Saturday, February 25, 2012
The Bull
This is silly and funny and silly and wow it is a Very Hard Thing to make a poem out of a newspaper article.
Tuesday, February 21, 2012
Very Small Thoughts
I have a lot of Very Small Thoughts today.
When I was a kid I asked my mom how people knew God existed. She said that sometimes you know that things are there even if you cannot see them. She said, "You know Daddy and I love each other very much, but you can't see that." And I said, "Yes I can Mommy, when you look at Daddy pink smoke comes out of your eyes."
One of my friends lost a parent when she was young like I did, and she said that whenever she sits down to write she has to ask herself if she will write about him or about something else.
This is true.
It's almost like a binary switch, a one or a zero, Mom or NotMom. Will I write about Mom today? Will I write about something else. Write about Mom? Write about something else. The funny thing is that even though the NotMom category includes the Entirety of the Universe and excludes only one infinitely small pinprick of a thing, Mom still feels bigger. Mom still holds more—I could write forever about it, and I probably will (whether I want to or not).
I watched Dead Poet's Society last week. It is a movie after my own heart. It made me want to start reading poetry, which I have (thanks C.W.!), and it made me think very hard about becoming a teacher. It also made me think that, if my art were being suppressed like theirs was, that my rebellious writing would make life much sexier. There's something sexy about making art in secret, using fingers in dimly lit rooms and talking low.
Along with Bad Underwear Days and Good Underwear Days I have to add two new things: Body Hair Days and Big Pimple Days. One of these is a very good day and the other is terribly bad. I had a Big Pimple Day today. I could make a chart of my face showing pimple placement in relationship to embarrassment. It would look like heat vision—the hotter the place, the more embarrassing it is to have a zit there. My cheeks and neck would be very cold—these are very acceptable and OK places to get a fat pimple. The nose would be a bit warmer—it does shoot off your face in a triangle, after all. I used to think the worst was around the lips. It's still pretty damn bad. The upper lip is loathsome, but on the lip itself, that's grounds for self-induced exile. The worst though, as I discovered today, is a big fat juicy plump little sucker right in the middle of your forehead. Foreheads are the face's billboards. Advertising space. When you have a B.P.D. on your forehead you shy away from conversations, you keep your head turned to the side, you make damage assessments in the restroom frequently. "Who have I talked to today and are my chances to know them as a person ruined forever?" I did not meet any new people today. I also ran back to my dorm, but that was more for the sake of running than anything else. Sometimes it's good to remind yourself that you are 21 years old and your legs still work.
Body Hair Days are great. No details necessary, really. You trim trim trim and you feel good good good. For me, it's a long process. Trim the noggin, trim the beard. Trim downstairs. Now that's nice. Nothing like a finely cropped and shapely bonsai tree to give you a boost.
In my Shakespeare and Dickens class my professor was talking about sex, which always makes me stop doodling because sex is something very important to me. Because I am a Human Being. He was talking about how sex satisfies an appetite we all have, which I knew, but he also said that sex could be seen as just another form of physical connection between two people. That it was a way for people to connect with each other in the same way we connect with handshakes and hugs, just something much more intimate. That sex could be just that—intimacy for the sake of intimacy, because intimacy feels nice and why not?
I wore a sequin flower shirt to a Madonna dance party on Friday at Reed College in Portland. My friend C.W. lent it to me. I haven't been checked out by that many girls in a very long time. The next time I go to Goodwill I am buying a sequin shirt.
I want to dress up as No Face for the next costume party I'm invited to.
Life feels pretty calm and that feels weird and I don't know what to do with it.
I need to start a new story.
When I was a kid I asked my mom how people knew God existed. She said that sometimes you know that things are there even if you cannot see them. She said, "You know Daddy and I love each other very much, but you can't see that." And I said, "Yes I can Mommy, when you look at Daddy pink smoke comes out of your eyes."
One of my friends lost a parent when she was young like I did, and she said that whenever she sits down to write she has to ask herself if she will write about him or about something else.
This is true.
It's almost like a binary switch, a one or a zero, Mom or NotMom. Will I write about Mom today? Will I write about something else. Write about Mom? Write about something else. The funny thing is that even though the NotMom category includes the Entirety of the Universe and excludes only one infinitely small pinprick of a thing, Mom still feels bigger. Mom still holds more—I could write forever about it, and I probably will (whether I want to or not).
