obligatory heyworth bar blog

[i originally started writing this as the power went out in heytown on dec. 27. sorry for the delay but amaren is really to blame]

it seems that every time i'm home i find myself at one (or more) of the three local establishments dedicated to alcohol consumption. and usually, something significant happens, about which I want to report. Things like crying over CT. sophomore homecoming dates becoming plumbers. jody singing while doing a shot. spartacus. my girlfriend from nap town. getting invited to house parties by 9th graders. the list goes on.....

but three things of significance happened last night at C2. first, i saw the necessary. it was not the first time i'd seen him at the circle. in fact, the very first time i went there on a thursday night with the butter cow crew he was there. the night it all began...but last night, the conversation was a bit more intense. he was one of the first people i saw after walking in with lou and mamaH. he said not much is new, except... & held up his left hand to display a wedding band. and then he very directly looked at my left hand. it was strange. i know plenty of married or engaged people. i know r___ & r____'s elaborate code system for communicating the presence or absence of a ring. but i've never felt so scoped out before. not to say that his scoping was due to romantic interest, but i guess i've never felt subject to such curiosity, presumably because i've always felt so far from the marriage stage. so i lifted my empty hand and said "nope" to which he responded with a slicing off the head motion, and said "don't do it." maybe i'm making too much of this, and by no means do i think this really means he is unhappy, but its very strange to be told by the man you went on your very first date ever with that marriage is a bad idea.

now, however much i'm blowing necessary's comments out of proportion, this is the type of thing i expect to happen when i make my rounds at the heyworth bars. i have bizarre conversations about children, marriage, jobs, school, and mostly the past with people i marginally knew in high school. but the second noteworthy event was entirely unexpected. i was standing by the flocked christmas tree with mamaH, and lou had gone to the bathroom (in which, taped to the mirror, is an utterly ignored sign that says "no smoking comrade" just below a newspaper article explaining the unconstitutionality of the illinois smoking ban). mid-conversation, i felt a swift and strong slap to the ass. i expected lou to be returning from the bathroom. but i looked around and she wasn't there. i searched behind me for b.s. or some other character i've known for 20 years that might feel such entitlement, but mostly just saw a bunch of kids about 6 years younger than me playing pool.

Then I saw markH. I didn’t know him well. His sister was on my high school basketball team. I believe we went to the same church as children. I once bought a pair of jeans were likely his from his family’s garage sale. But I wouldn’t say any of these connections might give one reason for thinking they have any business slapping my ass. Well, upon realizing through his drunkenness what he had just done, his face turned a bright rosy shade. He apologized. And I, being in a jovial mood didn’t yell, but laughed and eventually excused him. This of course, was the wrong move. I’m not sure any logic was functioning in his brain at the time, so perhaps my excusing was unrelated, but at this point, he started putting his hand on my waist and asking my age. When he discovered I was a mere 5 years younger than him (as opposed to one of his former girlfriends, who was 8 years younger), he pressed on. He paused to say “that’s kind of young” at which point I thought to myself- Oh, honey, if only you knew…but I kept quiet. The conversation finally ended with him attempting to get me to kiss him with the convincing line “come on, why not?” He walked away and rejoined his friends.

Later, Dana, who I had seen earlier with the elder Fox at H3, came over to say hello. We had lovely conversations about her sisters’ children, connie, and the Arkansas connection. The conversation was nothing extraordinary. But an hour after leaving the bar, I got a text from BS saying he ran into Dana at a gas station and she told him I was in town. The night before, I ran into little Mr. Burns at the AL and he texted his sister to tell her I was around. Last summer, BS’s brother saw me at the GLT summer concert and without my knowledge BS was informed. It sort of feels like being stalked. Perhaps it shouldn’t surprise me, and in a way its comforting, but you just can’t go anywhere in this town and get away with it. Word travels fast. My face is too familiar. This is not the place to hide out if I ever need to be anonymous. But on the other hand, it sort of feels like walking into the Cheers bar.

el fin

there's something about finals that heightens the senses.

maybe its that there is a sense of time that Fabian never accounted for. that sense that everything is about to end. The world, at least in its current state, will cease to exist after the next week. the clock is ticking and the sand is running out. nothing matters beyond next thursday. everything is urgent.

I spend all day in climate controlled environments, florescent lighting, the hum of the heater, the clicking of the keyboard. The copy machine blinds me. It is dark when I arrive and dark when I leave. The only light I see is the brief walk outside to the library.My bed is just a pitstop. I shed clothing leave it on the floor and find something new in the morning, just to repeat the cycle, leaving a mounting pile of discarded apparel next to the bed. My life is in disarray.

i carry books home just to set them down, pick them up 7 hours later and carry them back here. For all intents and purposes I live at this desk.

My sustenance comes from the convenient store downstairs, the free bread from some random event nearby, oatmeal that’s been sitting on the shelf for over a year and tea that we bought last spring for a department event. I have not eaten a meal at home in a week. Cookies, canned soup, an occasional bag of jellie beans.

Its as if everything is about to end. And suddenly everything must be solved now. This paper, which should be the pinnacle of my academic career thus far must be concluded. Anything I am passionate about cannot wait. I cannot be patient, I cannot take a deep breath and think about it. i cannot breathe except to write more. the feeling of time constraint makes it feel like something has to be secured before it all ends. it makes temptation scandal and excitement explosive.

But even in acknowledging it, I cannot fix it. I cannot slow it down. I cannot stop the keyboard clicking in my head, that blurs into the ticking of the clock and the heater’s rhythmic buzz, and the flipping pages, and beating hearts and churning stomachs and blowing wind, and my cell phone alarm buzzing and the coffee maker percolating and scanner screeching and I just can’t wait for it all to stop.

But when it does, as always, it will be a little too quiet. A little too lonely.

genero de nuevo

yes, once again, i have a comment about that whole gender debate i can't get over.

but i was reading david harvey's The Body as an Accumulation Strategy (1998 Environment and Planning 16:401-421), which I fall more in love with every time I read, and came across a sentence I thought appropriate.

But first, to contextualize: Basically Harvey is saying that the body is not "finished" but is malleable in certain ways, both by external and internal forces. Following from this, the body has a dialectical relationship with the processes that "produce, sustain, bound, and ultimately dissolve it" (402). Basically, similar to the way Butler conceives of the body (as not existing outside of discourse) Harvey is saying the body is very connected to the socio-political formations in which it is embedded.

And then the kicker

"And the representational practices that operate in society likewise shape the body, making any challenge to dominant systems of representation, as, for example, by feminists and queer theorists in recent years, a direct challenge to bodily practices" (403).

ok, back to writing. just can't get enough of the cholas...

prop 8

its late, i'm tired and stressed, and i have a full week of nonstop work ahead of me.

but this is just too good not to share.

dia de SIDA

today is world AIDs day.

and i have a number of disjointed thoughts on the matter.

1. i have never been tested for HIV. i always think i should do this. my excuse is that everytime i go for a checkup, most of the other tests are free. things like chlamydia, herpes, syphilis, etc? all covered. hiv, not so much. this just seems ridiculous now that i think about it. not ridiculous enough to be an appropriate excuse, i admit, but still. bizarre and counter-intuitive.

2. facebook tells me i should buy a cup of starbucks coffee today and they will donate a portion of profits to the global fund. and as lovely as this might seem, i have a real problem with the notion that the way to fix the world is to buy more. perhaps that $2 spent on overpriced coffee (even if it is free trade) should be directly donated to the global fund. its all so very sickeningly neoliberal. why is the technical solution to the problem always consumerism? why isn't the emphasis on education? or volunteering? because that would cause rethinking of cliches, and that's risking too much (to paraphrase tom robbins). instead we'd rather go about our daily lives changing very little, merely giving the appearance of caring through our commodified lifestyles. we've now fetishized caring about the world. i'm certainly guilty of it too, but i'm trying to be more conscious of it.

3. sure, i think world AIDs day is a great idea, but what about local AIDs day? I live in a city where 5% of residents are thought to have HIV. Not that we should not be concerned about "Africa" (as long as we can do it in a way that doesn't reek of paternalism), but maybe at some point we need to focus closer to home. Start questioning the ways in which HIV is closely connected to systemic inequalities here in our own neighborhoods. Start looking at the ways we reproduce the conditions that foster such high rates of HIV daily. Once we get that figured out, then its time to move on to the rest of the world.

