a la deriva

the end

2009-01-13T17:16:00.002-06:00

You probably guessed due to my lack of posting that a la deriva is no more. It is true, we have had many adventures together, a la deriva and I, but I have decided to retire it in favor of another project... which isn't ready to be unveiled quite yet. Thanks for reading!

movin on up

2008-08-25T16:47:00.000-05:00

Read a post by me on a Chicago Sun-Times blog!

times they are a-changin

2008-08-14T09:49:00.002-05:00

I hope you'll believe me when I say I have a list of possible blogs to write, both on paper and in my head. I have the beginnings of at least two more blogs about Israel written in various journals, and a couple more composing themselves in my head. I have ideas of what I can do with this blog that's new, what I can call it, what it can look like, what I can write about. Still a la deriva sits silent, and empty, and sad: Who has time to learn CSS, re-learn HTML, and think, much less write, critically about one's life and surroundings?

Still, I would like to blog everyday. Perhaps I will try.

Monday I begin my new job as an Intern at the Obama for America National Campaign Headquarters. Today I drink morning mimosas and eat sushi for lunch to celebrate and hop on a train that will take me west to Iowa. I've never been to Iowa. Nor, in the last year, have I looked forward to going to work in the morning. Stay tuned...

in the land of promises

2008-06-24T23:39:00.005-05:00

More often than not, news from the Middle East is bloody, and images, at least in my first-world mind, are of third-world scenes: starving children, violence, unstable governments, poverty. Perhaps I should have known better from my trip to Morocco (and, come to think of it, the U.S. isn’t exactly starving children-, violence-, and poverty-free itself) but I was surprised to see that Israel was civilized. There were supermarkets and retail stores and Coffee Bean and Tea Leaf (but, interestingly, no Starbucks—it apparently didn’t go over well there) and flush toilets and clean streets and paved roads and street signs and freeways and nice houses. We didn’t go near the West Bank or the Gaza Strip (which, depending on who you talk to, are not really part of Israel anyway) or to Sderot, where rockets launched from Gaza fall daily, but even though most of the buildings in the rest of the country are ancient, they’re well kept up, and even though it’s only been around as an official state for 60 years, it seems to be doing pretty well culturally, economically, technologically, politically, and otherwise. Still, it wasn’t home.

-----

We were standing in a balmy Tel Aviv evening, a warm breeze was coming off the Mediterranean, American music was permeating the walls of the nearby bar; we were talking about Israel. Rather, Israel and Palestine. We were, after all, in Israel.

I have picked up a few facts about the Israel/Palestine situation over the years but I've never really understood it or trusted any source of information to be true and unbiased. Perhaps this trip and this conversation will serve as my impetus to try harder to supplement my knowledge, some of which I picked up from this trip and this night when I opted to leave the bar because the music was too loud and American, the drinks were too expensive, and there was not one Israeli in the place. Even though the bar was identical to many in Chicago—with the exception of the Goldstar beer label written in Hebrew—there was one distinct and poignant difference. And we were reminded of it at every moment by the vigilant armed guard for our group of 50.

Standing there, listening to opinions about Israel and Palestine with one ear, trying to tune out the washed-out club music with the other, I looked over the tops of the buildings, and at times the boat masts behind me, and wondered if the planes and helicopters flying by were “friendly.” Our guard, holding the largest gun I have even seen, standing just a few feet away gave no sign.

(View of Jerusalem's Old City—note the wall surrounding it and the gold-domed mosque)

And I wondered again, earlier in the day, sitting at the junction of the Armenian quarter, the Jewish quarter, the Muslim quarter, and the Christian quarter in the Old City of Jerusalem. I watched the men in black hats, beards, suits, with tzitzit and payot walk by, the women in long skirts and dark caps pushing strollers, and the group of dark-skinned little boys not wearing yarmulkes and I looked out over the satellite dishes and white-stone rooftops to the gold-domed mosque that stands on the Jews’ Temple Mount—the fabled site of the creation of the world and the first two synagogues, among other things (see above)—and wondered if the man in the bright-green shirt pacing over the rooftops in front of us with a hand gun at his side in one hand and a walkie talkie in the other was, again, friendly. Our guard was whispering to another participant, but still close by.

And one more time I wondered, in only the second day of our trip, while walking through Shuk Machaneh Yehuda—a blocks-long outdoor market in the New City of Jerusalem—and carrying bags of bright, sweet fresh fruit and some unidentifiable morsels for lunch, a man walked quickly by with a machine gun. I didn't feel I was in danger in Israel, per se; with its rolling hills and subdued greens and palm trees it actually looked a lot like California, home (see below). But there were a few moments during my 10-day trip when, more often than when I’m in the U.S., I stepped back and wondered if my life was in danger.

(California-esque view from our first-night accommodations just outside of Jerusalem, in Shoresh)

I was, after all, in the Middle East. A Jewish state, maybe, or so our tour guide kept reminding us, reminiscent of California, yes, but not quite home nonetheless.

------

You see, before I left, I heard many stories from people, Jews of course, who had gone before, who got a starry look in their eyes when I said I was going to Israel, who said dreamily, “I stepped off the plane and felt like I was home.” “I wish I could go for the first time again, it was so magical.” Even during our final group discussion before we ate our last kibbutz-made dinner and got on the plane, people were saying tearfully, “I didn’t feel like a tourist at all.” Walking in a 50-person group with my sunglasses, hat, sunscreen, humongous water bottle, and camera certainly made me feel like a tourist. And I didn’t believe the “everyone is a Jew” thing either: everyone definitely didn’t look Jewish and there are plenty of Muslims and Christians who live there too.

(Me, dressed modestly, in front of the Western Wall, which is the only remaining piece of the second temple's surrounding wall that stood where the mosque stands today)

The moral of my first, excessively rambling post on my recent trip to Israel is the word “skeptical.” I think if I had taken this trip back when I was an impressionable freshman just learning about my Jewish side and before I went to Spain and saw Europe, it might have completely changed my life. Now, as a skeptical young adult, almost a year into my first full-time job, well, I’m not so impressionable. I wasn't moved to tears when the plane landed, I did not go to synagogue last Friday night, and I wouldn't be too upset if I never took another 12-hour El Al flight. That’s not to say that it didn’t change me at all, though. The recent surge in my Chicago social life can be attributed directly to Birthright. Aspects of the trip, its people, or just Israel recur nightly in my dreams. And I have a certain fondness for the country. My fondness won’t translate into me voting specifically pro-Israel in November, but it does make me read a little closer when I see an Israel-related article during my morning Internet news prowl. The thousands of dollars of philanthropic funding that provided my free trip wasn’t entirely lost on me: I have facts to pursue, questions to answer, issues to think about, and endless fodder for many interesting discussions ahead.

To be continued…

maybe

2008-06-17T09:57:00.002-05:00

Maybe if I wrote my posts like this I would have more readers.

I am composing Israel posts. I promise.

violin lessons

2008-06-11T12:49:00.004-05:00

Today I found myself in an unlikely situation. I was hiding from the California-esque sun in the cool, dark, faintly sweet-smelling basement workshop of a violin maker and repairman. There were violins of all shapes and sizes hanging from the walls, some with finish, some without, some with strings, some without, some full-sized, some half-sized, some giant (otherwise known, I think, as cellos). The repairman was slightly awkward but friendly, and though I had diagnosed my own problem, he proceeded to tell me all the other things wrong with my eight-month old violin. The strings are too high and cheap and the fingerboard too low, the pegs not "doped" enough. He gave me my choice of three "good" violins with appropriate string-heights and fingerboard angles and set to work, fixing the only fixable problem.

I spent more time staring at the dark graveyard of desks and dressers and couches and painted arches and picture frames that inhabited the basement outside his workshop than I did squeaking out the parts of songs I could remember after two weeks of not playing, convinced it was the violins that were out of tune and not I.

It seemed like such an unassuming place to work: an artists' building with no real need for business or numbers. I paid in crumpled cash. I didn't see the computer in the corner, only the wooden work tables, the mis-matched chairs, the small wood-working tools and the light coming through the distorted glass windows. This is a man who took the less-traveled path. This is a man who does not stare at a computer screen all day. This is a man who gets to surround himself with beauty, in sight and in sound, and he gets a tangible reward from his day's work: a well-working violin, and maybe even a child's smiling face. I certainly walked out of there, into the perfect day, smiling.

One of the reasons I'm a journalist (or I want to be one) is I enjoy finding myself in unlikely situations. Discovering unlikely people. Looking for graffiti under a freeway underpass, watching bikes fly by at a motocross raceway, exploring the bowels of a brand-new clean room in an engineering building, smelling the air in the sanctuary of a LEED-certified environmental synagogue: when I'm in these out-of-the-ordinary situations I like to take a step back, look around, and think, "Not many people can say they have been where I am now." I like to dabble, walk a mile in someone's shoes, and while I don't mind my daily routine, I relish the opportunity to leave it.

to the holy land and back again

2008-06-09T11:32:00.000-05:00

I left for Israel without telling you and now I'm back. Lots of words and thoughts and pictures will be up soon...

shiny new

2008-05-20T16:59:00.007-05:00

At 1:00 a.m. on Sunday morning as I was speeding along the freshly rained-upon sidewalk on my spiffy new bicycle (yes, the sidewalk, and don't worry, I didn't go further than that crack), the quiet moist air in my mouth, the wind brushing across my face and through my hair, I thought to myself as my lips moved into a smile, "This move was a great idea."

You see, last year at around this time, before I bought my one-way ticket to Chicago but after I started thinking seriously about moving here, I focused a lot of my decision-making energies on whether I thought I would regret the move later. Now I see that however badly I think I'm doing now, or how everything turns out later on, this move could never induce regret. While I probably won't end up here in the long run (though I can never be sure--I may be living on a corn farm in central Illinois in 10 years) I seem to have surrounded myself with very thoughtful friends. I may not have the quantity I had in college or the social life (yes, sometimes I go to sleep at 11:30 on a Saturday night), but I have met some very good people. And in my slightly less than a year here, I have received two of the most thoughtful gifts anyone outside my family has ever given me (of course not counting the many nice gifts my family has given me over the years).

The "new" bike that I was so gleefully riding the other night was presented to me as a no-occasion surprise Saturday afternoon in the living room of my boyfriend's apartment. I had my ears and my eyes sufficiently covered, and when the hands came away, the bicycle pretty much of my dreams was sitting between the alley-found armchairs and the old wooden floor.

"To what do I owe this amazing gift?" I stammered with amazement, gazing at the slightly faded black frame, the shiny handlebars, the cushy seat, the rusty fenders (perfect for painting white and red).

Apparently my friend has been eyeing it all winter, where it sat unlocked near a hidden bar on a forgotten street populated mostly by warehouses. She sat for a day or two scrubbing at the rust, tuning up the chain, fixing the flat tire until it was roadworthy and presented it to me with a smile. It still needed a little work, but it was a nice smooth ride. "What do you think?" she asked. I felt like Ralphie in The Christmas Story; of course I was thrilled to have my very own bike, and for free! And more importantly, my friend was thinking of me.

My new bike looks something like this, but black, a little rusty, and minus the metal thing in the back: (I will post a real picture when it's completed)

I will be speeding around the city with it upon my return from Israel when, I'm hoping, it will finally be warm. I'm pretty sure Spring doesn't exist here. Sure it's lovely: the trees are blooming and the colorful tulips are opening, but it's 53 right now... and it doesn't seem to ever want to get warm!

Nevertheless, I had my window open this morning, and in the couple minutes I had to kill before leaving for work I was playing my other most thoughtful gift--a red violin--as softly as possible in the crisp sunny morning breeze.

blue oblivion

2008-05-05T21:11:00.006-05:00

I shuffled over to the pool's edge yesterday afternoon, dodging puddles and little kids, sweating slightly from my brisk mile walk from the train station, the relatively warm weather, and the hellishly wet, warm locker room.

"Hey Lindsey," my coach declared from the pool with a wave and a smile. "You're the youngest person on the team now! You beat the youngest by four months!"

Evidently, I joined a swim team. I think it's safe to announce now that I've canceled my gym membership, filled out my forms, written a check, and been to every practice but one for the past two weeks. Apparently, in addition to being arguably the most out-of-shape swimmer on the team, I'm also the youngest.

I'm no stranger to being the youngest--odd, I know, considering I'm the oldest in my family. Regardless, by virtue of the fact that my birthday is on the late end of the Kindergarten cut-off date, I have always surrounded myself with people that are slightly older. And since graduating, the people I have surrounded myself with are older still--I'm the youngest in my apartment, the youngest in my office, the youngest of most of my friends (even those still in college), the younger in my relationship...

It doesn't matter, really. I was making friends at swimming who were 24 and 30 before anyone knew the difference. But still, there is a slight difference. I tend to group all of my peers in the same general age group, the 20s, but I constantly have to remind myself that while I'm figuring out what I want to do with my life and anticipating my one-year anniversary with my boyfriend, my 27-28-year-old friends might be thinking about marriage and kids. That, and they like to make fun of me for being as old as their younger, snot-nosed siblings.

But if my same-aged peers are not at work and not swimming and not living with me and are not my friends, where are they? Some of them are in college, some are traveling the world, some are in grad school, some are living with their parents--there's no way to know for sure.

Lucky for me, my age is not holding me back at swimming, thanks to my youthful muscles and my many, many years of swimming regularly before my couple-year hiatus in college. Regardless of how successful I am at it, I've come to realize that it's just plain essential for my sanity: I never realized how much I needed a time without cell phones and computers and dealing with people and expectations. It's an hour off three times a week, and it's small in comparison to the 40 hours per week I work and the 168 hours per week I worry, but it certainly helps.

on a tragic note:

2008-04-27T00:16:00.004-05:00

There was a shark attack in San Diego on Friday that killed a swimmer at a cove I used to swim at with my team during the summer. That hits a little too close to home.

this is not a political blog...

2008-04-25T11:53:00.004-05:00

Nor do I want it to be. But this article/blog is my favorite of the week and I couldn't resist posting it:

Drop Out, Obama

R.I.P. Banana

2008-04-24T09:25:00.004-05:00

I was eating a late dinner last night at the little green folding table in our kitchen while talking to my little sister on the phone, when I happened to notice out of the corner of my eye that my roommate was up on her knees on the kitchen counter, with her head jammed in the little space between the window and the cabinet and her butt sticking straight up in the air. There was a faint smell of banana wafting past my nose.

"Uh, what are you doing?"

"I dropped a banana. And it didn't just fall on the windowsill, it fell behind the cabinet. These things only happen to me!"

I sighed, hung up with my sister, and left my dinner half-eaten on the table while she jumped off the counter and started furiously opening and slamming drawers and cabinets. Short of dismantling the cabinets, there was no way get behind the cabinet from the front, so we'd have to get there from the back: a one-foot wide by three-foot deep space under the counter and behind the cabinet, mostly obscured by a metal bar across the top and the wall below the window. Or risk the return of Nelson (formerly known as Squeaky) and living with a kitchen that perpetually smelled of rotting banana. We got to work.

I held the flashlight and my roommate, a coat hanger. The banana was sitting about three feet down in the middle of a graveyard of never-again-played CDs, dust, and scraps of paper. When the coat hanger proved useless, I bent it a different way a tried again while my roommate held the flashlight. With each pierce of the metal coat hanger in the bruising yellow skin came another whiff of the future smell of our kitchen, made all the more dramatic by the dull thump I heard each time I tried to lift the hanger and the slick meat of the banana slipped off. We opened the window that hadn't been open since last summer, hoping we could unscrew the gate over it and get through the hole from a different angle. We were greeted by a shower of pebbles.

I taped a spatula securely to the end of the coat hanger and fished around while my roommate pawed through our drawers, looking for a pair of tongs, a barbecue poker, or anything more sturdy than a coat hanger. She stuck her arm down the hole as far as it would go, her head jammed awkwardly against the windowsill, one leg stretched straight up in the air. Her arm and taught fingers were just slightly too short to reach the now black banana. The circle of the flashlight bounced around in the hole while I giggled, my roommate teetering dangerously on her one hand on the counter, shaking from laughter.

We found a metal pounder of some sort, with a long handle and a sturdy base held by a triangle of metal arms that was just thin enough to maybe, just maybe, stick under the banana. I stuck my finger in the loop at the end of the instrument, stuck my arm down the hole, and very carefully scooped up the banana. We stifled our laughs and tried not to make a sound as I slowly raised the banana, my roommate ready with her hand to grab it. She did, and it ended up, like the mouse, securely fastened in a plastic bag, black and furry with dust, waiting to go down to the dumpster with the rest of the trash.

I finished my dinner. But I'm not sure I'll ever look at bananas the same way again.

remember the earth

2008-04-22T16:14:00.005-05:00

It is Earth Day. Just in case you haven't seen enough top-10 tips on reducing your carbon emissions lately, I'm going to add my own to the mix. I am by no means an expert on the environment, but I have picked up a couple of easy and environmentally friendly practices that I have, for the most part, added to my routine, and I hope you will try to add to yours. In no particular order:

1. Walk, bike, run, or take public transportation instead of driving. If you must drive, drive a car that gets good gas mileage.

2. Use reusable cloth bags instead of paper or plastic at the supermarket and during other shopping trips.

3. Replace all of your light bulbs with energy-efficient fluorescent ones.

4. Turn off the lights when not in use and turn off and unplug all all electronics when not in use. Buy energy-saver appliances and electronics when replacing old ones.

5. Turn your heat cooler a few degrees in the winter and your air conditioning a few degrees warmer in the summer. You will save energy and money on your utilities bill and you probably won't notice the difference.

6. Take shorter showers and don't leave the water running when you're brushing your teeth or washing the dishes. Run the dishwasher only when it's full and don't rinse the dirty dishes beforehand.

7. Buy local whenever possible (buy your produce at the farmer's market instead of at the supermarket). Buy fair trade.

8. Use Tupperware (or the equivalent non-brand version) to store food instead of plastic bags. Try to reuse them if you do. Use a reusable lunch bag or an old plastic bag as a lunch bag and garbage can liner instead of a brown bag. Buy a reusable water bottle for your water instead of single-use bottles. If you use a single-use bottle, recycle it.

9. Buy secondhand whenever possible. Buy books at used book stores or borrow them from the library.

10. Don't print this list out. Commit it to memory. Try to read most electronic documents on-screen. If you must print, use scratch paper or recycle it after you're done with it. Buy food and items with less packaging and recycle whatever isn't trash.

