Maps

In seven days, I will be with this person.

And we will be in this place.

The Empress of Ice Cream

When my brothers and I were young, I was the homework maven and enthusiast. I would do theirs, or help them with it, and then start my own batch of dittos. This was always enjoyable to me because I got to practice teaching, to remind myself of the basic stuff that seemed, at that point, "intrinsically known" and not teachable. When I was in the seventh grade, my assignments drifted out of the fun category and into business. There was no time for craftiness and creativity; I had some serious material to know (this attitude was, in all likelihood, self-inflicted). At this time, my brothers would have been in the fifth and third grade. The thrid-grader, Chris, brought home an assignment to make ice cream. He had no interest in such an activity, so I willingly and excitedly said I would make it for him and then help him write up the report. In one bag, I put the ice cream stuff (milk, sugar, vanilla) and in a larger one, salt. Little bag in big bag and shake, shake, shake. And then, ice cream. The resulting lump of vanilla ice cream was impressive to Chris and my mother, but I loved the act of making it. It was a very egotheistical moment: "I am god. I made ice cream." Granted, I had done crafts before. So many stuffed, felt teddy bears with crooked stitching had sprung from my fingertips, not to mention the God's eyes, friendship bracelets, beaded picture frames, and collages (so, so many collages). But this was different: I made food.

I thought of this yesterday as I was watching television with a dear friend. Yes, we were watching sitcoms, which just so happens to be the foundation of both our youths. We decided that the beauty of sitcom characters lie in their nearly adderall-laden brains that, this week, they're totally into _________. The intensity with which they throw themselves into a certain mindset, activity, paranoia, philosophy is nothing short of inspiring. Britta was on a mission to stop being such a buzzkill. Abed (a novice director) spent a day chasing a potential movie plot he detected in his friends' relationships. Liz Lemon wanted to get back at her only good boyfriend who was getting married on the Today show, right outside of her window, by accidentally feeding the recovering alcoholic a fish meal with a sauce made of Jack (She just thought the salmon would give him food poisoning!). Hilarity, my friends, ensued.

So, why this homage of sorts to sitcoms? Why, now, of a lifetime of half-an-hours do I feel the need to express my fascination with the determination of fictional characters who are characters? Because, dear friends, yesterday I cancelled the cable, frustrated with my frustration that is evident in the rotations in channels I enact over and over again. I hate to admit this, because, would you ask me on the street, I would say, "No, I don't watch t.v." Ah, but I do. I live alone, and put the set on when I eat. Even this small timeframe of 15 minutes has become way too much (the Thursday night ritual with above-referenced friend shall not stop, though: too much fun). I think I finally figured out what it is that I like about the sitcoms anyway. It was what I liked about myself when I did my brother's science experiment. That day, I was totally into making ice cream. The next day-ish, I was totally into making music with water glasses. I taught myself the usual songs, "Mary Had a Little Lamb," "The Birthday Song," etc. But now I am an adult, and my days have themes and goals before the day even starts. I usually figure out the next day the night before. "Run to the office, print that stuff, teach, office hours, drive home, walk dog, write response, class, go to that reading, pick up dinner, read, crash." What a limiting theme: busy. I think today I'm going to have to teach myself to do something I don't know how to do and be totally into it.

How to Be One Thing

I made this for my Politics and Literature class as a creative response to Marjane Satrapi's Persepolis. I'm calling it a graphic novella. I do hope you can read it. Enjoy!

Ode to the Holiday Identity Crisis

Last March, I was on a train from Maastricht to Paris. My travelling companion and I could only procure tickets for separate cars. I willingly shelled out some extra monies so that I could sit in first class. My own plate of warm cookies? Yes, please! Free wifi? Don't mind if I do. About an hour into the trip, I was blissing. My iPod was probably playing a traveling tune to which I was happily bopping. This is when the steward approached me and started speaking before I could take out my ear buds. He was trying to hand something to me. I smiled in the goofy and awkward way I do when I'm trying to compensate for the fact that I've never felt comfortable being waited on. I laughed loudly, pulling out the ear buds, and said, again loudly, "Oh, no thanks!!!" I thought he was handing me a moist towelette, which was unnecessary since I think warm cookies call for finger-licking. He scowled in the way that a young Frenchman might. Without repeating himself, he simply handed me the paper that I would need upon my arrival to collect baggage, shot me one final grimace, and walked on.

I felt loud, silly, and stupid.

I've been thinking about this night-time train ride this week because I'm home with my family. When I'm with them, I feel loud, silly, and stupid. When with my friends, I think I'm generous of spirit. You have a different opinion than me? Cool, let's hear it; let's discuss it...quietly. But at home, I'm ungenerous. I'm right, and they're wrong. I am loud because, well, they're loud. I feel like the last four months of non-stop exchange of ideas in the academy (best if said with a British accent) is foresaken for arguments and Grand Ideological Battles on Nothing (GIBON). I feel like the worst version of myself here. I seem just as ridiculous as I did that night on the train. I'm not loud and I'm not stupid. But what do I do when I am those things? Does my family think of me in the same way that the steward did?

I remember once telling someone who felt unhappy that the true test of a good and happy person is if they can be good and happy in any situation. It's easy enough to be giving and gracious when you're comfortable, but what about when you're in a less-than-ideal situation? I've failed a test of my own design. I'm itching to be back with friends in New York and Las Vegas so I can "be myself." But am I really myself if I'm not that person everywhere? Shouldn't I be able to listen to my brothers talk about Tupac and protein shakes and boxing without losing my patience and becoming that loud, silly girl? I can only hope patience comes with age.

Excuse me, I'm going to go age.

Gestation

Today, with a newly gifted fifty in my wallet, I rifled through the shelves of the bookstore in my parents' hometown after excusing myself from football festivities. This was a welcome solo adventure made even more welcome when I came across a familiar book that, no, I never read but had already decided I would like. This past summer I won a contest that the author (the publisher?) organized to promote the book. And there it was! In print, ready for my reading. Of course I wanted The Whole Five Feet by Christopher R. Beha, who sent me one of the volumes from his collection of Harvard Classics, the topic of his memoir. And what did I think in my moment of exaltation? I thought about how I would blog about this story if I had a blog. As I walked toward the register, I was constructing the post in my mind.

This is something I've been doing a lot lately. And I'm not surprised; I read blogs every day. Though it seems silly to write about the tone of blogs since there are a million bloggers with a million different voices, I do think that there is a sound that they (at least the ones I read) share. They remind me of the conversations that I have with fellow students: relaxed, unpretentiously intellectual (to us), humourous, reflective. And the refelective part is the bit I admire the most. One of the biggest challenges that I saw my English 101 students grapple with this past semester was their inability to recognize themselves as thinking people. And they really were. But I couldn't teach them to write until I taught them that they did have things to say. The difference between me and them is that I know there are things I want to write, but I don't do it. No one is telling me to write a personal narrative though I desperately want to. Thus, a blog is born. And that's the best way to put it. I feel like a daddy seahorse. They give birth to like two-hundred baby seahorses at a time ("Open new tab" -> Google "seahorse" -> Wikipedia entry for "Hippocampus (genus)" -> scroll to "Reproduction" -> My factoid is confirmed: 100-200 young released). But, on average, five of those young survive. This is blogging. I'm pregnant with so many posts, and I'm really excited to see which will grow into fully devoloped Hippocampi.*

*apologies to seahorses, or really, any living thing that's ever given birth. I use this extended metaphor naively.