So, in essence, my feelings on world AIDs day are crazy-isolationist, anti-capitalist, and hypocritical. what's new?

thanksgiving

As much as I like to think of myself as an optimist, I often focus on the bad more than the good. Earlier today I thought about writing something about all the things I’m thankful for, but I never really got around to it. And then I went off to thanksgiving festivities and didn’t give it a second thought.

Though I had quite a good time, I came home to my empty apartment, and couldn’t help but feel a little sad. It reminded me a little of thanksgiving 2003, walking home from work through grand central station the day before thanksgiving. Watching everyone rush off to their trains to see parents, siblings, cousins, grandparents, and family pets. Everyone in a good mood. Everyone with somewhere to go. And I just had to catch the 6 train downtown. Back to an empty apartment. At least this time I have windows in my bedroom.

And maybe its just that I tend to overanalyze everything. Or that I draw too many associations between tonight’s events and things that happened 5 years ago. But I was feeling pretty gloomy by the time I put my raw lasagna leftovers in the fridge.

But strangely, from the oddest of places, I was given hope. I ended up talking to tex, and despite all the complications and hurt feelings of the past, he was insightful, encouraging, and probably most importantly rational.

I am so very thankful for so very many things in my life, but at this moment, this is the one I want to write about. I have so many amazing friends that seem to pop up in the right time and place (even if via phone or email). I feel so lucky to have somehow happened upon people who really care about me. Who somehow see the best in me even when I’ve given them every opportunity to see the worst. And even though many of the situations we’ve found ourselves in over the years haven’t turned out quite as planned, I value them all so deeply. And their love manifests itself in many ways. Chocolate or cds randomly arriving in the mail. Love advice from once-scorned lovers. Text messages recounting random grocery store shelves or inside jokes about fishnets. Macabre postcards. I often ponder how much these people mean to me, and but its always nice to know I mean something to them too.

ok, enough with the mushiness already...

piensas terceras en hablando sobre genero en nueva york

i am in the midst of writing my paper on the fighting cholitas and am revisiting Cholas and Pishtacos for the 6th or 7th time. one of my great regrets about college (and there are probably only 3 or 4--and no, not even dillo day sophomore year would count as a regret) is not taking advantage of mary weismantel's wisdom. i've essentially sainted the woman in my mind.

so, of course, whenever writing about gender, race, ethnicity, rurality, the body, really anything...in bolivia, i consult my now tattered, dogearred, noted, penciled, penned, highlighted copy of the book. usually, i only read through the things i've underlined or highlighted, since i basically try to go through the entire book in a matter of an hour. but today, for some reason, i randomly found my self reading a paragraph i had overlooked before.

"passing--whether racial or sexual--is a signifying act that attempts to con the viewer into misreading the relationship between the clothing and the body; if it is successful, the error may never be discovered " (Weismantel 2001:111)

and for a woman with her personal politics, i find this treatment shockingly problematic.

words like "misreading" and "error" construct the trans (whether it be transgender, transrace, transclass, or trans-anything else) body as inherently its "prior" state and only superficially its post-trans state. and ironically enough, just half a page before, Weismantel invokes Butler, saying:

"Identity, Butler says, is not an epistemological fact at all, but an ongoing, improvisational performance, which takes shape through the 'mundane signifying acts of linguistic life" (Butler 1990:144 in Weismantel 2001:110)

so if its all signifying--if there really is no sexed body prior to the gendered body--then what is the mistake? what is the error?

but what i find most problematic is the word "con." it, of course, elicits similar meaning to "duped," but with a moral valuation. it is not merely "misrecognition" but intentional trickery, deception, and cheating. the more i think about it, the more i decide that "dupe" really is a rather appropriate word. perhaps this isn't pc, but in the same way i dupe people into thinking i know what i'm talking about in terms of bolivian wrestling...in the same way i dupe people into thinking i am "studious," "feminine," "kind," or "laid back," trans people--really all people--"dupe" others into reading their bodies in certain ways. and not just bodies, we read material goods, language, clothing, corporeality, and even facial expression as indicative of identity constantly. so why must we talk about it as if this is something bad?

perhaps what this all means is that we, as a society (or whatever you want to call it) lack the language for talking about this without stigma. (or maybe that's too much of a linguistic determinist position)

transgender day of rememberance

stated (as usual) more eloquently at feministing, and even more so by bear, but i just wanted to do a little part as well.

there have been at least 30 trans people killed in the last year, specifically because of their gender identity. say what you want about "duping" and "biology," but it baffles me that with so many problems in the world people feel compelled to spend energy tormenting each other.

so, the least we can do is remember

Kellie Telesford. Brian McGlothin. Gabriela Alejandra Albornoz. Patrick Murphy. Stacy Brown. Adolphus Simmons. Fedra. Sanesha Stewart. Lawrence King. Simmie Williams Jr. Luna. Lloyd Nixon. Felicia Melton-Smyth. Silvana Berisha. Ebony Whitaker. Rosa Pazos. Juan Carlos Aucalle Coronel. Angie Zapata. Jaylynn L. Namauu. Samantha Rangel Brandau. Nikki Williams. Ruby Molina. Aimee Wilcoxson. Duanna Johnson. Dilek Ince. Ali. And two other Iraqi transgender women.

and if any of you happen to be in san fran at the aaas, there's a great trans activism panel going on in about an hour.

decepción

to paraphrase charlie brown: nothing takes the taste out of soy hot chocolate quite like disappointment.

i know i should be writing about being 15 freakin' feet away from evo morales last night, but instead in need to indulge in self pity.

perhaps i am naive for being confident. shouldn't i have learned after all those rounds of applications that maybe i'm not as great as i thought i was. but no, i really thought it was going to work out this time. i thought it had all come together. i thought the reasoning was sound, the support was there, i even did the budget the way they told me to. and all for naught.

of course, this isn't the end of the line. there's always next semester. there are always other options. there's always debt. there's always reconfigurations. there's always the internet pain photos route to take (coincidentally about which i wrote an abstract today). but i guess i'm just feeling utter disappointment. not failure, but confusion. not sadness, but frustration.

i just need to remember, that when dwight couldn't get into bon vanai as an anthropologist he went as a public health worker. i need to be savvy...

luchando con la governadora

the rest of you out there in blog land might not share my fascination with wrestling, but you can't deny the absurdity of this

yes, sarah palin has been invited to attend TNA's december event, and not only that but to join the knockouts. at risk of reinforcing stereotypes about who watches wrestling and being complacent with the totally unnecessary sexualization of palin during the campaign, i just want to say that this seems all too appropriate. if there really is a palin 2012 in store, this seems like just the way to begin the pre-campaign.

hopefully my humor is shining through. in case its not though, i'll let rachel maddow cover me

en mis suenos

ok, i know i post things about mustaches all the time, but this is just too good to pass up.

piensas segundas en hablando sobre genero en nueva york

i had an interesting conversation today about the advantages of good argument, and it made me reconsider my previous thoughts.

first, i definitely tended to side with ee in the argument. though i was keeping quiet at first, then trying to frame the argument as an important point of exploration in understanding where others "come from," i still definitely thought of one person as "right" and others as "wrong"--though distinguishing between "unfortunately uninformed" and "closed-minded asshole." However, i think its important to understand that its not productive to judge peoples' true reactions. Granted, we all do judge neo-nazi reactions, gay-bashing reactions, etc. But first, I think many would argue those are not necessarily reactions but decisions. And that assumption aside, wouldn't it be more productive to understand the bases of those reactions, rather than immediately jump on them? Not to say there was immediate jumping in the conversation friday night, but when we get so utterly wrapped up in our research or cause we lose sight of they way it is situated in quotidian life of others, we lose sight of the ultimate goal.

Second (and on a less-philosophical, more practical note), the conversation today made me think about the way I argue. And here I will offer self-critique with this blog as a prime example. As in the previously linked past blog, and probably others, but i'm too lazy to look through old posts right now, I often make rhetorical points in rather sarcastic ways. And it is my hunch that this (rather than pointing out the social construction of race) was the fiend's tactic in the argument friday night. And really, that's not a very productive way to argue. Its that sort of thing that lends itself to the eruption of shouting matches, rather than dialogue that ends in mutual understanding, or even a more nuanced way of looking at a situation.