If you have any other easy tips to add, please do comment below!

more about water...

2008-04-22T14:41:00.004-05:00

An addition to my post on water: The New York Times had a story today that further explains why certain plastics could be dangerous (specifically, the plastic that's used in Nalgene bottles).

Yes, I realize I could drive myself nuts by trying to understand and eliminate every object and activity and material and food in our world that may, in some cases, cause cancer. But if it's an easy enough fix, why not?

the unifier

2008-04-18T13:41:00.005-05:00

A few times per month, or whenever I can, I venture down to volunteer at the unassuming storefront that is The Boring Store and its hidden 826CHI. (Pause for me to get out my journalistic writing style:) Founded in the Bay Area by the brilliant (my own editorializing) contemporary writer Dave Eggers, 826 exposes children of a variety of ages and skill levels to a variety of different styles of writing through free field trips, in-class visits, and workshops at nights and on weekends. It encourages excitement about literacy through these programs, along with its free tutoring program, in a creative and non-academic atmosphere. In short, it's amazing.

(Pause for me to ditch the fact-laden journalistic writing style in favor of something more descriptive:) Its sign is a confusing mix of words and sentences that do not amount to any understanding whatsoever of the organization inside. In the window is an uninteresting collection of brown boxes and some question marks. The first time I walked by I thought it was a box store, lacking any better explanation for the windows that stand adjacent to a row of old-fashioned furniture store neighbors with wrought-iron security gates. In the store is a random and creative assortment of supplies for spies, each displayed with its own personal brown box. Every aspect of this place is meticulously thought-out, from the mannequins equipped with black spy mustaches to the one-way mirror into the store from the classroom. And kids go wild upon entering. Even I, an adult (who admittedly retains some childlike impulses), like the brightly colored floor and the 50-something spy cameras that point toward the front door and the old-fashioned cash register.

Last week, on my once-a-month day off, I got up early and made my way to 826 as I often do for a field trip with a first grade class from the South Side. Without going into too much detail about the experience, the class goes on a field trip to 826, which, we tell them, turns into a publishing house during the day with a very mean and mysterious boss named Moody. A volunteer teachers the kids about what goes into a story, the class creates the beginning of an often very strange original story which is illustrated by another volunteer (once a second- or third-grade class wrote about a trilobite festival, creatures I had never before even heard of) and each student is directed to finish the half-finished story and create illustrations.

This is all beside my main point in writing about 826, which I am finally getting to. In this class of first-graders from the South Side, there was not one white student. There were maybe two Hispanic students, but the rest of the twenty-something kids in the class were black. The teacher was young and white. All of the volunteers and the full-time staff at 826 were white (and the majority young and female).

In the confines of the store, and even in the real world, none of this really matters, of course. Any kid, any class, regardless of location of the school in Chicago's rather strictly segregated North, South, and West Sides, regardless of parents' income and anything else, obviously gets the same program and the same number of volunteers, and the same professional-looking bound and "published" books at the end of the field trip. But the reason I bring it up, I guess, is to illustrate Chicago's persistent problem with gentrification and segregation based, unfortunately, on income and race. I don't know exactly what kind of area this school is located in or anything about the home-life of the children. I won't venture any explanations or solutions, as growing up in SoCal, diversity outside of white or Hispanic or Asian isn't really my specialty.

I will, however, keep volunteering.

taste of summer

2008-04-16T15:07:00.002-05:00

It is the warmest day of the year so far--69 by my last count--and the streets are teeming with wanderers reluctant to sit in their offices and there's not a cloud in the sky.

Yet Chicagoans, perhaps some of the most resilient folk in the country when it comes to weather, are strangely attached to their coats. Even today, when skirts or dresses without tights, when short sleeves, when even sandals are acceptable attire, the vast majority of the street wanderers still have all their skin covered and they are still wearing their coats, myself included. A jacket has become almost an extension of oneself at this point: we have been carrying around jackets, big and small, for the past six or seven months, and to go without one now is a bit uncomfortable--or even risky. Just like going without an umbrella in summer is inadvisable (due to those mid-afternoon or evening downpours), going without a jacket between approximately October and May is like taking walking on the wild side. Literally, at any moment, even on the warmest day of the year so far, the temperature could start to drop and the warm, happy non-jacket wearer could find him or herself not so warm and happy anymore. It wouldn't be the first time the temperature has changed 20-30 degrees in one day. So we cling to our jackets and our tights (yes, I am including myself with the Chicagoans--I am wearing a skirt with tights and a jacket today), even when they make sweat, even when they seem unnecessary in the face of the bright light sun. It is not summer yet.

all about water

2008-04-15T15:24:00.010-05:00

Apparently, there is no proof that water is actually good for you. What they forgot to mention is there's no proof it's bad for you either. What does this mean? Keep drinking water. Obviously, everyone makes their own rules, but I say, if my body is made up of mostly water, it makes sense to put some water in, especially if I'm thirsty.

There is also no proof that the plastic in Nalgene bottles is bad for you, but it might be. And there is proof that single-use water bottles are not meant to be reused, and that steel water bottles emit no questionable chemicals into the water bottled inside. I have been an avid user of Nalgene bottles in all shapes and sizes for about two years now, and I'm making the switch to steel.

diet decisions

2008-04-14T15:06:00.003-05:00

For the past seven-plus years, my not eating red meat, and my usually not eating pig-products or lamb, and my occasional rejection of any meat or fish whatsoever has been a fairly easy and "just understood" sort of choice. Everyone who knows me knows I don't eat these things, and most of my friends are vegetarian anyway, so it's not an issue. And if it, for any reason, becomes a not-so-easy choice and I run out of ways to explain it or I'm just not feeling it anymore, I'll adjust my dietary constraints accordingly. I started eating poultry instead of being a vegetarian, I started eating pig-products and fish in Spain, and now, while I still eat poultry and fish and shellfish and don't eat red meat or any other strange kinds of meat, I will occasionally have a piece of good Spanish ham, or prosciutto, or a piece of bacon on a sandwich.

Lately, however, I have been thinking about becoming an occasional beef-eater, making it an occasional treat like prosciutto or good Spanish ham. I don't think I'll ever be the type to eat a steak, or even ever really order beef at a restaurant or make it at home, but it might be nice to eat a real meatball every once in awhile, have a real hamburger, try a bite of corned beef or pastrami, eat a famous Chicago hot dog... I feel there are some culinary delights out there that I have never tried, and maybe should before I decide to reject them.

That said, there were a few times this weekend when I could have eaten a bite of beef. Corned beef, which frankly looked delicious on marble rye, pastrami on a novel pretzel-style roll at one of my favorite sandwich restaurants in Chicago, veal-that-looked-like-chicken at a German restaurant in my neighborhood (Now that I think about it, though, I don't think I'll ever want to even try veal, judging from the bad things my parents have said about it my whole life, being that it's from a baby cow and all). Even though I had the opportunity to become a full-fledged meat eater this weekend, I didn't. My excuse was what it normally is: "I haven't eaten beef for seven years and I don't know how my stomach would react." This time my theory was debunked by a doctor who insisted that a human stomach is equipped to digest meat, whether or not it has been getting the practice.

Regardless, though I'm curious about certain beef-based items, I realize the reason I rejected my opportunities to taste is because I don't actually want to become a beef eater. After reading The Jungle, after recently becoming more and more concerned with the environment, I don't need it and I don't really want it.

Strangely enough, in the same train of thought that I think about eating beef occasionally, I also think about becoming vegetarian again. Or "fishatarian." I rarely ever make meat of any sort at home, so it wouldn't really be too much of a change. But maybe I like having the freedom to eat the occasional turkey sandwich, chicken tortilla soup... philly cheese steak?

Evidently, I'm no closer to a decision.

eyelids droop

2008-04-01T00:25:00.002-05:00

This is rather a bad habit I've developed, probably due to years of writing articles late into the night at the Daily Nexus office and writing essays after that while the dark waves crashed on the invisible beach outside my window. I can't seem to produce quality work during the day, but in the middle of the night, when I seem to have all the time in the world to edit and re-write, my writings, or in this case, my articles, move along swimmingly. Not only do I not get paid enough to spend eight hours working and another three writing at night, but I do not start work late enough to be able to stay up until the early morning and still be high-functioning in the morning.

Having recognized this, I could now go to sleep. But this might just be the highlight of my work week, writing along to the quiet drone of my 109 Ani DiFranco songs on shuffle as my eyelids droop.

silence

2008-03-19T09:30:00.003-05:00

Once every two months or so I experience complete silence in the city.

This morning I was lying in bed for one last sweet second after my alarm went off when I noticed it. The fan was off. My incessant alarm was, thankfully, off. My thoughts were still groggy. All the 8:00 commuters had already left, so there was no creaking on the stairs or around the apartment. And most notably, there were no cars honking, speeding up, or stopping at the nearby lights, and there were no buses stopping with squeaky brakes, speeding up with noisy, dirty exhaust, or otherwise announcing their presence--the street or the route or the fact you can answer any further questions at www.transitchicago.com. Thank you for riding the CTA.

-----

I haven't quite decided if I like living in a big city. I like this city, I like its variety, I like its public transportation (even if it means I can't get to anything on time)--notice I DIDN'T say I like its weather--but big cities in general are horrible messes of places that are often exciting to visit but easy to leave. I think Chicago assuages (GRE word) the mess slightly by being sprawling and composed of 70-something different neighborhoods that each have their own feel: urban, suburban, European, gritty, clean, you name it. It still is a horrible mess, though. The public schools are bad, the north side is disproportionally richer and therefore better funded and maintained than the south and west sides, the sales tax--I just discovered--is over 9% and rising because of the transit system's budget and staffing and service woes... but there's a strange power to it all. I like working downtown, riding the train, craning my neck so I can try to see the top of the Sear's Tower (difficult), strutting across streets like I have something to do and like I know where to go (usually, I have both).

My friend asked me not too long ago if it bothers me that there are people everywhere. Before she asked I hadn't actually thought too much about it... there are so many ways to escape these days, from listening to music, to watching videos, to just plain reading. Then, sometimes, even with all these people, it's quiet. But when I think about the big mess and all the cars and people and hurry and bustle, I want to go back to my little bubble next to the Pacific Ocean, where I could hear the waves.

Happy Anniversary

2008-03-18T12:28:00.007-05:00

Today is my six-month anniversary of being a real person. For the past six months, today, I have had a job that I haul myself out of bed for almost every day, I have received a paycheck in my bank account every two weeks, and on varying dates throughout the month I have been expected to transfer this money to various companies and individuals--my landlord, my roommate, my gym, Visa, CTA, Netflix, Blue Cross, etc--now, six months later, I'm not quite rich yet nor do I think I will ever be. But this is beside the point.

On this most historic of days, my six-month anniversary of being the stereotypical, the miserable, nine-to-fiver, I am thinking about the GRE Practice Test I'm taking tomorrow and how I'm going to refuse the company administering this free test when they try to get me to agree to pay them over half of my current checking account balance so they can teach me to do well on this test I am almost certainly ill-prepared for. I am looking forward to, perhaps relatively soon, retreating into the sheltered academic cove I not-so-long ago knew and loved, which will allow me to get up past 7:00 a.m. during the week and, furthermore, see my apartment by the light of the sun. Today I am looking at my recently updated resume and planning what I will wear and what I will say at a job fair I am attending on Saturday. I am slowly scouring job-search websites and planning to update my writing portfolio and cover letter in between completing my least-favorite tasks at my current job.

This is not really how I thought it would go. Yes, by all accounts it is going fine: I pay my bills, I have a little left over, I am working in my field... but I left college hopeful and confident, a strong believer in the absolute freedom of the press, and now I'm disillusioned, confused, bored, and tired. And freedom of the press for me, for my interests, my beliefs, is a myth. That's fine. Unfortunate, but fine. Six months really isn't a long time, but it does feel like one... and what can I do now but look for and hope for something better.

-----

Today is also nearly my nine-month anniversary of living here in Chicago (and of dating my boyfriend). Nine months is also not really a long time, but Chicago's starting to feel more and more familiar, especially now that spring and summer are rolling around again. Concerts to look forward to, my pride at being able to navigate without a map of the streets or the transportation, my not having to deal with a car, my lovely apartment and neighborhood... so I try to focus on these things instead of the former.

shalom

2008-03-13T16:53:00.005-05:00

This afternoon, in the midst of front-page news about Israel and Gaza bombing each other again and the school kids getting shot in Jerusalem last week, I got an email with flights, dates, and a packing list.

Shalom, Lindsey, it said. You're going to Israel.

My philosophy behind traveling or basically doing anything else that scares me out of my mind is to not to think about it until the time comes. This way, I can sign up for things that I feel would be good for me, things that I feel I should do, and I don't have to think about exactly what I'm doing before it's too late. Like going to Spain and moving here, I don't freak out until I get to the airport, and by that point there's no turning back... Like that famous picture that still stands on the shelf above my parents' office computer, of me at the airport about to leave for Spain for six months, my eyes red and tears running down my cheeks. I knew objectively that studying abroad was good for me but if I wasn't an adult I would have tried to run and hide behind my mother's apron strings. But I am an adult. So I do it.

In this case, there are other factors at work besides simply being fearful, tired, or unwilling to leave the country. This is the Middle East we're talking about, after all. Nevertheless, I know this trip will be good for me because it has been for so many others like me, and I am an adult, so I'll do it. And not think about it until it's upon me.

(You can bet that I will think about it while I'm there and when I return. Check back in MAY and JUNE--and before and after that--for my thoughts on Israel.)

the no-send list

2008-03-13T16:52:00.002-05:00

This is that post I was talking about...

Easily number two on the Top 10 list of reasons people unsubscribe to the famed WJD is the confession that "I'm Catholic," or "I'm Methodist," or "I'm Christian." Also in the top 10: "@#$%!&#%!%@#$" (seriously, people yell and scream obscenities), "I don't want my mailman in the no-man's land of Kentucky to think I'm Jewish," "I care about the environment and I want you to save paper and postage by not sending this to me ever again," "I didn't pay for this [free] subscription and I want to know whose joke it was to send this paper to me" (findings based on the results of an informal study of an unspecified number of callers conducted by the WJD editorial assistant). Luckily I don't have the job of managing the circulation list so I don't get to hear the best of them. But if I'm good I do get to hear some, because an inconsistency in the phone system sends several of these delightful callers to my desk each day and some of them even leave me messages though my voice mail box message expressly tells them not to.

The woman I just talked to was polite, so she has a leg up on most of our callers. She said pleasantly, almost laughing, "I'm calling to cancel because [suppressed giggle]... I'm actually Catholic. So..." I said "OK" and transferred her to circulation before she could say "I don't want my mailman to think..."

My blood started boiling even before I really thought about the call. No, there is nothing inherently wrong with wanting to cancel a newspaper that is made with the religion and/or ethnicity that's not yours in mind. Maybe it was just her quick and cheery excuse. Why should it matter that she's Catholic? Is it against Catholic doctrine to touch, or, God forbid, open a magazine that has the world "Jewish" written on the cover? It wouldn't kill these people to be a little more accepting and a little less judgmental. It's not very encouraging to work somewhere where the volume of calls to cancel the subscription outnumber the constructive or article request or subscription request calls by at least 75 to 1 (findings based on the results of another informal study of an unspecified number of callers conducted by the WJD editorial assistant).

the absent engagement ring

2008-03-07T09:52:00.002-06:00

The secretary looked at me conspiratorially from between the long green leaves of the plant sitting on the edge of her desk.

"Are you getting married?" she asked covertly, excitedly.

I looked down at my semi-professional clothes, the pile of winter gear now in my lap, and the steno pad and pen in my hands, and thought quickly of my boyfriend. And my age. And my dolls. And the single university diploma sitting on my dresser at home. I decided I definitely wasn't, and giggled softly.

"No," I exhaled. "I'm here to interview..."

"I only asked because I was being nosy," she admitted. "When I was your age, I was getting married."

I wondered what age I looked and what age she was when she got married... and the rabbi called me into his office.

-----

I don't know where 20-somethings disappear to when they graduate from college, but apparently they don't end up at semi-conservative religious publications. People have mistaken me for many things since I've been here, and usually it's not the reporter I am. Or once I sit them down for the interview, they talk about me and my generation... "Kids your age, they don't feel any connection to stuffy Jewish institutions." (True.) And when, yesterday, we touched on "the problem of" Jewish continuity and intermarriage, I tried to sit up straighter and look older when I realized that I embody the quintessential "problem" the older generations talk about when they fear the religion will die.

I don't mind, really. I smile understandingly and look forward to one day when I will hopefully be among the hip, young journalists at some publication or blog that publishes articles I would read and things I would believe if I wasn't forced to.

the myth of objectivity

2008-03-04T14:29:00.003-06:00

Incidentally, I am in the process of composing a long, rambling post about why people hate journalists and the media, specifically my newspaper/news magazine/newsletter/magazine... whatever you care to call it. I may never get to the point of the post, in which case I will never post it.

Do not fear, this article should tide you over. It's concise, honest, and refreshing. It explains a lot of important things that most lay-people don't understand about "the media." It's what I wish I had been saying in the media's defense all along. Well, I have, but maybe not in so many words.

I still hate the phrase, "the media."

bad burritos

2008-02-28T15:32:00.003-06:00

Someone asked me yet again last night that all-too-common question, "Why did you move to Chicago?" Because I was in the company of funny people, as I so often find myself, I gave a slightly different answer than usual, "I really wanted to experience 30 below." My boyfriend added, "She really likes earmuffs." (It wouldn't have been funny to say any of that a few weeks ago when there was still a threat that the temperature would fall 40 degrees at any time... but now that March is nearly upon us, I feel confident that the worst is most certainly over. If you don't count the waffling of temperatures that's now upon us or the melting that will soon ensue.)

What I should have said was, "I wanted to eat lots and lots of really bad Mexican food."

Maybe I'm seeing the grass as greener in Southern California, but it seems like any Mexican restaurant I went to in San Diego or Santa Barbara (or LA for that matter... and even one in San Fran), it was reliably good. Or awesome. Or at least edible. Now while there are a fair number of Mexicans in Chicago, I have yet to go to a hands-down really good Mexican restaurant here--take out or sit down. I've been to a couple that pass, but always the rice isn't quite right or the tortilla isn't quite warm enough or there's just something that doesn't click like the amazing and famous Freebirds or Nico's or Rico's or Rose's or Senor Pico's... so last night I went out on a limb, went to one in a new neighborhood I had heard of but never been to, and it was not awesome, not good, and not really even edible. The half of chicken burrito I ate with one piece of bone, a measly, greasy slice of cheese, some brownish avocado, and a not-very-warm tortilla didn't give me food poisoning, but it left me planning a quick escape to the bathroom for the rest of the night and this morning just in case.

