Slightly ashamed, I eavesdropped on the silent conversation. Compelled to violate visual space. Though reproaching myself, the stare shifted not at all. Rude was no word for the way my eyes bore into that heated exchange. All I was was fixated, fascinated, unnerved. And not one bit of notice did they pay this direction. That is, until the thought screamed much too loudly, That. I want that. Then, and only then, did he turn towards the unvoiced interruption. The briefest of an understanding smile. Staying put they left me, again. To eavesdrop on the utterance-free dialogue. Compelled, ashamed, and unnerved.
Tuesday, September 02, 2008
Thursday, August 28, 2008
another brilliant analysis
Lazy-assed folk have properly grasped the opportunity costs of work. And have subsequently captured in actionality their illuminated understanding.
Saturday, August 23, 2008
saturday thoughts
Returning to a first love isn't necessarily simple. Not when the first love is something called books. Loving a plural pulls a girl in so many directions. And when there are always more books to be devoured, how can a girl ever be actually content?
On the desk sit the collection of M Twain's short stories; an irresistible overdose of witty cynicism. Atop the coffee table are the books I ought to, want to read. Shelved in the coffee table are waiting texts by A Sen, A Solzhenitsyn, V Wolfe -- to list the authors visible from this angle. Scattered round are wonderful stories needing to be revisited, embraced anew. On hold at the library are two books recommended by the wise prof. Once I pick them up (in approximately 90minutes) the present near equilibrium can only be upset.
Dishes need washing, furniture wants dusting, various to put away, sundry to do. But I'm distracted. Oh, do I adore this distraction.
On the desk sit the collection of M Twain's short stories; an irresistible overdose of witty cynicism. Atop the coffee table are the books I ought to, want to read. Shelved in the coffee table are waiting texts by A Sen, A Solzhenitsyn, V Wolfe -- to list the authors visible from this angle. Scattered round are wonderful stories needing to be revisited, embraced anew. On hold at the library are two books recommended by the wise prof. Once I pick them up (in approximately 90minutes) the present near equilibrium can only be upset.
Dishes need washing, furniture wants dusting, various to put away, sundry to do. But I'm distracted. Oh, do I adore this distraction.
Wednesday, August 20, 2008
kipling knew
awake are no slobbery kisses
her paws won't lean on the pillow
no echo of mingled sleepy sounds
awake, the spell leaves. she goes.
a spell of fantasy, broken.
my wish let me imagine
my imagined gave pretend
then slipping
falling
startled i wake
i seem to hear her breathe
sneeze and snore
i reach to rub her ears
legs and belly
lean to kiss whisker or paw
and all i kiss is nothing
touch nothing, hear nothing
there is no slip, no fall, no dog.
her paws won't lean on the pillow
no echo of mingled sleepy sounds
awake, the spell leaves. she goes.
a spell of fantasy, broken.
my wish let me imagine
my imagined gave pretend
then slipping
falling
startled i wake
i seem to hear her breathe
sneeze and snore
i reach to rub her ears
legs and belly
lean to kiss whisker or paw
and all i kiss is nothing
touch nothing, hear nothing
there is no slip, no fall, no dog.
Tuesday, August 19, 2008
i've got soul but i'm not a soldier
I'm still a bit worse from the wear of imagining a night of debauchery in the East Village. Technically, Sangria probably doesn't qualify as debauchery. However, the Sangria-induced fondling of the Greek-born, Egyptian-bred belly-dancer might. To be fair, I wasn't really fondling -- just making sure her girls were cancer free. This is also an inspired way to display the obvious merits of my innovative breast cancer awareness fundraising scheme.
Following activities included a demonstration of my eclectic dance style. I'm of the school that thinks shaking ones hips semi-annually and falling periodically counts as dancing. As the Killers croon, "I wanna stand up, I wanna let go." And then the Sangria pulls me to the floor.
Following activities included a demonstration of my eclectic dance style. I'm of the school that thinks shaking ones hips semi-annually and falling periodically counts as dancing. As the Killers croon, "I wanna stand up, I wanna let go." And then the Sangria pulls me to the floor.
Sunday, August 17, 2008
where or where is the promised update on your nefarious activities????