So, i hereby officially take back my comment about rolled tongues and attached earlobes. I'm not editing the previous post, because, well, i kinda think that picture is funny, and it wouldn't make sense if I deleted that part of the post. But I want to formally apologize to all 4 of you that read this for my unproductive argumentative skills. I'm going to try hard to argue in more productive ways. Hm...maybe that will be a new year's resolution. Or as jk used to suggest, a thanksgiving resolution.

ay dios

i'm guessing the number of people who read both this and the monkeyhippy's blog is between 0 & 1, so i'm not feeling guilty about reposting.

this is just ridiculous. but at least it demonstrates in one fell swoop how incompetent our healthcare and immigration systems are.

hablando sobre genero en nueva york

jster was in bklyn for a conference this weekend, so ee & i decided to take a little road trip. friday night, we had dinner with fiend, the r___, his relatively new ladyfriend, and scamz. of course, during dinner ee mentioned his research, followed by scamz engaging in a curious, interested conversation on the topic. but of course, others had to jump in with "biological" reasoning. now, this might be interesting in a case in which present at the table would be say, a biologist who studies the hormonal differences between men and women. but listening to a law student and a formerly radically libertarian anthro student defend the "naturalness" of the sex/gender system was rather unfortunate and uninformed.

The latter claimed along the way "i've read the same literature you have"--obviously not, and the former suggested "well, then i can just say i'm black." Ok, interesting reasoning, and at least this takes into account the socially constructed essence of race (though i'm not sure that was part of his reasoning). But what i really think would be a better analogy would be someone born in New Jersey claiming to be a New Yorker. Or perhaps someone who liked to listen to jam bands in their youth now claiming to be part of indie music culture. i think the point is that gender, like other forms of identity, has nothing to do with the past. it is instantiated in the moment and solidified by repeated iteration. much like the way "being a new yorker" doesn't necessarily mean you had to have been born somewhere between van cortlandt park and coney island, but relies more on an intimate knowledge of the subway system, or ability to wear stupid hipster clothes while taking oneself completely seriously.

And while ee is usually the first to get aggressive in the face of such attacks, i was rather shocked at his composure. he also didn't bring up the personal nature of the conversation, and i can't help but wonder how the conversation would have gone if this had been part of the mix. in the end, i'm not sure much was accomplished, but i was heartened by the way scamz seemed genuinely curious, and open to questioning his perceptions, even if the other two were not.

interestingly enough, today i came across this article on gay marriage in mexico city. sidestepping the marriage argument as a whole (and you might guess how i fall on this one) what i find most interesting about the article is the thought that marriage be defined as a union between “two biologically distinct persons.” now, this may be a product of poor translation, but i'm not sure, even if we don't question the ideology behind science and "biology," what two people would not be biologically distinct. identical twins? a cloned person?

and then further assuming that there is something "biologically" similar about certain people, wouldn't this mean that a black man and a white man could be married? or someone who is xxy could marry someone who is either xy or xx? or perhaps, like we all did in 6th grade science we should be paying more attention to who can roll their tongue and who has loose vs. attached ear lobes (yes i can roll my tongue and yes my ear lobes are attached, for those who might be interested).

saturday at dinner, i joined a less heterosexual, but just as normative crowd. they had just been to see mr. russell's casting genius in wig out (based loosely on paris is burning and ball culture), and mr. rhodes greeted me with "the legendary!" when i walked in. apparently dwt had mentioned dinner would involve a mystery guest, but hadn't told them who. later in the dinner, rhodes mentioned jk, and the table erupted in laughter. russell defended his previous statements. though i certainly have my own opinions about what actually happened (and those opinions certainly grant little legitimacy to the words of a man who lied about visiting his sister for a year and a half), i think this is at least demonstrates how, even for some of the most bourgeoise, homonormative, fabulous, bitchy (and i use that word, not in degradation, but because they do) men i know, sexual identity and practice do not necessarily coincide at all times.

ok, so yes, sexuality is very different from gender, and i don't mean to conflate the two. in fact, i think one thing that this weekend really solidified in my mind is how completely divergent sexuality, desire, love, and compatibility really are. and all for the best.

el sol

i was lying in bed this afternoon, listening to music, sort of "napping." I was listening to Kate Nash and her lyrics really struck me

I can be alone, yeah
I can watch a sunset on my own

how very appropriate.

of course, only my anthropology nouveau folks in the dale would really understand. and they don't read this, but i wanted to somehow commit it to memory. i should probably call mom and make sure she's fed the lizard too.

mapas

since i'm kinda obsessed with maps, and since we've all still got the election on our minds, here's a little eye candy.

4 de noviembre

tuesday when i got home from class i did laundry and watched cnn. but of course, nothing much was happening before polls closed, so there wasn't much point, except to see wolf blitzer and anderson cooper say the same things over and over. lou called shortly after i arrived, to say that she wasn't going to grant park as planned. i told her i was disappointed because i wanted to live vicariously through her.

but at 7:30 i went to julie's to watch the returns. the truth is though, i wasn't paying much attention to the tv. rumagin, ezra & i made some predictions as to timing and electoral numbers, but mostly i was concentrated more on my whisky and a conversation about umphrey's mcgee.

then ohio went to obama. and florida. and virginia. i had said to rumagin earlier, that if ohio goes blue, i'd be pretty convinced of victory. but somehow when the cnn powers that be announce such things with 14% of precincts reporting, it just doesn't feel real yet. so we continued to watch. the crowd of 15 slowly dwindled until it was just julie, phil, ee, and I.

and then mccain conceeded. i had a bottle of champagne that dvine gave me for my birthday, which we opened during his speech. However, we had to sort of work the cork out. no popping across the room. which is, unfortunately, how the announcement felt. but we toasted. it looked like obama wasn't going to speak for a while, so ee and i hopped in my car and i started to take him home.

but as we neared his place, the streets were getting crowded and we decided we should probably head down 16th street. we got to M and we were seeing more and more people, so we parked and walked to the white house. and there was a small crowd. there's a fence along the back side of the house, across the street from Lafayette Sq. and we worked our way through a few hundred people to it. there wasn't much going on other than chanting and singing and really we were both sort of tired and just taking in everything around us.

we stayed for about an hour, both running into students in the classes we TA. But things weren't too crazy. when we decided to leave, we realized the crowd had grown exponentially around us. by the time we got back to the car, and npr, they were announcing that the crowd had reached "several thousand." there were GW cross country team members running and singing, a guy wandering around in his underwear, people in suits, people with cameras, off duty security guards, kids who looked 15, old hippie activist types, young punk activist types. but everybody was happy and yelling. the streets were basically a constant stream of cars honking continuously, and pedestrians running with their arms up down the middle of the street shouting happily.

dc returned 92% in favor of obama by the last count i saw. and on the streets last night you could certainly tell. everyone was out. everyone was shouting or honking. and for once, nobody seemed to care how slowly traffic was moving.

jesus

i watched jesus camp tonight. which was a bad idea. (i'm not going to give a full recap, but there's interesting commentary here)

but first, the bright side. i noted during the credits that both directors, both producers, and both DPs were women. Assuming these people are normatively named, that's quite a feat. and that, in itself is a little depressing. what does it say about the state of affairs in film that i watch a fairly low budget doc, though well-distributed, and get excited that these 6 positions are filled by women?

but on to the real scary part. i think my timing in watching the film was a bit masochistic. Pastor Ted Haggard, President of the National Association of Evangelicals, representative of 30 million people, and advisor to President Bush said "Its an awful lot of people and we're growing...its got enough growth to essentially sway every election. if the evangelicals vote, they determine the election." Now, of course, I'm not taking ol' Haggard at his word, but it does give one pause. And I'm not about to write off the 2000 election as a time when the hidden masses of evangelicals made their voices heard, or even error. But it makes me question my faith in democracy in some ways (different ways from when i question whether one could really call the U.S. a democracy). Do I believe in a system in which a majority, no matter how oppressive or poorly guided their principles are allowed to make decisions for all, simply based on numbers (a la Hamas)? I suppose the one thing that Youth Pastor Becky Fischer and I agree on is "I think that Democracy is the greatest political system on earth but that's the problem. It's earth." Of course, she goes on to say, "It is ultimately designed to destroy itself because we have to give everyone equal freedom and ultimately that is going to destroy us." which I wouldn't really agree with.

This all of course reminds me of tanasha reemer. I wonder how she's doing, whether she and her husband and children ever made it to Africa to spread the word. Oh, excuse me...the Word. I wonder how her family is, and I hope they are all well. But moving back to the democracy issue, I truly hope they don't vote on Tuesday. And I hope that JeFF and Brewski don't vote on Tuesday. And those guys from Florida who lived in my hall sophomore year (2000). And for me that's scary. Because I believe so firmly that we should all have a say, but I guess deep down I'm a hypocrite. I only want the people who think like me to really be enfranchised. Maybe I should just go find a commune of like-minded people and cut myself off from the outside world.