The good news is I can do things to slightly quell my addiction to good, SoCal Mexican food. I can eat almost-good-enough burritos. I can try more places that have been rated the best by Chicagoans, though they can't really be trusted. I can go to Chipotle, which doesn't have the right feel, but the food is passable. I can make burritos at home, drowning the not-quite-right beans and tortillas in sour cream, guacamole, and black olives. It's unfortunate, really, because I was just beginning to like it here.

the case for grad school

2008-02-26T14:18:00.004-06:00

My latest article should be arriving in the mail shortly if you are a lucky subscriber. Or you can view it on the website. You may notice that I'm not posting a "this should have looked like this" version of it. Progress? Maybe.

You also may have noticed that I've been MIA. The winter is long, I have nothing to talk about besides the crazy and cruel weather (which no one wants to hear about anymore) and once I get out of the habit of posting often I forget to look for things to say and compose them in my head.

I have also become increasingly political in my talking, reading, and thinking, and I do not want this to become a political blog. There are far too many good ones (here, here, and here, just to name a few) and I am not qualified to be a good political blogger or a good compiler of political stories. I did enjoy writing my endorsement, but that's as political as I get here.

-----

I have never been a proponent of grad school. In fact, I have long been convinced that I would never go and have wondered why everyone thought it was the obvious next step after college. Why spend thousands on another degree that might not even lead anywhere? Why head immediately into more and more years of school when one has just graduated from 17?

Now, eight months out of college I am still not a proponent of beginning grad school immediately after undergrad (except for those who are on a specific path... to become a doctor or a lawyer or a scientist or psychologist or whatever). But I can see the argument now for going a couple years after college, or even long after college, after one has entered the work force and decided she either doesn't have enough training to do what she wants to do, or decided she doesn't really like the work force and wants to retreat back into her academia hole. I fit into both categories, hence the "she" pronoun and this post. I have many career and future aspirations that change weekly depending on my mood and the weather, but this particular aspiration to maybe someday go to grad school has not changed weekly, so I'm planning accordingly. Campus visits, reading online, talking to people, buying GRE prep books and taking practice tests, making friends again with people who could write recommendations for me... It might happen. I might apply if I still feel this way next winter, but for now I'm excited at the prospect of learning how to do math again for the GREs, preparing myself without spending much money, someday returning to my academia hole, perhaps going abroad again, and being, after it all, thousands of dollars in debt. But there's something admirable and serious about putting oneself through school. So maybe I'll learn to save a bit while I'm still working. Probably I'll still have to be a very hard-working student if I decide to do this. Maybe I'll finally cash in my bonds for the occasion.

The bottom line is, with the face of journalism changing so rapidly, I no longer think that journalism grad school is a waste of time. In fact, for people like me who made it through the first round of school and learning journalism just before and while the web was becoming so prevalent, it might be necessary to get that web edge. I'm still a proponent of paper newspapers... but I don't get any myself (this Slate article seems like a good excuse) and I'm beginning appreciate online that much more now that I spend basically all day reading the news.

more about the cold

2008-02-11T09:43:00.000-06:00

There is nothing positive to be said about -1ºF. Or, for that matter, -1º with a windchill of -15ºF. There is nothing positive to be said about the coldest day of the year, unless you count being inside, drinking hot chocolate and eating sweet tea biscuits.

There is, however, a certain cleanliness, a certain crispness about the -15º air. With not a cloud or snowflake in the sky skewing visibility, the lines of the buildings are perfectly straight and clear and everything is, in other words, brilliantly in focus. I looked down one of the few diagonal streets from the train this morning and could see the outline of downtown against the gray-yellow morning sky. And dotted above the three- and four-story red brick buildings into the distance were perfect clouds of white smoke coming from all the metal flews and chimneys. They seemed to be frozen in perfect formations by the air all at the same moment.

As I sat on the train this morning in just slightly warmer than -15º, bundled in my long johns, scarf, hood up, headphones on, I could also smell, quite strongly, chocolate along with every blast of frigid air from the frequently opening door.

Another Democratic Endorsement: A Slightly Different Take

2008-02-05T21:25:00.000-06:00

This guest endorsement is courtesy of Prince Philip Ramon, aka Philip, my boyfriend. OK, so both being liberal, young, white kids, our endorsements perhaps aren't much of a surprise (as Philip says). But I can truthfully say I don't know anyone who's pro-Hilary, so you're stuck with two opinions, though very different, about Senator Barack Obama. If you like his writing, Philip will be starting his own blog soon; you can find it here.

Maybe it's symptomatic of the dull workday of an office drone, but the 2008 Presidential Primary is the first time I've truly engaged myself in the political process. Since the summer, I've drowned my career sorrows in the race for a job that I'm woefully underqualified to hold, whilst performing a job for which I'm clock-slowingly overqualified. My week is punctuated with Slate political gab, Daily Kos diatribes and Ken Rudin (NPR's Political Junkie) delivering puns that Mike Huckabee wouldn't touch. With such a historic, conventional-wisdom-defying primary season, there has been no shortage of destinations for my internet wanderings. In brief, I picked a hell of year to become politically aware.

Still, I've ultimately been a spectator in this affair. That is, until today. Living in one of the twenty-two states holding its primary on Feb. 5th, I went to large stone church down the street from my apartment and cast my ballot for Barack Obama. As a white-male, age 23, I don't suppose this is much of a shock. But I haven't always been an Obama supporter. Back when the debates were a seven (sometimes eight) candidate affair, I was mostly interested in Richardson or Biden. Richardson impressed me with his resume. In the debates, Biden routinely came off as the adult in the room when talking about foreign policy, making the other candidates' look like undergrads reaching for an adequate exam answer. Alas, he never made it past round one. Richardson folded soon after, not even holding on until a western contest.

It wasn't long until Democrats were left with the Big Three. Three senators, three passionate speakers, three candidates who made up for their lack of political experience with the promise of change in the lives of ordinary Americans. Let's face it. Policy-wise Clinton, Edwards and Obama are all pretty much identical. Sure the health care plans have different strategies, Iraq troop withdrawal timetables vary slightly, and the figures change depending on the stimulus package. But the goals are uniform; get out of Iraq safely, make universal health care a reality, turn back the economic tide of the last eight years that did not lift all boats. In this policy stale mate, we've seen some interesting arguments emerge for why we should vote for one candidate over another. Edwards has been a fighter "all his life," except in 2004 when he took a break to run as the nice guy (or Obama lite). Clinton acquired 35 years of experience that she didn't seem to have when Biden and Richardson were still in the fray (perhaps because it would've been a laughable comparison). What's interesting is that Obama's message didn't change. Some say it's his weakness, he doesn't veer from his inspirational rhetoric enough to show he's got the specifics worked out. I see it as his strength. It's a sign that he makes those speeches because he believes them, not because they will have the maximum impact on that day's newscycle.

Clinton said in her infamous diner tear-up that for her, this election is personal. I believe it. The tone of her campaign makes me think that this is as much about righting the country as it is about restoring the Clinton dynasty. On her husband's presidency, it annoys me that Clinton wants to have her cake and eat it to. She says she's running on her own record, but then comes out with a line like "it took a Clinton to clean up after the first Bush" when confronted with the question of her serving Bill's third term. For me, it's a lose-lose proposition. If she wants to claim the Clinton presidency as part of her experience, then I'd rather not repeat the bitter partisanship of the late 90s. If she truly wants to be judged on her record and hers alone, then she and Obama are essentially evenly matched.

Something very interesting surfaced in one the debates last month. It's a difference that I think is a legitimate issue when deciding between the two remaining contenders. When asked what his greatest weakness is, Obama gave an honest reply. He can't keep his paperwork organized. Clinton gave a nonresponse to the question, but jumped on Obama's self-effacing answer. She proclaimed herself a bureaucratic superstar. A distinction was drawn that I think goes to the heart of these two candidacies. Clinton's MLK comment and Teddy's endorsement made the point even clearer. Obama is like JFK. Clinton is like LBJ. I'm a little dubious that Clinton is the master executive she claims to be, considering she has no personal executive experience to speak of. But I'm willing to give her the benefit of the doubt. At this moment, I think we need the former. For the past eight years, we've been united in our collective embarrassment of having Homer Simpson run our country (with Mr. Burns as VP!). It's time to be united under a positive, trans formative figure. We've had enough of the politics of "us vs. them." Obama wants to engage the Republicans, engage the insurance companies, engage the Iranians. I think this is the only way to get meaningful progress. Rather than letting the pendulum swing from one extreme to the other every ten years, I'd like to see a United States in which individuals feel represented and encouraged to help in finding solutions.

Some say that they'd vote for Obama, but not now. He should wait eight or twelve years. I disagree. Look what long careers in the Senate did for Biden and Dodd. They couldn't generate anywhere near the same amount of excitement for their candidacies. Obama could only run this kind of campaign now. After a decade in the Senate he would grow stale. Like McCain, he would go from maverick to establishment. Whereas if Obama is sworn in next year, I'll watch enthusiastically as the torch is passed to the new generation, rather than sing in my head those classic Who lyrics, "Meet the new boss, same as the old boss." If Obama becomes President, I don't think I'll be the only one looking back on this campaign as the first time I was genuinely excited and inspired by an election cycle.

2008 Democratic Primary Endorsement

2008-02-04T20:49:00.000-06:00

This is not a political blog. However, on the eve of many of the primaries for this most historic of elections, I feel it is necessary and important for me to join the hundreds of other bloggers, newspapers, and famous people and issue an endorsement. So, my editorial board of one unanimously endorses Barack Obama as the Democratic nominee for the next president of the United States.

I first became enthralled with Obama four years ago, along with much of the rest of the nation, when he gave the keynote address at the 2004 Democratic National Convention. Barely old enough to vote, I hazily remember vowing to vote for him if he ever ran for president. When he announced he was, indeed, running for president I, too, wondered along with the political analysts and the media whether the "wonder child" of only four years ago now had enough experience to become the president.

But now I wonder, maybe experience isn't the only thing the president needs: After all, we have seen this last seven years a president that did have experience but did not, overall, have a successful presidency or make good choices for our country. If serving as the governor of Texas is not enough, if attending Yale isn't enough, maybe in this day and age we need more. Obama has more. He is a fresh face in Washington and is better able and better suited to see past the traditional methods of politics, be creative and endevour to actually do what needs doing and not get stuck in overly complicated processes and old ways of governing. This is the age of the Internet, of everyone has an opinion, of taking the power out of the hands of the traditional news organizations and putting it in the hands of the people. This is the age of Apple and Google, of innovation, and in this age, we just can't elect the wife of the president eight years ago: What's new there? Abraham Lincoln came to the 1860 presidential elections with only four terms in the Illinois House of Representatives and one in the U.S. House of Representatives under his belt. And won. And went on to do one of the most drastic and important things a president has ever done: abolish slavery.

I'm going to echo The New York Times and say that Hilary and Barack both have pretty much the same views on a lot of the issues. They are, after all, both Democrats. Looking past the subtle, probably insignificant differences in their health plans, looking past their voting records, looking past Hilary's dirty way of running her campaign, her acting, her unfair accusations, and what she stands for (nothing new), I would probably vote for her if she was the nominee. Going purely on looks, having a woman president would be just as amazing and refreshing as having a black one.

But she's not the nominee. Given the same facts, I'm going to draw a different conclusion than The Times--who endorsed Hilary on her "experience" alone--and endorse Barack Obama. He has the mindset, he has the intelligence, he has the capacity to step out of the box and really bring some change to the White House. Chances are, Hilary is going to do things like the Clinton before her; lacking a precedent, Obama is going to do what he thinks is best for the country and for the world. And I trust him to make those important decisions.

So, if you're a resident of one of the 22 states that is hosting their primary today, and you're registered to vote, I encourage you to do just that. Whether or not you vote for my pick doesn't matter, what does matter is that you listen and then voice your own opinion.

Oh, and if you're republican, vote for Mitt Romney. We don't want John McCain going and stealing the votes of the moderates.

*Tune in tomorrow for a guest endorsement*

snow day

2008-02-01T09:23:00.000-06:00

This morning there were four little girls with brightly colored backpacks standing in a line at the corner, trying to look mature. They were up to their knees in snow, the falling flakes were sticking to their eyelashes, and for all they knew they weren't standing at the corner, like they were told, but in the street. When you're four feet tall and up to your knees in snow, it's hard to be mature, so they were fidgeting, giggling, and letting their feet sink in further, all the while yelling assurances to their guardian down the street. They weren't playing, per se, but they'd certainly rather be standing here than in school.

I felt a similar jubilation upon stepping outside of my apartment this morning before a path on the sidewalk had been cleared, so I didn't mind walking up to my calves in snow next to them; they were standing in the path the footprints before them had already made.

It's the biggest snowstorm of the year and my two roommates and I all have snow days. We're cooped up inside with the heat, the snow drifted around all the windows, and there's a tiny knot of excitement in all our stomachs. We're trying to be mature, too.

Amber Romance

2008-01-31T10:06:00.000-06:00

I just bought a new bottle of perfume. It's not actually a new perfume for me, but it's been a couple of years since I've worn it religiously and I decided to purchase another bottle because I've always quite liked it.

I didn't realize how strongly the smell is linked, for me, to that day back in college when I bought my first bottle. It turned out to be a particularly emotional day, and the months that ensued were not my easiest or brightest, but the nostalgia that hits me from one spritz of this perfume is not a foreboding sort of nostalgia, it's a regular sort of nostalgia for my more naïve self, coupled with an empowered feeling that I can clear hurdles and build bridges if I was able to get through those difficult months.

It also hit me late last night and early this morning in the form of a renewed love for journalism. Or maybe that was from the article I just turned in. But ironically, I began work on my first investigative feature story only a few days after I bought this perfume, I wore it all the way through the writing and the researching for the story, and it was from that time that my work was really appreciated at my college paper and I began considering a career in journalism.

Unfortunately, I've been feeling lately like I don't identify much with journalism anymore, but I'm thinking now that maybe it's just that I don't identify whatsoever with what I've been writing about lately. As a journalist, I have become miraculously good at finding some way to identify with every single thing I write, no matter how strange or small, but this job for some reason made me build a wall between myself and my sources and subjects, and as a result I haven't really enjoyed anything I've written. Today, however, my desk isn't visible under the papers and folders and notebooks I've been using to write this story. I like the sight of a well-used work space and I love the feeling of engagement, of reading something I've written that, finally, after hours of feeling like it's boring, fragmented, or not going anywhere, finally comes together when it's all done.

This is not to say that I won't despise this piece later, once it's been edited, or feel slightly nervous as usual when I see it in print, but I think this smell on my wrists is a good kick in the butt to get myself out there and start freelancing or pitching the stories that I really want to write. I'll still have to write the other ones, too, but right now, I'll take what I can get. Any maybe now, with a couple of bricks from that wall cleared away, I can start enjoying those too.

spin

2008-01-25T09:50:00.000-06:00

I am obsessed with this article. I'm not sure if it's supposed to be humorous, in fact, I'm pretty sure there's no way it can be, but it is written in such a deadpan way and the things the candidates say are so typical that I thought I was reading The Onion for a second. Anyway, it's a study in spin, and if you're tired of hearing about the primaries already and the games everyone is playing, this is the perfect cure.

street lake

2008-01-23T10:40:00.000-06:00

I saw this on my way to work this morning. It's about 10 blocks from my apartment.

The Brightest Star

2008-01-21T11:40:00.000-06:00

A preview of the February issue of WJD and my first full-length, nationally published article. Perhaps you remember reading it here first? As always, this version is slightly different and slightly longer than the one that appeared in print. In any case, it appears my blog verbosity is coming in handy... though I fully expect to be enrolled in Hebrew school and forced to go to synagogue for my honesty.

Armed with a map that listed every twisty, cobblestoned, sidewalk-less, barely car-width street in Sevilla, Spain, I made my way to the procession—my conspicuously red-haired mother in tow.

As we cross-referenced our guide to the holiday parades, we chatted, quietly, in English: we were the only Americans for miles. All around us families were setting up chairs on their balconies, kids were being pushed in strollers and nearly everyone was dressed in their Easter best. The procession, or paso, as it’s called in Spanish, was preceded by the whine of horns and the smell of incense. Line after line of robe-wearing, pointy-hooded nazarenos, or penitents, some carrying crosses, others candles, stepped in tune to the music. A few of them were barefoot for what would be a 10-hour route through town.

I was three months into my semester-long stay in Sevilla. Passover was about half over and I had spent the day following floats of Jesus and the Virgin Mary around town in honor of Domingo de la Resurrección, otherwise known as Easter Sunday. It wasn’t my first choice activity, exactly, but I had pretty much given up on finding a Passover celebration in this city. After all, when I had inquired at the program activity office about local synagogues, I was told there was exactly one, with approximately five members. I had raised my eyebrows and sputtered a reply in Spanish; this wasn’t even a minyan, after all—not even close to the hundreds of students who attended my UC Santa Barbara Hillel every week, if not only for the free Shabbat dinner. But I had tried, dutifully calling the phone number (it was disconnected) and venturing past the unlabeled building (on a shady street in a questionable part of town). Ultimately, it looked like I’d have to wait till I got back to Santa Barbara for my minyan.

In the meantime, I wore my Star of David necklace.

Of course, I shouldn’t really have been surprised that there are only five synagogue-attending Jews in Sevilla. From the tiny grey churches on every other street and the large, decorated picture of Jesus on the wall over my señora’s bed, I should have gotten it: this is a Catholic country. But I’m American, after all, and in the U.S., Catholicism is just a word like any other.

Not here.

At the parade that day, during Semana Santa, or Saint’s Week, hordes of Sevillians and Spaniards from other cities turned up to view the processions—everyone dressed in suits, skirts or dresses. Some bought seats along the parade route for 200 to 500€ each. Children ran around in the nazareno costumes—robes with pointy hoods like the people in the processions—asking for candy and pictures of their particular church’s rendition of the Virgin Mary float. My mom and I watched it all—even the float depicted Jesus wearing a gold crown with bloody hands and ascending up to heaven—and I quietly fingered my necklace.