This prolonged silence is unattractive, even on someone as yourself who finds it impossible to be unattractive.
Miss McClain, I need to know whether some Sheikh has whisked you off to his dudgeon...errrr em' "palace" (yes, I totally mean "palace") to be his head concubi... errrrr em' "wife". Basically, there are a few things that are worth knowing: are you in with the mucky-muck of some oil-rich state yet? Can I come visit your oasis in the oil fields? Is it true that you wear silk underwear underneath the burka?
Oh, you don't wear a burka. Well, that's understandable, Your figure hasn't been shot to hell ,yet, by birthing all the little sheikhs' to be. When it goes, you can bet that currently fine ass of yours that you'll have a burka folded nicely on your then empty bed.
So it goes. Rest assured dear one, when your currently fine ass has borne the brunt of time, I'll still be your friend. A better one, seeing as I will no longer be consumed by a murderous jealousy. What a day that will be.
Write back. Be sure to tell me all about the desert, fast horses, armored vehicles, and trodden-status of women who are not you.
me
Miss McClain, I need to know whether some Sheikh has whisked you off to his dudgeon...errrr em' "palace" (yes, I totally mean "palace") to be his head concubi... errrrr em' "wife". Basically, there are a few things that are worth knowing: are you in with the mucky-muck of some oil-rich state yet? Can I come visit your oasis in the oil fields? Is it true that you wear silk underwear underneath the burka?
Oh, you don't wear a burka. Well, that's understandable, Your figure hasn't been shot to hell ,yet, by birthing all the little sheikhs' to be. When it goes, you can bet that currently fine ass of yours that you'll have a burka folded nicely on your then empty bed.
So it goes. Rest assured dear one, when your currently fine ass has borne the brunt of time, I'll still be your friend. A better one, seeing as I will no longer be consumed by a murderous jealousy. What a day that will be.
Write back. Be sure to tell me all about the desert, fast horses, armored vehicles, and trodden-status of women who are not you.
me
conversational styles of men and women, a comparative analysis
"In the interest of something like disclosure, here is something you probably should know about me."
"Ugh-huh," he sort of mutters.
"If this thing happens, I'm likely to, at some point, stomp my foot. Either literally or otherwise. Perhaps both."
"Ugh-huh," he sort of mutters.
"It is just what I do."
"Ugh-huh," he sort of mutters.
"Seriously! Its not a big deal. I don't know why you have to go and treat this like the end of the world. It isn't. Get over it already."
"Ugh- sure," he sort of mutters.
"You are so sweet and understanding."
"Ugh-huh," he sort of mutters.
"Ugh-huh," he sort of mutters.
"If this thing happens, I'm likely to, at some point, stomp my foot. Either literally or otherwise. Perhaps both."
"Ugh-huh," he sort of mutters.
"It is just what I do."
"Ugh-huh," he sort of mutters.
"Seriously! Its not a big deal. I don't know why you have to go and treat this like the end of the world. It isn't. Get over it already."
"Ugh- sure," he sort of mutters.
"You are so sweet and understanding."
"Ugh-huh," he sort of mutters.
Friday, August 15, 2008
...its been awhile, she said
Today, I "ran" into a friend from years gon' bye. From all those many years ago when I was in college and said things like "like, I don't know. I was all like and like he just like stood there and like did nothing. Like totally." From back in the day when I thought showering at a guy's place circa eight in the morning meant something, as opposed to just pity.
Anyway, about this friend. I couldn't remember his first name, though I didn't realize this immediately. I didn't notice because I was too busy calling him by his middle name; perfectly oblivious to the fact that this wasn't his first name.
Point being, I must be doing something right since I got out of Dodge.
Wait a second... how is that the point!?!?
Can't recall. Something about increased neuronal activity indicated by early onset amnesia.
Anyway, about this friend. I couldn't remember his first name, though I didn't realize this immediately. I didn't notice because I was too busy calling him by his middle name; perfectly oblivious to the fact that this wasn't his first name.
Point being, I must be doing something right since I got out of Dodge.
Wait a second... how is that the point!?!?
Can't recall. Something about increased neuronal activity indicated by early onset amnesia.
