The Way Back
(2-11 May 2000)
11 May 2000
[from San Diego]
-Jake writes the best
e-mails.
-Fish's suite feels extremely
homey. I wonder if I'd come to college here if I'd look on it
as I do my own school, or
because it isn't mine, I can take it more loosely. That's
really an interesting perspective
shift - maybe one attaches too many thoughts or, dare I say it,
expectations to higher education
& then gets upset when it turns out to be just more of the same
ol' life. I mean, I already
know that such things amount to some of the problem. College
isn't capable of living up to
the way it's promised to us. & I guess I could see how this
life would be a drag after
a while. But somehow it feels so much more soothing &
settled. Methinks it might
just be the Pacific.
-Making a booklist for the summer could be a
dangerous proposition.
I have a feeling it'll get too long & I'll get demoralized
& end up becoming capable
of reading one page every 4-6 weeks. If so, though, I'd
probably be able to write a novel
in more or less the same timespan. That trend's gotta curb
itself.
-Am I keeping this up
over the summer?
10 May 2000
[from San Diego]
-I think being forced to stay in Texas might well
be a greater health risk than anything he could have faced staying on the plane.
Especially Amarillo.
-Flying to Albuquerque was kinda surreal, even more so considering my comments
earlier to the Southwest ticketperson. But getting 3 seats to oneself
is always a party. I remember exactly 10 minutes of that flight.
-Six people. MAYbe seven. But most of them, not yet even.
8 May 2000
7 May 2000 6 May 2000
5 May 2000 4 May 2000 3 May 2000 2 May 2000 Introspection, My Worst Friend* (Current)
-#2
- Not being here.
-#1 - Being there.
-One paper, packing, & exit. There are so many worlds I need space from.
It's gonna be one hell of a summer.
-A
word of advice when attempting to send "anonymous" hate-mail: Cover
your tracks.
-The neat thing about the Web is its voluntary nature. You never have to
go anywhere you don't want to, never have to read anything you don't want to.
People can put whatever they want up for their own purposes, or for their
friends, & the public at large can ignore it or read it as they see fit. I
have always said that if you think this is insipid, you don't ever have to see
it again. But some people have said they like reading it & I've always
been partial to stream-of-consciousness writing. So that is why it's here.
-Sunrises are reassuring.
-Good seeing Schneider, as always. & I'd TOLD Ariel she'd met him before!
Everything is coming together here at the end & that's just a good feeling.
-Well,
THAT certainly is a massive relief. Lord, I missed her. I didn't
even realize how much until I didn't have to anymore. But that's always
the way it is with missing people, huh? Oh well. Tonight, I'm just
relieved. & as my Mom would tell you, relief is the greatest feeling
in the world. Not sure I concur, but it's up there...
-I admit that I get frustrated with people very easily. Probably doesn't
surprise many of you. But I think the main reason is because I care about
many people a lot. When they put themselves & others through so much
strife, it breaks my heart & I have a hard time understanding it. Especially
when I think I can see ways around the pain. So, despite possible difficulties
this creates in dealing with people, I really do think it's good on the whole.
Or at least okay. Especially if my frustration motivates me to help
them improve what they're doing, or understand other peoples' perspectives.
It's all about the understanding, in the end... You know what, though?
I need more people in my life who challenge me like that.
-Matt Barrett! You punk! SOME people actually liked the WalthamWeekly...
I think. Points for humor, though.
-I really love Trivial Pursuit. Sometimes one finds knowledge one didn't
even know one had. Julius C. Dithers? That's just absurd.
-Man, that's a lotta tape. I remember when Mrs. Calog thought I was the
biggest user of tape in the history of North America. She may well have
been right - the mountain on the desk certainly seems to back up said theory.
Blank walls make it real. Though emotionally, I think I'm somewhere
else already anyway. Maybe I'll just do my papers tonight to have it behind
me. Stop laughing! I am CAPABLE of doing things before they're due
- it's just not, well, I usually don't want to. Yeah, that's it...