Well, if there is a god, i hope that god is a sensible one and uses their godly powers to shape positive change in the world, because as i've mentioned before, its so screwed up i'm pretty sure only some supernatural power could make much progress.

bigotes

i am reexamining my lack of belief in a benevolent divine being.

halloween

and what a halloween it was...

i hadn't dressed up since 2004. and i didn't plan on it today. i left the house and 9 so i could get to school, write a welcome speech, and do some reading before class. i got the speech done, but i ended up collecting pictures for the remaining gill for his media room. after class i rushed to butler for the opening session and to give my welcome speech (it went fine). after the radical cheerleaders did their business, i rushed to battelle to meet with despina. instead i sat outside her office with julia & catherine for almost an hour. it was there that i learned that no one likes yellow scarf girl. finally catherine & i got in and we discussed everything from austrian performance art politics of the 70s to why americans like conquest movies to much, and even the historical trajectory of cindy sherman's art. strangely, though, i left feeling still bewildered. but charging ahead, i rushed back to butler to make sure there was water in nina's session. there was. finally, the conference ended and i went back to the basement of battelle to get my shit together for the panel i'm facilitating tomorrow. but of course the printers weren't working at first, and it took me almost 20 minutes of fiddling to fix one. then i walked to guapos.

there things got better. i had my first sustenance (aside from a reeses peanut butter cup) of the day, along with 2 margaritas. i ended up talking to naomi, david, & his prof from Wesleyan for a long time, before going to rumagin's party.

the geico caveman outfit was quite a success. in fact, it looked way better than i had expected. ee & i felt left out so we decided to exchange clothing and go as each other. someone donated a blonde wig, and we used rumagin's fake hair scraps to fashion facial hair for me. it was quite the experiment in embodiment. the jeans were very tight on my hips, but having so much shit in my pocket definitely made me stand differently. and facial hair (or maybe just fake facial hair) certainly changes the way i drank and ate. though, i'm not sure ee got the full nell-embodiment effect, because i wore a skirt today, which generally throws me off as well. its just so damn hard to sit in those things! but i think this may play well into our binding video we make for our "creative project" for despina. we shall see.

in the end, i ripped the hair off my face, and drove home. the places where the sideburns were glued feel a little raw. hopefully, i won't wake up tomorrow, bright and early, ready to facilitate my anthropology and activism panel with giant red splotches on my cheeks.

regalos de cumpleaños

an especially large & unexpected gift this year got me thinking about the amazing gifts i've been given in the past. i'm always amazed by the generosity of my friends. i generally try to put a lot of thought into the gifts i give, and my mom often tells me that i'm "such a good gift-giver." but these things go far beyond that. so in a gesture of appreciation to both those wonderful friends, and the grand generosity of the universe, here are the 10 best birthday gifts i've received since 1999

10. the family guy evil monkey patch & jesus coloring book, from the cladistics, age 23
9. a white russian (because it directly followed a 3 wise men shot), from the 409 crew, age 21
8. entrance to the co-op's halloween party, from dwt, age 19
7. a fetish necklace from the rez, from biijihbah, age 25
6. a poem and thai food, from scamz, age 20
5. a hand constructed bar, from dwt, age 21
4. a ring made from polish amber, from lou, age 26
3. a vintage 1965 french bike, freshly painted mint green, from ee, age 27
2. my purpleish scarf, i bought it for myself, age 23
1. the navy hoodie that i call home, from mom, age 18

i'm either paranoid or too intuitive for my own good

please excuse the vagueness. i have my reasons.

i'm feeling like i'm about to be very disappointed and i'm not sure i can take it. i've already had my heart ripped out twice in the last year, and i'm sick of it. i keep telling myself that good things happen to people all the time, and i shouldn't be so suspicious, and damn, just look around...

and when this all started, likely due to the previous rippings, i proceeded cautiously. but after what seemed like some perfect communication i started to throw caution to the wind. now i think that probably wasn't the best idea. i'm usually far more reserved, but after countless gchats with kj, it seemed like that was the way to go. maybe that's what we had been missing all along.

and i've decided that friends forseeing happy things in my future, usually means brief bouts of happiness followed by disappointment. last year when the now short-haired dirty hippie suggested something good would happen in the next 6 months, i only had to wait 2 weeks. then two months later i felt like i had been trampled.

this summer, gina cottone-divito-cottone's former future ex-husband told me something would be "seriously wrong with the world" if something good didn't happen soon. and a few weeks later, something did. but am i so terribly cynical and bitter that i can't just be happy and enjoy it. why am i so suspicious that things couldn't possibly work out. why must i read too far into simple things that should make a giant smile spread across my face. instead, i call the lou frantically saying i'm sure its a method of avoidance. i wish i could just let go and enjoy things as they happen, for better or worse. maybe this time, things are different.

i must be totally insane.

but then i think back to instances when i tried to convince myself i was just paranoid, but really, i was just seeing the first inclings of bad news. the spell right before finals. that conversation so many years ago about mcCait while lying on the floor of the zbt chapter room. or worse, the "i think i just need to deal with the tension" phonecall (though that one i really wasn't all that upset about). that look accompanied by "oh, dj nellie." its always subtle, but i can always see right through it. and damn, i really hope this is not that.

mejor

today was a much better day than expected. especially considering the fact that my archaeology midterm was due tonight.

it started like any other. i woke up later than planned and tried to throw some more ideas about marxist archaeology on the page. then off to the class i TA. afterwards, i had had a lot of archaeology reading to do and a project proposal to turn in by 5. i decided my desk at school was the place i was least likely to be productive (especially with rumagin around), and scoffing at the coffeehouse options near campus i headed to admo. basically, after hearing mention of unicorn two weeks ago, and then walking past it last saturday, i've realized i crave a space like that here. i wasn't a frequent patron of the 'corn, but i have fond memories of it. i'm pretty sure i composed a few poems there, back in my bard-esque days. but here, the options are couches in the student center, starbucks, or the "mud box" in the basement of the library. rumagin actually suggested there's a coffeeshop in the arts center, which i didn't know, but i thought today wasn't right for exploring. i needed something reliable. so i hopped on the red line and headed to tryst. i called e.e. on my way, and he met me there. i got a decent amount of reading done, finished my proposal, and had a tasty sandwich too.

at 5, we left, and i decided to take the bus back since it was running more frequently. on our walk east, we stopped into city bikes, where e.e. wanted to get some sort of elusive bolt for otto's bike. they didn't have it, but the guy behind the counter said if he brought the stem in they could figure something out. behind the counter there was a half full bottle of vodka. they had a little feat cd playing. i like that place....if only i had a bike. but i do have a suspicion that i might be getting one soon. i was confused as to what gift would require my inseam length but not my waist size. but when i mentioned that e.e. should build me a bike, he reacted strangely. then he said he had been painting today, and when i asked what was being painted he responded "just something i needed to paint." i'm suspicious. or maybe its just wishful thinking. i suppose i'll find out soon though.

after all this, i took the bus back to campus, finished reading, did one quick last edit of the midterm, and printed it, using the secret hidden toner stash.

finally, at 8 it was time for class. archaeology is usually the bane of my existence. its been almost 7 years that i've been saying "never trust an archaeologist" (and i keep finding new reasons why its true). i find the discipline marginally interesting on good days, and dreadfully mundane anytime after 6pm (and the class is 8-10:30pm). but instead of meeting in our usual classroom, we have moved our class to d-say's new lab. sure, its in the basement, but its littered with paul simon posters, and maps of the great dismal swamp (sounds so upbeat!). and to celebrate our new location, we had a lab-warming party with pastries, pakistani potato balls, cookies, and pumpkin bread. our new seating arrangement was far more conducive to discussion, and i was more awake than usual tonight. perhaps because we were discussing inequality and resistance as visible in the archaeological record. dan even asked if anyone really got into resistance. his example was "you know, when you hear the word resistance, do you say 'fuck yeah!'?" I responded that maybe i didn't say those exact words, but i did get into resistance. of course slight ironies were not lost on me. i noticed every liquid in the room was a coca cola product. a 2 liter of coke. a 2 liter of sprite. a 16 oz coke. a 16 oz diet coke. a McDonald's medium cup full of coke. a 20 oz dasani (porcupine) water bottle. a 16 oz dasani (porcupine) water bottle. and i even drank some coke, but only because rafi poured a cup for marvine, but she already had one. i simply offered to consume what would have otherwise gone to waste....