Saturday, August 09, 2008
around a world
She changed me when
I did not notice.
She grinned, eyes sparkling,
Knowing what I could not.
Having found a simple truth,
Generously she shared the secret.
With laughter. By love. In life.
As a pulsating canvas
She has ascended whole
From all the rejection,
Tragedy,
Fatigue,
Success,
And accidents of a mortal existence.
The story mapped on her body
Shines love to her friends.
Pain, softening her eyes,
Hidden behind laughter,
In time I saw. Sometimes unseen,
Perhaps misunderstood,
A soft residue of life strives on.
I did not notice.
She grinned, eyes sparkling,
Knowing what I could not.
Having found a simple truth,
Generously she shared the secret.
With laughter. By love. In life.
As a pulsating canvas
She has ascended whole
From all the rejection,
Tragedy,
Fatigue,
Success,
And accidents of a mortal existence.
The story mapped on her body
Shines love to her friends.
Pain, softening her eyes,
Hidden behind laughter,
In time I saw. Sometimes unseen,
Perhaps misunderstood,
A soft residue of life strives on.
Tuesday, August 05, 2008
i think i said that
Today during a meeting I happened to ask my employer whether the organization could rent a jump-house for the staff. Judging from her silence, she thought this a fantastic idea. Also judging from said silence, I think she was contemplating bringing in a couple clowns.
That's fine by me, so long as they are sad clowns. Happy clowns give me the creeps.
That's fine by me, so long as they are sad clowns. Happy clowns give me the creeps.
Monday, August 04, 2008
"One word of truth shall outweigh the whole world."
MOSCOW (AP) -- When Alexander Solzhenitsyn's "One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich" appeared in the thick monthly literary magazine Novy Mir back in November of 1962, taboos were shattered. Buried secrets were unearthed. And the Soviet Union was shaken to its foundations.
Solzhenitsyn's short novel described a single day in the life of a carpenter caught up in the Soviet Union's secret network of slave labor camps, where starvation, bitter cold and punishing work regimes were the rule and, it has been said, the average life expectancy was one winter.
The author was working as a provincial math teacher, and his greatest work, "The Gulag Archipelago," was still to come. But "One Day" was to shock the U.S.S.R. and the world.
Some of the crimes of the dictator Josef Stalin were exposed and denounced following a secret speech by Communist Party leader Nikita Khrushchev in 1956, as part of his short-lived campaign to reform the brutal Soviet system.
But Solzhenitsyn's novel, based on the seven years he spent as a prisoner, was the first real expose of the gulag - a word derived from the Russian "Glavnoe Upravelenie Lagerei," or Main Camp Administration.
Solzhenitsyn, who went on to win the Nobel Prize for Literature but was exiled from his homeland because of his work, died of heart failure Sunday at age 89, his son, Stepan Solzhenitsyn, told The Associated Press on Monday.
The gulag was, Solzhenitsyn wrote, the "human meat grinder" for processing what Stalin sneered at as "wreckers," vermin and "enemies of the people" who allegedly sabotaged Soviet progress to the workers' paradise. The grim process started, typically, with a knock on the door late at night, an arrest on charges of trivial or imaginary crimes, condemnation by a secret tribunal, transportation by unheated rail car and finally incarceration in the camps.
The prisoners formed a secret army of slave laborers who built railroads, worked in mines and cleared forests in some of the world's most inhospitable terrain. In the end, by the most authoritative estimate, the gulag systematically ground down some 29 million souls.
Armed with his literary talent and prodigious memory, Solzhenitsyn (sohl-zheh-NEETS'-ihn) spent more than 40 years working in secrecy, in fear and finally in exile as he chiseled away at the lies that supported the Soviet system. And in the end he, as much perhaps as any individual, helped to bring it down.
To read the rest of this article: http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/S/SOLZHENITSYN_LIFE_OF_DISSENT?SITE=FLMYR&SECTION=HOME&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT
Thursday, July 31, 2008
boyzone are poets
Here's the thing: life, work, and futbol practice can't be taken particularly seriously when accompanied by a "Foreigner" power ballad or a "Take That" uptempo number.
--> (chorus) Yes, yes baby! I'm working the cheesy pop.