I had chosen Sevilla because it had appeal: a large student population, a moderate size and a rich cultural and religious history. I had heard tales from my friend about dating a nice Jewish Spaniard—whose parents proposed to her at Passover dinner on behalf of their son because she was the only Jew he had dated—and was sold. After all, maybe Sevilla wasn’t as devoutly Catholic as everyone said.

But I was wrong. Sevilla is most definitely Catholic. Except … maybe not devoutly so. Because that was the interesting part: despite their traditions, it’s hard to tell how religious Spaniards actually are. The señora with whom I was boarding, for instance, never went to church, but she did pray each night before bed. Gay marriage is legal in Spain and CBS reported while I was there the country had shifted from being devoutly Roman Catholic to predominately secular in less than a generation. In fact, they also reported that while 80 percent of Spaniards call themselves Catholic, only 42 percent believe in God and only 20 percent go to mass.

And yet: printed on all the jars of green beans in the supermarket is the phrase “Judias verdes.” Literally: green Jews. (Supposedly the word comes from the shape of the Jewish nose being similar to that of the green been.) If not devoid, Spaniard have religious unity, which is something I don’t know too well. How would I when the only country-unifying holidays in the U.S. are Thanksgiving and July 4th? There are no Purim celebrations in the streets, no nativity plays for the whole community. No common hair color, face shape, type of cuisine. In Spain, everyone has the same thick, dark-haired look. Not I. And my language—well, I spoke perfect classroom Spanish. People around me ate the ends of their words, lisped the “s” and “z” sounds and said “Eh?” whenever I spoke. Perhaps most significantly, while everyone else gave a slight smile, a flick of their eye or a mindless reach for the tiny cross around their neck while walking past the many neighborhood churches, I just kept walking, hands at my sides, eyes looking ahead. There was no connection.

Now, back in the U.S., I feel so at home in part because I’m able to blend in. I speak the common language, throw in the requisite slang. My thinnish light brown hair fits right into the varying skin tones, hair colors, heights and weights. Even my Star of David necklace, with light and dark blue heart-shaped stones, goes unnoticed amid all of the tiny gold crosses, large silver crucifixes, heads covered with scarves or turbans.

But it’s more than that. In Spain, religion is intricately interwoven with the Spanish way of life: there is no separation. Here, perhaps because we’re allowed the luxury of deciding how and to what extent we want to celebrate our religion, the opposite is true. We can separate it as much or as little as we want. We may not call it from the rooftops as they do in Sevilla—there are no nazarenos bringing crosses to my door—but we are religious just the same. In fact, many take it as a matter of course that the U.S. is more religious than Europe.

As I watched the passing float of Jesus ascending to heaven that day at the parade, it was through the eye of a journalist: calm, distant, not flinching once. There was so much pomp, ritual, symbolism, so much outward display of religion. And this, I realized when I returned to the States, is not what I need. I am Jewish. I know what I believe. And it is enough.

Some would call me an assimilated Jew. After all, I wear jeans and use my cell phone on Saturdays. But that’s my way of being religious—I choose to keep most of my religion in my head.

Or, in this case, around my neck.

I should have stayed in bed

2008-01-19T22:29:00.000-06:00

I know, all I write about is the cold. I'll get over it eventually:

It looks absolutely beautiful outside. So beautiful, in fact, that if I were in California, I'd probably call this a perfect California day.

Except it's not.

Even though the sky is a perfect blue and there's not a cloud in the sky, when I went outside today I wore 27 layers (according to my roommate) and looked something like this:

My first though when I walked outside into 5 degrees with a slight wind chill was that it wasn't so much different from 12, from 17, from 22... from all the other ungodly temperatures I've experienced so far this winter. But during my one-minute walk to the train station I could feel the difference. 5 just hurt a little more, on my cheeks, on my nose, on my fingers and toes, it made my sinuses feel stiff, my eyes water, and my nose run. I could also feel the difference when I got to the train platform. Heating lamps do nothing in 5. Granted, they do little in 35, but they might as well not be there at all when it gets below that. Why Chicago's train platforms are outdoor, and even worse, lined with cool, modern-looking metal with holes in it is beyond me. So that was me, with my 27 layers; I was dressed better than most people.

don't change your plans

2008-01-18T10:59:00.000-06:00

The good news: Lungs can't freeze from breathing in Chicago-cold air.
The bad news: It only takes about 10 minutes for a child's skin to freeze when the temperature is 0 degrees Fahrenheit and there's a breeze.

Thank you, Chicago Tribune, for making me never want to go outside again. Yesterday, it was raining, then snowing, then icing, the temperature dropping about 20 degrees over the course of the day (that still amazes me--California temps doesn't change that much between summer and winter) and I was proud of myself for not letting the weather change my day-off plans. I lugged a bottle of laundry detergent through the snow and I braved possible snow drifts (and mice) to bring my laundry down to the basement to wash. I can't change my plans according to the weather in Chicago, I thought, because if I did then I'd never do anything.

Now I'm trying to plan my weekend so I won't have to go outside: 6 degrees, "feels like -11" on Saturday, around the same if not a little warmer on Sunday. I do think I'm allowed a little wimping out, this being my first winter here and all, but I shouldn't let in get in the way of the little trips I want to make, to the gym, to the grocery store, to the coffee shop down the street. I'm 18 days into the 62 January and February days that make up the actual winter here, not counting the days it's still cold and snowing in the months after that... I doing fine with the cold so far, I don't really mind wearing my Antarctica-weight coat, my hat, my scarf, my mittens, my boots, and my wool socks every day. But we're heading into uncharted territory here, again. So maybe I'll just hibernate in my down comforter this weekend. Hide from the germs that are making nearly everyone sick: just stay home.

R.I.P. Nelson

2008-01-08T10:48:00.000-06:00

I had a pet mouse.

It did not come with a plastic cage with a bag of shredded newspaper, a wheel, or a water bottle and I did not name it Nelson*. It was thrust upon me quite unwillingly Saturday morning at approximately 5:30 am when I awoke to the realization that someone--or something--was trying to scratch through the wall next to my bed. As it turned out, I wasn't thinking quite rationally at 5:30--walls are pretty thick--but something was enjoying the collapsed boxes under the bed, every so often scurrying out to rustle the plastic bags in my closet. I glimpsed it on one such occasion, as it sped across my floor--or its floor, as it had been for the last weekend--I was unable to contain my scream at the sight of the small, dark body and long tail, so I grabbed my bedding and left.

I put up a good fight for my room Saturday, spending the better part of the day sitting on the windowsill in my dining room (the furthest place from my room that's still inside). Later I pawed through my stuff with a broom, trying to catch it in a box and take it down to the park. It refused to cooperate, hiding in the shadows of the late-afternoon sun, so I set out four plastic graves filled with glue and peanut butter, thinking I would find a stuck, still mouse when I returned home. Well, it was alive and kicking, speeding across its floor at the switch of the light, grinning at the fun it had this weekend, leaving dark pellets all over my clothes, tearing my paper, and doing whatever the hell else it is mice do to make people despise them so. It was alive and kicking, that is, before the pest control man came to fight, armed with more sticky sheets.

Poor Nelson. It fell from heaven into my room and, this morning, it fell from my hand into the dumpster downstairs. To be sure, I won't soon forget him. He will be the first thing I think of every time I enter my room, every time I stick my hand in a dark crevice or box, every time I lay my head down to go to sleep, every time I hear a rustle a squeak or a scratch. Thank you, Nelson, for bringing so much to my life even though you're so small. I hope you enjoyed your accommodations in my room. Excuse me, your room.

Note: Credit where credit is due... Pronoun "I" has been used in place of "he" or "she" on some occasions, especially those where "I" came into direct or indirect contact with my pet/pest.

*My roommates and I named him after the pest control guy, Nelson.

trial by ice

2008-01-02T09:29:00.000-06:00

It was 8 degrees when I was walking to work this morning, and 15 once I reached downtown. Yes, that's fahrenheit.

This was really my first experience with the really cold, with the exception of last night when I ventured outside for the first time all day at 7 to have dinner... I don't know how cold it was exactly, but I heard rumors that it was 6. I did OK for a Californian. I forgot my hat and I didn't wrap my scarf right, but I had two hoods that kept my head warm and the scarf, though not covering my face as much as it should have, kept my neck warm. In truth, I'm not sure I can tell the difference between the cold and the really cold, but I probably won't willingly be venturing outside very much so I can learn. Anyway, the cold just becomes a part of life. Like putting on my shoes and underwear in the morning and before I go outside, I also put on a scarf, mittens, a hat, and a big coat. That way, whether it's 32 or 2, I'm prepared.

in a word: gentrificaton

2007-12-21T10:50:00.000-06:00

When I first visited Wicker Park last January, it was a lot more urban and a lot less glamorous than I was imagining based on the constant praise my boyfriend was giving his new home. (Yes, this is the same area and/or park that the Josh Hartnett movie Wicker Park was named after.) In my defense, it was nighttime when I arrived and it was my first taste of the Chicago cold, so I was focusing more on keeping my face inside my jacket collar and my hand gripped around my suitcase handle than on the surroundings. I saw iron bars covering shop windows and doors, I saw 24-hour check cashing places, I saw shady looking discount furniture stores: it wasn't very pretty.

When I came back in June with my all my worldly possessions in tow, it did not look much better for the first few weeks I was there. But as I set out to explore the thrift stores littered between bars and pubs, boarded-up store fronts, and discount furniture stores, I saw it was actually more glamorous than it looked. It was the city hipster style of glamorous, which is a little dirty; or if not glamorous, then it's at least cool. The windows were covered with art, the boarded-up store fronts covered with music and art show posters. There were at least three independent coffee shops, some crazy take-out places, and several banks.

If you haven't guessed, I'm talking about gentrification, a word I didn't actually know the definition of until a few months before I moved here (which, by the way, was five days shy of six months ago). For those who are sheltered like I was (let's face it, Santa Barbara was gentrified before it was even born), gentrificationmeans the process of renewal and rebuilding accompanying the influx of middle-class or affluent people into deteriorating areas that often displaces poorer residents(taken directly from the Merriam-Webster Online Dictionary).

Technically Wicker Park was gentrified already before I started college, but now you can see the stores rushing to keep up. I have seen the ridiculously expensive Akira Chicago jump around North Avenue, moving from smaller stores to bigger ones with bigger windows, start offering valet parking, and putting up its bright red awning outside new Women stores and Accessories stores and Mens stores and Shoe stores and stocking areas. I have seen the local pizza place and brewery, Piece (which does not sell Chicago-style pizza) take over the ex-high end stuff store next door and start offering take-out. I have seen boutique shoe stores and boutique thrift stores move in and two of the three independent coffee shops move out. And most tragically and hideously, I have seen Bank of America with its bright blue and red move in to occupy not one, but three store spaces on one of the big corners in Wicker Park. What used to be a hot dog take-out place, a huge independent coffee shop with couches, and a convenience store, is now a beacon of florescent light seen for miles. And what used to be the busiest, bustling six-way intersection of hipster haven now has a Starbucks, three banks, an upscale bar, and, I think, a cell phone store littering its corners.

I'm not overly focused on these things anymore, the corporatization of the purely independent, but I do think it's rather unfortunate. Not only for the character of the neighborhood, but more importantly for the people who get displaced by this gentrification. Chicago has a fairly strong undercurrent of race issues, exacerbated by the fact that the yuppies follow Bank of America and suddenly all the minorities find themselves living together in the only area they can reasonably afford.

Nevertheless, the hipsters who wanted to live somewhere edgy who moved to Wicker Park in the first place are now moving on to a place like Logan Square, located just slightly north and west, which has a slow influx of independent coffee shops, restaurants, and boutiques, but it still has the cheap movie theaters, dollar stores, discount family stores, Mexican markets, and boarded up store fronts.

My neighborhood is a little different because it's inhabited by young families mostly (perhaps these hipsters grown up?), but the main drag is a postcard of beauty: brick, lights, couples pushing strollers, and lots and lots of restaurants and little boutiques. There's something for everyone in that little half-mile stretch. Just one block west and a couple steps north of this charming village is an ugly intersection (mattress store/bank/Wallgreens/shady discount jewelry store), and a bunch of fast food and some nondescript stores, most of them with signs written in unidentifiable foreign languages. Some of this quick shift I can chalk up to Chicago just having some unforgivingly ugly streets no matter how far north or south (or east or west) you go; these streets near my house are two such streets. But the rest? Well, more gentrification, I guess. The young couples haven't procreated enough to expand outward yet. I don't really really mind because there are three dollar stores, one brilliant and cheap Mexican market, five Thai restaurants, and several check-cashing places (for those last-minute, late-night laundry quarter runs) within walking distance. Not to mention four coffee shops (one Starbucks), 20-30 restaurants, an awesome used book store, and my bank... you get the idea.

I think I've reached my satisfaction point of discussing things I really don't know much about. But I would like to note that I've been interested in this real estate/development/planning stuff since I became familiar with it in college and I'm wondering what kind of job I can do that will incorporate that, my desire to learn everything there is to know about that in Chicago, and writing. Business journalism, maybe, which I always thought I hated.

coexistence

2007-12-17T09:46:00.000-06:00

Downtown was a disaster this morning. Cars driving on wet, slushy black streets. People walking on icy sidewalks, using muddy crosswalks. Piles of dirt-peppered snow lining all the curbs. Shop owners at work with their snow shovels and salt beneath the busy feet of morning commuters. Chunks of snow and ice falling with the wind from the tops of the buildings. Snow dusting the street below the train tracks after a train goes by--every 7 minutes during rush hour. A layer of dirt, water, and salt lining the floors of the building entrances. Everything is chaotic compared to its usual bustling precision, yet there are a few patches of glistening snow that remain pristine. A layer on the sills of some windows, an outline on some of the building decor, a light powder dusting the planters. Every so often, too, amidst the piles of dirty snow and ice, plowed and shoveled into submission, there is a patch of snow that remains untouched on a forgotten corner somewhere. No one has needed to step through it with their booted feet. It has not wandered in the path of any shovel: it is smooth and as white as the day it fell.

zombie

2007-12-14T09:07:00.000-06:00

It's amazing to me that the last couple mornings I have managed to go through my morning routine and, 40 minutes later, find that I'm walking out of the train at the correct station. It's similarly amazing that I turn the corner and the clock on the bank overhang miraculously reads 9:00, no matter how long the ride seemed to take (without it ever really registering in my mind). For the past weeks the clock has been religiously reading 9:10 whenever I turn that corner, no matter how short the ride seemed. Nevertheless, the way I mark my book, close it, and put it away at the stop before mine is really more of a reflex... and the way I walk to the correct place to get on the train in order to get off at the correct place is not something I think about. My mind is replaying my evening or thinking about the book I was reading or anticipating another unmemorable day at work...

the wonder of snow

2007-12-05T10:10:00.000-06:00

What was a white dream last night was a brown, slushy rush-hour nightmare this morning.

But that doesn't change the wonder and excitement I felt when I was walking to the park last night, my boots making a sliding crunch every time I stepped. Every single sky-facing surface was covered in a pillowy layer of white. Every detail of the tree trunks, bare branches, and few remaining leaves were outlined, every iron fence, every street sign. It was fresh snow and still falling, so the plows hadn't made their way to the side streets yet; the only thing differentiating the sidewalk from the small residential street (besides a jarring step down the hidden curb) was an occasional tire path. It was silent, the usual bustling pedestrians were at home or in taxis, many of the cars either buried under mounds of snow or slowly making their way on the main streets. The snow fell lazily, tiny white particles swirling with the wind, sparkling under the street lights, unobtrusively attaching themselves to strands of my hair, the fur on my hood, the toes of my boots. Excellently aimed snow balls hit my face, the cold prickling my skin and immediately melting down my neck, past the high collar of my jacket. The night was bright, with the yellow street lights reflecting white, the sky hazy and slightly orange.

Cities, with all their concrete, brick, and stone, can be beautiful in their own grotesque way. But the snow erased the concrete and the dirt, outlined the stone and brick, and created, for lack of a better phrase, a different world. A dream.

The snow continued through the night, stopped to let the shop owners shovel, the commuters walk and wait, the car drivers scrape, the salters salt, and the snow plows clear. By the time I got outside, there were signs warning of falling ice, the sidewalks were concrete again, the curbs black with the dirty white, the planters, trees and hidden parking lots still pristine. It's snowing again: small dusty particles mingled with the larger white, all lazily swirling with gravity and the wind. With any luck, by the time I'm finished working all will be white again and I can try my hand at a snowman or a snow angel. Or another snow-ball fight.

I figure I have this winter and maybe next to enjoy the snow before I start hating it and the hassles it causes. I only know one person who has lived here for longer than two years who still likes the snow. Maybe I will be that person in another few years. Or maybe I will retreat, sheepishly, back to California.

walking ten miles, uphill both ways, in the snow

2007-12-04T16:39:00.001-06:00

I have such an understandably California mentality when it comes to weather. It just started snowing again, and from my ninth floor perch in the center of downtown it doesn't look like much -- just swirling dust that's not accumulating. But my mind starts whirling when I think of how the plans I have tonight and tomorrow might be affected by the weather. Will I not be able to walk the mile from the train to my violin lesson? Will I not be able to walk back? Will I not be able to wait outside, in the middle of the freeway, for the train? Will my violin get horribly out of tune just from being outside? Will it be wet? Do my boots have enough traction? Are they waterproof? Am I dressed warm enough?

In college I would miss class, cancel appointments, walk, umbrella in hand, or drive down the street when it rained. Here I have to walk and ride buses and trains like always. I have to get to and from work on time, go to the gym, and once a week I have to get to my violin lesson. My life goes on just as it did in summer and fall, I keep doing what I'm doing regardless of how cold it gets, how high the winds, how icy the sidewalk, how heavy the snow or sleet or rain. I might take a taxi, stand under an awning, or decide to spend a Friday or Saturday night inside. But this day is just a day, and days don't stop even when the weather intervenes.

-----

Despite my general ignorance when it comes to any weather besides rain, I do, however, feel I've become accustomed to my thermometer reading 32 degrees, 28 degrees, and even 20 degrees. There is no more dancing in my room in the morning with long johns in one hand and three pairs of socks in the other, a selection of gloves, mittens, scarves of various degrees of warmth, long-sleeved shirts, sweaters, and knee-high boots strewn at my feet. Whatever I wear -- long-sleeved shirt or sweater or both, mittens or gloves, boots or moccasins, I'll make it to the train and to my office, and by the time 5:00 rolls around, I'll be sweating under my sweaters and long-sleeved shirts, my hair straight from the heating, and it won't be nearly as cold outside. I'm OK now -- the dance will commence again when the highs are in the teens. My California-bred brain might even try to devise ways for me not to go to work or the gym or violin lessons.

so this is (REALLY) winter

2007-12-02T20:41:00.000-06:00

Look! It snowed Saturday afternoon!

