lake Erie. Cause I was up there the other day. And there was this seagull. And I shot this picture. QUIT LOOKING AT ME.
Tuesday, July 26, 2005
Repent, All Ye Sinners, The End Is NIGH!!!!!!!!
He came back last night late, and started in on the pontifications pretty much right away. I wasn't as nice this time, the patience is wearing thread-bare. He spoke of hallucinogenic drugs as proof that demons rule the earth, I spoke of the processes of the brain, the scientific ways in which cognition happens. There was no in between though, no hope for a meeting of the minds.
He kept saying how human beings are perfect, how we have our senses perfectly aligned in every way. Just enough sight. Just enough ability to hear. And I thought, to a praying mantis we are bumbling idiots who can't see what's right in front of us, let alone hear a predator waiting in the bushes around the corner. You can tell someone where the big dipper is in the night sky, but this is relative to where you are on the earth, in this solar system, etc. Perspective colors every facet of our existence -- how can we pretend to know what is absolute and what is not?
Then he used an example of a bird building a house. "If a bird is building its nest next to a construction site, do you think it has any idea what's happening right next to it? Don't you think it's fully driven by instinct?" How do you argue with someone who hasn't even begun to chew what he so eagerly spits forth?
"Think about the reverse. Do you think those humans on that construction site have any idea that there's a bird right nearby, building a dwelling space as well? Would the humans have the faintest idea of how to build a suitable structure for a bird? (Wood shop 101 notwithstanding, we're talking nests here.) What makes one better than the other? How do you categorically say that an apple is better than an orange without it being purely a matter of opinion?"
He made no comment, only went on to discussion of the "last days" and other such severely dramatic suppositions that I'm sure get people all excited and hot.
This belief in the perfection of the human animal was, for me, the most narcissistic and illogical thing that he has said to date. When he said that Rugby has no soul I went upstairs to look through old photos and let my ears go back to their normal color. The braying downstairs stopped after about fifteen minutes, but the calm in the house has even now not fully restored itself.
There will be no more of this.
1. Religion is often presented to us when we are young and intellectually unable to be skeptical. We trust what we are told and our world view is permanently colored.
2. We expect our belief system of religion to be absolutely true since it comes from an inerrant God. Consequently, we constantly find ways of proving it is true. Conversely, we ignore every evidence contrary to our expectation.
3. Religion carries with it many rituals. Ritual behaviors relieve our tensions and depressions in carrying the notion of "effective action" and getting positive results. (Rabbit's foot, anyone? Perhaps you need a wooden table to knock on.)
4. Prayer and Faith cannot be subject to disproof. We continue praying until we get some "signal" that our prayer is answered. If something bad happens it becomes a case of not displaying "enough faith."
5. Religous beliefs are reinforced by the social pressures of the group we belong to. Many groups are completely exclusive. Thus, all possibility of disproof is unavailable for observation.
6. The confidence, absolute certainty, positive attitude and determination that comes from believing you are RIGHT propel the "faithful" person into confident behavioral demonstrations. The faithful convinces himself and others as a result.
7. A True Believer has their ego and their future completely tied up in a package deal that must be reinforced and strengthened constantly to remain effective. As a consequence ever more active participation must be engaged in or the real world intrudes and extreme depression results.
ABSOLUTE CERTAINTY is often demonstrated by the true believer in the form of putting their life and their fortune in peril. Only in this way can the believer continue to feed themselves on the "reality" of their superstitious world view.
Is it any wonder that Jehovah's Governing Body constantly plays the trump card of brinksmanship in predicting world events that can instantly disconfirm their very belief system? They dare themselves and their fellow believers and even God himself to refute the certainty by demonstrating it is all a fantasy tissue of lies. Absolute confidence!
This seemingly reckless course of action is the only sort of self-proof a true believer can permit themselves to experience. When the events predicted do not occur what happens? NOTHING! It is a spur to invest even more faith into the ritual behavior. The rain dance continues as it must. Eventually, the dancers believe, the rain will come and wash away any who doubt the absolute certainty they display.
