So it's been a month and a half since I posted. Much has changed, much has remained static, and time passes like a translucent apple ripening on a branch that hangs between my eyes and mind.
My mum was in the hospital for a couple weeks in the middle of February on account of a collapsed lung, so I spent much of my time working out of the hospital during that period. Being there with her made me realize that I'm pretty much the only person in her life, which is a strange epiphany. Makes my chest swell and shoulders sag. Also befriended a lovely, young nurse named Paula during this tenure. She's been working the evening shift Monday through Friday for three years now. She might be one of the happiest people I have ever met.
Beautiful day outside. Spring's finally in the air. Started running again. Stopped eating meat a few days ago. Not sure how long that will last though. I've been craving chicken like a fox outside the coop. Can't stop smoking cigarettes, but cut back on account of what happened to my mum (guilty conscience). Thinking a lot about getting older. Still feel young though. Spring is making me want to do something with my life besides sit around the same old house and tweak computer code all day long. Don't know how to scratch this itch though. It's in a hard to reach place. Wish my arms were longer.
Listening to d_rradio's So Happy It Hurts while watching people pass my apartment building down on the sidewalk. I feel like my heart is melting. It's a warm, oozy sensation that runs down my sternum. My head is feeling light, like my thought's are evaporating, like when we used to huff whip cream cannisters as kids. I feel like I would fly if I jumped out this window. I'm also well aware that I would plummet to my death if I jumped out this window. For some reason this makes me smile. I'll have more later. I promise.
Peace.
Saturday, March 20, 2010
Sunday, January 31, 2010
Diction Rejected: Haha
Sup world.
I have found myself in the throes of a resplendent Sunday morning, sipping freshly brewed coffee and enjoying the sunlight as it spills in through the windows and furnishes my den with this weightless, lambent glow, an effect which lends a certain oneiric quality to the supine atmosphere it floods over, laminating the scene and making me almost giddy, as if I'm on the verge of transcendence, melting into the moment, a diffusion out into this still-life. . . . Not that this can last too much longer, even now I can hear my work beckoning, artfully pulling at my heartstrings, making me feel like Odysseus must have felt on Calypso's Isle when he would think of Ithaca, those thoughts that made paradise tortuous for him.
My nephew told me the other day that he thinks I should start attending Workaholics Anonymous meetings.
But I should be able to hold my epic addiction at bay until at least noon, that is, languish for a little longer and permit myself the illusion of enjoying (what the bourgeoisie refer to as) the weekend.
So recap (as it's been awhile since I posted):
Friday evening was a pretty good time, mainly because Jasmine graced the apartment with her presence and a couple bottles of cheap wine.
She showed up around seven, not bothering to call beforehand, somehow knowing that I would be in despite the fact that it was a Friday night (can it really be so obvious that I would be at home on a Friday that it wouldn't even cross her mind to check before making the trek . . . makes me wonder . . . ).
"Chris, darling," she greeted me when I opened the door, "I need to escape."
"Sanctuary to all who enter," I proclaimed (rather charmingly) with a sweep of my arm, though she was already brushing by me as if I were simply the doorman rather than the host.
I threw on Herbie Hancock's Head Hunters album to liven the mood. Jasmine poured us wine (we drank from the plastic excuses for wine glasses that she pulled out of the dusty recesses of the cupboard). Then we spent a couple hours talking about things, not specific things, but general things (mainly because Jasmine never likes to talk about the specifics of her life, while the specifics of my life tend to be mundane generalities), though I did gather that she's now working as a waitress at the V-Spot (that vegan restaurant on 5th Street) and she's been blowing most of her tip money on blow, which she blew a few lines of off my coffee table.
After awhile, I suggested we throw on a movie, and (having perused my DVD collection) she proclaimed The Fugitive as the cinematic entertainment of the night. I put the movie in, hit the lights, and curled up with her on the couch.
We were ballin' by the time Kimble made his desperate jump from the spillway in the Cheaoh Dam.
She ended up spending the night (like a throw back to yesteryear), but left early in the morning on some vaguely important mission (probably to score more cocaine before her lunch shift [well, that's an embellishment, I don't know what she actually hurried out to do]). I guess it was nice spending time with her. I just wish we had more in common with each other these days . . . but that's life for you:
Changes you and everybody else until no one recognizes each other anymore.