class ended with a rousing tale of how d-say didn't drop out of college due to one amazing archaeology professor. the story also included the fact that he graduated from high school 4th from the bottom of his class of 2000, and at one point in his college career had a 1.65 gpa. i guess that gives one hope that no matter where you start, you can get a ph.d.....and a job....

after class we all hung around a bit finishing off the last of the snacks, and i ended up offering k squared a ride home. i've decided he's my new favorite friend. along the way he told me stories about when he and his wife were in the peace corps in romania. and he made a joke about celeine dion music.

so maybe the day wasn't quite so remarkable, but the paper is finished, and all i have to do tomorrow is go to class and write my (now 2 days overdue) questions for the panel i'm facilitating next weekend. and then on to birthday partying this weekend....

constitución

just in case you're not paying particularly close attention to bolivia, the draft constitution was ratified!

gracias a dios

there is a lot i want to write about my weekend, but this is more important for the moment.

i'll only say this.

there is a person i have found supremely annoying, insincere, and abrasive for a little over a year. however, it seemed that no one else saw those qualities in this person. in fact, most of my friends were quite fond of this person, so i've been biting my tongue and trying to deal with the hours i spend with this person daily.

however, tonight i discovered that an entire cadre of people feel exactly the same way. and its so relieving. so vindicating. i feel like a burden has been lifted, and like i'm not such a bitch for having negative feelings about this person.

las políticas de zappatos

this weekend i went to a wedding. while it hasn't been uncommon for me in the last few years to end up at the weddings of people I only vaguely know, i had never met either the bride or groom this time. i'd like to think this gives me a unique perspective.

weddings always hit me in a strange way. partially because for so many years i was pretty convinced that i had no marriage (nor the desire for one) in my future. partially because wedding ceremonies make so clear the ways in which "traditional" gender ideology continues to be reinscribed. i'm not the biggest fan of phrases like "man and wife" or all the talk about the aim or marriage being reproduction. and to all of that add the blatant commodification of desire.

not to say i don't enjoy weddings. other people's grotesque overspending usually results in me having a pretty fantastic time (and this wedding was in no way any exception). and the truth is, though i wouldn't be particularly concerned with the save the date magnets matching the bridesmaids' hair-dos, if i ever get married i can imagine myself eating every angsty word i've ever muttered about the ridiculousness of weddings (though thankfully, consueloZ, from the midst of wedding planning, assures me that it is possible to keep a level head about these things--no sand art!).

but this i will never take back...the ceremony had already begun when we found a pew on the wrong side of the aisle. the priest launched into a long metaphor of the ephemerality of flowers and the necessity of roots for lasting love. and then he turned to meaning of sacrifice in a relationship. here i will try to loosely quote: "John, sometimes you'll just want to come home and watch TV, but Casey will want to talk about her day, and you'll have to sacrifice. And Casey, when you're out shoe shopping and John just wants to go home, you'll have to sacrifice and take him home."

what struck me as so brialliant about the phrase was the complex interweaving of gender, consumption, and identity. the priest constructed the neoliberal formations at work here as naturalized (see lancaster 2003) and traditional enough to be in what many consider to be a sacred ceremony.

i'll side-step the television reference, and focus exclusively on the shoes. shoes represent a particuarly feminized realm of consumption, even in an age in which men's clothing style as become important and indicaive of lifestyle (see mort 1996). shoe shopping also connotes a level of wealth which allows for shopping as a leisure activity, rather than the procurement of a necessity. Finally, the positions of quitting shopping as "sacrifice" positions it as not only normative, but a right.

and so, in this most important of moments, neoliberal gender ideology forms the way we conceputalize partnerships, the family and the meanings we associate with "love."

la política electoral

I had a meeting today for our conference on supporting social movements, during which, among many other things, we discussed who would moderate the closing panel. some people felt this was a particularly important decision because a) the topic is political b) the panel includes at least one politically outspoken person c) Laura Nader (Ralph's big sis) is on the panel and d) it takes place a mere 3 days before the election. a democratic party leaning professor was decided upon.

what followed really bothered me. there were half joking comments about turning people's mics off if disparaging comments about (or merely disagreements with) Obama or his stances were made. I muttered something under my breath about free speech. the conversation then turned to blaming Nader for Gore's defeat. The Jag said, "Nader should be banned from the ballot in swing states." A lone undergrad spoke up and said "maybe the democratic party should stand for real change." I kept my mouth shut.

i find it really frustrating that people who consider themselves so liberal, the kind of people who dedicate time to a conference on supporting social movements, code pink enthusiasts, radical activists, trans rights workers, people with close relationships and vested interests in subjugated groups around the world, would be so closed-minded. i don't care who they vote for. its none of my business and frankly, if people want to write in Ann Coulter for president I won't judge them for it (well, maybe just a little, but i'm sure they have their reasons). but to limit people's options or access seems to me to be the opposite of democracy. and these are people criticizing Palin for suggesting that a democratic Hamas victory didn't count as democracy.

el comunismo

at the age of 13, i decided my composition class final paper, essentially an 8th grade thesis, would be on "communism." now, as a child of the cold war, my concept of communism certainly had far more to do with stories about east Berlin and the Soviet breadlines than any sort of political or economic philosophy. as part of this exploration, i embarked on the Communist Manifesto and found that communism was not some exotic or even evil philosophy of domination but was actually somewhat sensical. i imagine the paper was a monumental (by my standards of the time) length of 10 pages (10 hand-written pages of course), and how i managed to even delve into something like "communism" is laughable.

well, fortunately, i have now had a chance to read it again. and after having read das Kapital (vol. 1) last year, i felt pretty fluent. in fact, in a class with 11 other silent parties, i felt like the know it all, answering question after question following a pregnant pause.

until last year, i never really contemplated my stance on marxism/socialism/communism. however, after hotboxing althusser, harvey, gramsci, wolf, and voloshinov for a few years, i guess i'd have to admit a pretty marxist leaning in my academic work.

...i guess some things are just inevitable.

la idioma de amor

i've written before about the politics of affectionate nickname usage here, but feministing clued me in to a recent nytimes article that discusses diminutive nicknames used toward the elderly. obviously, this demonstrates parallels between sexism and ageism, but it really makes me wonder how this came to be. how did words that should be wonderful to hear become such a burden? in both cases, i suppose, false or unwelcome affection is taken as offensive. i suppose its all (as usual) about power, and who is able to manipulate others via language.

iglesias bolivianas

sometimes i feel like i've been looking at all the angles. then i see something like this that reminds me just how wide the spectrum is.

so, i guess the one thing we might agree on is that we'd all be happier if bolivia were a little less violent, and relations with the u.s. were a little less strained. of course, i doubt we'd agree on who exactly is at fault in that relationship.

adición

home baked vegan banana bread makes everything better

lluvia

i'm in a shitty mood tonight.

first, i went to the bank today to deposit my giant stipend check, and according to the bank's computer, the account I've had since the fall of 2003 is a "new account" so i must wait 3 days for my funds to become available. the guy let me take out some cash as a "special favor" and then criticized me for wearing a sweater in the 65 degree weather.

class was actually alright, and afterwards, i went with ee & delf to get 1/2 price veggie burgers at a bar in dupont circle. $5 instead of the regular $10. but of course, they were out of veggie burgers, so i ended up paying $7 for a small bowl of lentil soup.

on the way home, i stopped to buy some neosporin (which seems to be the only thing that makes me not itch my crazy dry ankle until it bleeds), and i thought i had a bit of luck. the sign in cvs said it was on sale for $4.49. but, of course when i took it to the register it rung up for its regular price, $8.99. whatever...i was going to buy it anyway.

finally, i got home and found an email from the anthro dept.'s student activities advisor who basically told me that it was "impossible" that the people who were supposed to get reimbursements last year never received them.

i'll deal with it tomorrow when i'm in a more diplomatic mood.

i also had my ipod plugged into my computer to charge all day, and upon returning home found that not only did it not charge at all, the computer isn't recognizing it, and its stuck on the "do not disconnect" screen.

sorry for complaining. hopefully tomorrow will be better. unfortunately, thursdays are the worst day of the week.

ugh.

el crudo y lo cocido

against my better judgement, i have been persuaded (coerced) into eating only raw food for a week. granted, the lasagna and apple pie were damn good, but i know i am going to regret this. don't worry, i PROMISE this will not turn permanent. i will never try to convince you that you should try it. i will never chant "cooked food is poison." but i think there are some important things that will be made clear by doing this.