I watched Dead Poet's Society last week. It is a movie after my own heart. It made me want to start reading poetry, which I have (thanks C.W.!), and it made me think very hard about becoming a teacher. It also made me think that, if my art were being suppressed like theirs was, that my rebellious writing would make life much sexier. There's something sexy about making art in secret, using fingers in dimly lit rooms and talking low.
Along with Bad Underwear Days and Good Underwear Days I have to add two new things: Body Hair Days and Big Pimple Days. One of these is a very good day and the other is terribly bad. I had a Big Pimple Day today. I could make a chart of my face showing pimple placement in relationship to embarrassment. It would look like heat vision—the hotter the place, the more embarrassing it is to have a zit there. My cheeks and neck would be very cold—these are very acceptable and OK places to get a fat pimple. The nose would be a bit warmer—it does shoot off your face in a triangle, after all. I used to think the worst was around the lips. It's still pretty damn bad. The upper lip is loathsome, but on the lip itself, that's grounds for self-induced exile. The worst though, as I discovered today, is a big fat juicy plump little sucker right in the middle of your forehead. Foreheads are the face's billboards. Advertising space. When you have a B.P.D. on your forehead you shy away from conversations, you keep your head turned to the side, you make damage assessments in the restroom frequently. "Who have I talked to today and are my chances to know them as a person ruined forever?" I did not meet any new people today. I also ran back to my dorm, but that was more for the sake of running than anything else. Sometimes it's good to remind yourself that you are 21 years old and your legs still work.
Body Hair Days are great. No details necessary, really. You trim trim trim and you feel good good good. For me, it's a long process. Trim the noggin, trim the beard. Trim downstairs. Now that's nice. Nothing like a finely cropped and shapely bonsai tree to give you a boost.
In my Shakespeare and Dickens class my professor was talking about sex, which always makes me stop doodling because sex is something very important to me. Because I am a Human Being. He was talking about how sex satisfies an appetite we all have, which I knew, but he also said that sex could be seen as just another form of physical connection between two people. That it was a way for people to connect with each other in the same way we connect with handshakes and hugs, just something much more intimate. That sex could be just that—intimacy for the sake of intimacy, because intimacy feels nice and why not?
I wore a sequin flower shirt to a Madonna dance party on Friday at Reed College in Portland. My friend C.W. lent it to me. I haven't been checked out by that many girls in a very long time. The next time I go to Goodwill I am buying a sequin shirt.
I want to dress up as No Face for the next costume party I'm invited to.
Life feels pretty calm and that feels weird and I don't know what to do with it.
I need to start a new story.
Thursday, February 16, 2012
Bad Underwear Days
Two days ago I remembered I had green eyes. That's a weird thing to remember. I was in the restroom in the library washing my hands, and I looked in the mirror and it was like I had been wearing sunglasses for a long time, and was used to seeing myself that way, and I just took them off. Whenever anyone asks the, "What's your favorite body part" question, I always say my eyes, even though it sounds sappy, because it's true, and I'm proud of them, and my mom had green eyes and everyone who knew my mom always says that I have her eyes. I've noticed that whenever I'm conscious of my eye color that my eyes always feel very kind, and I like looking at people with kind eyes. What's it like for Dad whenever he looks at my eyes and sees Mom?
The urinals in the creative writing building stick out too far. They look like malformed toilets stuck to the wall. They look like they want to be sat on. See the problem with a Very Large Urinal is that you have to stand very far back from it, which leads to Exposure, which is a problem when you take a piss next to Tobias Wolff. This happened. I didn't look down at his junk, and he didn't look down at mine, but you can't help but see a flash of skin when you're both standing two feet from a wall aiming into what might as well be a toilet stationed a million miles away. This is the problem with Very Large Urinals.
Speaking of Tobias Wolff's penis, I've actually seen it before. Swimming. I had just swam at the Avery Aquatics Center and I was getting dressed when Tobias Wolff came in and changed in that unselfconscious way that older men do. I can do that now, change unselfconsciously. It's something I learned in College. Because it's just skin anyway, and everyone's naked under their clothes, and who cares. The point is, I didn't look or anything but there it was, and it reminded me that writers are Human Beings too and they just happen to be good at writing, and that was what I like to call a Nice Realization.
I like Good Underwear Days. These exist. They are days when you decide you will wear one of your sexiest, best-fitting, most arresting pairs of underwear. On Good Underwear Days you feel sexy all day and you know that no matter what situation you get into—namely, situations with little clothing—you'll be able to drop your pants and put your hands on your hips and thrust out your pelvis and say, "Look at me, don't I look nice?"