Religious belief and the laws of science have one thing in common. Those who truly have convinced themselves will not budge as the wrecking ball comes hurtling toward their face! They both will stand firm to the eventful moment of truth.
Such is the nature of belief.
He kept saying how human beings are perfect, how we have our senses perfectly aligned in every way. Just enough sight. Just enough ability to hear. And I thought, to a praying mantis we are bumbling idiots who can't see what's right in front of us, let alone hear a predator waiting in the bushes around the corner. You can tell someone where the big dipper is in the night sky, but this is relative to where you are on the earth, in this solar system, etc. Perspective colors every facet of our existence -- how can we pretend to know what is absolute and what is not?
Then he used an example of a bird building a house. "If a bird is building its nest next to a construction site, do you think it has any idea what's happening right next to it? Don't you think it's fully driven by instinct?" How do you argue with someone who hasn't even begun to chew what he so eagerly spits forth?
"Think about the reverse. Do you think those humans on that construction site have any idea that there's a bird right nearby, building a dwelling space as well? Would the humans have the faintest idea of how to build a suitable structure for a bird? (Wood shop 101 notwithstanding, we're talking nests here.) What makes one better than the other? How do you categorically say that an apple is better than an orange without it being purely a matter of opinion?"
He made no comment, only went on to discussion of the "last days" and other such severely dramatic suppositions that I'm sure get people all excited and hot.
This belief in the perfection of the human animal was, for me, the most narcissistic and illogical thing that he has said to date. When he said that Rugby has no soul I went upstairs to look through old photos and let my ears go back to their normal color. The braying downstairs stopped after about fifteen minutes, but the calm in the house has even now not fully restored itself.
There will be no more of this.
1. Religion is often presented to us when we are young and intellectually unable to be skeptical. We trust what we are told and our world view is permanently colored.
2. We expect our belief system of religion to be absolutely true since it comes from an inerrant God. Consequently, we constantly find ways of proving it is true. Conversely, we ignore every evidence contrary to our expectation.
3. Religion carries with it many rituals. Ritual behaviors relieve our tensions and depressions in carrying the notion of "effective action" and getting positive results. (Rabbit's foot, anyone? Perhaps you need a wooden table to knock on.)
4. Prayer and Faith cannot be subject to disproof. We continue praying until we get some "signal" that our prayer is answered. If something bad happens it becomes a case of not displaying "enough faith."
5. Religous beliefs are reinforced by the social pressures of the group we belong to. Many groups are completely exclusive. Thus, all possibility of disproof is unavailable for observation.
6. The confidence, absolute certainty, positive attitude and determination that comes from believing you are RIGHT propel the "faithful" person into confident behavioral demonstrations. The faithful convinces himself and others as a result.
7. A True Believer has their ego and their future completely tied up in a package deal that must be reinforced and strengthened constantly to remain effective. As a consequence ever more active participation must be engaged in or the real world intrudes and extreme depression results.
ABSOLUTE CERTAINTY is often demonstrated by the true believer in the form of putting their life and their fortune in peril. Only in this way can the believer continue to feed themselves on the "reality" of their superstitious world view.
Is it any wonder that Jehovah's Governing Body constantly plays the trump card of brinksmanship in predicting world events that can instantly disconfirm their very belief system? They dare themselves and their fellow believers and even God himself to refute the certainty by demonstrating it is all a fantasy tissue of lies. Absolute confidence!
This seemingly reckless course of action is the only sort of self-proof a true believer can permit themselves to experience. When the events predicted do not occur what happens? NOTHING! It is a spur to invest even more faith into the ritual behavior. The rain dance continues as it must. Eventually, the dancers believe, the rain will come and wash away any who doubt the absolute certainty they display.
Religious belief and the laws of science have one thing in common. Those who truly have convinced themselves will not budge as the wrecking ball comes hurtling toward their face! They both will stand firm to the eventful moment of truth.
Such is the nature of belief.
Monday, July 25, 2005
Saturday, July 23, 2005
For The Love of Christ. (Like, For Real.)