first, i'm convinced that the more thought that goes into food, the better. in making it harder for myself to eat whatever happens to be around, i will hopefully be paying more attention to where my food is coming from, what's in season, which nutrients i'm actually getting...not to say that one must eat raw food to pay attention to such things. but it also cuts way down on packaging and energy used to cook (though i'm still keeping fresh things cold in the fridge).

second, i think this will be a study in the kind of time, dedication, and resources such a lifestyle would entail. many diets, even vegetarian ones, are only available to those in privileged positions. soaking things takes a lot of time. raw nuts and some of the other specialty type items important to raw food are hard to find, and food processors, dehydrators, and juicers are expensive. basically, to pull this off, you'd have to be an affluent, leisure-endowed, childless person with some pretty swell kitchen appliances.

anyway, i might end up giving up after a few days, but i thought it would be an interesting experience to write about. dissertation seminar ordered pizza tonight and had some leftovers, which ee and i scavenged. so broccoli pizza (though cold) will be my last cooked meal for a week. here goes the experiment.....

revistas

i generally despise the magazine industry. i have a lot of good friends that work in publishing, and i even spent a brief stint and nyrb, but in the end, all these publications do is promote conspicuous consumption and remedial reading levels.

ok, maybe i'm being too harsh. i am currently sitting next to a stack of 2 national geographics from the 1970s and and 9 issues of harper's which i claimed from the free book pile today. i do read magazines, but generally think the world would not be a worse place if they didn't exist.

generally.

unfortunately, i learned today that bitch magazine will likely fold, and soon, if a grand old sum of money does not fall into their hands. and i've got to say, i actually do think the world would be a little worse of a place is bitch ceases to exist. i'm not an avid reader. i've probably only bought 3 or 4 issues. but i think in a world of cosmos and vogues, magazines like bitch, and even jane circa 2003 (and i'm not just mentioning jane because they so kindly put my picture in their and gave me a free pair of roller skates) give young--and not so young--women an alternative view of aspirations. kind of like when mattel came out with the less drastically waist lined barbie or something.

basically, what i mean to say is: as long as we've got this screwed up magazine industry, its been nice having a few options which are not quite as evil as the rest. though it seems like those days are numbered.

politics of motherhood

I admit to being hypocritical about a number of things. I think this happens because I'm pretty stubborn, and once in a while two things on which i refuse to change my opinion come in to conflict. For example, I consider myself "open minded." However, upon being faced with the prospect of dating someone i thought was quite nice and smart but with who i profoundly disagreed about politics (particularly a certain brand of reaganomics), i ended things. when told i was being closed minded about the situation, i said, "you're right. and i accept that."

However, one issue I still struggle with is cesareans. In 2006 31.1% of US births were via cesarean, compared to 5.5% in 1970 and 2002 (most recently available) rates for France and Holland (two of the countries with lowest infant mortality) were respectively 16% and 14%. The WHO recommends that a rate of 10-15% is advisable. There's been much research determining the adverse affects of unnecessary cesarean sections, and I tend to readily advocate "natural birth" over cesarean. In fact, I'd say that I tend to think slightly less of mothers that give birth via cesarean, even when deemed "necessary" by doctors. Somehow I believe these women should be more assertive, argue with their doctors, stand up for their "rights," and demand natural childbirth. And somewhere in my biased mind I believe that those who don't want a natural birth are just ill informed or lazy.

But I'm trying. Because I also believe that a central part of reproductive justice is giving people the right to choose to reproduce or not, in whatever way they feel most comfortable. People--meaning the citizens, not some state institution--should have choice and autonomy in their sexual and reproductive decision. This means they should be able to choose any form of partem they see most fit. And if they happen to think that cesarean section is the most advisable or preferable way to do things, I should support them.

Well, much to do has been made over Sarah Palin's womb, children, and one particular child's womb lately. And while I don't think Bristol's fetus has anything to do with her mother's ability or lack thereof to govern, NAPW President Lynn Paltrow has pointed out some of Palin's own inconsistencies on the subject of autonomous reproductive choices in an open letter to the Alaska Governor. I highly recommend clicking on that link and reading for yourself, but for those of you too busy/lazy here is the point in brief: Paltrow points out inconsistencies in Palin's stances on abortion and forced cesarean in the context of the birth of her fifth child, with whom she waited over 11 hours after her water broke to enter a hospital. Paltrow respects Palin's ability to evaluate risk and make her own decisions. She simply asks that Palin extend such respect over choices to other women. I clearly can't do the letter justice. I guess that's why Paltrow is president of a national organization, and I'm just a lowly Ph.D. student...

mantequilla

i don't know about the peanut butter...

and it looks a bit like a "mule with tits"

but i'm definitely going to try this at home

presidentes

i've been trying to refrain from too much politics here, most likely due to my cynicism. but i couldn't help but post the this link to writing about female vice presidents in latin america. its funny how we think of the u.s. as so far removed (& beyond) our Southern neighbors, while they make political moves that we can only hope for. i wonder how long it will be before we have an indigenous president.

not to say that latin america should be seen as a role model for fair or equitable electoral politics, but i also think its important to not get too far ahead of ourselves thinking a non-white or non-male on a major ticket is anything revolutionary.

professora w.

i just heard a piece of news that could solve all of my advisor orphandom problems....

the prof i really missed out on at nu now has personal reasons for wanting to be in dc.
and there is a lovely spot (really 2) open for her here. assuming we could convince both parties the marriage would work.

oh man, i could be living the cholas y pishtacos lifestyle!

better not get my hopes up yet.

el cinismo y la apatía

I've been feeling pretty cynical about politics lately.

I recently wrote this to a conservative friend who asked what I thought of Michelle Obama's speech Monday night:

***

Quite frankly, I've been pretty jaded about politics in general lately. I've basically been feeling like the world is such a screwed up place at this point that it doesn't really matter what happens politically. The one miraculous candidate that can put an end to poverty, and provide health care for everyone, and distribute resources, and keep people safe, and make the Palestinians, Israelis, Iranians, Sunnis, Shiites, Catholics, Mormons, Capitalists, Socialists, and Creationists all join hands and get along just doesn't exist. Can't exist. And maybe that's too much to ask, but I'm beginning to feel pretty apathetic.

I thought Ms. Obama was a fine and articulate, perhaps even exceptional speaker, but the words dripped with the rhetoric of a neoliberal american dream to an extent that the speech seemed both meaningless and sickeningly sweet for me. Wow, I sound so very bitter.

I think this is maybe all stemming from Evo's recent confirmation in the recall election. Which should be uplifting, one would think. But really the whole drama likely exists so that the Bolivian right can keep the Bolivian left too distracted to concentrate on changing the constitution in any significant way. And while I do tend to lean towards the sentiments of those on Bolivia's left, its not really any specific change that would put me to ease. The whole situation just makes so painfully clear that there is never an easy answer, and its always so much easier to slip further down the slope of economic and political disparity, that even a seemingly perfect candidate (and I am in no way implying that Evo is perfect) has little power to create real change. And that coupled with the recent violent outbreaks (or should I say the continuation of violent outbreaks?) is just depressing.

***

so today, as i drove through the rain to school, i was listening to Ralph Nader on democracy now. He had a number of good points, but one really struck me. He said something along the lines of "when people become cynical, feel they can do nothing, and take a step back, that's when they lose the country."

so, while I'm not necessarily inspired to go out and vote for Nader, or Obama, or McCain, i do feel more compelled (is that grammatically correct? can one be more compelled? most compelled?) to snap out of this cynical and apathetic mood i've been in lately.

el olor

i'm starting to be able to smell again.

its been almost 2 weeks since i could last really smell something. and forget about tasting food. its funny how things i usually love (saffron rice, black beans, feta, sun dried tomatoes, curry) just become bland blobs with offending textures. this has lead me to primarily rely on yogurt, bread, and colby cheese for nutrients.

but smelling again is a rather magical process. its like the world is coming alive. i wash my hands and the soap tickles my nose. the kitchen is brimming with tastiness. and the outdoors are overwhelming. not having the sense for two weeks has made me really notice odors now. smells that would be mundane under normal circumstances are noteworthy. now, lets make some curry!

problemas grandes en un pueblo pequeno

i was talking to my mother this evening, when i could hear in the background my dad burst in and say "there are 20 police cars up the block." this coming from a man who lives in a town that only has one police car. and at most 2 officers on duty at a time. this is a town where i once unlawfully entered the library at 2am, knowing that the police officers were changing shifts at that moment and i wouldn't be caught.

my mom said she was going outside to put some meat on the grill, and go "crook-hunting." I told her to take a big knife. she said the sawzall might be better.

an hour later i called back to get the report of what was going on.

the neighborhood was abuzz, 8 different neighbors had stopped by, all the kids were riding their bikes around checking out the scene. the traffic from 136 was rerouted on cole street, making the front porch prime viewing real estate, and the k's had come over to watch. kerkid heard a plane overhead, and thought it was a helicopter, at which point kathkid said she knew there had been helicopters on the scene earlier because she thought she had seen one.