Similar to Good Underwear Days are what I like to call Bad Underwear Days or, if you'd rather, a B.U.D. for short. On a B.U.D. (usually the last day before laundry, or on a day you feel under the weather, or on a day you just want to feel unsexy for whatever reason), you wear that one pair of underwear that doesn't fit well and maybe has holes and is most likely threadbare and Depressing. The problem with B.U.D.s is that, for one, you go around feeling unsexy all day. No one can see your underwear and you know that but you can tell that, somehow, they sense it, they sense your threadbare underwear and now there's no way in hell they'll give you the time of day. The other problem with B.U.D.s is that sometimes on this day you run into a situation where you really, really wish you had decided to make it a Good Underwear Day. Have you ever avoided a sexual situation because you were having a Bad Underwear Day? I hope I never do. I think I probably have.
I want to have so many good pairs of underwear that every day is a Good Underwear Day.
The urinals in the creative writing building stick out too far. They look like malformed toilets stuck to the wall. They look like they want to be sat on. See the problem with a Very Large Urinal is that you have to stand very far back from it, which leads to Exposure, which is a problem when you take a piss next to Tobias Wolff. This happened. I didn't look down at his junk, and he didn't look down at mine, but you can't help but see a flash of skin when you're both standing two feet from a wall aiming into what might as well be a toilet stationed a million miles away. This is the problem with Very Large Urinals.
Speaking of Tobias Wolff's penis, I've actually seen it before. Swimming. I had just swam at the Avery Aquatics Center and I was getting dressed when Tobias Wolff came in and changed in that unselfconscious way that older men do. I can do that now, change unselfconsciously. It's something I learned in College. Because it's just skin anyway, and everyone's naked under their clothes, and who cares. The point is, I didn't look or anything but there it was, and it reminded me that writers are Human Beings too and they just happen to be good at writing, and that was what I like to call a Nice Realization.
I like Good Underwear Days. These exist. They are days when you decide you will wear one of your sexiest, best-fitting, most arresting pairs of underwear. On Good Underwear Days you feel sexy all day and you know that no matter what situation you get into—namely, situations with little clothing—you'll be able to drop your pants and put your hands on your hips and thrust out your pelvis and say, "Look at me, don't I look nice?"
Similar to Good Underwear Days are what I like to call Bad Underwear Days or, if you'd rather, a B.U.D. for short. On a B.U.D. (usually the last day before laundry, or on a day you feel under the weather, or on a day you just want to feel unsexy for whatever reason), you wear that one pair of underwear that doesn't fit well and maybe has holes and is most likely threadbare and Depressing. The problem with B.U.D.s is that, for one, you go around feeling unsexy all day. No one can see your underwear and you know that but you can tell that, somehow, they sense it, they sense your threadbare underwear and now there's no way in hell they'll give you the time of day. The other problem with B.U.D.s is that sometimes on this day you run into a situation where you really, really wish you had decided to make it a Good Underwear Day. Have you ever avoided a sexual situation because you were having a Bad Underwear Day? I hope I never do. I think I probably have.
I want to have so many good pairs of underwear that every day is a Good Underwear Day.
Tuesday, February 14, 2012
What about?
What about time travel? What about the speed of light?
What about an Infinite Telescope?
An Infinite Telescope happens when you've gone so far away and gone so fast that you can look back and see History.
Take a telescope with you on a trip to the outer edges of the universe. You have to have a very good telescope because it must be able to see an Infinite Distance, and you must have a very good spaceship because it must be able to go faster than The Speed of Light—which is very fast.
Now if you could travel a distance of sixty-one lightseconds in the span of one second, that means you would arrive one minute faster than the light you emitted when you left Earth. Then is the magic. Get out. Turn around. Look through your Telescope. You can see yourself shutting the hatch door, you see the rocket boosters explode like a dust mote smearing the green carpet of Earth, you see yourself streaking toward you like a ghost being reeled toward its body.
Now imagine you travel a distance of one lightyear in the span of a day. Get out. Turn around. Look through your Telescope—there, picking a white pumpkin from the pumpkin patch at the state fair. There, that night, too drunk to stand so your friend prepares for you a toothbrush with paste. There, falling asleep next to Delilah your rottweiler because you would never admit it but you still feel a pang of fear the moment light slowly sinks below your windowsill. There, you, one year younger, never knowing that with an Infinite Telescope you were watching yourself make History.