Here's me looking goofy outside of my apartment. And my parents will be happy to see that I'm wearing my heavy jacket.

After a few hours of snow and a bit of hail it started raining, and by the time I went outside again Saturday evening, there were piles of brown snow on the sides of the roads, there were little icicles hanging off all the signs and overhangs, and the sidewalks were coated with ice.

And by Sunday it got so warm and rained so much that it looked like it had never snowed at all.

so this is winter

2007-11-30T07:56:00.001-06:00

This was taken from my front window, looking out on the sunrise, the tree missing its leaves, and the buildings down the street. Cute neighborhood, no?

There is 100% chance of snow tomorrow. I don't know how they can predict something 100% when they have about a 20% success rate when predicting Chicago's weather... nevertheless, I have my snow boots on and I'm ready to go. A California girl can't afford to be caught in a "wintry mix" without her snow boots on.

mid-life crisis

2007-11-29T15:23:00.000-06:00

I've been thinking about this guy a lot today.

Not because he's handsome or inspiring -- I only have enough room for one handsome, inspiring boyfriend in my life -- but because what he's doing is radical. He's traveling around North America doing a different job every week for a year. He's a hippie -- he's sleeping on people's couches and he has dreadlocks. He somehow doesn't need money -- he's doing all these jobs and receiving no pay, the companies are only making a suggested donation to a charity. He's a really a fictional character in a sense, an online personae, yet his mission is very real: to find a job that he loves.

Isn't this what we all want to do with our lives? Work at a job we love and consequently never work a day in our lives? This is why we go to college, major in what interests US not what interests our parents, this is why we head into our adult lives hopeful and starry-eyed. But how many people actually have the luxury of finding and doing what they love? I, for one, feel stuck. I need to pay the bills (not to mention that I need something else to put on my resume), so I need to stay where I am. It's not ideal, it's not my dream job, but it's something. There are so many jobs in this world, but the vast majority are closed, meaning unless you have the experience and the skills, you can't hope to get the job. For now, I'm a journalist. I'm not even the journalist I think I'd like to be, but I'm doing what I'm doing, blindly following the career path in my head that may or may not actually work with my life. Maybe I don't want to commit the hours to my chosen profession. What then? And what about those who are stuck somewhere less strategic? Like a temp job or a secretarial job; something they couldn't do forever? What do they do?

I've always thought I might like book publishing or advertising or editing or even public relations: I know how to edit and read and deal with people, but without real experience, I can't even hope to break into these fields. My perfect job could be waiting somewhere I will never get to because I chose to focus on newspaper internships and jobs in college, not get experience in every possible job I think I might like to work someday. I also had to pick a major, and in order to ease my mind of the gravity of my decision when I was a senior in high school and a freshman and sophomore in college, I told myself that it didn't really matter what I picked as long as I liked it. But it did in a sense because majors automatically close a lot of doors. I've also been thinking that maybe I should have become an architect. In order to break into that field I would need to become a student again, study for years, go into major debt, and again, send out my resume in hopes that someone, anyone, will hire me. Or maybe I should become a cook: go to culinary school and join my sisters in Santa Fe, New Mexico for the grand opening of our new restaurant Lindsey'S Peach. Or was it Linsapa's (pronounced: Linseppe's)?

So here I am, my peers beside me. We're motivated, smart, and we have college degrees: but all we see when we look at our options for now and in the future are closed doors. Sean Aiken (the man that prompted my rant today) is 36 weeks into his adventure, and nothing really has struck a chord with him besides his job in advertising or raising funds for cancer research: perhaps not entirely related to his degree in business administration. Of course, he could write a book now, become a travel book writer, start a T-shirt company, or whatever because people know his name, but even the man who has "tried every job" can't identify definitively the one he loves. Come to think of it, I know very few people who like their jobs without a "but"... maybe Juli and maybe my uncle. Maybe it depends on the type of person you are. Would I have said even last year that I liked my job at the Daily Nexus, when now I look back with such longing?

My argument is unraveling at the seams. I could go back to school and become an architect, I could even go back to school and become a doctor, or a teacher, or anything I wanted. I, like most of my peers with college degrees, have that luxury. I realize not everyone does. I think my problem right now is just deciding one way or the other, and at some point giving up on everything else. I don't have to do that yet, but I just hope that when the time comes I feel like I have landed somewhere worthwhile.

ruby slippers

2007-11-23T15:35:00.000-06:00

I come home to California for Thanksgiving and I barely step foot outside. Even so, I know what the air will feel like if I do and I can picture all the local landmarks. Things don't change, and even though I haven't been here for close to six months, I can still picture my surroundings so effortlessly. The ocean and beaches to the West. The beach side communities, Camp Pendleton, and later Los Angeles and Santa Barbara to the North. The city of San Diego, the harbor, and Mexico to the South. The desert and mountains to the East.

In Chicago I don't have such an effortless connection to my surroundings. The gridded streets confuse me sometimes, and I don't know which way is North, South, West, or East (well, generally, the lake) and what the landmarks in those directions look like. I don't know what the air will feel like when I step outside or how strong the wind will me: I'm chained to my thermometer. I don't know what happens when you drive past the city limits and reach the part of Illinois that grows the corn and soybeans that we all eat. It's a black hole, most of it, and the surrounding states are even a darker shade of black.

After four years in Santa Barbara I had a pretty good idea of my surroundings. But I don't know if I'll ever get to that point in Chicago: It's such a huge, mysterious city with sprawling suburbs, that I don't know if I'll ever see these places I hear about in the news and from Chicago natives. But until then, I'm not sure I'll ever feel like I'm home.

I am not alone

2007-11-09T09:27:00.000-06:00

Chicago is the most caffeinated U.S. city

Thanks, Dad, for looking out for me.

I am happy to report that I have not had caffeine for the last two days and have not gotten a headache. It's a mystery to me, but I'm not complaining.

the red pen

2007-11-08T15:31:00.000-06:00

The two subscribers to the World Jewish Digest who also read a la deriva won't be getting their December copies for another few weeks... but when you do, please note that the Uganda brief that has my name on it meant to read like below. The other readers of my blog should save themselves the trouble and not bother to subscribe:

---

Much to the dismay of the people standing in the back of the room, those who were lucky enough to find seats kept filtering in and out of the back door to the bathroom down the hall. At the front of the room stood Aaron Kintu Moses, director of education and acting spiritual leader of the Abayudaya, or Jewish, community in Uganda. He was proudly discussing the new water tanks that held, for most of the residents, their first taste of running water.

The sounds of screaming children wafting through the open door from the middle school Halloween dance down the hall did not facilitate a perfect understanding of Moses’ strongly accented English, but the photos circulating around the room—of children excitedly using the new spigot to wash their hands—filled in the blanks. Moses, clad in a green dress shirt, a red tie, and a blue Bucharian kippah, wore a face of equal elation and pride as he spoke erev Shabbat to Congregation Hakafa at a community center in Winnetka, Ill.— an affluent suburb of Chicago—about his community of 800 Jews in central-eastern Uganda. In addition to limited running water during the rainy season, the community now has five synagogues, a primary school and a secondary school.

“This is so good,” Moses said to an overfilled room of assorted ages and backgrounds. “It is so important to have brothers and sisters together from all around the world, to come together as Jews.”

The Winnetka visit was only one stop on Moses’ month-long speaking tour at Reform and Conservative congregations around the United States. He hopes to educate fellow Jews on the history of the Abayudaya, collect contributions to help the population grow and advertise for the fifth annual two-week long trip to visit the community, which will take place next month.

Although the Abayudaya have been practicing Jewish customs learned from military and political leader Semei Kakungulu since 1919, 300 of them underwent formal halakhic conversion to Judaism in 2002. The conversion was conducted by Rabbi Howard Gorin of Congregation Tikvat Israel, a Conservative synagogue in Rockville, Md., with a team of other conservative rabbis. Gorin said this trip was his first to Africa, but he has since been back to Uganda, and will soon visit the Jewish communities in Nigeria.

“One of my biggest fears was that this would be a nominally Jewish community,” said Gorin, “But this was an organic Jewish community—they were so powerful in their commitment and it even more powerful because they were practicing in Uganda.” He says the conversion was especially important to the Abayudaya because served as a formal introduction to the Jewish community worldwide.

Moses discovered his own Judaism during the reign of President Idi Amin (1971-1978), a ruler who was notoriously unaccepting of other religions and ethnicities. He said people, such as his father, were jailed and harassed for being Jewish. Moses himself was punished by his teachers for not going to school on Shabbat as he was required to.

“I would be lashed by my teachers because I wouldn’t go to school on Shabbat,” Moses said. “I also saw my father be put in prison because he built a Sukkah—the government thought he was building a place for rebels to meet.”

During this time period, the number of Jews in Uganda fell from 3,000 to 300. Following Amin’s reign, however, Moses helped to build the community to its present day numbers. Today, Moses said, Jewish children go to school alongside the local Christians and Muslims, praying in synagogues made of mud and shells.

Following a brief oneg—celebration—the Winnetka congregants left their makeshift synagogue in the community house made of wood and drywall, wallpaper and flowered curtains, and got in their cars to drive home.

---

This is what should have printed, but due to an extreme error in judgment, a complete lack of respect, and my inability to fight back, an atrocity actually appears on the page. Embarrassingly enough, "raise awareness" actually appeared in the edit: I tried to edit it out.

I sometimes wonder why I care.

harmless addiction

2007-11-05T15:34:00.001-06:00

It's 3:45 and I'm drinking my cup of pomegranate white tea as fast as I can, hoping I can catch the faint wisps of pain brewing in my forehead before they become an aching caffeine headache that can't be cured with pain killers.

I knew this would become a problem a few weeks ago when I was looking forward to that soothing and awakening cup of tea each morning when I arrived at work. And now that it's gotten cold, it's extra nice to hold that warm cup, swirling with (fake) milk, and check my email.

But Saturday I didn't have my customary cup of caffeinated tea in the morning, and was struck with a pounding headache at 4:00 p.m. that didn't go away until I broke down and had a cup of English breakfast tea with dinner.

I don't like addictions. I don't like withdrawal headaches. But I love tea. And though decaf herbal tea is delicious at times, I prefer the whites and blacks and greens that usually come with an added dose of caffeine. It's not that I need the caffeine (though my addiction insists that I do), it's that I like the warm liquid in my hands and in my belly on a cold day.

edit: you can write but you can't edit edit

2007-11-04T13:16:00.000-06:00

This morning when I turned on my computer I was greeted by an unknown symbol in the lower right hand corner of my web browser. A cloud with little stars. They are, apparently, now predicting snow showers and a low of 29 on Tuesday. And WIND on Monday.

Now what?

(edit)
Well now, I watch the weather and see that they changed their minds after all. Partly cloudy with a 20% chance of precipitation. I do, however, have plans to build a snowman in the park and go sledding with one of my roommates when it does snow: making childhood memories I don't have. Whoopee!

Blommer Chocolates

2007-11-01T13:41:00.000-05:00

On certain days, at certain times, when the wind is blowing just right, it smells like chocolate in downtown Chicago. It's not a sickeningly sweet chocolate smell, it's just a faint hint that hangs on the wind and flies through the city streets. There are so many disgusting things that cities can smell like, and sometimes Chicago can too, but on chocolate days, even when it's cold, it makes it all the more worthwhile to live here.

disconnected stories with the same theme

2007-11-01T10:53:00.000-05:00

I walked to the train this morning, ears freezing off my head, cheeks stinging, wondering how I'm going to survive the winter. I'm never going to wear my hair up. I'm going to invent a nose warmer with my sister and start a company. I'm going to get a black ski mask and never show anyone my face. I'm going to wear ear muffs. I can't wait 'til it's cold enough to wear my winter coat: then I will be warm.

-----

I stood on the packed train this morning, wedged between a tall guy in a smelly red fleece jacket, a guy in a hat reading the New York Times, and the door. It was so packed that I didn't have to worry about falling: gripping as tight as I could onto the metal pole, bending my knees, or shifting my weight. I was sweating inside my new wool sweater (from a thrift store, $5), a scarf, my new brown boots, and my California-winter jacket. I turned my face up to the train map above me and wished I was almost at my stop.

-----

A woman in the elevator mentioned to her companion that it's supposed to snow next week. A flutter in my chest and a million things running through my head: what will I wear? what shoes will I wear? How cold will it be? When will it happen? Where will I be? Isn't it too early for snow? Is this the beginning of the winter? My cheeks red, my eyes twinkling, myself getting suddenly three feet shorter, a sled appearing in my hand I gazed out the window, looking for a cloud. I burst into the office, smiling, and said quickly to my co-worker, a Chicago suburbs native, "Someone in the elevator said it's supposed to snow next week." "No way," she said. "Don't ruin my morning." Well, anyway, weather.com says it's not supposed to snow next week. In fact, the lows don't get below freezing and the highs don't get below 45. I'm going to buy wool socks and long underwear and sweater tights and long-sleeved shirts and more wool sweaters that aren't itchy and I'll be fine. And snow? This is me in snow:

-----

I always write about the cold. I have other things to say, but sitting here at my desk, still in my wool sweater, sipping my tea, the cold is what I think about. Because it might not be warm outside, but it's not warm inside either. My fingers are chilly on the keyboard, my nose is frigid. About that nose warmer.

my world is burning

2007-10-22T11:34:00.000-05:00

It's so hard to sit here at work like always, gazing out the window at a wall of windows, and imagine the fire that's burning somewhere moderately near my house in San Diego.

apartment-renting blues

2007-10-11T12:46:00.000-05:00

I need someone to fix my shower.

This morning in my zeal to stop our ever-dripping shower head I put a bit too much pressure on the "Hot" handle and it broke off in my hand. Probably a testament to the fact that my landlord paid $3 for it at Ikea or Walgreens... or Deals, my favorite dollar store (and he, in turn, paid someone $3 to install it). I don't know how it broke, all I know is that it will not reattach because it's broken, I can't turn on the hot water with a wrench, and my roommates and I are sentenced to cold showers, no showers, showers at boyfriend's apartments, or public showers at the local pool until it is fixed.

I feel so powerless to fix it. I have called my landlord twice and the fix-it man twice, still no appointment. And none of my roommates or I are even there during the day anyway to get this taken care of. This sounds familiar, right? (My bathroom fiasco in Spain, for all you loyal readers.) Well, at least the toilet works. I keep telling myself that am a journalist: If anyone can make this happen, I can. Today I successfully navigated a website entirely in Hebrew (which I do not speak or read) to locate an email address. I can make a couple of Americans fix my shower in a timely manner. It just makes me nervous because this request is so urgent: It's not like we can live with it like we live with the nonfunctional buzzer and intercom, the clogged dishwasher, and the dripping shower...

the march of the cold

2007-10-10T22:37:00.001-05:00

I came to the realization very quickly this evening, while standing on a street corner waiting for a bus, that my flimsy summer flats just don't cut it anymore. They don't block gusts of wind, they don't keep my feet dry in a light drizzle: they do absolutely nothing to keep out the 48-degree air.

I'm getting a little worried.

suddenly, everything has changed

2007-10-09T12:25:00.000-05:00

I slept with my air conditioner on last night. Last night and for the past week because the persistent 80- or 90-degree heat found its way into my room and couldn't be drawn away -- not with the help of fans, not with open windows. Today I'm thinking it might be time to put it away because finally, finally the weathermen are predicting what I assume to be more normal temperatures for this time of year in the 50s and 60s.

The change occurred in the span of about three hours last night. I stepped inside (to see my boyfriend perform improv) at about 7:00 p.m. wearing short sleeves and sandals, the heat and humidity noticeable. I stepped outside again at about 10:00 p.m. and had to put on my sweater: the air felt lighter, crisper, slightly cooler. This morning I made my way to the train station wearing a sweater and a scarf, crunching fallen leaves as I walked down the street. It was, as my neighbor remarked at the door, a beautiful morning. Tomorrow I suspect I'll be wearing a jacket: the temperature is supposed to drop another 10 or 15 degrees.

Weather aside, the world felt different this morning too. Last night was really the first night that I've "gone out" with a girl friend. One of my roommates to be specific, and the evening consisted of everything a good night should: comedy, lots of talking and laughing, beer, and no regard to time. Of course, I realized this morning as I crunched my way to the train station 15 minutes behind schedule, gambling on the fact that the train would only take 30 minutes, that Monday was not a very strategic night for this experience. Nevertheless, as I sat on a bar stool last night just talking, and again this morning in my kitchen, I started feeling what I felt most of last year: the feeling that starts in my stomach and spreads to my racing heart and up to my content brain, the feeling that I am doing the right thing. What's more, this feeling spread through my sleepy eyes and pounding head to my desk at work and suddenly my to-do list didn't seem so dire and my work here didn't seem so final. This is what I do now, not forever.

All this contributed to my feeling this morning, as I strode across LaSalle in the direction of my building in my mini-heels and scarf, that I belong here. I belong where there is the sun glinting in the windows of skyscrapers in the morning, where there are honking cars and people wearing suits crossing the street. I belong where there is, finally, fall.

weird weather

2007-10-07T21:18:00.000-05:00

Last year, runners in the Chicago Marathon had to wear pants and long sleeves.

just wondering

2007-09-21T10:25:00.000-05:00

For the past almost three months and even before that I have been looking at everything in terms of "when I have a job." I knew (rather, I hoped) my unemployment was temporary, so I tried not to get involved in too much or make too many plans for fear I would have to reprioritize and reschedule once I started my variable freelance work, part-time job, or full-time job. Now that I am on the eve of starting my job and a few short weeks away from actually earning an income, I'm wondering what I should do.