Conclusion: I'm in little danger of being taken seriously.
--> (repeat chorus)
--> (chorus) Yes, yes baby! I'm working the cheesy pop.
Conclusion: I'm in little danger of being taken seriously.
--> (repeat chorus)
Sunday, July 27, 2008
yet another instance where a professor did me the favor of crushing my hopes and dreams
Every word that cascades from Rudy's mind is genius, poignant, necessary, illuminated. His heavy Cuban accent makes 66.6667% of these gems unintelligible. This serves to add to the market value of the semitelligible third. Half of this passably understandable talk (or 16.6667% of the whole) occurs during smoking breaks.
Once, during an attempt to prove the seemingly hopeless point that a gal my size could gracefully exit through the same office window that her buck-ten midget-sized nemesis barely squeezed through, his accent was nearly entirely understandable for successive sentences, absent any nicotine inhalation. Standing in the bushes outside the then occupied-by-me window, unlit cigarette hanging loosely from his chops, Rudy decided to quiz us on the implications of paragraph 19 of random scholar's article in the 1969 Economic Geography, spring publication. Specifically in relation to Sam's brilliant analysis, on an entirely unrelated topic, made during class hours earlier. (Apparently, the relevance of an article he read 35 years previously occurred to him somewhere between pulling the cigarette out of his pocket protector and climbing through the bushes to better witness my failing evacuation.)
"Em, Rudy. Due to this particularly awkward position that I find myself currently occupying, (indeed the untrained eye might say that I am technically stuck in this window,) that particular paragraph of that otherwise memorable article has been driven from the functioning portion of my so-called brain. However, I think that... [begin to draw a preliminary outline of a particularly insightful, albeit straightforward logical interpretation on some topic that probably related to incentives.]"
Interruption.
"No, quite sorry. I don't have a light."
So, you can see how I got it into my head that Rudy looked to me as a bright light in the future of economic analysis and theory.
Imagine my horror, shock, and disappointment that after his two crushing exams nary a comment was made regarding the brilliance of my economic analysis and insight. Adding insult, my chicken-scrawled essays were red-penned with statements like: LOL; amusing; maybe you could write for comedy central; you seem bitter- are you married?; somewhat to very creative, though clearly better suited to an anthropology course.
If I ever get around to writing that suicide note, I'll be sure to thank you Rudy.
Once, during an attempt to prove the seemingly hopeless point that a gal my size could gracefully exit through the same office window that her buck-ten midget-sized nemesis barely squeezed through, his accent was nearly entirely understandable for successive sentences, absent any nicotine inhalation. Standing in the bushes outside the then occupied-by-me window, unlit cigarette hanging loosely from his chops, Rudy decided to quiz us on the implications of paragraph 19 of random scholar's article in the 1969 Economic Geography, spring publication. Specifically in relation to Sam's brilliant analysis, on an entirely unrelated topic, made during class hours earlier. (Apparently, the relevance of an article he read 35 years previously occurred to him somewhere between pulling the cigarette out of his pocket protector and climbing through the bushes to better witness my failing evacuation.)
"Em, Rudy. Due to this particularly awkward position that I find myself currently occupying, (indeed the untrained eye might say that I am technically stuck in this window,) that particular paragraph of that otherwise memorable article has been driven from the functioning portion of my so-called brain. However, I think that... [begin to draw a preliminary outline of a particularly insightful, albeit straightforward logical interpretation on some topic that probably related to incentives.]"
Interruption.
"No, quite sorry. I don't have a light."
So, you can see how I got it into my head that Rudy looked to me as a bright light in the future of economic analysis and theory.
Imagine my horror, shock, and disappointment that after his two crushing exams nary a comment was made regarding the brilliance of my economic analysis and insight. Adding insult, my chicken-scrawled essays were red-penned with statements like: LOL; amusing; maybe you could write for comedy central; you seem bitter- are you married?; somewhat to very creative, though clearly better suited to an anthropology course.
If I ever get around to writing that suicide note, I'll be sure to thank you Rudy.