Next, try something bold. Travel a distance of two lightseconds every second and point your Telescope through the porthole at the back of the ship. See your life unfold in reverse. Inhale carbon dioxide. Breathe oxygen. Watch your hair grow stronger and see the kinks leave your body and watch your spirit lift. Watch your pen pass over a letter to your mother and see it drink words through the nib. Watch your fingernails grow into your hands.
And then you could find a moment. Slow down. Travel at The Speed of Light. Point your telescope back at that blue splotch in space called Earth. You have frozen time. You have stopped all of History and it will never start again. Focus in. Watch your small hand live inside your mother's that time after the park when you learned how to swing and when you learned what a Brontosaurus was. Watch that moment paralyzed in exhale. Watch the oak's branches split by the power line, and the cold wash of clouds above a neighbor's frozen garden. Watch blue lips never come. Watch houses never shaking.
And you could go on forever but the problem is you're hurtling through space and it feels like this moment is frozen in time but in reality you're simply traveling too fast and the Universe is only so big and you can only go so far before you run out of space—
Monday, February 13, 2012
Astronaut
I drove home today from the library at 1 a.m. and I screamed at the top of my lungs in my car. I laughed after I did it every time. It wasn't a pain scream or a blood-curdling scream or anything like that. It was more of a, "I'M FEELING EMOTIONS SO HERE ARE SOME LOUD NOISES. RAAAAHHHHHHHHHH!!!" I love being in my car. I'm not sure if my car is actually sound proof, but certainly if anyone saw me through my windshield they would have thought I was in the process of being abducted by an alien, or seeing The Most Horrific Thing, or that maybe the inside of my car lost cabin pressure and I was going down, down, and my eyeballs were popping out like Arnold Schwarzenegger in Total Recall. (I learned on the Science channel that that's not actually how it works—dying in space is a very quiet thing and doesn't involve exploding eyeballs.) Thinking about that makes me think of this little thing I wrote for fiction class last quarter. There it is at the bottom.
How often do you scream at the top of your lungs just because you want to? That's why I love the space inside my car, even if I do get caught looking insane sometimes. Because you know what? I'm in a car. I can just drive away and laugh.
I need to go to bed. My neck hurts and I'm tired and I may be getting sick. I hope not. I'm going to drive to Portland this weekend to visit my friend C.W. and I can't wait. I love her to death, and I find myself really craving being around people who love me right now. It's something. You walk into a room, people brighten up, smile at you, are thankful you're there and that you were born and that you're in their life. I don't have that here at Stanford, really. It makes me sad. I'm working on it. I'm working on spending time with people I think could be Good Friends, and maybe even Really Great Friends. I guess there's no getting around it. I want those friendships now, right this instant, fully formed and fat and complex and nice. Doesn't work that way.
I read in The Tao of Pooh today about following the Nature of Things. It's funny. Square pegs don't fit in round holes. A revelation, right? Really, though... how much time do I spend trying to shove square pegs in round holes, then coming up with Clever Ideas to try and really trick that square peg into being round, when instead I should have used all that energy walking around, looking up at the trees, smelling flowers, touching water, and—oh, hey, a round hole. It fits.
Astronaut
How often do you scream at the top of your lungs just because you want to? That's why I love the space inside my car, even if I do get caught looking insane sometimes. Because you know what? I'm in a car. I can just drive away and laugh.
I need to go to bed. My neck hurts and I'm tired and I may be getting sick. I hope not. I'm going to drive to Portland this weekend to visit my friend C.W. and I can't wait. I love her to death, and I find myself really craving being around people who love me right now. It's something. You walk into a room, people brighten up, smile at you, are thankful you're there and that you were born and that you're in their life. I don't have that here at Stanford, really. It makes me sad. I'm working on it. I'm working on spending time with people I think could be Good Friends, and maybe even Really Great Friends. I guess there's no getting around it. I want those friendships now, right this instant, fully formed and fat and complex and nice. Doesn't work that way.
I read in The Tao of Pooh today about following the Nature of Things. It's funny. Square pegs don't fit in round holes. A revelation, right? Really, though... how much time do I spend trying to shove square pegs in round holes, then coming up with Clever Ideas to try and really trick that square peg into being round, when instead I should have used all that energy walking around, looking up at the trees, smelling flowers, touching water, and—oh, hey, a round hole. It fits.