-I am REALLY beginning to believe that all the (Recovered?) Satellites (see
28 April) are in many ways the exact same. Or close enough to be
profoundly eerie.
-The
cool thing about nice guys is that we don't just let other people walk all over
us. That's one of the many great services we provide, granted, but I think
our crowning achievement is that we walk all over OURSELVES. & you don't
have to just take my word for it - ask Freez & he can tell you all about it
too!
-There is no such thing as absolute rest. Not physically, not metaphysically.
Now how to work this into a term paper for Philosophy of Space & Time...?
-Wherever in the world you go, no matter what you're doing, there will always
be a Denny's nearby. & it will always be the same. Sure, the architecture
may vary, but the food is always the same. The coffee is always the same.
By & large, the waiters &/or waitresses are always the same. I'm
torn between that being comforting & downright depressing.
-Driving for close to 6 hours tonight has motivated me to knock off the remaining
5 states on my list (for the uninformed, I've been to 45 of the 50). Problem
is, they're ALL far from each other, which is weird & makes consolidating
the list especially difficult. Anyone with a potential route-map that includes
South Carolina, Louisiana, Iowa, North Dakota, & Alaska, please send it my
way...
-#3 - No papers &/or tests. But EVEN BETTER, no other people worrying
about papers &/or tests &/or reading around me! An overall escape
from the game we call academics will be nice indeedy.
-I have grown so little in the past 2 years. It's mind-boggling, especially
when I'm surrounded by people who talk about how much they've matured & developed
as human beings since coming to college. I just feel like I've been in a
holding pen that's kept me as far removed from personal growth as humanly possible.
Like I'm on a treadmill or something. Because it's taken a lot of
wasted energy to stay here, but I still feel like I'm the exact same person who
walked onto that plane, bound for Massachusetts for the first time, back in August
of '98. Stina tried to reassure me that most people are still working through
embryonic levels of growth, but that somehow isn't terribly reassuring & doesn't
excuse me anyway. Maybe it's just tough to really grow in a region so firmly
committed to stagnation.
-Peter Hoeg is an amazing writer. "Borderliners" is just the tip
of this Danish iceberg.
-It's starting to amaze me how quickly I can lose my appetite these days. I
know all the jargon about shrinking stomachs, but maybe I've simply misplaced
mine. Anybody seen it?
-#8
- No more classes with that darn grad student in Philosophy of Space & Time.
-Jordan actually managed to surprise me. I mean, those comments were about
the best thing I could think of someone saying about me. Which blew my
mind. Even though I wonder about his sincerity, that was quite an impressive
moment.
-#7 - No more nights in the mood I seem to be wading into right now. This
is gonna be a long long night.
-TIME TO RANT (since people seem to be so into that of late...) -- Hey you.
Yeah, you. You know who you are. I've got a couple suggestions.
First of all, confront me if you want to talk about me, don't go bugging
my friends. They still care about me, despite your best efforts, so leave
'em alone. "Subversive" comments? I actually think that's
kinda cute. I could've been a lot harsher, but I wasn't feeling up to
it. You took care of the harshness, as far as I can tell. Not my
fault if you don't want to deal with the reality you've created - it ain't gonna
be pretty, but that's the way you painted it. & the last thing I've
heard from you is you "don't have time for this". The "this"
there sounds like whatever semblance of a friendship there may have potentially
been left. Which is a damn shame, considering how much time you spent
trying to convince me I wasn't someone who deserved betrayal. But now
it looks like all that was just a clever ruse for later betrayal, huh? Just
like the girl who shares your name who you once hated. How poetic. So,
you apparently know where I am... If this is the year for goodbyes, that's your
own doing. I dunno how "good" they are... Kiddo.
-To the rest of you: Deeply sorry about the directly above. But
I hate hate hate it when people go behind my back. & so I feel compelled
to blow everything wide open. My emotions are always available for public
viewing - the more deceptive people get, the more open I feel compelled to be.
That's the kinda person I am. Sorry.