Friday, July 25, 2008
Monday, July 21, 2008
my lil' sister kicks ass
Admittedly, she hasn't quite finished her first round in this years nat'l champs of 156 awesome junior chica golferettes. And, admittedly she is facing the hardest (by ranking) hole on the course.
Whatever!
She's tied for 17th... and at one point about an hour ago she was tied for 8th. Which further supports my assertion that she kicks ass.
Like, mine!
Whatever!
She's tied for 17th... and at one point about an hour ago she was tied for 8th. Which further supports my assertion that she kicks ass.
Like, mine!
Friday, July 18, 2008
3 very good reasons to be thankful
- Randomly ran into a friend on a train platform during his walk of shame.
- Softball team winning without my having to get out of bed.
- Other folks undefeated records.
Monday, July 14, 2008
how things coming before are discussed after
"So you see I already had my breakdown.” I sip my black decaffeinated Fair Trade tea, weakened with milk. When in Scotland it is only seemly to do as the Scots even if it means partially ruining a perfectly good cup of tea. “It bloody well wouldn’t do to have another one. Greedy wouldn’t you say?”
“I’m not sure bloody well is the expression you were searching for.” Reaching across the small coffeehouse table he grasped my hand to his. “At any rate, it’s over. You got out.”
I smile. That hand grab was awfully well played. Rather impossible to count the number of times I’d been told “you got out!” As unoriginal as the sentiment was, hearing it roll off a Scottish tongue was a delightful addition.
“Geez gal! Your hands are freezing.” With the slight raise of the eyebrow he asks a silent permission. I smile and shyly look down as he “warms” my cold paws.
“As to that breakdown of yours,” with a squeeze a bit strong for warming purposes “it sounds like a sanity break. And you have my permission to be as greedy as you like… provided it involves me!” He throws me a smile initially teasing. It softens as he casually asks, “When?”
“A bit over a year ago.”
His gaze rests gently on my face as he begins to trace slow circles over my right palm with his index finger. This holding hands business across the table is a bit conspicuous for me. I don’t stop him; supporting the direction things are presently headed. Hopefully we can move away from the clown car of my past life. I had been different. Broken. That weakness is an embarrassment.
“Don’t be embarrassed.” He says in his low, rich, accented tone. “It’s a bit… heroic.”
“It wasn’t my doing. My friends rescued me.”
“Look at me.” He gently commands. “You are stronger than you let yourself believe.”
His hands tighten over mine as I shake my head in silent disagreement. My mind wanders back. Back to those sleepless nights in the rickety apartment on 3rd St, tears stubbornly absent. I would hold the pillow close and will the tears to flow. My involuntary stoicism left me feeling like a failure. That feeling of being empty. As if I had run out of all goodness, kindness, and love.
His continued chatter interjects itself into my consciousness. Shame on me, I hadn’t heard a word of that last bit. Scotsmen talk whether or not their audience pays mind so I hadn’t exactly been rude.
He looks at me waiting for a response. “I’m sorry. I was a wee bit distracted. Could you say that again? As in the last ten minutes.” My tone is serious, my eyes playful. He thinks I’m kidding. (Success!!!)
“Em’, I was saying that this place is shutting up. Would you like to go to the PGC?”
“The what?”
“PostGrad Club. You know I’m on the board.”
“I’m not a member.”
“Despite what you may have told me!?!”
I giggle slightly. “You won’t be forgetting that?”
“It’s rather etched into my mind. Associated as it is with how you looked in that lovely undergarment.” His deliberate gaze shifts down from my eyes for a long second.
“And you claimed to remember something other than my cleavage!” mock indignation fools no one.
He wraps his arm around my waist and pulls me close as we wait for the light to turn. “Oh, I remember everything,” he says. “Your voice, your face, your smile. Your smile when you said you were a member of the club.” He pauses, smelling my hair. “How you left without saying goodbye. And how your elfish friend flashed me your boobs. Repeatedly.”
“Do you remember the part nine days ago when she didn’t give me time to get my goodnight kiss?”
“You want to lay all of that at her door?” referring ever so gingerly to my propensity for mixed signals.
“No.” I admit with a smile. “I just want you to rectify the situation.”
We silently cross the intersection. As we step onto the far curb I snicker slightly.