And on that sardonic (tongue in cheek) comment, I shall abruptly conclude.
Enjoy the day and . . .
Peace.
I have found myself in the throes of a resplendent Sunday morning, sipping freshly brewed coffee and enjoying the sunlight as it spills in through the windows and furnishes my den with this weightless, lambent glow, an effect which lends a certain oneiric quality to the supine atmosphere it floods over, laminating the scene and making me almost giddy, as if I'm on the verge of transcendence, melting into the moment, a diffusion out into this still-life. . . . Not that this can last too much longer, even now I can hear my work beckoning, artfully pulling at my heartstrings, making me feel like Odysseus must have felt on Calypso's Isle when he would think of Ithaca, those thoughts that made paradise tortuous for him.
My nephew told me the other day that he thinks I should start attending Workaholics Anonymous meetings.
But I should be able to hold my epic addiction at bay until at least noon, that is, languish for a little longer and permit myself the illusion of enjoying (what the bourgeoisie refer to as) the weekend.
So recap (as it's been awhile since I posted):
Friday evening was a pretty good time, mainly because Jasmine graced the apartment with her presence and a couple bottles of cheap wine.
She showed up around seven, not bothering to call beforehand, somehow knowing that I would be in despite the fact that it was a Friday night (can it really be so obvious that I would be at home on a Friday that it wouldn't even cross her mind to check before making the trek . . . makes me wonder . . . ).
"Chris, darling," she greeted me when I opened the door, "I need to escape."
"Sanctuary to all who enter," I proclaimed (rather charmingly) with a sweep of my arm, though she was already brushing by me as if I were simply the doorman rather than the host.
I threw on Herbie Hancock's Head Hunters album to liven the mood. Jasmine poured us wine (we drank from the plastic excuses for wine glasses that she pulled out of the dusty recesses of the cupboard). Then we spent a couple hours talking about things, not specific things, but general things (mainly because Jasmine never likes to talk about the specifics of her life, while the specifics of my life tend to be mundane generalities), though I did gather that she's now working as a waitress at the V-Spot (that vegan restaurant on 5th Street) and she's been blowing most of her tip money on blow, which she blew a few lines of off my coffee table.
After awhile, I suggested we throw on a movie, and (having perused my DVD collection) she proclaimed The Fugitive as the cinematic entertainment of the night. I put the movie in, hit the lights, and curled up with her on the couch.
We were ballin' by the time Kimble made his desperate jump from the spillway in the Cheaoh Dam.
She ended up spending the night (like a throw back to yesteryear), but left early in the morning on some vaguely important mission (probably to score more cocaine before her lunch shift [well, that's an embellishment, I don't know what she actually hurried out to do]). I guess it was nice spending time with her. I just wish we had more in common with each other these days . . . but that's life for you:
Changes you and everybody else until no one recognizes each other anymore.
And on that sardonic (tongue in cheek) comment, I shall abruptly conclude.
Enjoy the day and . . .
Peace.
Wednesday, January 27, 2010
Mission Objective: Keep the Head Up
Sup . . . world?
Went out last evening to join Jasmine and some of her friends in Williamsburg at this dude's apartment, which was interesting. Everyone sat in a circle and passed around a pipe with (what seemed like) a bottomless bowl, packed full of marijuana. The girl I was sitting next to, who they all called Quinny Flamms, would proffer the marijuana piece to me after each hit she took and I had to tell her every single time that I didn't smoke, which felt absurd after awhile.
The conversation was erratic, but somewhat enjoyable (given that it was mainly orchestrated by stoned hipsters), drifting from politics to celebrities to the economy to homosexuality to art (this part wasn't very interesting, in fact, the air began to get so stuffy with pretension that I almost gagged) to religion to the end of the world to whatever came after that . . . can't really remember to be honest. Every now and again I would make a vocal contribution to the subject at hand, but I mostly preoccupied myself with analyzing the dynamics of the group (as opposed to becoming a notable dynamic myself).
Plus, Jasmine was flirting with this guy Rob the entire time, which was a little maddening/put me in a somewhat dejected state. When I told the group that I probably had to roll back to my crib, all I got from Jasmine was a smile and a quick goodbye (could I have hallucinated that she also rolled her eyes?) before she turned her attention back to Rob (who had just said something incredibly funny, which is what I attribute Jasmine's genuine-looking smile to).