In college (and even high school) I was limited to the few activities I had already chosen: the newspaper, my classes, my internship, swimming, and socializing. Here I have a blank slate. A beaded bag just waiting to be filled. Now that I possess this freedom to do what I like I feel paralyzed by it. Maybe I don't want to join a swim team. Maybe, with the winter looming, I don't want to purchase a bike and try to be a triathlete. Maybe I don't want to take a cooking, yoga, photography, or art class (they're all ridiculously expensive anyway). Maybe I don't want to pick up guitar again or learn a new instrument. Maybe I don't want to freelance. Maybe I don't want to write the Great American Novel (or Short Story). Maybe with nearly ten hours of my daylight committed to work and transportation there there's no time for anything else. If I load everything up now, then, like college, I will have no time to be flexible: spend a quiet night at home with my boyfriend, go out with a promising new friend, curl up in all the blankets and scarves I can find when it's 20-below outside and read a book, go to sleep early. I always loathed that my jam-packed schedule in high school and college didn't permit me to be spontaneous. Now I'm wondering if I really want that spontaneity: whether I will still feel busy and purposeful or just plain idle if I have it.

The Aon Center

2007-09-20T11:25:00.001-05:00

This is where I work. Well, today and tomorrow anyway. It is, I believe, the second tallest building in Chicago; it has 83 floors and at least eight banks of elevators. I have an office with a window that overlooks the river, the lake, and the mess of city below. I have a thick credit card-shaped pass that says "Visitor" and demands that it be "surrendered before leaving the premises." There's a picture of a middle-aged man on the door that supposedly says my name: Mike. Apparently he doesn't do much all day long, because since I got here at 9:00 I've only proofed three ads. All for Dell. There are cassette tapes, yes, cassette tapes of 70s and 80s punk bands and some others I've never heard of lining the walls of the office.

Funny story about this building I learned on the architecture tour I took a couple of weeks ago. The building was originally designed to be the world's tallest marble building (apparently Chicago has a bit of a Napoleon complex that it's compensating for with all its tall buildings) -- clad in the same marble as Michaelangelo's David. The weather proved too much for the stone and it had to be re-clad thirty years later in white granite (for, as one might imagine, quite a hefty price). Nevertheless, it is still quite an imposing figure on Chicago's skyline.

when it rains, it pours

2007-09-19T12:36:00.000-05:00

I have a job.

Beginning next week, and extending every day from now until whenever I decide to quit, except Federal holidays, Jewish holidays, and weekends, I will be joining the thousands of people dressed in suits who commute downtown to work. I will sit or stand among my fellow commuters for the 45-minute train ride, I will walk the block to my building from the L stop, and I will ride the elevator up the skyscraper until I get to my office. Or cubicle. I am the new Editorial Assistant at the World Jewish Digest.

I'm not sure exactly what that entails yet. But it is some combination of what I want to be doing: writing, editing (and some administrative work).

This comes at a perfect time: just when I was going to have to start applying for more jobs, just when I was getting completely, unalterably bored, just when I was about to run out of money. And because I am so bored, I am using my last two weekdays of freedom to do some freelance proofreading at some sort of company downtown. It pays double the most I've ever been paid per hour.

exploring modern sexuality

2007-09-16T20:09:00.000-05:00

I first became acquainted with the term "ex-gay" a few months ago when Chad Thompson came to speak at UCSB, parading his book titled Loving Homosexuals as Jesus Would: A Fresh Christian Approach. Mislead by the title as I'm sure the author intended, I threw the flier on my busy university editor desk and vowed to deal with it later. But what I thought was a Christian telling people "It's OK to be gay" had the queer community in furor: it was actually, if you read the fine print, a reformed homosexual Christian telling people "You can change. I did." Rather, from his website, "Provide a living counterexample for those who say that homosexual people can never change."

It's a baffling assertion, really, that it's possible to change one's own sexuality using only self control and a really serious devotion to God and religion. My knowledge of sexuality comes from within, of course, and I'm pretty devoutly heterosexual. My knowledge of religion comes from myself, of course, and I'm pretty casually Jewish. Two identifications that I suppose make it very difficult for me to understand what it's like to be homosexual and Christian. Nevertheless, I was lead to believe that homosexuality is nature, not nurture. The same way my hair is brown, I'm short, and my eyes are brownish hazelish, nature is difficult to change.

To be fair, there is something to be said for people who are able to find something they don't like in themselves and decide to change it. That's hard to do. But I'm not sure if it's quite that easy with the question of sexuality. Ted Haggard accomplished it in a couple weeks. Larry Craig probably will too if he ever decides to admit he was, indeed, soliciting sex in a men's airport restroom. The bottom line is these people can say whatever they want to appease themselves and others who think it's wrong, but we won't ever know what they think about at night before they fall asleep, whether they are ever satisfied again being just heterosexual. Really, it doesn't matter: they are only denying themselves of love, pleasure, and honesty. It's sad, really. Another ex-gay Charlene Cothran (founder of Venus magazine based in Chicago) did an interview with a New York freelance writer that's published here (see April 10, 2007). It's fascinating and I admire the writer, for having the huevos to ask her most of the questions he did, and her, for answering them. So he asks her whether she's still attracted to women. Well, it seems to me that would be the hardest to change: it's easy enough to abstain from sex, dating, and to change your "Looking For" on Facebook to read the opposite gender, but pure, physical attraction is rather involuntary. So she answered: "I would say after 29 years of walking in the sin of lesbianism that if the devil were going to try and tempt me that he's probably not going to send a football player, if you will, because that didn’t do it for me. You follow me? I’ve got sense enough to know if he tries to tempt me he's probably going to send something that resembled the thing that I was entangled with. You follow me?" I follow. And it's a great answer. But basically she's saying, "Yes, I'm still attracted to women, but I think it's evil so I try to shut it out."

Why shut it out? I find it incredibly disheartening that religion is the trigger and the proof behind many of these "reforms." Religion that's supposed to facilitate a good life (happy and healthy?) and a pleasant afterlife. That's for another day. It's just tragic that they would be so devout as to deny themselves of having a completely loving, happy relationship with another person: same sex or opposite.

groundhog

2007-09-11T21:30:00.001-05:00

Somewhat appropriately I got my first glimpse of the cold today. A week ago, a cloudless sky and bright sun meant I would have been foolish to leave the house in anything other than shorts. Today, the sun looked only deceptively bright, and people started pulling out fall jackets for their commutes. It was, in fact, the first time Chicago's morning streets have seen me in something other than short sleeves or a tank top. It's nice to be cozy, but pulling out my jackets from the back of my closet also unearthed a sense of unease about the coming winter. Unease, mostly, because I don't know what to expect. And I don't yet have half the apparel I think I need to survive the winter.

HOY

2007-09-11T21:15:00.000-05:00

Now that I live in a big, decadent American city, I had to wonder a little more about today's date when I boarded the inbound train this morning. Six years ago today my mom was shaking me awake before my alarm saying, "Lindsey, something has happened. You've gotta see this." This year at around the same time I was riding public transportation with the beautiful Chicago skyline shining in the background.

parallels

2007-09-06T13:50:00.000-05:00

I haven't worn heels since I arrived in Chicago over two months ago.

I've never been an overly willing heel-wearer because I don't like the click-click they make when I walk, I don't like blisters, being topply tall, or getting them stuck in the cracks of sidewalks. I would wear them in college occasionally when I was going out (usually accompanied by makeup) or when I wanted to look professional and commanding. Having a boyfriend eliminates the need to go all out when I do go out, and I don't have too many girlfriends to go out with solo yet. So I stick to my flats.

I haven't worn makeup since I arrived in Chicago over two months ago.

I've never been an overly willing makeup-wearer because I don't like the way it feels when I sweat, I don't want to become dependent, it takes entirely too much time, and I really don't know what to do with it. I would wear it in college occasionally when I was going out (usually accompanied by high heels) or when I wanted to look professional and commanding or just change my appearance. Having a boyfriend eliminates the need to go all out when I do go out, and I don't have too many girlfriends to go out with solo yet. So I stick to my face.

Today I wore both these things. I tottered around in a full suit, heels, straightened hair, and makeup feeling like a little girl in dress-up clothes and makeup, smearing colors all over her face (thinking it looked pretty, of course). I suppose to the innocent observer I looked like just another business person, like all those that frequent the Loop each business day. I felt ridiculous.

Ridiculousness compounded by the fact that I overcompensated for how long it would take to get from my northwest apartment alllllll the way southeast into the Loop. I was wandering around for a half hour, purposeless, before my interview, wishing it was okay to sit down in the middle of the sidewalk. Then I realized my professional appearance was somewhat mauled by the bleeding blister that had formed on my left heel (again, from the heels). I scratched my eye, only to find a scar of black eyeliner left of my finger.

My interview went fine, thanks.

feet and buses

2007-08-02T19:58:00.000-05:00

Cities are amazing places. Yes I have replaced the sound of the ocean for the sound of traffic almost drowned out by a window air conditioner, but I have also replaced my car with my feet. Or in some extreme cases, a bus or train. My neighborhood is amazing. Within a half a block from my new apartment I can find a record store, an L stop, two book stores, a little market, a movie theater, three coffee shops, three dollar stores, several banks, a Wallgreens, a library, a park, a pool, and a smattering of boutiques and restaurants. There are about five thai restaurants in fact. If I venture a little further, I can find a bigger market, and if I hop on a bus I can reach Target, a supermarket, and Trader Joe's.

I like the ocean. But I can see the point of the new urbanists who work toward cities instead of suburbs, feet, bicycles, and buses instead of cars. It's extremely convenient.

lonely musings

2007-07-27T20:13:00.001-05:00

I opened up the free daily that's on every street corner today and found an article that I have already written. Two years ago. And then again a few months ago. "Old news!" I wanted to shout. I also considered copying my clips of that very same article (only better, of course) and sending them to the woman I just sent my resume and some other clips to at that very same publication. I can write and research like these people. I can even break the story two years earlier. So, then, what do they have that I don't have? A few more years maybe? A few more dollars saved up in the bank from a past position? I will probably find, once I finally get my foot in the door, that I have a lot more to learn... but in the meantime this "rule" that you can't work at a metropolitan daily if you've never worked at a metropolitan daily before is just silly. And something like a catch-22.

Speaking of catch-22s, I have decided that if I must get an hourly job to pay the bills, I would rather work at a bookstore again than dirty my hands with whipped cream and espresso and grumpy customers who haven't yet had their morning coffee. There's a hip-looking, non-corporate bookstore about half a block from my new apartment... I might see if they're hiring. Then I can get serious about this "foot in the door" business.

I'm really enjoying this free time I have to read for pleasure again, and I'm devouring books like I did before I had to read for class. In light of this, I'm glad to be graduated. Because I have the time and the lack of stress to read books for pleasure, and I can read and analyze them in my head without having to compete with pretentious English majors for attention. Despite my general disdain for fellow English majors and sometimes English classes, I think if I were to do it over (college, that is), I would probably choose to be an English major again. I really like fiction. More than poli sci or psychology or sociology or biology or geology (all majors I briefly considered), I think it made sense to study something I enjoyed. Even if I didn't learn a bunch of equations or theorems or laws... what good does learning that technical stuff do, anyway, if I don't use it? It's quantitative versus qualitative, I guess, and in my everyday life I dwell more on things I make up, things I find and learn in fiction, things I read, than I do on why the sky is blue and how concrete is made and why buildings look the way they do. I was just walking around the Magnificent Mile (which was so magnificently crowded that I had to leave) -- probably the reason for all my city questions. But walking around, I cared more about where that guy with the frenzied look on his face was headed and how much begging of parents those little girls had to do to get American Girl dolls.

I don't think I articulated that very well. Something my English major essay-writing skills should have fixed. But it would have been articulated considerably worse had I written it in numbers and equations. Anyway, it'll be interesting to see what my sister, a chemical engineering major, gets from college. Whether she will perceive it as useful knowledge in four years, or whether she will wish that she learned less quantitative stuff and thought and wrote a little more.

landmines

2007-07-26T16:39:00.000-05:00

I am finding and applying to jobs with renewed vigor. The day always drags when one has tedious work to do, but after a shower, lunch, and a few episodes of Arrested Development I have found that the evening is within reach. I always get more work done in the evening and late late into the night because the sun isn't beckoning me to leave the house, do something in this city full of promises. I haven't yet wasted away the day fiddling around with my resume and cover letter. I haven't yet squandered another precious day in this beautiful city. There's still time before it gets dark, and time after that before my eyelids get heavy.

I've been meaning to compose something about this:

I saw a concert last week that summoned the rain and lightning they'd been predicting all week. It was nestled in the bosom of the city, the skyline looking down on the amphitheater, its own gray metal decor stretching up to meet the buildings.

It was a hot day, unusually disgusting actually with humidity so high it felt like a swamp -- not a grassy park by the shores of Lake Michigan. I regretted my decision to wear pants as I plopped down on the grass three hours early to join the line to get in. I rolled up my pants. The humidity persisted as we made our way to seats, gazing expectantly at the music stands, the bright yellow light, and the guitars and drums for the band. Epic, I think, would be a good way to describe the pairing of the classical comfort of violins and flutes with the familiar lyrics and acoustic guitar of one of my favorite bands. Apparently the weather thought so too. It started raining in big drops. Some people took shelter under umbrellas (much to the annoyance of the people sitting behind them); I rolled my eyes at its timing and put my face up to the sky, glad that the cool rain drops had chased away the worst of the day. At times the crash of the cymbals were accompanied by the crash of thunder. And an occasional camera flash was buttressed by a flash of lightning lighting up the sky. It was an energetic and beautiful show with or without the storm, but the rain just made it that much more novel.

The real storm occurred long after the applause, long after the damp fans made their way through the deserted downtown streets to the nearest L stop, long after the lazy train finally pulled up to the station. It was raining in sheets when we detrained. It was dark but the lightning was trying its best to imitate the sun, the thunder trying its best to rival the light show. We ran inside and curled up on the couch with some tea. It wasn't cold enough for tea, but it felt safer somehow.

reaffirmation

2007-07-17T20:44:00.000-05:00

Thanks to a kick in the butt from my friend leeann (who has blissfully started posting regularly as well), I have started making writing part of my routine. Funny, because I have no routine. Ironic because I'm trying to make a living out of writing. Anyway, we'll see how long my inspiration lasts.

I sat outside the Tribune Tower this afternoon, stiff, because I didn't want my button-down shirt to become untucked from my skirt and underwear (as an extra precaution) or stuck to my perspiring body resulting in huge, transparent, smelly sweat spots. I shamelessly envied everyone who bustled around the tower because they had probably lived in the city for more than three weeks and knew what they were getting themselves into by walking outside, they also probably had jobs that paid at least a few dollars per hour, and maybe they also had cars: a luxury that would eliminate the need to leave one-and-a-half hours before a scheduled appointment and worry that they'd be late anyway when the bus or train didn't come or stopped needlessly. Or that the predicted three-inch rain and thunderstorm would actually come and I would walk into the building looking like a fish out of water. Which, I suppose, I am.

"Most people go the other way," my contact at the Tribune told me several times today. Yes. Most people go the other way. But I'm happy with my soon-to-be-apartment that costs approximately $400 less than I could expect for a moderately nice bedroom anywhere on California's coast. I don't mind the weather. In fact, the variety and unpredictability are rather exciting, though the winter is still a long way off.

I was sitting there stiff, envious, unfriendly, fidgety, thinking I could never translate my love for college journalism, for comparatively small-town, weekly, subscription-only business journalism, for affluent high school journalism to neo-gothic building, city crime journalism. I know next to nothing about this city. I had never heard of an alderman (which are apparently part of the government here). I'm fresh out of college and i'm shy, without experience or talent. Traveling silently to the loop each day dressed in a suit doing something terrible and boring in a cubicle is what I want: it's easier and faster.

I walked out of the building walking quickly, clicking my heels confidently. I considered untucking my shirt. It's nice understanding something. The bus routes in this city I don't understand (I had to ask the driver both ways on Michigan Avenue where it stopped). Nor the government. Nor the weather. Nor the accent. Nor the segregation. But the Tribune's sprawling newsroom with its white boards and desks and meeting rooms to discuss design and lead stories and photos, style sheets, breaking news... I understand all that. Writing a story for such a publication, even something as lowly as an obit, is scary and daunting and seemingly impossible... at least that's what my doubting mind tries to trick me into believing. But I know can do it: I've done it before.

American City

2007-07-16T12:31:00.000-05:00

I have started 100 posts in my head in the past two weeks, fleeting ideas that have disappeared as quickly as they arrived leaving me with nothing to say nothing to write nothing with which to appease my loyal readers. Although, knowing me, I will find something to say. I have, after all, embarked on my Great Adventure in Chicago.

The truth is, it really isn’t all that different here. Just sitting on my bed in Spain provoked 1,000 words. I’ve explored this city far and wide and all I’ve managed is a few unfinished ideas, a short, lame post, and several phone conversations. It’s the Midwest, sure, it’s a big city, it has crazy weather, it doesn’t have an ocean, it has public transportation, it is two hours ahead… but I feel the same. And some of the only notable differences I’ve come across between here and California are the ridiculously high price of avocados, the way people say “pop” instead of “soda,” the way the buses don’t turn, and that none of the public restrooms feature toilet seat covers (it’s the law in California). I did, however, come across a startling and exciting response to the problem of toilet seats in the big downtown Chicago Public Library, which had those crazy saran wrap-looking sheaths that completely covered the seat and disappeared at the press of a button (http://www.brillseat.com/). And at the Pitchfork Music Festival this weekend, I got to experience 8:30 p.m. Port-A-Potties that had been used all day by thousands of hippies and hipsters in the dust and heat.

My point is not to talk about toilet seats. My point is that this is an American City, and all American Cities are alike; every American City is American in its own way (paraphrased from Anna Karenina). Richard M. Daley, mayor, has his name on every sign and poster in the city. There’s pizza, Chinatown, Little Italy, Downtown with big buildings, thrift stores, areas of big-name commercial presence, residential areas, trees, rich people, homeless people, students, people who go to work Downtown in a suit each day, mothers with lots of little children.

*****

The other week my frequent male escorts and I caught the bus down the street in order to catch another bus that would take us to aliveOne. We waited for awhile: it was late, it had started to rain. Chicago buses are lazy; their signs commonly say “runs every 13 to 25 minutes” or “runs from the early morning to the late afternoon.” Standing under the Borders overhang next to us was a woman, young, with five children gathered around her. One was in her arms. One was in a stroller. Three came to various places on her leg. They were dressed in various stages of alikeness, their hair was braided and barretted and they were quiet and stationary. But the woman still had her hands full, with five extensions of herself running around, trying to get on a bus, get seated, and pull the rope at the appropriate stop. This isn’t really American, but it’s interesting.