So much of talking is just the other party being patient, waiting for their turn to speak again. So many arguments can be broken down to simply waiting for the moment to play the trump card, waiting until the one side's “rightness” is irrefutable.
What is the root of that? Ego. And your ego will always seek to overthrow your inner logic, the thing that tells you, “this is absurd.” All that your ego cares about is that you are the top shit on crap mountain. Even if it is as absolutely irrelevant as all that.
So they were braying about the afterlife because I had asked an innocuous enough question about it, based on my desire to understand what Jehovah’s Witnesses think happens when you die. (He had been on about how horrible the world was, what with Tsunamis and AIDs and such. What I don’t understand about most highly organized religion is, if it’s such a great thing, the afterlife, why is it such a horrible tragedy to die? Is this sophomoric??) Somehow we landed on the topic of judging how one religion could possibly be better than the next, and they asked to see my copy of the Bible.
He handled it as though it were a tool of the devil. Hyperbole aside. My only Bible is called, Quest: A Bible for Academic Study. Cause if I’m going to read about Abraham begatting Isaac, you’d better believe that I want the Norton historical references. Can I get a witness. No pun intended.
So, he quoted the scripture, “for surely through time, weeds will arise in your field of wheat,” meaning that people will come along and taint the “true” version of what Christ is teaching. This simple phrase in the bible was his entire platform. This phrase, in and of itself, was the reason that it is right to be a Jehovah’s Witness as opposed to, say, a Shiite.
Here is my point. I think it to be quite a simple point. Couldn’t the role of weed be applied to any ideology, as likewise the role of wheat could be applied to any religion? Catholics could just as easily point to this piece of scripture as proof positive for the strength of their religion.
Yet, I said nothing, and he went on to eight more sections of scripture whose elucidation was equally illogical. “And this proves…. what, exactly?” But, I kept my mouth shut. He has barely got his GED. He is a 22 year old part-time grocery teller desperate to have something to believe in. I could make swiss cheese out of his arguments, but it would annihilate his happiness and would only make me feel guilty. But the biting of my tongue is certainly a constant conscious process, and frequently involves actually biting my tongue. My fear is that he thinks he’s winning me over… he actually invited me to church this Sunday (I declined.) I’m still waiting for the piece of scripture that explains the “prophecy,” and why J.C. knew that in 1914 World War I would happen. For real now, this is supposedly in the Bible somewhere.
Do you ever suppose that perhaps you were dropped on this planet as a child, and that your alien family is cracking up somewhere via satellite, watching you interact with these strange creatures?
Why would God give a flying fuck about whether or not you say fuck, or if you drink a beer, or how often you've gone to church. I wouldn't want to put my faith in someone so.... human. Oh, these egos. Anthropomorphizing the creator.
What is the root of that? Ego. And your ego will always seek to overthrow your inner logic, the thing that tells you, “this is absurd.” All that your ego cares about is that you are the top shit on crap mountain. Even if it is as absolutely irrelevant as all that.
So they were braying about the afterlife because I had asked an innocuous enough question about it, based on my desire to understand what Jehovah’s Witnesses think happens when you die. (He had been on about how horrible the world was, what with Tsunamis and AIDs and such. What I don’t understand about most highly organized religion is, if it’s such a great thing, the afterlife, why is it such a horrible tragedy to die? Is this sophomoric??) Somehow we landed on the topic of judging how one religion could possibly be better than the next, and they asked to see my copy of the Bible.
He handled it as though it were a tool of the devil. Hyperbole aside. My only Bible is called, Quest: A Bible for Academic Study. Cause if I’m going to read about Abraham begatting Isaac, you’d better believe that I want the Norton historical references. Can I get a witness. No pun intended.
So, he quoted the scripture, “for surely through time, weeds will arise in your field of wheat,” meaning that people will come along and taint the “true” version of what Christ is teaching. This simple phrase in the bible was his entire platform. This phrase, in and of itself, was the reason that it is right to be a Jehovah’s Witness as opposed to, say, a Shiite.