I mean, I'm not a jealous guy, but she called me to come hang out because I never come hang out. Then when I go hang out, all she does is talk to this other guy, which eradicated the reason I came to hang out in the first place. So the experience ended up being a little frustrating, which it shouldn't have because it should have been a nice escape from the apartment.
When I got back it was ten o'clock and I decided to stay up and get some work done as compensation for my fruitless jaunt into the social sphere. Called it quits on the programming around two and put on an episode of Heroes to lull me off into my dreams.
But that didn't work, so I picked up an essay collection my mum lent me and read a piece by Sartre about the necessity of writing, which made me want to post on my blog. Though now that I'm well into said post, I'm finding this ramble somewhat less necessary than Sartre had me believe.
Trying to think whether I'd call this late at night or early in the morning . . . 3:40 am? Guess we're much closer to the morning twilight than the evening one, though there's no closure to a sleepless night. I'd have to call this a weird . . . caliginously liminal juncture . . . characterized by isochronistic movements between lethargy and restlessness.
1-27-2010 hasn't even hit puberty yet and already it's kicking my ass.
Hmm . . .
[Chris drums his fingers as he enters the restless point of the cycle]
Can I refer to myself in the third person without portraying myself as a ninny?
[Chris reaches for his pack of cigarettes]
Can you believe that eighteen years ago I was in the third grade? I can't.
[Chris lights a cigarette]
Don't worry, I'm authorized to smoke in my apartment.
[Chris takes a couple thoughtful drags on the cigarette]
I'm not usually prone to such orectic whims as smoking in my home. My general rule is to enjoy tobacco al fresco, out in front of the building. Tonight's insomnia just seems to entail a special, undeniable profligacy. Plus, what's more picturesque than a writer with a smouldering cigarette between his lips as his fingers frenetically pound the keyboard? Not that my fingers are frenetically pounding the keyboard. The writer bit is a little outta whack as well.
[Chris takes a couple more drags]
. . .
[Chris extinguishes his cigarette]
Well, might as well go enjoy some leisure time before I have to start filling Wednesday's insatiable quota of productivity.
Peace.
Went out last evening to join Jasmine and some of her friends in Williamsburg at this dude's apartment, which was interesting. Everyone sat in a circle and passed around a pipe with (what seemed like) a bottomless bowl, packed full of marijuana. The girl I was sitting next to, who they all called Quinny Flamms, would proffer the marijuana piece to me after each hit she took and I had to tell her every single time that I didn't smoke, which felt absurd after awhile.
The conversation was erratic, but somewhat enjoyable (given that it was mainly orchestrated by stoned hipsters), drifting from politics to celebrities to the economy to homosexuality to art (this part wasn't very interesting, in fact, the air began to get so stuffy with pretension that I almost gagged) to religion to the end of the world to whatever came after that . . . can't really remember to be honest. Every now and again I would make a vocal contribution to the subject at hand, but I mostly preoccupied myself with analyzing the dynamics of the group (as opposed to becoming a notable dynamic myself).
Plus, Jasmine was flirting with this guy Rob the entire time, which was a little maddening/put me in a somewhat dejected state. When I told the group that I probably had to roll back to my crib, all I got from Jasmine was a smile and a quick goodbye (could I have hallucinated that she also rolled her eyes?) before she turned her attention back to Rob (who had just said something incredibly funny, which is what I attribute Jasmine's genuine-looking smile to).
I mean, I'm not a jealous guy, but she called me to come hang out because I never come hang out. Then when I go hang out, all she does is talk to this other guy, which eradicated the reason I came to hang out in the first place. So the experience ended up being a little frustrating, which it shouldn't have because it should have been a nice escape from the apartment.
When I got back it was ten o'clock and I decided to stay up and get some work done as compensation for my fruitless jaunt into the social sphere. Called it quits on the programming around two and put on an episode of Heroes to lull me off into my dreams.
But that didn't work, so I picked up an essay collection my mum lent me and read a piece by Sartre about the necessity of writing, which made me want to post on my blog. Though now that I'm well into said post, I'm finding this ramble somewhat less necessary than Sartre had me believe.