*****

The Fourth of July was already ages ago, but memories of the night still greet me with smiles. We drank beer and grilled things (mostly veggie). We made our way up the ladder to the roof and were silenced by the perfect night and the 360 degrees of festivities. Fireworks are legal in Indiana, I’ve heard, and Indiana is only 30 minutes away. There were explosions and bits of light filling the sky from every direction: to the south-east, the city, with its buildings obscured by smoke and light, to the south, nameless towns and families celebrating with their own explosions, to the west, to the north. I stood, speechless, for an hour watching.

*****

Is this the ocean or the lake?

*****

Are these aliens or friends?

Note: I have just finished the first book on my summer reading list not counting two Harry Potter rereads: Special Topics in Calamity Physics by Marisha Pessl. My strange capitalizations, ordering, and references in this post may be attributed, in part, to her. Irvine Welsh, I believe, is next. Watch out for the Chicago accent coming through in phonetic spelling. Also watch out for spells. Harry Potter comes out soon.

adjust

2007-06-28T16:26:00.000-05:00

I have been here less than two days. I have replaced my student I.D. card with a CTA Transit Card. Car and bike keys for a train map. The Pacific Ocean for Lake Michigan. The sound of waves for the purr of air conditioning and of traffic. My sweater with an umbrella… except today when, to my surprise, I stepped outside and it was chilly. I don’t know quite what to think about all of this, so I’m boarding the busses and trains like a native, with my CTA card the right way (cut corner toward me), acting like I have somewhere to go and that I know how to get there.

a new adventure

2007-06-26T01:15:00.000-05:00

Beginning tomorrow, a la deriva will become a travel journal yet again. This California girl is moving East. I'm off to drift again, so to speak, this time in Chicago.

And you know, they say hot dogs are a specialty of the city.

Romantic Without A Cause

2007-06-11T15:59:00.000-05:00

I am printing out my last English paper. Eight-and-a-half wondrous pages of disorganized thought. It's not nearly the best paper i've written, but it's not often that I concoct the title and the concluding sentence with phrases so cleaver that I finish reading with a sigh.

Sure the vivid descriptions of cooking up may stroke the curiosity of some, but anyone who experiments knows he could end up just like Mark Renton: an addict without a future, emotions without an outlet, wandering with no destination, an 18th century Romantic without any 19th century Victorian ending.

On the eve of my entrance into real life I am strangely obsessed with Trainspotting. A bit of an inappropriate book and/or movie to live by, certainly, but I think they have good intentions. As do I.

I'm going to be just like you.

when is not all the time

2007-06-07T02:04:00.000-05:00

I just decided to do my English last paper on a topic that would allow me to deviate and make my academic career go full circle. I'm going to touch on Romantic poetry (which I studied most in 12th grade) , and modernism (which I have always liked). I came across this gem from a paper I wrote four years ago that I was always so proud of: He suggests that despair is temporary in the line “but when the melancholy fit shall fall” (223) with the use of the word “when,” because when is not all the time. This is the kind of line that reporters would sometimes turn in (you know, when I used to edit at the newspaper), and the whole office would laugh about it and repeat it before I would finally delete it.

I'm rather embarrassed. This is precisely the reason why I generally refuse to read my articles after they've been published -- especially the ones that sit collecting dust in big red memory books -- they may remain clearly good in my mind, but my refined eye won't be able to read them now without cringing.

now what

2007-06-07T00:12:00.000-05:00

Freshman year -- and even sophomore year when we had time -- I frequently ate dinner with a group of three other girls who lived on my floor. We'd eat, we'd laugh, and we'd sit there for hours procrastinating the evening's studies. Junior year we all went our separate ways into I.V. or abroad; we didn't see each other quite as frequently and it became more and more difficult to get us all in the same place at the same time. But this year, we made an effort every few weeks to have lunch, not lingering as long because of various time conflicts, but nonetheless sitting together, laughing, and catching up.

This evening we had dinner. We lingered just as long as we used to at the dining commons, this time in the natural light of a restaurant and not under the horrible gaze of that mural in Ortega. It was pleasant until I started to think about it as the last time. When I started college I never thought it would end. I remember so clearly walking around campus the day I moved in, talking to my neighbor who would later become my good friend, wondering at the experiences that lay ahead. And here it is, ending. I'm ready for it to be over, i've taken from it all I could have -- i've grown up -- but it's terrifying looking ahead because I know it will never be the same. My life here is such a bubble. I have a dozen good friends within arms reach and all the intellectual stimulation I could ever need a five-minute bike ride away. What is the real world like?

I've been riding the last few months on the excitement and adventure of graduation, or at least the big decision, and now as i'm about to begin my last day of classes, write my last paper, take my last final, complete the last day at my internship, it's beginning to feel real and i'm not quite sure what I should do. Run around and celebrate? Stay quiet and soak in the nostalgia? Go about my business as usual? Try to forget?

-----

I've had an obsession for the last four years with the hot dog stand on campus. Whenever I am fortunate enough to pass by it (which has been quite often this quarter due to the location of my classes) I am treated to the potent aroma of beef, turkey, and veggie hot dogs sizzling on the grill. I have never smelt anything quite like it, so juicy and so flavorful, and I suspect I never will again. But even though I have long harbored this obsession, for whatever reason I have never actually bought a hot dog there. Now, because I only have a week left here and i'm safe from the possibility that I would also become obsessed with the taste of these hot dogs, I have decided to walk up to the stand and order.

uncovered

2007-06-01T18:29:00.000-05:00

Two people were playing chess at a card table set up on one of lawns on campus this morning. It wasn't particularly sunny, nor were the bike paths and sidewalks humming so early on Friday morning, but nevertheless there they were, a man and a woman, playing chess.

I didn't think anything of it until I glanced again and realized that the woman was naked. Completely naked, sitting with a crossed leg and arms in front of her chest, in the middle of campus.

Things just outside of the realm of "normal," even for a university, generally occur this time of year. One of the advanced art classes unleashes its artists and their comments on society upon the campus, artists who set up public displays that are designed to raise the eyebrows of the passersby. This year there was a man hidden in a tree, yelling compliments and insults down to walkers on the busy sidewalk underneath; a few students sitting in the middle of a saran-wrapped group of trees; a man riding his unicycle around and around the main roundabout on campus; an unbirthday party; and my personal favorite (aside from the naked chess player), a woman pretending to fish in the grimy campus pond.

I wondered why I hadn't noticed the naked woman before; surprised that my mind would see the other details of the scene, the chess pieces and the man's colorful hat, but not acknowledge the woman's obvious nakedness. I was also struck with concern, both because there was a chilly wind blowing and because one of the last sexual assaults that occurred on campus was in the early morning. And why did she choose Friday morning - the volume of visitors to campus, especially in the morning, is comparatively low after the Thursday night bar specials. The point behind such a performance was to incite thought, and she certainly got me thinking… so I rode by again about an hour later, just to see how other people reacted - especially boys -- now that the sun was a little higher in the sky. I didn't see much out of the ordinary, but as I was passing a man yelled at her, "Aren't you cold?" She replied cheerily, "Well I was a little before but now the sun's out."

It was interesting that she answered, chose to step out of her world, her objectivity in the eyes of others and interact with the student. She was just that when she wasn't speaking: an object. An object that was there, but wasn't, masked behind her art project. Talking to the student made it seem normal. Maybe it wasn't all that strange.

Our Favorite Goat

2007-05-26T18:56:00.000-05:00

It doesn't matter if it comes from Al Gore's mouth, from Jon Stewart's mouth, or my roommate's: I inevitably get irritated when anyone blames everything on "the Media." The Media is everyone's favorite scapegoat, but I might consider taking their criticism with more than a grain of salt if I knew what they were talking about. I am often on the side of the Media because I am a part of it and I generally believe in its supreme importance, but I don't pretend to faithfully campaign for the goodness of our country's media at all times even when it's doing something wrong. That's my disclaimer.

What is the Media? Are we talking about big newspapers, little newspapers, magazines, celebrity gossip shows, Cosmopolitan, The O'Reilly Factor, News at 6, NPR, ABC, FOX, the Onion? I think half the time when people are blaming all of the country's problems first on Bush, and second on the Media, they don't have a clear idea of who they're talking about. Al Gore included (during his Thursday appearance on The Daily Show, which was the trigger of my post). He made a lot of good points and Jon Stewart was generally hilarious as usual, but Gore was talking a lot about the Media and he lost me at the capital M. Which Media? After listening to him berate newscasters mostly, I was able to conclude -- if not shakily -- that he was talking about TV news. I think.

I try to stay away from TV news, besides the occasional 60 Minutes, mostly because I agree with Gore. It is very focused on entertainment. The teasers make the stories seem more interesting and important than they actually are, and when it comes down to it the short short stories don't actually say anything. TV news doesn't have the time or the interest to report on Iraq or Israel everyday, so they focus on the local, on the zany, or the different. Generally the stuff that doesn't matter. So it's the entertainment value over the actual investigation, money over matter. But would anyone watch it if it was meaningful? Would any of the approximate 50 percent of Americans watch the news "regularly" if was about exposing politicians rather than Paris Hilton? How heavy do people really want the subject matter when they get home from a long day at work? And really, there are only so many watchdogtype pieces that can come up at any given time. Maybe it's not that TV news is in league with the government and the capitalist economy, as Gore suggested, but that they don't think that anyone really cares. They probably don't. Apathetic, I think, is the word i'm looking for.

Don't newspapers do all that? Newspapers have the same annoying headlines, leads and nuts trying to get people to read it, they also have issues of ownership and advertising income, but they also have more meat. It would take a newscaster 30 minutes to read the feature I wrote earlier this year, but in print people can read it, look at the picture of the penis drawn into the grass, and take from it what interests them. Newspapers have broken some brilliant stories in the past few years, and many many journalists have been jailed and tried for not revealing their sources. Isn't that evidence enough that some reporters, at least, are trying?

Maybe the invasion of the Internet is just what we need. Newspapers (and local news stations) are focusing more and more on the local local issues, the things the people who actually read the papers care about. The local scandals, the local heroes. There are countless places the public can read about Iraq, there's only one place they can read about the city council meeting. That's the trend, anyway.

Either way, people are going to blame the Media. I don't know what, exactly, the Media is, but it's the cause of all the problems in the world.

rescheduling

2007-05-20T16:26:00.000-05:00

Today is Sunday. It is past two o'clock and i'm marvelling at how the sun shines through my dirt-streaked windows at this time of day and how the clouds are still just visible, covering the sky with a whitish film. For the majority of Sundays since October 2005 -- when I first began my editor duties at the Daily Nexus -- I have been smooshed into the editor-in-chief's office with my clipboard, yellow pad, and pen, discussing news and half dreading a week's worth of story assigning, editing, and late nights. Today i'm eating carrots, listening to music, and I have a vague idea of what i'm going to do for the rest of the day.

Perhaps i'll start to feel more nostalgic about the end of my editing duties come Thursday, when I have spent a whole week making dinner, going to Wednesday karaoke night, finishing my assignments, and going to bed at a reasonable hour. Maybe my freedom will become more apparent tomorrow, around midday, when I haven't received a call from a single reporter, assistant, or photographer. Or later in the week when I hear a siren on campus and don't feel the familiar flutter of "I hope that's not a story." It's been a good year, it's been intellectually stimulating, i've spent countless hours laughing, problem-solving, arguing with some co-workers who have become very good friends, i've learned more than I ever needed to know about the inner workings of UCSB and how to re-word sentences. I've left a legacy of organization, competence, and a couple memorable stories. But I think four years of meager pay and four quarters of Sundays and five o'clock on Mondays, Tuesdays, Wednesdays, and Thursdays was enough.

Well it's certainly strange this relative absence of stress, now that i've completed the hardest part of the quarter juggling a full-time job, an internship, and three classes, and purchased a one-way plane ticket to my immediate future. And i'm looking forward to it staying that way, through finals, through the packing and the plane ride and the first month or two of finding a place, adjusting, and building a life. But I will make sure to treasure my two o'clocks and five o'clocks, hesitantly at first, then more confidently up until I take them for granted. I have earned this time.

here's to hoping this is true

2007-05-09T02:55:00.000-05:00

If I may make a terrible comparison that only I will understand, decision making is a lot like editing. A lot of things are like editing done right, but right now i'm feeling the decision-making parallel.

When I first read a horribly written and organized article (at least by Nexus standards), I feel overwhelmed, I do not know what it's trying to say, I have no idea which details matter, and I have a million questions buzzing around my fingertips. If it's especially confusing, i'll sit down with the writer and ask him or her to summarize the issue. If it's workable, i'll go through cutting and pasting, organizing by topic and spacing paragraphs to keep myself organized. Then i'll start from the top. Formulate a lead that grabs the reader, gets them hooked on the most interesting aspect of the story. Then i'll write the second paragraph, the nut. This usually takes the longest, summarizing the article and pertinent background into four to five sentences. It's also usually accompanied by a feeling that the article will never, ever make sense, nor did it make sense to begin with. Nevertheless, the remaining paragraphs usually organize themselves, pending the insertion of a really good quote, some good transitions, interesting lead-ins, and sentence variety. It's a bell curve, really, in terms of difficulty, and a diagonal in terms of improvement.

I think i'm beginning the down slope to my decision-making bell curve. I've talked to the necessary people, I've organized, i've reorganized, i've prioritized, i've rationalized, i've toiled, i've made lists, i've thought long and hard... i've written my lead and my nut and I think i'm just leaving that part where my efforts feel hopeless and just starting that part where the story writes itself -- where the decision decides itself. I'm just about to insert the best quote into the story, which generally makes me feel (if it's good enough) like all the stress was worth it.

Well I don't know if I could ever say that. Maybe when hindsight kicks in in a year or so. But the journey back to normal feels so much better when the high point of the bell curve (the vertex, if you will) was just out of my reach.

by the way

2007-05-07T16:34:00.001-05:00

I believe that global warming is happening. Perhaps that point was a little muddled by my late-at-night brain. I think that the world’s reliance on cars -- especially the U.S.’ -- and its relative resistance to making them run with anything other than gas is disgusting and I wish I understood how cars work so I could do something to change it. I also hate that America is resistant to sign anything that pledges to lower emissions… though the UCs, for example, are doing well in that area, not everyone has jumped on the bandwagon. At the same time, it seems like nothing anyone does is going to be enough, if global warming is occurring like scientists say. But I suppose a counter to that is somewhat like the arguement for voting: every little bit makes a difference. And it couldn’t hurt to try.

I think most people are aware of it by now, which is probably a result of Al Gore and, at least at UCSB, the drill approach they’ve taken to provide us with speakers and books and discussions on it. It just seems like it’s all going to blow over. Like the Iraq war, perhaps. Next year, the vast majority will wonder if global warming is still around, it’ll be like a distant memory and everyone will be thinking, instead, about the presidential elections, or whatever it is that comes next. I could harangue the media for that, but I will abstain because i'm considering "the media" as a career and I believe in the good of newspapers, at least, at any cost. As long as the people that matter don't forget about it, the ones who sign bills and make cars and get the masses to change their lives and do things in general. Until then... I, personally, will think twice before driving anywhere (now more than ever because, with a broken car, I can't drive anywhere), use low-emissions light bulbs (even if they are blindingly bright), be receptive to new hybrid/electric/whatever car technology, and do whatever else I can think of to reduce my own impact on the environment.

I will not, however, buy credits to offset my carbon emissions. I think that's a strange and counter-productive way to live environmentally. I can use my car as much as I want as long as I pay some company according to how much I drive to invest in sustainable energy sources. Really? I will also probably not spend a year without toilet paper like the family in the New York Times who decided to be zero emissions for an entire year. But I believe in it.

Just the encouragement I need...

2007-05-04T10:54:00.000-05:00

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/05/05/business/05jobs-web.html?_r=1&hp&oref=slogin

sleepwalk

2007-05-04T02:57:00.000-05:00

I have stayed up so late the past three nights that I can't see clearly. I stumble through my homework, job applications, readings, preparations with my eyes half closed, my vision blurry through my dry lashes. The yellow light my overhead light gives off makes it seem later anyway... so I pull through that work that just keeps coming, only to awaken before 8 the next morning for more.

I haven't been this busy since this time four years ago. Every day is 20 waking hours long (to steal a phrase from my more articulate friend) and while I don't really mind the things I fill these hours with, it'd be nice to sleep.

I went to see 20/20's John Stossel speak tonight. And while my views are not in line with his libertarian outlook, it was refreshing at least to hear something different. College students are fed a diet of liberal(itarian) in classes, from speakers, and reading the newspaper. I don't realize how tiresome it all gets, this academic, optimistic, but generally worthless tone all college discussions take. So there was a liberal kid or two in Stossel's audience (not including me the fly-on-the-wall journalist), and one of them asked during question and answer how America came to have a 40-hour work week. I think he was getting at labor issues that are big around here this time of year, but Stossel started talking about how Americans have the freedom to choose the length of their work weeks... which could lead me (and led him) into a long discussion of money and the economy. But I guess my point is that it's what i've chosen, this 80-hour work week, and regardless of whether i'm making the economy healthier by my decision to work, it generally occupies me -- makes me happy.

I think, however, that my year on the newspaper staff has taught me one thing that's not necessarily positive: to hate activists. Two years ago this time I went to a protest of the war in Iraq, a protest I now wouldn't touch with a ten-foot pole. The activists I deal with daily are, for the most part, fairly ignorant and not picky about what they're protesting. So we get this large group of people who lead every rally just for the sake of parading around campus and yelling and who love to spout facts that are almost true at best. And though I love the environment, it's these people who pitch stories to me every week that make me hate the concepts of sustainability, going green, climate neutral, and especially global warming. I haven't yet seen An Inconvenient Truth, but Stossel made a point I found very compelling: years ago, the catchphrase on everyone's tongue was global cooling -- what happened to that? We love to be scared , but mainly, if we can't predict the weather, how can we predict climate change? It's important to look at, important to take steps to curb the harm we're doing to our environment, but it really is a ridiculous fad that's receiving far too much publicity, from my paper included. He also seemed to think the Prius is a waste of time, but then again (as he said) he has the money to pay $10 per gallon for gas (as opposed to the rest of us -- and me, whose car is broken).

I can see it happening already. If I spend most of my life in journalism, i'm going to come out the other end much more cynical, still hating activists, and quite possibly believing in decreased regulation of government -- like the good conservative I... am?

