lonely musings

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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...

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

sleepwalk

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

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

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?

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

[...]

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.