Trying to think whether I'd call this late at night or early in the morning . . . 3:40 am? Guess we're much closer to the morning twilight than the evening one, though there's no closure to a sleepless night. I'd have to call this a weird . . . caliginously liminal juncture . . . characterized by isochronistic movements between lethargy and restlessness.
1-27-2010 hasn't even hit puberty yet and already it's kicking my ass.
Hmm . . .
[Chris drums his fingers as he enters the restless point of the cycle]
Can I refer to myself in the third person without portraying myself as a ninny?
[Chris reaches for his pack of cigarettes]
Can you believe that eighteen years ago I was in the third grade? I can't.
[Chris lights a cigarette]
Don't worry, I'm authorized to smoke in my apartment.
[Chris takes a couple thoughtful drags on the cigarette]
I'm not usually prone to such orectic whims as smoking in my home. My general rule is to enjoy tobacco al fresco, out in front of the building. Tonight's insomnia just seems to entail a special, undeniable profligacy. Plus, what's more picturesque than a writer with a smouldering cigarette between his lips as his fingers frenetically pound the keyboard? Not that my fingers are frenetically pounding the keyboard. The writer bit is a little outta whack as well.
[Chris takes a couple more drags]
. . .
[Chris extinguishes his cigarette]
Well, might as well go enjoy some leisure time before I have to start filling Wednesday's insatiable quota of productivity.
Peace.
Monday, January 25, 2010
Mission Objective: Breakfast?
Morning World.
Woke up twenty minutes ago. Tossed and turned in my sheets for five minutes, then realized that sleep was no longer an option. Now I'm sitting here at the computer in my den, listening to the Dusker album by Kiln and sipping some morning coffee. The wind's howling against the building, throwing itself against the windows so that glass rattles in the panes, giving the room sensation of being shaken, like a piggy bank by a greedy kid now regretting his decision to invest that penny.
It's a nice ambiance. Peaceful morning with apocalyptic undertones.
One of my friends in high school had a theory that wind is a result of a crack in the layering of time. According to the theory, if the crack opens to a particularly tumultuous period in human affairs, then what we feel as wind is really the termagant activity of human spirits (their immortal and agitated souls) rushing around us, highly involved in their dramatic event. Or that's the gist of it anyway, I'm not sure if I'm remembering it right. It was a crackpot theory to begin with (that is, it is assuming time's a pot).
The forecast calls for some heavy thunder storms later, which is kind of a bummer because the high is 56, which is a brilliant temperature for January. Still, serves as motivation to sit down and get through some of the work I put off over the last couple days.
Pretty good weekend, all things considered (this is Michele Norris). Met up yesterday with Jasmine for a movie . . . which means I finally saw Avatar, which was SICK!
Umm, what else . . .
Man, this wind is really distracting. It just won't give up (I'll huff, and I'll puff, and I'll blow your . . .) . . . I'm guessing the time fabric cracked open to September, 1776 when the British were sacking the city, pushing Mr. Washington back, and back, and back . . .
Alright, my head isn't fully operational yet, still feels a bit crowded - . . - clouded -
Might wake myself up with a shocking dose of world news from the BBC website. Just wanted to share this early morning moment with y'all.
Peace.
Woke up twenty minutes ago. Tossed and turned in my sheets for five minutes, then realized that sleep was no longer an option. Now I'm sitting here at the computer in my den, listening to the Dusker album by Kiln and sipping some morning coffee. The wind's howling against the building, throwing itself against the windows so that glass rattles in the panes, giving the room sensation of being shaken, like a piggy bank by a greedy kid now regretting his decision to invest that penny.
It's a nice ambiance. Peaceful morning with apocalyptic undertones.
One of my friends in high school had a theory that wind is a result of a crack in the layering of time. According to the theory, if the crack opens to a particularly tumultuous period in human affairs, then what we feel as wind is really the termagant activity of human spirits (their immortal and agitated souls) rushing around us, highly involved in their dramatic event. Or that's the gist of it anyway, I'm not sure if I'm remembering it right. It was a crackpot theory to begin with (that is, it is assuming time's a pot).
The forecast calls for some heavy thunder storms later, which is kind of a bummer because the high is 56, which is a brilliant temperature for January. Still, serves as motivation to sit down and get through some of the work I put off over the last couple days.