Here is my point. I think it to be quite a simple point. Couldn’t the role of weed be applied to any ideology, as likewise the role of wheat could be applied to any religion? Catholics could just as easily point to this piece of scripture as proof positive for the strength of their religion.
Yet, I said nothing, and he went on to eight more sections of scripture whose elucidation was equally illogical. “And this proves…. what, exactly?” But, I kept my mouth shut. He has barely got his GED. He is a 22 year old part-time grocery teller desperate to have something to believe in. I could make swiss cheese out of his arguments, but it would annihilate his happiness and would only make me feel guilty. But the biting of my tongue is certainly a constant conscious process, and frequently involves actually biting my tongue. My fear is that he thinks he’s winning me over… he actually invited me to church this Sunday (I declined.) I’m still waiting for the piece of scripture that explains the “prophecy,” and why J.C. knew that in 1914 World War I would happen. For real now, this is supposedly in the Bible somewhere.
Do you ever suppose that perhaps you were dropped on this planet as a child, and that your alien family is cracking up somewhere via satellite, watching you interact with these strange creatures?
Why would God give a flying fuck about whether or not you say fuck, or if you drink a beer, or how often you've gone to church. I wouldn't want to put my faith in someone so.... human. Oh, these egos. Anthropomorphizing the creator.
Friday, July 22, 2005
Unwavering Determination.
This sunflower is growing through a crack in the asphalt at the hospital in Oberlin.
Tuesday, July 19, 2005
Sunday, July 17, 2005
Woody Falls In Love.
Pat gave me the idea for this little pose for Woody....
It reminds me of a joke anne told me once.
The axe comes into the forest, and the trees say, "Look! His handle is one of us!!"
The Journey of the Jinn.
I pretty much only listen to Butterfly Boucher when I'm having thoughts of just going. I woke up so irritated this morning, and why? For what. Tired, I guess. I had sent him a long email that finally spelled out everything, the culmination of this past month of pain, because a face to face conversation has become such a futile entity. He sent me back a stream of consciousness limerick about hot dogs.
It's funny, what hope inspires, what the human animal is willing to take. When the word funny is replaced with the word staggering.
I had a dream last night of mom when she was my age, only all of us were still the ages we are today. She was reading some letter she had written to Libby; it was though Libby had died as a young child and this was mom's pouring-my-heart-out-about-what-you-meant letter to her. While she was reading said letter, there was a film reel scrolling, of the three of us, of family trips and band concerts and tennis matches (although the letter supposed that Libby had died at a young age, in the film reel it was as though she was still alive and well.) It was so beautiful and painful and sad, horrible and wonderful, bittersweet, convulsive. Made me realize how lucky I've been.
I keep thinking of the sacrifices I've made to get to where I am right now, and it's hardly even an equilateral trade off. Would serve me well to keep that in mind. I'm applying for that job at evergreen, and I'm going to make daily sacrifices to Ba'al in the name of getting it, and I'll go. Not to start over. To just start. Think about this: I have never uprooted my life in the name of my own goals.
"Alone, or together? All right! Alone then!"
It's funny, what hope inspires, what the human animal is willing to take. When the word funny is replaced with the word staggering.
I had a dream last night of mom when she was my age, only all of us were still the ages we are today. She was reading some letter she had written to Libby; it was though Libby had died as a young child and this was mom's pouring-my-heart-out-about-what-you-meant letter to her. While she was reading said letter, there was a film reel scrolling, of the three of us, of family trips and band concerts and tennis matches (although the letter supposed that Libby had died at a young age, in the film reel it was as though she was still alive and well.) It was so beautiful and painful and sad, horrible and wonderful, bittersweet, convulsive. Made me realize how lucky I've been.
I keep thinking of the sacrifices I've made to get to where I am right now, and it's hardly even an equilateral trade off. Would serve me well to keep that in mind. I'm applying for that job at evergreen, and I'm going to make daily sacrifices to Ba'al in the name of getting it, and I'll go. Not to start over. To just start. Think about this: I have never uprooted my life in the name of my own goals.
"Alone, or together? All right! Alone then!"