Astronaut
I pull Allan by his spindly rubber arms toward the front office and the principal.
“I’m failing you,” I say.
“Aw, come on Mr. Seitz. I didn’t do nothing.”
“Anything. Stop dragging your feet.”
“I’m not going to do nothing either.”
“I realize that.”
“You know,” Allan says. He plants his feet on the precisely white hallway tiles. His shoes slide as I pull and long black marks spill out behind his sneakers. “I really didn’t do nothing. Anything. You never see anything when it happens.”
“Then who?”
Allan pulls at the front of his shirt. “I’ve seen girls throw good sometimes. Rochelle throws harder than me.”
I untuck my shirt and lift up the back and show Allan the welt slowly waxing above my pant line. “This hard?”
He could not hold back a snigger. “That look like it hurt.”
“Rochelle.”
“Shit, I don’t know.”
“Come on.”
But just as I start to pull again, and as Allan begins to protest, I hear fast heals stamping down the hallway carrying a woman’s voice. “Mr. Seitz,” I hear. I turn and it is Maria Soto. I know instantly, even though she is at least fifteen years older than the last time I saw her. “Mr. Seitz,” she says. “Do you remember me?”
She is wearing a yellow, unironed summer dress and pearls and the most delicately infuriated expression. I had failed Maria when she was in eighth grade because she always watched the boys with their soft mustaches instead of listening to me. Allan squirms under my intensifying grip. “Who’s that?” he says.
“Maria Soto, of course. And?” I search for something innocuous. “And how is the family?”
“Mr. Seitz,” she begins. Her eyes finally settle into hard little shells, and I notice she is ever so slightly choking the life out of one of the crooked pleats on her dress. “I’m a civil engineer.”
“Please, you can call me Greg now. An engineer you said?”
She nods, her lips drawn.
Allan announces proudly, “I could be a engineer.”
“Well good. That’s fantastic Maria.”
“Yes, it is.”
I cannot read her face—it is impassive, yet filled with something that seems to have been boiling under a heavy lid for a long time. “You came all the way here to share the good news?”
“Do you remember what you said to me? Before Christmas break—you had me there, just like that.” She gestures toward Allan.
I do remember what I said. “No, I don’t,” I say, “but it must have left a good impression. An engineer, wow!” She does not speak, so I fill the air by saying, “You couldn’t stop ogling those boys.” I laugh at myself. “I always knew how you would turn out, though. A good mind.” What I said to Maria Soto when she was thirteen years old was that she was not even cut out to be a trophy wife.
“I live in a big house now,” Maria says. “I have a husband.”
“That’s great,” I say.
“I have two beautiful children.”
“Yes.”
“And I make six figures.”
Allan squirms again and I loosen my grip. I happen to glance at Maria’s legs. They are tan and strong and strapped with black heels. Without the heels, though, I can almost imagine that it is still thirteen-year-old Maria’s legs poking out the bottom of the wrinkly yellow cotton. “Is that all?” I say.
Her face does not look satisfied, but whatever was boiling there seems to have subsided. She lets her pleats breath again, nods her head yes, and turns to leave. I go to where Allan’s shoes had scuffed the immaculate floor, bend down, and try rubbing them out with my handkerchief.
Allan stands there over me, finally loosed from my hold on his arm, looking strangely exposed without a teacher or a hall pass at his side. He watches Maria walk briskly down the hallway and around the corner, out of sight, in awe.
“I never liked a white girl before,” he says.
I rub half of the first mark out of the floor and sit back on my haunches. “Think you can take yourself to the office?”
Allan wakens from his daydream and looks at me. “They won’t stop me?” He tugs at the front of his shirt and then says, “Alright,” and leaves.
I think about Maria as I try to rub the scuffs out of the tile. I can feel the welt still steadily rising under my shirt. Someone had gone to the trouble of throwing a rock at me. They had to take it in from the outside, which meant it was premeditated, unless Allan always carries around rocks. Or maybe it was Rochelle. After a while the bell rings for the end of third period, and I realize I left my students alone for the last twenty minutes of class. By then the scuffs are mostly gone, and as the kids flood the hallway I try to discretely dry my armpits with the handkerchief.