“See, ‘rectify the situation’ is subtle for…”
He doesn’t let me finish. I should be expressing mock indignation at this flamboyant interruption with bonus back-dip. Instead I open my mouth, slightly. With a smile.
“What ye be grinning at?”
I arch my eyebrow in that irresistible way. “You really should rectify the situation again.”
“I’m not sure bloody well is the expression you were searching for.” Reaching across the small coffeehouse table he grasped my hand to his. “At any rate, it’s over. You got out.”
I smile. That hand grab was awfully well played. Rather impossible to count the number of times I’d been told “you got out!” As unoriginal as the sentiment was, hearing it roll off a Scottish tongue was a delightful addition.
“Geez gal! Your hands are freezing.” With the slight raise of the eyebrow he asks a silent permission. I smile and shyly look down as he “warms” my cold paws.
“As to that breakdown of yours,” with a squeeze a bit strong for warming purposes “it sounds like a sanity break. And you have my permission to be as greedy as you like… provided it involves me!” He throws me a smile initially teasing. It softens as he casually asks, “When?”
“A bit over a year ago.”
His gaze rests gently on my face as he begins to trace slow circles over my right palm with his index finger. This holding hands business across the table is a bit conspicuous for me. I don’t stop him; supporting the direction things are presently headed. Hopefully we can move away from the clown car of my past life. I had been different. Broken. That weakness is an embarrassment.
“Don’t be embarrassed.” He says in his low, rich, accented tone. “It’s a bit… heroic.”
“It wasn’t my doing. My friends rescued me.”
“Look at me.” He gently commands. “You are stronger than you let yourself believe.”
His hands tighten over mine as I shake my head in silent disagreement. My mind wanders back. Back to those sleepless nights in the rickety apartment on 3rd St, tears stubbornly absent. I would hold the pillow close and will the tears to flow. My involuntary stoicism left me feeling like a failure. That feeling of being empty. As if I had run out of all goodness, kindness, and love.
His continued chatter interjects itself into my consciousness. Shame on me, I hadn’t heard a word of that last bit. Scotsmen talk whether or not their audience pays mind so I hadn’t exactly been rude.
He looks at me waiting for a response. “I’m sorry. I was a wee bit distracted. Could you say that again? As in the last ten minutes.” My tone is serious, my eyes playful. He thinks I’m kidding. (Success!!!)
“Em’, I was saying that this place is shutting up. Would you like to go to the PGC?”
“The what?”
“PostGrad Club. You know I’m on the board.”
“I’m not a member.”
“Despite what you may have told me!?!”
I giggle slightly. “You won’t be forgetting that?”
“It’s rather etched into my mind. Associated as it is with how you looked in that lovely undergarment.” His deliberate gaze shifts down from my eyes for a long second.
“And you claimed to remember something other than my cleavage!” mock indignation fools no one.
He wraps his arm around my waist and pulls me close as we wait for the light to turn. “Oh, I remember everything,” he says. “Your voice, your face, your smile. Your smile when you said you were a member of the club.” He pauses, smelling my hair. “How you left without saying goodbye. And how your elfish friend flashed me your boobs. Repeatedly.”
“Do you remember the part nine days ago when she didn’t give me time to get my goodnight kiss?”
“You want to lay all of that at her door?” referring ever so gingerly to my propensity for mixed signals.
“No.” I admit with a smile. “I just want you to rectify the situation.”
We silently cross the intersection. As we step onto the far curb I snicker slightly.
“See, ‘rectify the situation’ is subtle for…”
He doesn’t let me finish. I should be expressing mock indignation at this flamboyant interruption with bonus back-dip. Instead I open my mouth, slightly. With a smile.
“What ye be grinning at?”
I arch my eyebrow in that irresistible way. “You really should rectify the situation again.”
Friday, July 11, 2008
anonymous shame is a highly effective instructional resource
Half six in the morning
"It makes quite a statement. This could... this has..." I leave the thought hanging and contemplate uses of the $2500 first prize. With the haze of the unslept fogging my brain, I mercilessly read over the essay again. My inner voice finds the proper tonal pitch to convey the urgency embedded in sentences laboriously composed throughout the last 16hrs. "If I'm being completely honest about this," I say to the cat curled up on the arm of the loveseat, "perfectly honest; well, I've done quite a good job. Not a masterpiece, of course. Not bloody Keats." With a contented chuckle I realize that never having read Keats, presumably it might be on par... or better. With that pleasant thought and a look at the clock I find my way upstairs to bed after an approximately 37 hour absence.
