In&Out

This is human, to be in an empty room and a playground. With worlds inside, celluloid ribbon both raveled and rolled. Recorded negatives, some developed and others decomposed.

Bicycle

This is my sky blue Schwinn, feat. Orange the pudgy cat & her Trader Joe's bags:



I've planned to buy some canvas to cover the seat, but the main problem with the bike has been flat tires. Mysterious flat tires. In the past few months I've had six flats, and all but yesterday's have had no known cause (yesterday I ran over a very un-mysterious piece of metal on my way home from work). So when I was in Philadelphia last week, I considered buying a new bike. Unfortunately, I got a flat tire while test-riding a bike for two minutes. It was cool, though, cause the tire went "pssshhhh" as I dismounted the bike. Like some neat hydraulic system that lowers about an inch. As a result, I decided to just get my Schwinn's tire fixed again, and instead of a new bike I bought this hooded sweatshirt:



It's also blue.

Dikembe Mutombo'd

Neither Boston University nor William & Mary accepted my graduate school applications. As my sister said, it seems that graduate schools need you to apply two years in a row to prove that you're serious. So now I plan to return to the classroom as a teacher. Even though the rejection hurts, I'm not too upset. The more I considered the possibilities of being a graduate student or secondary school teacher for the next five years, the less I worried about graduate school acceptance. I want to get back to teaching.

In the meantime, here's something I would have loved to study in graduate school: cultural neuroscience. Maybe I'll try to attend a few lectures about it, and pretend that I'm a student.

15 Solid Albums

Wild

A bellow in solitude:

1) The fear of reprimand

2) The surge of freedom

3) The silence of isolation




.

A Trade

I love to see people work at something they've mastered. It's especially enjoyable to watch someone do something that I'm also into, but it's the adeptness that matters. Maybe that's why I didn't get museum fatigue yesterday at Colonial Williamsburg - all those master craftsmen. Whether we were at the Gunsmith or the Joiner, I could have watched any of them work all day. Well, except the Wigmaker.

My admiration for skilled work has increased because of my job in a kitchen, where I'm surely the least experienced and skilled. The gym, too, has made me appreciate the fluidity and sureness that comes with mastered technique, especially when it means a kick in the ribs or an armbar. In fact, my generalist tendencies seem to keep me from any real mastery. So maybe it's an appreciation born from envy. Or just straight-up envy.

Rebel Rebel

I clearly remember the first time I fully considered my mortality, my death. My eighth grade math teacher walked by my desk to see if I needed help with a worksheet, but when she looked at me and said "is everything alright?", she wasn't talking about arithmetic. I was either twelve or thirteen. Because of this, I would brush off the suggestion that teenagers think they're invincible, that they'll live forever. Maybe I didn't calculate risk as an adult would, but I certainly felt the full weight of my mortality.

This all sounds grave to me now, overly-dramatic, but those are also apt descriptions for most of my adolescence. And it's not as though I became obsessed with death as a figure or concept, earnestly drawing skulls and macabre scenes, nor with my own death in the way that some people fantasize about their funerals. I just remember thinking: this isn't permanent, and eventually all that I know and am will cease to exist for me.

It's silly to assume that I was alone in this realization. And now it seems a natural and crucial part of developing a sense of self, a period in a process that psychologists have probably laid out neatly. But those models of individual development always seemed like challenges to me. As though psychologists dared me to defy their predictions, like the freshmen orientation at college when they tell you to look to your right and left because only a certain percentage of you will graduate. When you say, "Not me, but I bet this homely-looking dude next to me won't make it."

Two Songs

I didn't realize that this song is from the 90s, though it seems obvious after watching the video (and Alix says it's in Empire Records, which is also a clear giveaway):



The song really does it for me. However, I'd assumed that it was a 90's style rip-off that came out around the same time (2003) as this song:



Aside from being a decade apart, I think these songs have a lot in common. First, they both have videos with the leader singer making weird faces. It's a nice reminder that most people look silly when singing, especially when they're not actually playing music. Stylistically, they nail the heavy pop rock sound - something rarely done. I'd also argue that both songs have bridges with enough hook to be choruses. In fact, all three parts of the traditional verse - bridge - chorus structure are solid in both songs. That's a rarity, like getting in all clean shots on a jab - cross - hook combo. Knockout.

Over and Under

At the end of every summer, as the school year arrived, I would tell myself how much I'd changed since the last year. How much cooler I'd be, for whatever reasons, and how much it would impress others. Then I'd find myself re-immersed in the day to day social and academic world of school, and realize that, for the most part, I was the same.

A similar process happens when I reflect on certain philosophical and spiritual ideas. At times, I will feel I've reached some sort of revelation, a new way of seeing the world and myself. But as time goes on I will find my overall perspective unchanged.

This isn't something I'm realizing now, though. After a couple of school years without significant growth in coolness, I'd say to myself: Yeah, I thought I was cool going into those last few years, but this year is totally different and I have a whole new perspective. Then I'd start to think that reflecting on one's coolness isn't very cool, and so I'd just let things ride. Be cool. Still, I was the same.

In my deeper reflections, I'd tell myself that constantly seeking progress in great leaps only held me back from further progress. Then I'd try to progress by letting go of my desire to progress.

I can't believe that I'm alone in this type of thinking. Rather, I assume that most people do it. Or at least most people under the same cultural influences as me, because I think that my culture creates this conception progress and growth. I'm not, however, referring to the obsession with get-rich-quick schemes or revolutionary diets. Rather, it's in our stories, our histories and myths. Here we have flashes, sudden revolution and invention and enlightenment that changes everything.

Supermen

I took a Russian literature course in college, titled "Outsiders, Supermen, and Ordinary People." The professor, a young woman from Russia who matched the description of all I'd imagine when told that the professor is a young woman from Russia, often provided much-needed insights on Russian culture as we discussed Pushkin, Lermontov, Turgenev, Tolstoy, and Dostoevsky, among others. She also brought up characteristics of American culture, sometimes to contrast with the Russian perspective.

As the course title implies, we gave a lot of attention to the place of individuals in society, both as the individuals perceive their place and as society sees it. One day, the professor said: "One thing I cannot understand is how Americans so often believe that they can be anything they want to be." She went on about how one can wish and try and pursue the goal of being one of history's great writers, but only certain people are actually capable of reaching that level.

By saying this, she not only challenged the Disney-esque message that if we try hard enough we can all achieve our dreams, she also suggested that talent - genius, even - is an inherent quality. Some of the class sided with her, while others fought back. However, remembering this, I forget which stance I took. I can imagine taking either one. And maybe that's the thing: subjectivity and open-mindedness can create a wash that makes nearly anything look possible, yet nothing definitive.