Pretty good weekend, all things considered (this is Michele Norris). Met up yesterday with Jasmine for a movie . . . which means I finally saw Avatar, which was SICK!
Umm, what else . . .
Man, this wind is really distracting. It just won't give up (I'll huff, and I'll puff, and I'll blow your . . .) . . . I'm guessing the time fabric cracked open to September, 1776 when the British were sacking the city, pushing Mr. Washington back, and back, and back . . .
Alright, my head isn't fully operational yet, still feels a bit crowded - . . - clouded -
Might wake myself up with a shocking dose of world news from the BBC website. Just wanted to share this early morning moment with y'all.
Peace.
Friday, January 22, 2010
Mission Objective: Secure Some Semblance of Metaphysical Bearings
Sup world.
Think I'll use this post to address a couple items of a somewhat (though not overly) personal nature. I got a Friday afternoon to kill and it's about time I put this blog to some use, even if this comes across as slightly ostentatious. So without further ado, I bring you:
1) Item 1: Tense of Thought:
I've been noticing a disturbing mental trend lately [cue the ominous music, let it build a little bit, your heartbeat is slowly accelerating, this tension is building, even the actors are holding their breaths . . . and then BAM]: my thoughts have been increasingly forming themselves in the future tense. It's beginning to worry me. I'll try to explain why.
Here are some vague examples of the phenomenon: Next year I'll have enough money to move out of this dingy apartment . . . Soon I'll be able to start paying back these student loans that have been hanging over my head . . . Hopefully Jasmine will drop by tonight . . . I'll start running again when the weather gets nicer . . . When I . . . If things . . . Later . . . etc.
Basically, I seem to be engaging in a battle against the present, armed rather sparsely with these generalized and suppositious hopes that the "hereafter" will be a better place, a more productive and fulfilling time than the now . . . but I've lived long enough to know that the "hereafter" is a mad beast, always threatening my dreams with claws bared like knives sharp and glinting with unpredictability as the beast fosters it's perpetual momentum, while I'm usually (almost paradoxically) bracing myself against it, turning away from it, trying to keep my balance as it rushes all around me and, as I'm swaying (teetering if you will), I'm thinking about all those opportunities that the future is tearing away from me.
I don't know if I'm putting this into words well (if you haven't noticed, I'm feeling a bit melodramatic, must have something to do with the overcast skies today, this cabin fever, the lingering smell of the mac & cheese I cooked for lunch . . . which is subtly turning to the smell of fart) . . . I guess (you'll have to excuse this bromidic metaphor) it feels like I'm trying to gain satisfaction by painting these grandiose, idealistic visions of the Tomorrow. The thing is, every time I embellish the future with these hopes (as humble as they are), the now inevitably turns uglier in contrast. I find myself more complexly trapped and restricted by what is happening, bogged down by these things of the moment and perpetually frustrated by the evanescent nature of possibility . . . I'm a full-fledged sucker when it comes to this potent and addictive drug of abstract potential that keeps me among the ranks of the lotophagi.
Not to make this more serious than it really is, but if I were the detective assigned to this case, I would bet a pretty penny that the culprit behind this outburst of future tense mischief is Mr. Discontent himself, that unfortunate shadow permanently hinged to existence. And, of course, this is unsettling to me. I'm twenty-six years old. I have more than two thirds of my life ahead of me [knock on wood], I can afford to let the future be for a little bit, try to enjoy the simple, yet mind blowing fact of my existence (I rejoice, therefore I am). I mean, if you think about it, the future is like a politician, full of absurd promise and always trying to win your trust. And, of course, it's tempting to believe that he's not simply trying to manipulate you, that he actually means to make these things come true if you hand him your vote, but let's face it, politics (just like law, fortune-telling, and slam poetry) is substantiated by the art of bullshit.
Anyway, continuing down this path (which is really a trajectory defined by a complete immotility, a spellbound stasis, an illusion of motion as time moves things around the dopey-eyed, unwavering disciple of Future) is going to eventually turn me into a laudator temporis acti (which is Latin for a person who's been effectively hollowed out, gutted, by the future they inhabit).
So, with the god that is the Internet as my witness, I hereby declare that for now on I will make an honest effort to believe in the future only so much as the present moment may craft it, to recognize the limitations of the future tense, and strive to kindly return the immediacy with which the world addresses me.