I head for the safety of the teacher’s lounge and fill my thermos with coffee. I climb up the break room counter because someone, I do not know who, always hides the coffee creamer on the top shelf. I reach it, and as I do Cheryl Kravitz and Shep Grossman walk in laughing. Since the beginning of the year I have tried to glean from the other teachers whether or not they are having an affair. She is wearing her blue-and-white, polka-dotted blouse today and the jeans I always thought made her butt look less full than I often imagined it was. They see me taking a knee on the counter, my foot tucked under my bottom, and laugh more.
“Again with the creamer, Gordon?” says Cheryl.
I get down from the counter and add the creamer to the coffee in my thermos. “It’s some asshole that keeps doing it,” I say. This makes Shep grin.
Cheryl says, “If you drank it black you wouldn’t need creamer.”
“What were you guys laughing about?”
“I always drink mine black,” says Shep. “The kids can smell a teacher who doesn’t.”
I keep looking at Cheryl, waiting for her to rescue me from feeling like an idiot.
“It was nothing,” she says finally. “That little brat Allan was giving Shep trouble in first period again.”
“He threw rocks?”
“Jesus,” says Shep, grinning wider still. “They’re throwing rocks at you now?”
“Well, I don’t know for sure if it was him.”
“I saw Allan in the principal’s office,” says Cheryl. “You sent him?”
“Just now.”
“And you don’t know if it was him?”
“I guess not.”
Shep’s laughing now. He takes the coffee creamer from me and puts it back on the top shelf. He does not have to reach—he is tall and lean and always has on the same athletic shoes the kids wear. “Rocks, Gordon? Really?”
“You’re the one who puts it there?”
Shep shrugs and then thumbs my belly. “Just looking out for you, Mr. Seitz.”
I do a thought experiment where I imagine what it would be like to grab a fistful of Shep’s hay-like hair and throw his head against the cracked yellow linoleum counter. The brutality and clarity of the thought surprises me. Then my mind flashes with images of Cheryl’s blue-and-white, polka-dotted blouse slipping down her shoulders and gathering around her hips like rumpled paper.
“I should get going,” I say.
“You’re going to pub night tonight?” Cheryl says.
Shep’s face seems to be stuck in a permanent grin and I say, “Not tonight, no.”
Cheryl looks at me and for a second I imagine that in the room there are only us two. “That’s too bad,” she says.
On my way to my favorite bench outside I run into Allan, who has just left the principal’s office. I decide to ignore him, but then change my mind. “Was it bad?” I say.
Allan eyes me and is silent for a few moments. “They called my mom. She’s coming right now.”
I take a sip of my creamed coffee and then look down into my thermos. “What did you say to them?”
“The same as I told you. This time, it wasn’t me. This time I didn’t throw nothing.”
“They believe you?”
“What do you think?”
I nod down at my coffee. I never thought I would end up anything like Ms. Rifkin. When I was in eighth grade she liked to list for me all of the ways in which I would fail. Like, for instance, how I would never become an astronaut. Most kids had outgrown their idolization of astronauts by the time they left elementary school, but not me. Thinking about it now, I was enamored to the word more than anything else. Astro, as in the stars and the universe, and the blackness you see at night only when you are deep enough in the wilderness. Naut, like nautical, like the sea and its captain. If you were an astronaut, it meant you were the captain of the universe, it meant you could control space with a box of buttons and a port hole. It meant you could sail solar winds.
I glance back over my shoulder. “How would you like to go into the teacher’s lounge?”
Allan looks around me and then pulls at the front of his loose shirt. “They got vending machines, huh.”
I pull four glimmering quarters from my pocket and place them in the palm of Allan’s hand. “I’m addicted to root beer,” I say. Allan follows me to the break room, and by the time we get there Cheryl and Shep are long gone, and Allan and I share a soda as we wait for the arrival of his mother.
Sunday, February 12, 2012
The doppler effect
How about running so fast you age.
You know the doppler effect? You hear it all the time. An ambulance comes toward you and it sounds high pitched, and when it passes it sounds deeper, lower pitched. When the ambulance approaches you it is moving so fast that the sound waves between you and the siren get compressed. The pitch is higher. When it drives away, the sound waves are elongated. The pitch is lower.
Here's a thought—if you ran very fast, and talked very loudly, you would sound like a child coming and an adult going.
If I could run fast enough, I could sound like I did when I was eight years old, I could sound like kid Lucas, and the moment I ran past my voice would get deeper and I would sound old, three times as old as I am now—I would sound like an old man. And that way I could grow up right before your eyes, but to me I would feel the same, only just a little tired because I'm running sixty miles an hour.