"Not bad -- no masterpiece -- impressive really." I mumble this repeatedly until passing out.
Waiting patiently in my inbox following afternoon
"Bad," she writes. "Not good. Takes the reader three pages to figure out your point. By then not enough time to develop point. Structure all wrong. Advise to start again."
I'm shocked. She's wrong. As a compromise, a few aesthetic changes are made. Recommended alterations ignored. Moment of hesitancy before pressing SUBMIT NOW button.
Conversation months later where, mistakenly, I believe that I'll be haven' the last laugh
"Admittedly, you did have a point. Still, it wasn't that bad. It got an honorable mention and a few hundred bucks."
She smiles. "No, I was wrong." A sideways glance and a very pregnant pause. "My comments were much too kind. Much less deserving than I noticed on first read."
Confusion passes over my face. First read? She read that slapt-together paper more than once?
Her smile widens to its distinctive fearsome width. "Oh, yes. I removed your name, of course. By mid-term we had all edited it numerous times. It was less coherent under the hood than it first appeared. Excellent sample of what an academic paper should not look like. "
"And by we all...?"
By "we all" she means the required upper-division GE econ writing class of 40+ students.
"It makes quite a statement. This could... this has..." I leave the thought hanging and contemplate uses of the $2500 first prize. With the haze of the unslept fogging my brain, I mercilessly read over the essay again. My inner voice finds the proper tonal pitch to convey the urgency embedded in sentences laboriously composed throughout the last 16hrs. "If I'm being completely honest about this," I say to the cat curled up on the arm of the loveseat, "perfectly honest; well, I've done quite a good job. Not a masterpiece, of course. Not bloody Keats." With a contented chuckle I realize that never having read Keats, presumably it might be on par... or better. With that pleasant thought and a look at the clock I find my way upstairs to bed after an approximately 37 hour absence.
"Not bad -- no masterpiece -- impressive really." I mumble this repeatedly until passing out.
Waiting patiently in my inbox following afternoon
"Bad," she writes. "Not good. Takes the reader three pages to figure out your point. By then not enough time to develop point. Structure all wrong. Advise to start again."
I'm shocked. She's wrong. As a compromise, a few aesthetic changes are made. Recommended alterations ignored. Moment of hesitancy before pressing SUBMIT NOW button.
Conversation months later where, mistakenly, I believe that I'll be haven' the last laugh
"Admittedly, you did have a point. Still, it wasn't that bad. It got an honorable mention and a few hundred bucks."
She smiles. "No, I was wrong." A sideways glance and a very pregnant pause. "My comments were much too kind. Much less deserving than I noticed on first read."
Confusion passes over my face. First read? She read that slapt-together paper more than once?
Her smile widens to its distinctive fearsome width. "Oh, yes. I removed your name, of course. By mid-term we had all edited it numerous times. It was less coherent under the hood than it first appeared. Excellent sample of what an academic paper should not look like. "
"And by we all...?"
By "we all" she means the required upper-division GE econ writing class of 40+ students.
Saturday, July 05, 2008
a kiss through the bars of Orion
A friend sent me an email today that left my heart glad. In it she included a few candid photos taken over past months. They served to remind me of her beauty, passion, and soul. Perhaps I lovingly misplace these truths in her smile. She walked me through what was to be seen and I believe now to know her. Knowing her, how can I see anything less than this quiet wisdom; the capacity to listen, love, lose, and find the worthwhile in life?
My dear, I miss you too.
My dear, I miss you too.
Thursday, July 03, 2008
the ride
I keep a spoon in the freezer, eat lemon curd to get high, forget names that might be better unforgotten, cry till laughter chokes up the tears, and pound keys on a piano poorly. And sometimes, I recall what sensai O'Shea taught me ages ago... ^#*@, it doesn't matter.
He was so right.
He was so right.
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