Friday, July 15, 2005
Wednesday, July 13, 2005
Crappy Poetry.
Scraping at bits of tin,
we want to believe so we don’t look --
just fall in.
It turns out they’re
a dime a dozen,
and we don’t even get the deposit back.
It was a day just like this when he left.
Has this always been tin?
He looks before he leaps,
and jumps in.
What I wanted to shout up towards the break-wall was,
send a rope;
not yourself.
we want to believe so we don’t look --
just fall in.
It turns out they’re
a dime a dozen,
and we don’t even get the deposit back.
It was a day just like this when he left.
Has this always been tin?
He looks before he leaps,
and jumps in.
What I wanted to shout up towards the break-wall was,
send a rope;
not yourself.
Monday, July 11, 2005
Some Stuff.
Ulcer. Stomach cramps. Getting worse at work, I should stop drinking coffee with this going on but it’s one of the few vices I’ve got. And I won’t go to the doctor or blow my top at the source of the problem, I’m like Akakyevich with his ill temper and malaise, "so my stomach hurts, eh! Well, let it get worse!" It makes little sense but the lack of sense is one of the few things I can hold onto. So hold on I do.
We’re in the children’s crusade, she and I, and though it might be illogical and crazy and driving us to ruin, it is a thing of beauty. All beautiful things have a grave. And that’s precisely what fuels the beauty, that tomb.
When a person slips into insanity, it’s only scary for the ones left on the outside, the ones who still have to deal with reality. When your sanity starts going the last thing you care about is how this might affect you in five years’ time or what the neighbors will think or how you’ll possibly manage your bills.
All day todayI was thinking about the reason behind people’s actions. Had Alex S. on my mind. We shouldn’t act out of some self-aggrandizing need to be flawless, infallible, untrumpable, enduring. We shouldn’t do good things out of a desire to have good things done to us. We shouldn’t follow a moral code because we fear for punishment in an afterlife.
We should act justly and with compassion because that’s the right way to act.
Ask Rugby. He’ll tell you all about it.
We’re in the children’s crusade, she and I, and though it might be illogical and crazy and driving us to ruin, it is a thing of beauty. All beautiful things have a grave. And that’s precisely what fuels the beauty, that tomb.
When a person slips into insanity, it’s only scary for the ones left on the outside, the ones who still have to deal with reality. When your sanity starts going the last thing you care about is how this might affect you in five years’ time or what the neighbors will think or how you’ll possibly manage your bills.
All day todayI was thinking about the reason behind people’s actions. Had Alex S. on my mind. We shouldn’t act out of some self-aggrandizing need to be flawless, infallible, untrumpable, enduring. We shouldn’t do good things out of a desire to have good things done to us. We shouldn’t follow a moral code because we fear for punishment in an afterlife.
We should act justly and with compassion because that’s the right way to act.
Ask Rugby. He’ll tell you all about it.
Something Old, Something New.
I wake to dream and take my waking slow; I learn by going where I have to go.
Two kids riding in circles on bikes in the parking lot just beyond my window. We used to have a detective agency in the attic and we'd read Nancy Drew novels, we were sure that at least one of us would be the first female pro ball player; later we liked to see the world through Picasso eyes and we'd sneak cigarettes out on the deck at midnight, we made tacit promises to each other and the moon that we'd never fall into normalcy, be beaten by the fear that safety propagates, let the robber baron blood completely exsanguinate.
Here I am, and I'm 25, and I'm drinking the first coffee of several in an office I have nightmares about, avoiding a boss whose gaze makes my stomach tighten.
Last night I stayed up until 2 a.m. finishing my first linoleum stamp. I carved it mostly with an xacto knife, which surprisingly didn't leave a blister in the palm of my hand. It's a 4x6" skull and crossbones; he's wearing an army helmet that, on the front, has an emblem of a heart locked behind bars. I started stamping them onto cut up matboard. I watched them as they dried, and miscellaneous Rimbaud quotes started coming into my head. After the first one dried I wrote my favorite of the quotes into the empty space, and I continued thusly on several of the others. I think I'll take my skull and crossbones cards everywhere I go, and leave them around like little sentinels over our need to derive some kind of meaning out of all of this. I dunno. Maybe that idea is over the top, but I can't just keep doing this drudgery much longer. I moved back to Ohio under the auspices that I would do art all day and write, and really have a chance to be creative. Then work got in the way, and here I am, back at square one.