-#6 - Getting to choose the people I spend time with... i.e. not having to deal
with people who happen to be in the same area (cafeteria, other places on campus)
just because they're there. Sure, if they go to the Frontier, I might
get unlucky, but there's 5 full rooms there... much easier to narrow time to
the people who matter.
-I suppose it's "random" that my all-green string of Christmas lights
has stopped functioning. Three guesses as to who those were a gift from
& the last two don't count.
-#5 - Three-on-three basketball tourney in 2 weeks in Los Angeles with Fish
& Kunx! How cool is that?
-#4 - Bob Dylan concert on 3 July with Fish's family, my family, & Gris.
It admittedly doesn't get much better than that. This will be, for
the record, Gris' 4th attempt in one calendar year to hear "I Want You"
played live. My money's still on "Stuck Inside of Mobile with the
Memphis Blues Again", & maybe that new single from the "Wonder
Boys" soundtrack: "Things Have Changed". Wish us
luck! Or better yet, call up Bob & ask him to play those then. I
think Jewel has his number... or "you can always reach him through his
secretary..."
-"Not
a big deal"? Wow. How 'bout that? Well, I'm glad I've
been wasting all my time worrying about such an un-big deal. Maybe people
just never understand each other. That's hopelessly depressing & I
know I don't mean it. But sheesh. I wish I knew how to deal better
with feeling rejected. Because it's usually what happens to me!
-Nocturnality has its weaknesses.
-Top Ten Things About the Coming Summer: #10 - No more e-mail from Rod
Crafts!
-Waltham is putting on its very best Albuquerque-impression today. No
clouds, & it's almost resembling what Easterners call "warm".
Appreciating this fact, I almost ended up under a Pepsi truck. Had
I done so & survived, I would've been able to say, for the rest of my life,
that I'd been run over by the choice of a new generation. How fitting
would that be?!
-Waltham's got all these new yellow-on-black banners up in town that have a
big sun-logo & say "Waltham: the City to Watch". I
was very tempted to buy some yellow paint for the express purpose of painting
"Collect Dust" under each one of them.
-#9 - Driving to run errands instead of walking.
-At least I can help convince others to behave in a manner that, if the people
in my life followed suit, would make me happier. I guess that's some consolation.
& of course, I have their happiness too, which is more than consolation,
it's joy.
-Kate,
you can HAVE "Everybody's Best Friend & Nobody's Lover"... I'm
certainly more tired of it everyday. What do I get in return? Anything
resembling an ounce of potential happiness? Hey, if we work out a deal
over this, maybe I will agree to that part-time position later in your life...
-Morose & judgmental - yup, I suppose that's me. There's worse things
one could be accused of, I'm sure. Maybe I should sew a little warning
label onto my Mariners jacket.
-This feeling of tranquility won't go away. Not that I'm asking it to!
I'm certainly quite pleased with inner peace, for now. I'm not even
sure of the source, but I'm not complaining. I think it has something
to do with being utterly calm about academics when everyone else around me is
eyeing tall buildings & bridges over the very same academics. It's
basically calm by contrast. I feel like I'm living in a big plexiglass
bubble, rolling through life, soothed amongst the stressed. Eight days
& counting.
-Fish, this is just a friendly reminder: please don't die! Thanks,
& have a nice day...
-In spite of everything, even though I don't build it up or get freaked out
about it, there's still few feelings in the world as exhilirating as finishing
a paper. How can some people muck up that feeling by proofreading the
paper afterwards?! It's all about save-spellcheck-print. & that's
all.
-&, of course, few feelings as un-exhilirating as walking out into the rain.
Oh well. More ways to push that potential joy back into the realm
of calm tranquility. I feel like so many stuck records. Sheesh,
this is a lot of updates for 9 in the morning, huh? Purely mathematically,
this would put me on pace for what would certainly be a record 16 updates today!
Good thing I don't believe in math...
-Repeat to self: I will not get dragged down into it, I will not get dragged
down into it, I will not get dragged down into it, I will not...
Ye Olde Archive (Past)
Tell me this is not the end...*
*-lyrics from an as-yet unreleased song, "The Same Old Frontiers",
by SWClayton.