Didn't mean for that issue to turn so long-winded, but hey, how do I know what I think until I see what I write? I gotta work these things out. So on to the second item.
2) Item 2: Am I loser?
I currently have the honor of being an employee of a software company called Yillitech (which you've never heard of before), and the job pretty much consists of sitting in front of a computer typing for at least eight hours a day , though I usually put in overtime and try to get a healthy eleven hours of work in a day (since my salary's basically equivalent to that of a dishwasher and I have bills to pay and I can guarantee you this living ain't cheap these days). Because all I need is internet access for me to work, I'm rarely obligated to leave my apartment. In fact, leaving my apartment sometimes even makes me feel unproductive.
When I was hired for the position a year ago, it seemed like a godsend (I was previously working IT over at John Dewey High School, which is pretty much the south end of the borough, right next to Brighton Beach, meaning a five o'clock (a.m.) wake up, nearly two and a half hours of bus commute a day, and I even had to teach a typing class, which the kids actually resented me for, so being hired by a web-based company like Yillitech seemed analogous to being given a permanently paid vacation. I could work wherever I wanted . . . which made the weeks following my hiring perhaps the most thrilling portion of my professional life to date). But, as I just tried to communicate in that rant above, the future has a way of turning things on their head. The cutest dogs smell the most repugnant . . . or, as Jasmine would say, the drugs are too good to be true. As of right now, my social network is limited to e-mail with co-workers, a once a month visit to my mum who lives over on Long Island (a place I've never been shy of voicing my qualms about), my nephew stopping by my apartment on his way home from school, or Jasmine dropping in whenever she feels like it (this feeling of hers usually having something to do with being high on something).
The weird thing is I don't know if I'm complaining about my life or not. To be honest, I don't know how I ended up in this situation, but it seemed to happen naturally enough. I just kind of started to let most my relationships with people dwindle, grow stale, more or less fall apart from neglect until I reached my current status: an ascetic with a computer. I've even started to feel a bit like a stranger when I'm out in the neighborhood and I can't tell if I prefer it this way or not -> hence the question -> "Am I a loser?" (notice how I used data pointers " -> " to construct that statement).
It's a funny question. My conception of the word loser was a very concrete, easily defined noun in high school and, even in college, I could tell you (quite objectively) whether or not someone was a loser within half an hour of having met them (granted that I had the opportunity to ask the right questions). Now, I dunno . . . so much. The older I get, the more obvious it is that if life is a game, it's one can't be won.
Don't get me wrong, I don't mean for that to be a pessimistic assertion, it's just seems clear to me that there are no set rules to human affairs, that we're making it up as we go along, and the more people trying to "win" the game, the more messy things end up getting. And, still, despite my making the argument against life being a game, it's impossible to deny that there's a desire to win, to triumph, to overcome in life (at life), no matter how atavistic a notion that it seems to be.
Anyway, I'm gonna wrap this up (the longevity of this post seems to put me in the loser schema by default). What I'm trying to get at is that if life is a game, or more aptly a competition (which would make winners and losers possible), then I can't take the competition any more seriously than a game of Monopoly. Which might seem to create some tension with the ideas I was throwing around while addressing item one, but the basic point is this:
I am mad confused. Which is awesome. I feel like I could take on the world right now. And if you think my clumsy vocabulary and stuttering presentation is funny, I'll knock the teeth out of your mouth, because I'm a big boy and, loser or not, I know how to hold my own. I slice the paper to confetti with my commas; I won't think twice about ending a sentence's journey with the violent smackdown of a period (die motherfucker! die!); I dole out apostrophes as if they were cheaper thing on the planet; I make a sentence go schizophrenic crazy with semicolons; and I won't hesitate to get up in your face with an exclamation mark! And, through all this chaos, I somehow manage to keep my head balanced and lucid. Hyah! [High kick to your mind like the karate kid]
Mad confused yo, whoo, I'm dizzy . . . this is wonderful!
Peace.
Think I'll use this post to address a couple items of a somewhat (though not overly) personal nature. I got a Friday afternoon to kill and it's about time I put this blog to some use, even if this comes across as slightly ostentatious. So without further ado, I bring you:
2 ITEMS OF IMPORTANCE!
1) Item 1: Tense of Thought:
I've been noticing a disturbing mental trend lately [cue the ominous music, let it build a little bit, your heartbeat is slowly accelerating, this tension is building, even the actors are holding their breaths . . . and then BAM]: my thoughts have been increasingly forming themselves in the future tense. It's beginning to worry me. I'll try to explain why.