A different location/job/financial situation isn't going to be the catalyst. I have to be the catalyst. Money is not the end all be all. We (this nation, where madness prowls) are so hung up on this idea of freedom, and most of us will never even fully realize what freedom actually is... to be unencumbered by wants/desires mistakenly representing themselves as needs. To have the freedom to give yourself completely to the unknown. To find release from the daily rat race. To live, to breathe, to create, to serve as an example to future generations that human life is not something already charted, that there is absolutely no limit to what's possible.
As Crow T. Robot would say, hummm ditty hee hee. Hooa Hooa.
Two kids riding in circles on bikes in the parking lot just beyond my window. We used to have a detective agency in the attic and we'd read Nancy Drew novels, we were sure that at least one of us would be the first female pro ball player; later we liked to see the world through Picasso eyes and we'd sneak cigarettes out on the deck at midnight, we made tacit promises to each other and the moon that we'd never fall into normalcy, be beaten by the fear that safety propagates, let the robber baron blood completely exsanguinate.
Here I am, and I'm 25, and I'm drinking the first coffee of several in an office I have nightmares about, avoiding a boss whose gaze makes my stomach tighten.
Last night I stayed up until 2 a.m. finishing my first linoleum stamp. I carved it mostly with an xacto knife, which surprisingly didn't leave a blister in the palm of my hand. It's a 4x6" skull and crossbones; he's wearing an army helmet that, on the front, has an emblem of a heart locked behind bars. I started stamping them onto cut up matboard. I watched them as they dried, and miscellaneous Rimbaud quotes started coming into my head. After the first one dried I wrote my favorite of the quotes into the empty space, and I continued thusly on several of the others. I think I'll take my skull and crossbones cards everywhere I go, and leave them around like little sentinels over our need to derive some kind of meaning out of all of this. I dunno. Maybe that idea is over the top, but I can't just keep doing this drudgery much longer. I moved back to Ohio under the auspices that I would do art all day and write, and really have a chance to be creative. Then work got in the way, and here I am, back at square one.
A different location/job/financial situation isn't going to be the catalyst. I have to be the catalyst. Money is not the end all be all. We (this nation, where madness prowls) are so hung up on this idea of freedom, and most of us will never even fully realize what freedom actually is... to be unencumbered by wants/desires mistakenly representing themselves as needs. To have the freedom to give yourself completely to the unknown. To find release from the daily rat race. To live, to breathe, to create, to serve as an example to future generations that human life is not something already charted, that there is absolutely no limit to what's possible.
As Crow T. Robot would say, hummm ditty hee hee. Hooa Hooa.
Sunday, July 10, 2005
Wednesday, July 06, 2005
Robot Flea
This is the drawing that I finished recently. I got the idea from a dream that Ryan told me about once.
Can't Wait For Anne To Get Back.
For a brief moment the tear in the curtain has become apparent to me and I can see past deluge of today, into the sound and steady depths of beyond tomorrow. The feeling is reminiscent to the bliss of last fall; there exists an unshakeable certainty that something excruciatingly wonderful is there just around the bend -- the perfection of a well made mistake -- the achievement that is sometimes failure. How wasteful I’ve been lately, to be so hung up on these petty misgivings that would like to lay claim to my life. What significance does a year long job have to a life? What significance does it have to that magic that’s just there, beyond the tear in the fabric? I’m sorry that she’ll never see it that way, that for her the answer will always be, “all of the significance that a life can have.” How lonely it must be. Time is on my side, and for her it’s too late.