Dulce locura

2007-04-26T02:58:00.000-05:00

I like to complain -- today especially I have really liked complaining about the fact that I didn't start my English midterm paper until the night before it was due, when I was already burnt out by an editing assignment I also completed for tomorrow. But I forget that I really like staying up late. My room gets this wonderful vibe late at night, i've got a soft yellow light wrapped around my shoulders, Spanish music on a little too loud, a candle burning, and the waves intermittently crashing outside during pauses in the music. I'm fairly interested in my topic, excited about how my intro turned out, and just awake enough to finish the other half of it tonight.

numb

2007-04-16T22:15:00.000-05:00

I feel paralyzed.

So paralyzed I can't motivate myself to eat my leftovers from lunch for dinner or indeed articulate the point I actually wanted to make with this post.

I am paralyzed firstly because my weekend visitor left and now I don't know what to do with myself. Sit on my stripped bed and procrastinate a writing assignment that's due tomorrow and an article to edit. I will get back into my routine, I guess. But after such a lovely break my day-to-day crazy doesn't sound at all appealing.

But tomorrow, once I have forgotten the wonders of the weekend and how nice it is to be around someone who cares, I will still be paralyzed. It's just this feeling i've been getting lately about my wide-open future. I have a mountain of interests, possibilities, prospects, experience, skills--thank you, college. But what i'd like to have is a path. A plan. A rule. Something that will tell me where to go and what to do and how to do it. I feel like if I don't do something different and exciting now (aka, work at Yellowstone) then I will never get to do it, because i'll be trapped in the professional world for all eternity. But I don't want to do something different and exciting now because i'm so tired of thinking about this fork that I just want to make my decision already and get started on my life in a city that is not located in Southern California.

Okay, so get a job. But I have been rejected so many times that whenever I tailor my cover letter, resume, and clips to fit yet another position, I am doubtful that I will ever actually hear anything. I think of my job application materials like the plague, yet I know there's nothing wrong with them. Okay, then find a city. In that department i'm having trouble with my priorities. Yes, a job will help me attain happiness and the financial ability to live in another city, but the friends that live in these places will ultimately decide how content I actually am. I can make friends, true. I will make friends, but how many of these important people in my life will I be able to live without? Move first, job later? But what if I choose wrong?

I am paralyzed.

I have two months.

think more?

2007-04-11T14:28:00.000-05:00

I've gotten into the awful, insincere habit of always saying "Good, how are you?" when someone asks me how I am. It's my automatic answer, and it's so hurried that no one could really believe i'm paying attention when I say it, but I say it anyway.

So someone at work, one of my bosses' bosses--part of the design team, he was wearing a vertically striped button-down shirt in lime green, pink, and blue when I first met him--stuck his head over my cubicle wall and said "Hi, how are you?" And because I had just gotten to work--late--and because I had just sat down at my computer and was trying to take the advice of my calming tea, I answered "Good, how are you?" And he said cheerily, "Simply great." And though he asked me a couple of other questions after that, I was so taken aback by his clean and confident answer that I just stumbled through the rest of the conversation, convinced that I should change my rule. Or think more.

Thomas Gray: Ode on a Distant Prospect of Eton College

2007-03-22T00:47:00.000-05:00

[...]

Alas, regardless of their doom,
The little victims play!
No sense have they of ills to come,
Nor care beyond today:
Yet see how all around 'em wait
The ministers of human fate,
And black Misfortune's baleful train!
Ah, show them where in ambush stand
To seize their prey the murderous band!
Ah, tell them they are men!

These shall the fury Passions tear,
The vultures of the mind
Disdainful Anger, pallid Fear,
And Shame that skulks behind;
Or pining Love shall waste their youth,
Or Jealousy with rankling tooth,
That inly gnaws the secret heart,
And Envy wan, and faded Care,
Grim-visaged comfortless Despair,
And Sorrow's piercing dart.

Ambition this shall tempt to rise,
Then whirl the wretch from high,
To bitter Scorn a sacrifice,
And grinning Infamy.
The stings of Falsehood those shall try,
And hard Unkindness' altered eye,
That mocks the tear if forced to flow;
And keen Remorse with blood defiled,
And moody Madness laughing wild
Amid severest woe.

Lo, in the vale of years beneath
A grisly troop are seen,
The painful family of Death,
More hideous than their Queen:
This racks the joints, this fires the veins,
That every labouring sinew strains,
Those in the deeper vitals rage:
Lo, Poverty, to fill the band,
That numbs the soul with icy hand,
And slow-consuming Age.

To each his sufferings: all are men,
Condemned alike to groan,
The tender for another's pain;
The unfeeling for his own.
Yet ah! why should they know their fate?
Since sorrow never comes too late,
And happiness too swiftly flies.
Thought would destroy their paradise.
No more; where ignorance is bliss,
'Tis folly to be wise.

what if this were (still) the widespread opinion:

2007-03-19T02:02:00.000-05:00

"Nature, then, having placed the stronger mind where she gave the stronger body, and accompanied it with a more enterprising ambitious spirit, the custom that consigns to the male sex the chief command in society, and all the offices which require the greatest strength and ability, has a better foundation than force, or the prejudices that result from it. The hard, laborious, stern, and coarse duties of the warrior, lawyer, legislator, or physician, require all tender emotions to be frequently repressed. The firmest texture of nerve is required to stand the severity of mental labour, and the greatest abilites are wanted where the duties of society are most difficult. It would be as little in agreement with the nature of things to see the exclusive possession of these taken from the abler sex, to be divided with the weaker, as it is, in the savage condition, to behold severe bodily toil inflicted on the feeble frame of the woman, and the softness of feeling, which nature has provided her with for the tenderest of her offices, that of nurturing the young, outraged by contempt, menaces, and blows."

Catherine Napier, Women's Rights and Duties, 1838.

less adventurous

2007-03-19T01:42:00.000-05:00

I made Spanish food today. A big, brilliant, acidic pot of gazpacho and two gooey, oily, delicious Spanish tortillas. My roommates wondered where the corn and flour were... and I wondered where the taste was. The taste of Spain. I concede that it was a valiant effort. The gazpacho was thick enough and the tortillas stayed together (thanks to my good friend, Cooks magazine). But it just didn't taste the same. The tomatoes are grown in different ground and the eggs are laid out of different chickens... or gallinas, I suppose, in Spain. I try to remedy the problem by using Spanish recipes, hoping that taste will just come by virtue of the fact that i'm reading in Spanish, words that were delivered with Spanish intention. But these recipes tend to be overly vague and strange to my American eyes. And if I went by memory, my señora's verbal instructions, I would put a cup of oil in to a frying pan and not know where to go from there. So instead of trying, I shy away from Spanish cooking and eating all of the exotic previously living things I ate in Spain because the air is different here in Santa Barbara, and for some reason, nothing tastes the same.

cloud cover

2007-03-15T19:36:00.000-05:00

I ventured out of my bubble of a world today, and as soon as I got on the freeway headed away from campus, the clouds broke and it was sunny.

Funny because it's been overcast and cold for the past two days, which has encouraged all of the weekend beach bums to change into a pair of sweats and uggs and study for their finals instead of going to the beach. Turns out the change in weather from March to summer was a trick.

Well, it's sunny somewhere, right? Just like it's 5:00 somewhere at all times, it's always sunny somewhere. So the next time I get depressed and feel inactive as a result of the weather, i'm going to leave I.V. and it'll probably be sunny.

I tend to think there's a dark cloud covering I.V. for a reason, being the "den of debauchery" that it is (that is such a Nexus phrase). However, since I went to interview the Dean of Students a few weeks ago, i've been trying my hardest to love I.V. She loves I.V. in such a beautiful and articulate way, and while I tend to get annoyed by the parking problems and the idiot youth walking around in the middle of the street, she sees it as all part of the charm. The unique world that is this little town with skinny streets where the average age is 21 and the daily occupation of most is the beach.

I suppose when I sit here with my curtains closed listening to the waves, I can't help but love it here. And when i'm in my more amused moods I can't help but smirk at the shenanigans... the car that was blocking in our parking spaces all night, the raccoons who eat the trash in the middle of the night, the cats that get in fights in the construction site next door, the homeless people, the people that dig through the trash for cans, the number of people wearing flip-flops and bathing suit tops. And the guys who hit golf balls off their roofs. Only in I.V.

nice to meet you

2007-03-14T03:11:00.000-05:00

The word for the day is pleasantry.

And i've always wondered: if humans know so well the game of pleasantries, why must we all continue to play it? The handshakes, nice-to-meet-yous, smiles, pleases, and thank-yous: wouldn't it be quicker and much less fake if we all were to go by a new game of just relax?

I'm not rude. I sometimes forget to express my pleasure at having met someone I will never see again, and I sometimes forget to thank the waiter that refills my water, but I have a good handshake, a quick smile, and a habit of saying sorry. I have been socialized well to dress up when I have interviews, sit up straight (in order to not untuck my ironed white button-down shirt), and not crack my knuckles or bite my nails. And it generally works. My charm is not infallible, but I have found for myself a good number of jobs, internships, and interviews for articles (not to mention gotten myself out of a few sticky situations) by playing several of my best pleasantry cards.

In fact, most of my everyday interactions with people would probably change only slightly as a result of me one day dropping all my remaining pleasantry cards in the lagoon. Perhaps I am, again, well-socialized in this respect, but I don't mind being nice to people. I do mind putting on a mask, a highly uncomfortable skirt, button-down shirt, and heels to go impress people I don't know. In interviews (and indeed in most conversations) we spend so much time on pleasantries and skirting around the issues that we don't ever get to the meat, the point. Much like my last English paper. Much like any encounter with a boy at a party or downtown. The real purpose to most interactions are glossed and glazed over so many times they look and sound nothing like they were intended by the end, and no one really gets any answers or makes any connections.

I met all these people today with a handshake and a smile, feeling highly over-dressed, and they all stared at my resume with a pencil in hand, asking me things they already knew the answers to. I don't know why it annoyed me so much, but when I walked out of the last interview I took my heels off, untucked my shirt, unzipped my skirt, and sang along to music at the top of my lungs. This is America. Now Spaniards are no strangers to maintaining a steady appearance in dress and demeanor, a fascade, a front, a mask, but they don't go for pleasantries. There is no please and thank you, there is only give me. And the "nice to meet you" is only a word: "encantado" or "placer" -- quick and to the point. The point is that things would be much easier if only I could say what i'm thinking instead of taking that, discarding it, chastizing myself for thinking it, and twisting the vague concept all around into a form hardly recognizable or meaningful, but into something that is acceptable to say in public.

maybe you noticed

2006-11-16T03:46:00.000-06:00

I haven't been moved to post for several months now. No reason really, except living the comfortable routine of my Santa Barbara life doesn't move me to spend as much time thinking as Spain. Rather, thinking about important things... I spend a lot of time thinking about things no one wants to hear about: the newspaper, boys, and school, in that order.

I had an English teacher in high school. A teacher I never admitted I liked because the kids used to make fun of her, the teacher that really, more than my mom and anyone else, pushed me into journalism. For that alone, I owe her my happiness. I wasn't critical of her because I always saw a little bit of myself in her... the way she got excited about little things, the way she would try to incorporate inspirational quotes or videos into class, the way she wasn't the most popular teacher but she tried really hard. Now, as I pencil in my post-college career plans, I am becoming more and more interested in a similar path to hers. She was a reporter for awhile before she got her teaching credentials and became a journalism advisor. A brilliant way to try out the daily newspaper world for awhile but getting out before it becomes too fast and stressful.

Now, she's a mess. Or recovering from being a mess, but nonetheless not the lady I once knew. Life can take unfortunate turns.

HoLa

2006-09-13T15:12:00.000-05:00

This has been a summer of reunions. Reunions with friends, relatives, people I worked with, most of them physically absent from my life for at least six months. When I imagine these reunions I imagine fireworks and music, wide smiles and double-takes. For the most part, the reentrance of these important people into my life has been very anticlimactic. Like we saw each other yesterday. No readjustment period or awkwardness like with long-lost cousins, just the mandatory "How was Spain?" before starting to make new memories.

My first reunion was with my family at the international terminal of the LAX airport. I was two hours late strolling into the terminal and I had to use a pay phone to locate my family, who had long before moved to the seats to wait with their "Welcome Home" posters and balloons. After my hellish journey home and my delusion from lack of sleep and food, that was my only reunion that wasn't anticlimactic -- it was in fact wonderful because my sisters looked older and taller and no one asked me how Spain was.

Yesterday I ran into two people I haven't seen in over a year. One was outside the grocery store, and we exhanged plesantries while I grinned crazily and marvelled in my head at the changes in both our lives. One passed me on the street and gave me a little wave and a "Hey" like we had kept in touch all along, even though we hadn't. When I caught up with my former roommie in Barcelona in April after nine months, she was sitting on a bench on the corner outside our hostel looking and acting astonishingly the same (and not pregnant). We spent the following five days ripping through the sights in Barcelona, dancing, and talking like "old friends," which I guess we are by now. A good friend showed up on my doorstep in the middle of the night my first day back to Santa Barbara and proceeded to pass out on our couch. Another one was sleeping on the couch when I stumbled home late and when I was getting ready for work the next morning; she asked me "Hi, how are you?" as I ate my breakfast.

Now a senior in college, I suppose my peers and I are now well-versed in the art of saying hellos and goodbyes. If I see someone I haven't seen since Greek Myth lecture freshman year, high school, or even elementary school, I smile, say hello and make small talk. Or shake my hair in front of my face, hold my sunglasses and hide. There are still a few important people I haven't yet seen, at least one of which deserves fireworks and music but will probably recieve just a long hug and the biggest smile I can muster. Goodbyes back in December struck me as slightly silly, because there were just as many hellos waiting somewhere down the road. Hellos, unlike goodbyes, are long-awaited but not immediately fulfilled. The first hello may be anticlimactic, but the second and third and forth are that much sweeter, because even though not much changes, six months or more is really a long time to go without seeing someone who remains still a friend.

half what

2006-09-09T10:46:00.000-05:00

http://halfwhat.blogspot.com

I'm also a member of this blog, and we just moved. So update your bookmarks.

poker face

2006-09-05T12:33:00.000-05:00

Someone on the bus today was playing one of those video poker games with the beeping for the whole twenty minutes it took to get downtown. Whenever I turned around it wasn't readily apparent who it was, so it just kept going and going and going until I thought I would be forced to jump out the window in order to get away from it.

Maybe it was the free McDonald's gourmet coffee this morning, but my attention span is five minutes long this morning and i'm thinking it's the unprovoked agitation I was subjected to on the bus.

lessons

2006-08-28T14:22:00.001-05:00

"What would you attempt to do if you knew you could not fail?"

Business newspaper intern reporting is such that I get assigned a lot of the more cut-and-dry business or people profile stories that require a few interviews and no investigation. I prefer some spice in my life, successfully investigating the more shaky, "watchdog"-type stories without making anyone mad... but I don't get gifts for doing those. Businesses, especially new businesses, really like when newspapers write advocacy articles about them. And today I recieved my first gift for doing one of those. A paperweight with that quotation. I guess there's something to be said for making someone's day with an article, rather than ruining it.

if I were a psych/soc major...

2006-08-22T16:27:00.000-05:00

I've been reading Craig's List personals lately, mostly because everyone in the office seems to find them so interesting, and partly because a friend suggested I do. Today I decided to do a men and women comparison. The men seeking women seem to either include a long list about the man and a short list about what he's looking for (beautiful, confident, young, smart, funny...), or something defiant and different that seeks to introduce the guy without actually saying anything about him. The women seeking men are the opposite, as most are ridiculously long lists of characteristics of the "perfect man" created by women who have dated before and want a long-term relationship or a marriage now.

In that respect, it would seem that it's up to the woman to look and pick because the men seem fairly non-picky in just describing themselves. There are also far less personals written by woman than by men, meaning the men expect the women to pick but they're not doing a good job at it. It's a wonder, really, that anyone gets together.

Paso Monica

2006-08-21T13:41:00.000-05:00

In my six years of writing articles and editing newspapers, I do not recall having made a glaring factual mistake. I'm sure i've made plenty that I wasn't called on, a couple I was called on that i'm not remembering, and some that were caught before the story went to print; neither reporters nor editors are perfect. My sophomore year in high school I recieved a letter after my very first article was published in the baby beginning journalism paper, a letter that the teacher pretended was bad but was actually good, thanking me for a good job my article.

This morning when I walked into work I was told that I shouldn't go to Santa Maria because i'll be lynched... apparently in my recent article I wrote Santa Monica instead of Santa Maria and Robles instead of Paso Robles. A stupid mistake that no one in the newsroom, including me, caught. Obviously not an oversight in my questioning, but a blaring typo that, in hindsight, seems absolutely impossible. However it got there, whether it was a brain freeze or prompted by alien influence, that's what it read. Granted, in six years I probably won't remember this mistake either, because the involved parties didn't storm the office or wake me up in the middle of the night screaming in my ear, but nevertheless. It's something to think about while I write and edit.

not-so-miserable monday

2006-08-07T17:00:00.000-05:00

It's really amazing what an extra half-hour of sleep can do on a hopeless Monday morning. I couldn't sleep last night, tossing and turning and reading for hours, worrying my current or future job would impossibly turn into The Devil Wears Prada and all my dreams would become nightmares. Instead of dragging myself out of bed this morning after the third push of the snooze, I felt I deserved to sleep for another half-hour and went into work 25 minutes later than normal. I found three long and informative voice mails on my machine, several long and informative e-mails in my inbox, and enough writing to keep me occupied the whole day. Now, high afternoon nap time again, i'm wide awake and engaged.

tea break

2006-08-02T13:31:00.000-05:00

It's about time that I felt awake and alive this morning, considering it's already 11:30 and i've been awake for four hours and alive for 20 years, 18 months, 11 days. I'm drinking Pomegranate White Tea and the quiet caffeine is entering my body through my stomach and going first for my droopy eyes. Then it's heading down to conquer my flaccid cheeks and my relaxed mouth, my noodle fingers and my lazy brain. It doesn't take much brain or typing power to come up with intern busy work briefs, but it does take a little to keep myself interested and sounding intelligent.

The addicts I talk to (mostly cigarette after my six months in nicotine-infested Europe) say they're more addicted to the routine and the atmosphere that creates the desire to smoke than the actual chemicals. Like sitting around after dinner and having a smoke and a good conversation, like sipping coffee, reading a newspaper, and dragging off a cigarette. For me, I like my caffeinated tea around this time when i'm sitting at my computer at the intern desk in 72-degree air-conditioned air, freezing my butt off and wondering when i'll be hungry enough to take my lunch break.