You know the doppler effect? You hear it all the time. An ambulance comes toward you and it sounds high pitched, and when it passes it sounds deeper, lower pitched. When the ambulance approaches you it is moving so fast that the sound waves between you and the siren get compressed. The pitch is higher. When it drives away, the sound waves are elongated. The pitch is lower.
Here's a thought—if you ran very fast, and talked very loudly, you would sound like a child coming and an adult going.
If I could run fast enough, I could sound like I did when I was eight years old, I could sound like kid Lucas, and the moment I ran past my voice would get deeper and I would sound old, three times as old as I am now—I would sound like an old man. And that way I could grow up right before your eyes, but to me I would feel the same, only just a little tired because I'm running sixty miles an hour.
Naked shower parties
Donald Murray said, "If I write, the dark shadows move away from my desk."
Two nights ago I took a shower with a bunch of naked people. That's true. It's not an analogy... though the longer I think about it, it is.
It's hard to describe how sad and regretful I feel that it's taken me almost four years to start doing things I love. I'm being melodramatic. It's still true. And I'm even more regretful that now that I've discovered this new way of living, this way that's exciting and full of wonderful people and new experiences, that I only have three months left. And that feels like a very, very short time. The last small breaths of a symphony, and I've only just now realized—my God—how could it be—I reach to my head. Ear plugs.
Here it is, here's the analogy: I've been waiting for an invitation to a naked shower party for a long time. I didn't know I was waiting, but now it's obvious. And what a moment it was.
There, an extended hand, promising adventure. Me leaning, taking the touch of the hand and saying with tired and grateful relief, "I thought you would never ask."
Two nights ago I took a shower with a bunch of naked people. That's true. It's not an analogy... though the longer I think about it, it is.
It's hard to describe how sad and regretful I feel that it's taken me almost four years to start doing things I love. I'm being melodramatic. It's still true. And I'm even more regretful that now that I've discovered this new way of living, this way that's exciting and full of wonderful people and new experiences, that I only have three months left. And that feels like a very, very short time. The last small breaths of a symphony, and I've only just now realized—my God—how could it be—I reach to my head. Ear plugs.
Here it is, here's the analogy: I've been waiting for an invitation to a naked shower party for a long time. I didn't know I was waiting, but now it's obvious. And what a moment it was.
There, an extended hand, promising adventure. Me leaning, taking the touch of the hand and saying with tired and grateful relief, "I thought you would never ask."
Always go swimming
I was going to do this on Tumblr. Fuck that. Something more private, something for just me. I'm doing all this journaling these days... most of it is private, some things aren't. I want to make something out of all this writing I'm doing. The more I produce, the more that comes out. It's like opening a rusty valve. At first you can barely get a drip, but the more you work at the knob, the more you twist it and give it elbow grease, the more it gives. Turning the knob. Drinking water.
The people I love can look through this because I love them, and what's mine is theirs, and I share myself because I love them.
I thought about this, I thought about friendship. You tend the most beautiful, complex, precious plants in a greenhouse. I can see you inside, I can see you tend them. I know how much water each plant takes, how you prune them. I see which plants you cover for the winter and which you let die, I see which ones have thorns, which ones are your favorites. Sometimes you take a plant outside and show me, turn it around, point out the buds, how it's shaped, the bends here and there, you say, "Here's this plant I love, take a look, let me share it with you."
Here's the point. You can't force yourself into someone else's greenhouse. You can't barge in and say, "I want you to show me everything, God damn it, let's be close." It doesn't work that way. You have to wait. Here's what you do: take your favorite plant, or take the plant you have with the most thorns, or your most boring plant, take any one. Hold it out to this person and say, "Want to go on a walk?" And you share with that person, you show them everything about that plant to the best of your ability, and you ask for nothing else. Don't ask for them to show you anything. Don't ask into their greenhouse. Everyone guards their plants—they're precious. All you can do is be open, and hope that by being open it will encourage others to be open too.
I want to make something out of my journal pages. I love reductive poetry—as in, take a newspaper article, black out everything except for a few words and you have a poem. If you're good. My journal's too private but some things aren't, and I want to make something out of them. You'll see. We'll see. I'll see.