Here are some vague examples of the phenomenon: Next year I'll have enough money to move out of this dingy apartment . . . Soon I'll be able to start paying back these student loans that have been hanging over my head . . . Hopefully Jasmine will drop by tonight . . . I'll start running again when the weather gets nicer . . . When I . . . If things . . . Later . . . etc.
Basically, I seem to be engaging in a battle against the present, armed rather sparsely with these generalized and suppositious hopes that the "hereafter" will be a better place, a more productive and fulfilling time than the now . . . but I've lived long enough to know that the "hereafter" is a mad beast, always threatening my dreams with claws bared like knives sharp and glinting with unpredictability as the beast fosters it's perpetual momentum, while I'm usually (almost paradoxically) bracing myself against it, turning away from it, trying to keep my balance as it rushes all around me and, as I'm swaying (teetering if you will), I'm thinking about all those opportunities that the future is tearing away from me.
I don't know if I'm putting this into words well (if you haven't noticed, I'm feeling a bit melodramatic, must have something to do with the overcast skies today, this cabin fever, the lingering smell of the mac & cheese I cooked for lunch . . . which is subtly turning to the smell of fart) . . . I guess (you'll have to excuse this bromidic metaphor) it feels like I'm trying to gain satisfaction by painting these grandiose, idealistic visions of the Tomorrow. The thing is, every time I embellish the future with these hopes (as humble as they are), the now inevitably turns uglier in contrast. I find myself more complexly trapped and restricted by what is happening, bogged down by these things of the moment and perpetually frustrated by the evanescent nature of possibility . . . I'm a full-fledged sucker when it comes to this potent and addictive drug of abstract potential that keeps me among the ranks of the lotophagi.
Not to make this more serious than it really is, but if I were the detective assigned to this case, I would bet a pretty penny that the culprit behind this outburst of future tense mischief is Mr. Discontent himself, that unfortunate shadow permanently hinged to existence. And, of course, this is unsettling to me. I'm twenty-six years old. I have more than two thirds of my life ahead of me [knock on wood], I can afford to let the future be for a little bit, try to enjoy the simple, yet mind blowing fact of my existence (I rejoice, therefore I am). I mean, if you think about it, the future is like a politician, full of absurd promise and always trying to win your trust. And, of course, it's tempting to believe that he's not simply trying to manipulate you, that he actually means to make these things come true if you hand him your vote, but let's face it, politics (just like law, fortune-telling, and slam poetry) is substantiated by the art of bullshit.
Anyway, continuing down this path (which is really a trajectory defined by a complete immotility, a spellbound stasis, an illusion of motion as time moves things around the dopey-eyed, unwavering disciple of Future) is going to eventually turn me into a laudator temporis acti (which is Latin for a person who's been effectively hollowed out, gutted, by the future they inhabit).
So, with the god that is the Internet as my witness, I hereby declare that for now on I will make an honest effort to believe in the future only so much as the present moment may craft it, to recognize the limitations of the future tense, and strive to kindly return the immediacy with which the world addresses me.
Didn't mean for that issue to turn so long-winded, but hey, how do I know what I think until I see what I write? I gotta work these things out. So on to the second item.
2) Item 2: Am I loser?
I currently have the honor of being an employee of a software company called Yillitech (which you've never heard of before), and the job pretty much consists of sitting in front of a computer typing for at least eight hours a day , though I usually put in overtime and try to get a healthy eleven hours of work in a day (since my salary's basically equivalent to that of a dishwasher and I have bills to pay and I can guarantee you this living ain't cheap these days). Because all I need is internet access for me to work, I'm rarely obligated to leave my apartment. In fact, leaving my apartment sometimes even makes me feel unproductive.