Denny, the neighbor who you can hear from 5 blocks away, any summer night yelling "Hans" (his son's name), came over to give his version of the report. Which presumably would let the whole east side of town know, given his town crier skills. Some guy named Cletus beat up his girlfriend last night. Kerkid asked if it was Cletus Newton, the high school football defense, shotput and discus coach.

**Coach Clete was beloved by many of us back in the glory days of track where we spent more time hanging out at the IGA than running the circuit. He was the type of guy who weighed 300 pounds, but didn't let that keep him from riding his harley and being an athletic coach. Plus, since he wasn't actually "our" coach (except for mary, jessie, and marcy) we didn't have any ill feeling toward him for making us do intervals or dots or boxes or bunny hops. he was just pure fun on the track bus.**

well, kerkid heard this news and wondered aloud why they didn't just send his best friend, mike law (former hey high interim principal, athletic director, and sexist phys ed teacher) over to talk to him. taking it upon himself mr. k called mr. law and asked why he didn't just go over and talk to him. apparently, mr. law then informed mr. k that it was not Cletus Newton, but some other Cletus that lived on the same block (what are the chances?) that had beaten up his girlfriend. and apparently had a large arsenal of hunting riffles. hence the swat team being called in. oh, and by the way, coach Clete apparently doesn't even have a girlfriend (shocking!)

so, now as of 10:20 pm cst, they heytown, county, and state cops are using sirens, airhorns, and bullhorns to try to coax this other clete out of his house.

so, no doubt thanks to kerkid's assumptions and denny's loud mouth, half the town will be calling for Clete's resignation as school starts tomorrow. I'm a little sad I wasn't there for all the commotion. Not since the escaped convict ran through town 10 years ago has so much action taken place!

mis amigos

it just occurred to me that my last 2 posts made me sound pretty bitter and elitist with my superior attitude toward all my friends.

but the truth is, though lately i've noticed what annoys me about people, i also have been noticing the things i value. ms. burns's utter good-heartedness. stevie's sense of humor. gordo's & brewski's protective natures. otto's snarky remarks about the state of the world. the jag's undiscriminating conversational skills, the way ee banters, and the r______'s desire to change the world.

i'm not sure why i've been so negative. really i'm quite happy lately, and though they're not my dearest friends, these people are all wonderful components of my life. so, enough negativity. let's be happy! at least until school starts.

la boda gorda

I walked into the church foyer with papa H, and saw stevie and ms. burns in line. We slid in with them, and were seated on the groom’s side about half way down the aisle. Not long after gina and jen joined our row, and eventually, mr. BS came and sat on the end. The music started playing and my mustached first grade crush (who will be a father in 2 weeks) walked in with a bridesmaid.

Now, I’ve been to a number of weddings in the last few years, but this was my first wedding as a single adult. And I thought that would make me less sappy. Maybe bring out my bitter cynical side. But the truth is, when brewski walked down the aisle to join gordo as his best man, my eyes got teary. There is something about seeing us all together in the same room that really got to me. Just feeling the presence of these people who I rarely speak to made me so happy and at home.

I guess there’s something about the people that you’ve known since the age of 4 that really allows you to be yourself. Suddenly, I could do anything. All self consciousness subsided. You can’t get away with an ounce of pretension with the people you used to take swim lessons with. At the reception I sang along because they’ve all witnessed me in years of painful chorus classes and karaoke nights before I developed my staunch aversion. I danced wildly without fear because we’ve been forced to line dance, swing, and perform the hand jive together, and quite honestly, I’m sure I looked far more awkward on the jr. high basketball team than I ever could on the dance floor. I said whatever came to my drunken mind, because they’ve all heard my most embarrassing statements (about Lincoln’s election) and one night of eloquence would never be enough to convince any of them I’ve become “educated” or “refined.” And though we might not have a lot in common any more, though we might be in different places both physically and figuratively, our mutual history counts for more than I’d realized. They are like family. Some of them annoy me, some piss me off, others I just disagree with entirely, but I love them all.

home part iii

i just thought i should counter the previous post with some later summer thoughts on "home"

I woke up at 5:30 this morning, when lou was leaving for work. my clothes were still in the washer from the night before, so i took them out to the clothesline. then i watered mom's garden for her. by that time it was fully light out, and the newspaper had arrived so i read it on the front porch watching the pickups go by on the morning routes.

mom and dad got up around 9 and i walked to the iga with dad for eggs & milk. we carried the big canvas bag. as we walked in the door an old man said hello to us very directly. i forget that you have to be ready to respond to salutations at all times here. as we walked back home in the still dewy morning, we discussed possible campaigns for dad's newly formed green initiative.

in the afternoon, i helped mom strip some furniture, and we made a quick run to the fabric store for upholstery fabric. i think these chairs are going to turn out nicely. in the afternoon j.m. drove by and took a look at our handy work. i got dad to saw some of the left over beadboard from the bathroom into good painting sized pieces for me.

as the sun was setting we took turns taking showers, and all quickly made some dinner. then off to the Ks. Jon is home from Iraq and the family is all around for the wedding reception tomorrow. i've said it before, but they really are a second family to me. i ended up talking to ellen in the kitchen for a long long time. in the other room, the college kids played poker, until they moved to the garage for some beer pong. we went home around midnight, but ended up sitting on the porch with a bottle of wine looking at stars and watching a few cars go by. lou eventually came home from some after-work activity and we all went to bed exhausted.

i guess this is what i'm always looking for when i come home. something you can't find in the city. something you can't find in a place where you haven't known everyone since the age of 5.

un otro

another early summer writing about blo/no

Tonight I ate dinner across the street from the coffeehouse. I saw indie looking boys walk by, and yell to their friends, “hey man, I haven’t seen you in a while.”

It made me realize this place doesn’t feel like home anymore. No more sitting at the coffee kup recognizing people that come in. no run ins along the street. No gunshots outside of la bamaba.

Sure places change, and I’ve been away for almost 10 years. But gentrification is a different beast entirely. The cobbler’s been displaced. Along with other ports. You’ll still be the only one I’ll ever love, but this Uptown is bullshit.

I guess I’m feeling a bit disenchanted with this place in general. The small-town bars aren’t what they used to be. The IGA still holds untold wonders, but even my parents, the coolest in the world, are losing their usual luster. Not in a getting in arguments sort of way, but they’re just being a bit boring.

But I also wonder how much this has to do with my current state of affairs. Usually, it seems, there’s something to keep me grounded here. Or rather, keep my feet from totally touching the ground. A friend around. A boy’s calls to keep me occupied. And lou. But this has been just me and the ‘rents. Which is nice, but it lacks that Sweet Home Alabama feeling I always associate with these parts.

And I want to write about this in a Klosterman-esque sort of way. But its not coming to me at the moment. No lofty poetry about the open spaces of the center. Or the way the center centers me. Perhaps I’ve grown out of this. Or perhaps it’s the comparisons I’m making. The last two weekends were filled with former friends and the sort of comfort one expects to find only at home. And not to say that comfort isn’t here, but the camaraderie I’ve had recently is missing. No antics. No late nights, flaming beaches, or wine-drinking roof talks. It is simply home. In a very adult sort of way. And maybe what it comes down to is that I want this place to restore the child in me. To make me feel as young and free as I want to be. But now, my friends here have children and own houses. They’ve all settled into that sub-suburban lifestyle, and aren’t hanging out at the circle anymore. So I’ve just got the Hs and the Ks around. And as much as I adore them all, they don’t have the spark of 20-something life that I’ve enmeshed myself among in recent weeks. By comparison to DC this is the life. By comparison to the nj/ny contingent, this is lame.

But now, I await my train to Chicago, and I hope more antics shall be found there. Of course, the usual suspects are all out of town, but chuckles will be a good time, along with the moyer, and of course my one true love, lou.