Last year there were so many moonless winter nights that I’d traverse the treacherous country roads between Birmingham and Oberlin. Orion would stand sentinel as I marveled at the barren wastelands that are snow covered Ohio homesteads at two in the morning. I always loved those treks for their solitude, for the feeling that I was absolutely invincible. And most nights I was driving dad’s truck, so I’d make the cross-town hike home on foot when the rest of the world was asleep, after the truck had been safely returned. There was never a single soul stirring, and I would pretend that I was on the moon or in some post-apocalyptic Siberian outpost. There was never anything to be afraid of then, it was all just adventure. Night after night I would make my nod towards safety and the familiar as I plunged headlong into the unknown.
Would serve me well to take those lessons to heart.
Last year there were so many moonless winter nights that I’d traverse the treacherous country roads between Birmingham and Oberlin. Orion would stand sentinel as I marveled at the barren wastelands that are snow covered Ohio homesteads at two in the morning. I always loved those treks for their solitude, for the feeling that I was absolutely invincible. And most nights I was driving dad’s truck, so I’d make the cross-town hike home on foot when the rest of the world was asleep, after the truck had been safely returned. There was never a single soul stirring, and I would pretend that I was on the moon or in some post-apocalyptic Siberian outpost. There was never anything to be afraid of then, it was all just adventure. Night after night I would make my nod towards safety and the familiar as I plunged headlong into the unknown.
Would serve me well to take those lessons to heart.
Saturday, July 02, 2005
500.
I watched Knockaround Guys again last night. It was the perfect finish to a somewhat testosterone laden day. Yesterday afternoon I had impressed Martin with my ability to manuever a pallet jack loaded with 900 lbs around a cramped warehouse. Before I started he told me it would be tough- guy test, to see if I was as strong as Anne, and I told him that my guns were unrivaled. After the third load he agreed and kept wanting to squeeze my bicep. But that's because he's a pervert.
At midnight I went for a long and hard run, through downtown, through the old neighborhood, past drunken sorority looking chicks (they exist in Oberlin??) and sped towards home. I was thinking about a conversation that occurred earlier in the day. For the third time in the past week, the boy had mentioned some new person he's working with, a woman named Erin who just moved here from Colorado. The other day we were driving through downtown and we passed her on her bike. His eyes were fixated on the side view mirror, watching her approach as we sat at the intersection of College and Main waiting for the light to change. I think my friendship with Paula has caused me to be overly paranoid about other women and cheating.
Anyway, so he's telling me about this chick yesterday afternoon, and said that she knew me. "How the fuck does she know me," I scoffed. I was still in tough guy mode from the pallet jacking. "I dunno, she said you used to date some dude with a weird name. She said you're really sweet." He knows who Ahniwa is and it's weird that he always pretends he doesn't.
"You mean Ahniwa. OHHHH, that Erin." Flags are going up left and right. The rear view window thing, the fact that he keeps casually mentioning her, the massive insecurity that this very chick caused in my last relationship, all coupled with the fact that someone I've become closer with is "the other woman" in two guys' lives and I've heard all the tricks for how they get away with it, ... it's like a molotov cocktail for paranoia.
So, after the run and the ruminating I'm watching Knockaround Guys, and realizing that I need to lay a little more 500 down in my own life. The threads of this story probably don't tie together as you read this, but in my mind they do. I think I'm too nice. Too willing to guard what I'm actually feeling. Too aloof about my own vulnerability. Vin's character in this movie is absolutely raw, and real, there aren't any layers between who he is internally and who he broadcasts himself to be.
I had a breakfast meeting with Avery and afterward impressed him with my skateboarding abilities. There are these moments in which I can see that there are lots of reasons that people should accept me because I'm me, and not because I'm simply filling some hole in their life (loneliness, transportation, money, etc.) I'm not a punching bag anymore, or somebody you call because you're sitting in your house alone and it's late and none of your male acquaintances have called you so why not call the MLE....
Anyway. I wish that I would randomly meet Michelle Rodriguez on the street one day and we'd hit it off and drive around in an abductor van together, telling stories and getting tattoos and spitting, and stuff. SKRAWK! This is perhaps the most rambling blog post I've ever done.
But Michelle Rodriguez is hot.