When I was hired for the position a year ago, it seemed like a godsend (I was previously working IT over at John Dewey High School, which is pretty much the south end of the borough, right next to Brighton Beach, meaning a five o'clock (a.m.) wake up, nearly two and a half hours of bus commute a day, and I even had to teach a typing class, which the kids actually resented me for, so being hired by a web-based company like Yillitech seemed analogous to being given a permanently paid vacation. I could work wherever I wanted . . . which made the weeks following my hiring perhaps the most thrilling portion of my professional life to date). But, as I just tried to communicate in that rant above, the future has a way of turning things on their head. The cutest dogs smell the most repugnant . . . or, as Jasmine would say, the drugs are too good to be true. As of right now, my social network is limited to e-mail with co-workers, a once a month visit to my mum who lives over on Long Island (a place I've never been shy of voicing my qualms about), my nephew stopping by my apartment on his way home from school, or Jasmine dropping in whenever she feels like it (this feeling of hers usually having something to do with being high on something).
The weird thing is I don't know if I'm complaining about my life or not. To be honest, I don't know how I ended up in this situation, but it seemed to happen naturally enough. I just kind of started to let most my relationships with people dwindle, grow stale, more or less fall apart from neglect until I reached my current status: an ascetic with a computer. I've even started to feel a bit like a stranger when I'm out in the neighborhood and I can't tell if I prefer it this way or not -> hence the question -> "Am I a loser?" (notice how I used data pointers " -> " to construct that statement).
It's a funny question. My conception of the word loser was a very concrete, easily defined noun in high school and, even in college, I could tell you (quite objectively) whether or not someone was a loser within half an hour of having met them (granted that I had the opportunity to ask the right questions). Now, I dunno . . . so much. The older I get, the more obvious it is that if life is a game, it's one can't be won.
Don't get me wrong, I don't mean for that to be a pessimistic assertion, it's just seems clear to me that there are no set rules to human affairs, that we're making it up as we go along, and the more people trying to "win" the game, the more messy things end up getting. And, still, despite my making the argument against life being a game, it's impossible to deny that there's a desire to win, to triumph, to overcome in life (at life), no matter how atavistic a notion that it seems to be.
Anyway, I'm gonna wrap this up (the longevity of this post seems to put me in the loser schema by default). What I'm trying to get at is that if life is a game, or more aptly a competition (which would make winners and losers possible), then I can't take the competition any more seriously than a game of Monopoly. Which might seem to create some tension with the ideas I was throwing around while addressing item one, but the basic point is this:
I am mad confused. Which is awesome. I feel like I could take on the world right now. And if you think my clumsy vocabulary and stuttering presentation is funny, I'll knock the teeth out of your mouth, because I'm a big boy and, loser or not, I know how to hold my own. I slice the paper to confetti with my commas; I won't think twice about ending a sentence's journey with the violent smackdown of a period (die motherfucker! die!); I dole out apostrophes as if they were cheaper thing on the planet; I make a sentence go schizophrenic crazy with semicolons; and I won't hesitate to get up in your face with an exclamation mark! And, through all this chaos, I somehow manage to keep my head balanced and lucid. Hyah! [High kick to your mind like the karate kid]
Mad confused yo, whoo, I'm dizzy . . . this is wonderful!
Peace.
Thursday, January 14, 2010
Mission Objective: Ultimately Unknown
Sup world. Welcome to Compartment: Code 7.
I guess I should start the silliness with a statement of purpose.
I created this site so that I would have a place to post the thoughts and ideas that come to me throughout the day. I've been spending a lot of time at home lately, which means that there's a lot bouncing in my head without necessarily having people to talk these things out with (working from home is a very mixed blessing in this regard). I'm hoping this blog may at least give me the illusion of having an audience . . . or at least provide me with the constant possibility of someone actually seeing this.
That being said, I'm feeling very uninspired at the moment. I could rattle off some things that I think would allow you to get to know me better, but I don't know what this would accomplish. So I guess I'll keep this short and sweet.
Peace.
I guess I should start the silliness with a statement of purpose.
I created this site so that I would have a place to post the thoughts and ideas that come to me throughout the day. I've been spending a lot of time at home lately, which means that there's a lot bouncing in my head without necessarily having people to talk these things out with (working from home is a very mixed blessing in this regard). I'm hoping this blog may at least give me the illusion of having an audience . . . or at least provide me with the constant possibility of someone actually seeing this.
That being said, I'm feeling very uninspired at the moment. I could rattle off some things that I think would allow you to get to know me better, but I don't know what this would accomplish. So I guess I'll keep this short and sweet.
Peace.
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