I also wonder if the crazy, unrequited things running through my head lately are putting me in a funk that’s not letting me fully enjoy my surroundings. I feel like I spend all year waiting for these moments, and then when they arrive, they are disappointing. And that’s no way to live life. I need to make them worth the wait. So here we go…

upside downtown

i wrote this about 2 months ago while sitting outside at the coffee house. now, the coffeehouse is being sold to the development agency. its like watching my youth disappear one business at a time. i guess i shouldn't feel so privileged to think that i could escape the effects of gentrification. but enough commentary. on to the writing:

I am sitting at a coffee shop I frequented ten years ago. And all around it, things have changed. This is now uptown, and across the street is a bar whose LED sign advertises 80s night.

Ten years ago I sat just a few feet away, and I read a poem of my own aloud for the first time. In those days, this was downtown, and I recognized the faces of the passersby.

I’m back working in the same office where I spent those summer days, and though little has changed there, my attention to detail now thrives.

I used to spend my nights staying awake, roaming the streets, using the cover or darkness to engage in illicit acts in parks and feeding my thin body only on caffeine and free desserts from all night restaurants. In those days there was always someone to see and somewhere to go next. There was always an adventure just around the corner. And many of those adventures began on the corner I’m staring at. But the pizza place is gone along with the import store, and my favorite roach-infested lunch counter. And half the disappeared places I can’t lament because I don’t recall what occupied these brownstones. There was a thrift store somewhere on this block. The comic book store where I once saw Kevin Smith. The drug paraphernalia store that claimed to be a music store. The music store my one-time crush bought after I moved. The candy store in the old train station. The used book store. This place, in many ways reminded me of an early Linklater movie. Now its just Uptown.

And a skinny blonde girl walks past in short shorts and a thrift store t shirt accompanied by a dreaded guy on a skateboard. And for a minute I pause. First because they make a strange pair. But I see myself in her. Second because they just don’t seem to belong here anymore. At least the way I used to belong here. Or the way I felt I did. But it was downtown then. Now its uptown.

all action is performative. all choices are conscious. go read some mauss.

i just want to make one thing perfectly clear

(even though i have done so before)

spellings are results of specific histories. however, language is alive, and using a descriptive approach to it is often more productive than a prescriptive approach. besides, insistence upon correct spelling just feeds the bourgeois neoliberal heteronormative patriarchal universe of discourse to which i do not subscribe.

thus, comments upon my spelling choices are unproductive and will be rejected.

el amor o la amistad

not that anyone cares, but crisis averted.

its all on the up and up.

let's just say that rather than being coached into stepping up to bat, i suggested a move back down to the minors.

this should make the dinner party tonight less awkward.

he is who i thought he was

just a warning: i will now commence using my boys-esque metaphor.

i waited on the train platform for the r______ ready for a friendly slow pitch softball game. and that's how it started out. the walk to the air & space museum was practically whiffle ball. But then at the national gallery he pulled out the 16" softball. Yes, indeed he had broken up with the girl, and the oh, so casual "so, are you still single?" But it didn't stop there. As we walked through NMAI the balls got smaller and harder, the pitches went from underhand to overhand. I tried to ignore the "I thought when I met you, you would be the type of person I'd like to date." But by the time we were marveling at the Lincoln Memorial, there were 100mph fast balls coming straight at my cheek in the form of a kiss.

So why am i so disappointed? I did kinda like this guy 4 months ago. But something changed this summer. I guess most of it is probably that he was the only straight male i saw regularly for quite some time. And then this summer, I realized there's a whole world of men out there. Not that any of them were interested. But at least a little exposure made me feel like there were other teams that might be worth a trade. So, now i've got a date lined up. my first one in a while. But i'm not giddy and excited. I'm not nervous. I'm not really even looking forward to it. I'm already concocting break up lines in my head.

And worst of all is, he's so nice. Charming even. And he wants to have a picnic. and he says my spanish is very good. Hell, he even pulled out the one compliment that really gets to me (for a clue, see Buchlotz, Mary. 1999. “Why be normal?”: Language and identity practices in a community of nerd girls. Language in Society 28: 203-223. ). And not just out of nowhere, but after a somewhat lengthy discussion of my research topic.

Maybe its the fact that he's already trying to convince me I should be studying pain in amazonian indigenous communities of Peru. Maybe its the fact that he mentioned I should try to catch the bouquet at Gordo's wedding. Maybe its that he's already singing to me en espanol. But its so disappointing to spend all summer hoping for some sort of romance, and then when it finally comes along, its well....disappointing.

Then again, maybe he's the perfect slump-buster.

mis chicos

i watched the My Boys season finale tonight without seeing any of the rest of the season.

suffice to say, i'm still convinced it is a reflection of my life.

and despite the fact that anyone with with unimpaired hearing can tell the show is total crap, i love it.

noches gigantes

I stood there, among the dispersed listeners at the back of the pitchfork crowd, and the Hold Steady opened with “Massive Nights.” I thought to myself how those kinds of nights had been few and far between lately.

The summer began with two epic weekends; one at the beach, one in the city, but quickly simmered into a quiet small town molasses pace. Even once I was back in a city, the drinking and late nights could hardly be described as massive.

But that song seemed to foreshadow the immediate future. As the Hold Steady finished their set, Animal Collective began setting up for their headline set. I noted the frontman’s red hat—it looked just like mine. A few minutes later, two of the Fleet Foxes band members stood directly in front of me, talking to a woman in white cowboy boots, not nearly as cool as my sister’s. To my right were a collection of three mud people, covered in deep black Midwestern soil, liquefied by earlier rains, then hardening like body paint on clothing, shoes, limbs, and faces alike, dancing with flailing arms, and shaking asses. But when the set ended abruptly, it seemed as if it would all be downhill. The hipsters and hippies spilled onto the street, most waiting for buses or trains, but like us, many people joined an eastward migration on foot. It felt like a protest with the only message being an unwillingness to accept that the music was over.

Fortunately the three of us, all coincidentally clothed in white v neck t shirts, had another destination. MC had heard there would be an after party in our friend Jacob’s basement. With only the bikers traveling faster, we arrived in the first wave and made small talk while sitting on the hood of some old white car parked in the back yard. The yard slowly filled with people who looked more ridiculous than an urban outfitters catalog, surpassing even my experiences in East Williamsburg. Every man wore tight pants, a plaid button up or an ironic t shirt and painfully quirky glasses. Hairstyles varied, but ranged between bed head and alfalfa cowlicks. My favorite women’s look involved turquoise ankle boots, a vintage yellow dress that extended approximately ½” below the ass and white gloved hands which clutched an Old Style can. Even Ida’s converse, plaid pants and fanny pack were no match for this apparel.

As Jacob frenzied to get his drum in the basement, a trio of men dressed distinctively less hip than possibly everyone at the party, excepting the three white v necked t shirt wearers, walked around the side of the house. One wore a red hat just like mine.

Shortly after, we filed into the basement and Jacob’s band, Mung played a quick set, then No Age played before an infinitely more densely packed basement. As their set wore on, filling what had earlier seemed like a very spacious basement with vibrations and reverberations, and a number of people dancing under a thin water pipe seemed to be using it for support. The pipe bent like a spring twig in their hands.

Given my three flooding incidents this summer, I felt a fourth was inevitable. The three v necks decided to move to the back of the crowd. The set ended shortly thereafter and the crowd filed to the backyard. The yard was filled at this point, shoulder to shoulder with people infinitely more “hip” than we were. We checked a phone for the time and concurred maybe it was time to end the night, even without a sound from or conversation with Animal Collective. It took about five minutes to squeeze off the porch, around the side of the house, and onto the sidewalk. We got about halfway down the block when the sky opened up and filled the space between clouds and concrete with rain. It was one of those sudden unexpected torrential downpours that instantaneously created pools where curbs once were and made our raincoats, still in tow after that morning’s rains, totally ineffective.

After waiting a time for the bus, we decided the best plan of action would be walking to the nearest thoroughfare and hoping for a taxi. The plan proved effective, and after dropping MC off at the blue line, we continued to the red line Fullerton stop. We arrived on the Northbound platform, to find it empty; never a hopeful sign late at night. But we sat with our backs resting on a pole with a large F sign, and waited. And waited. And waited. Nearly an hour later, the platform having now filled with riders, an announcement was made apologizing for the delay. A train would be arriving shortly.Once on the train, our car was quite a side show. Next to us, two men bantered barbershop style. At the other end of the car, a group of college age men sang Bohemian Rhapsody. At the door near us, a young man gave unsolicited love advice to a middle aged business man who had just bid farewell to a woman he only first met on Thursday. After another 45 minutes and much hubbub about the train switching to express, we arrived at our stop and finally made it home safely.

(red hat + old style cans = not quite hipster)