I started making Reminders. Reminders? Reminders. I'm learning all these lessons and I want to remember them. Every night before bed I make a card about something I learned that day. So far:
*Remember to LISTEN
*Remember to SEE THE MAGIC
*Remember to SAY YES
*Remember to BREATHE
*Remember, PERSPECTIVE always helps
*If the moon is ripe, HOWL
*Remember: don't WORRY YOUR FLOWERS (don't over analyze, don't worry things to death)
*Remember... be GOOFY. Be yourself, the right people will respond (this is hard for me, I'm goofy as hell but it so rarely comes out. Stop trying to be anything... not everyone will want what you have to offer, but better that than to offer up a bland and diluted version of yourself.)
*Ask people SILLY QUESTIONS (What would you do if you won the lottery? What's your favorite sound in the whole world? Your favorite taste? Where would you go if you could fly? Invisibility or flight?) Really Listen to their answers--you can learn so much
I took off my mom's ring recently. I'll write about that another time. Remind me.
On that note—ask me everything. I have my own journal for very private things—this is semi-private, for friends, for people I love. Dear reader, you don't have to pretend you haven't seen any of these posts. Dear reader, ask me questions. Dear reader, engage me. Dear reader—that's the point.
Hello, friend. Here are mountain laurels. I love them because they smell sweet and remind me of childhood. Here is honey suckle. I used to pretend there was a kingdom inside the bush in the front yard. Here is my hand, I would love to take a walk.
And there it is, the Very Bad Beginning—FUCK! What a ride the last week has been. Living, learning, loving, learning to love, learning to live, living to love, loving to live—I miss any? Yup. Goodbye!
The people I love can look through this because I love them, and what's mine is theirs, and I share myself because I love them.
I thought about this, I thought about friendship. You tend the most beautiful, complex, precious plants in a greenhouse. I can see you inside, I can see you tend them. I know how much water each plant takes, how you prune them. I see which plants you cover for the winter and which you let die, I see which ones have thorns, which ones are your favorites. Sometimes you take a plant outside and show me, turn it around, point out the buds, how it's shaped, the bends here and there, you say, "Here's this plant I love, take a look, let me share it with you."
Here's the point. You can't force yourself into someone else's greenhouse. You can't barge in and say, "I want you to show me everything, God damn it, let's be close." It doesn't work that way. You have to wait. Here's what you do: take your favorite plant, or take the plant you have with the most thorns, or your most boring plant, take any one. Hold it out to this person and say, "Want to go on a walk?" And you share with that person, you show them everything about that plant to the best of your ability, and you ask for nothing else. Don't ask for them to show you anything. Don't ask into their greenhouse. Everyone guards their plants—they're precious. All you can do is be open, and hope that by being open it will encourage others to be open too.
I want to make something out of my journal pages. I love reductive poetry—as in, take a newspaper article, black out everything except for a few words and you have a poem. If you're good. My journal's too private but some things aren't, and I want to make something out of them. You'll see. We'll see. I'll see.
I started making Reminders. Reminders? Reminders. I'm learning all these lessons and I want to remember them. Every night before bed I make a card about something I learned that day. So far:
*Remember to LISTEN
*Remember to SEE THE MAGIC
*Remember to SAY YES
*Remember to BREATHE
*Remember, PERSPECTIVE always helps
*If the moon is ripe, HOWL
*Remember: don't WORRY YOUR FLOWERS (don't over analyze, don't worry things to death)
*Remember... be GOOFY. Be yourself, the right people will respond (this is hard for me, I'm goofy as hell but it so rarely comes out. Stop trying to be anything... not everyone will want what you have to offer, but better that than to offer up a bland and diluted version of yourself.)
*Ask people SILLY QUESTIONS (What would you do if you won the lottery? What's your favorite sound in the whole world? Your favorite taste? Where would you go if you could fly? Invisibility or flight?) Really Listen to their answers--you can learn so much
I took off my mom's ring recently. I'll write about that another time. Remind me.
On that note—ask me everything. I have my own journal for very private things—this is semi-private, for friends, for people I love. Dear reader, you don't have to pretend you haven't seen any of these posts. Dear reader, ask me questions. Dear reader, engage me. Dear reader—that's the point.
Hello, friend. Here are mountain laurels. I love them because they smell sweet and remind me of childhood. Here is honey suckle. I used to pretend there was a kingdom inside the bush in the front yard. Here is my hand, I would love to take a walk.
And there it is, the Very Bad Beginning—FUCK! What a ride the last week has been. Living, learning, loving, learning to love, learning to live, living to love, loving to live—I miss any? Yup. Goodbye!
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