Connections

(I’m endeavoring to write down the thoughts I have as I have them, because waiting drys them out. Forgetting is death.)

Jules and I spoke on feminism, as we some times do. She shared an idea with me that has stuck with me like paste residue on a book cover. The thought goes something like, “The far right and the far left share a great many core concepts, but their reasons and goals are what make them different and even opposed. An example: Home-/un-schooling as a way to shelter your child versus home/-un-schooling as a way of freeing and broadening your child.”

I’ve come across, internally, another example. The character Jesus the Annointed, in the Christian Bible, tells his apostles to not lust after another person, specifically another woman, because to think an impure thought is to have already commited the sin. Modern Christians that I’ve interacted with and been taught by suggest a great many ways to keep ones thoughts from straying. I myself learn many techniques, one in particular sticking with me: the Eye Bounce. When seeing an attractive woman, don’t let your eyes linger, because that begets bad thoughts. Instead, learn to “bounce” your eyes off her, getting them looking at something else. I can still do this without effort or aknowledgement.

One of the reasons I quit religion, and Christianity in particular, is the oppressive focus on guilt and thoughtcrime. In my early teen years, as my sexuality became a focus instead of just “good feelings”, and I began watching/reading/viewing porn, I dealt with a lot of guilt and shame. Especially as I learned to masturbate, and learned to hide my interest in kink and alt-lifestyles. That took me years to fully get over. I had trouble with it until after I finally moved out, in fact.

I say all that to make the point that for me, not feeling guilty about my body, about sexuality, about lusting, about all of it, was and still is a victory for me. I broke away and found a better life that accepts and supports, not condemning and guilting.

In the last two years, I’ve learned a lot about feminism and equality and the principles behind QUILTBAG and able-ism and size-ism and every (obvs not actually) version of prejudice. I’ve learned some about rape culture and systemic sexism and patriarchal gender roles. I’ve also learned some about sexual objectivication (specifically of women), and its harmful role in suppressing marginalized views.

One idea is that men should not objectify women, period. By participating, even internally, we perpetuate a culture of debasing and dehumanizing women. So what that means for a man is to, you guessed it, Eye Bounce! We have now come full circle.

I am back to feeling guilty about finding a woman I’ve never seen before attractive because as long as I continue to do so, I make it easier to allow worse offenses in society around me. Same as making rape jokes, while not explicitly endorsing rape as an act, implicitly allows rapists to be let off with only three months or voting for politicians who make rape victims pay for their own rape kits.

So what do I do? What the fuck do I do? How can I find my own happiness?

The problems in our culture make me want to die. How does one look at this and see an end? I am generally optimistic about humanities future, but the American Right has me feeling more and more hopeless. It never ends.

Now I’m rambling, and wasting your time, dear readers.

Abstracting Sympathy

I get off work, leaving my bag at the office, and walk down to Union Station to take the 33 out to Best Buy. I miss the first bus I see, and decide to renew my bus pass while I wait. As I’m crossing the street, I see a woman standing opposite me, waiting for her own ride, on a different line. Unlike most, she catches my eye. Allow me to paint a picture:

She is standing in 2.5″ heels, light leather brown, the kind that aren’t a point but a solid high-backed shoe. She’s wearing a skirt, or maybe a dress, white, with robin’s egg blue flowers print. It terminates a little above the knee, leaving her legs bare. She has her right hand on her lime green messenger bag, which drapes from one shoulder across her front right hip. The bag lays against a hot pink, short windbreaker, which is unclasped, showing an open ranger green cardigan and a ruffled white blouse underneath. A heart-shaped locket on a silver chain hangs from her neck. Her left hand holds an iPhone 3 in a molted green case against her tilted head, which is completely hairless. Light gray lines, thick to thin, have been applied to her eyebrows. She’s wearing mohagany lipstick, which matches the mohagany Elvis Costello-frames of her glasses. Her bald head is covered by a scarf in the same print as her skirt, white with baby blue floral designs. She is laughing into her phone as I pass, but I don’t catch her voice. She is white.

As I walk away from her, I’m overcome with feelings of sympathy, tension, attraction, warmth, and a striking need to say something to her, the same way I have and will again compliment someone on a t-shirt splashed with an image representing a musical group or television show or any other sub-specific interest I enjoy. A couple quick conversational ideas enter into my head. “We don’t know or mean anything to each other, but I think you are really brave.” “It’s awesome that you’re ” You’re what? What can I say to someone who (potentially (I don’t even know for certain she has (or had) cancer. How arrogant of me)) has experienced something so profound, so outside of what I, a cis white middle-class easy-life male, has experienced.

But as I’m walking through the Mercantile Center, the feeling, the urge to connect with her in any way, to commune, to impact and be impacted, stays with me. I buy Aprils pass, I buy a muffin from the coffee shop next door, because I forgot to eat lunch, and I head back towards the doors near the bus stops. She is still waiting, still on her phone, still laughing.

These abstract emotional desires are real, the same way a computer manipulating electricity to display words on a screen such as the one I am using right now is real, but are the urges more than their empty trading of chemical charges? Hard to say.
The base elements that make up my body flow and fire, leaving a reaction to these outside stimuli (structured by memetic logic and reinforcement) that society (itself a memetic construction of a highly abstract nature) labels a “Decision.” I reach a No as I recross the street.

I keep her laughing form in my periphery until her bus arrives, she boards, and disappears from view.

I’m not religious anymore. I would describe myself as a fierce atheist, and I believe heavily in the ideas of humanism, transhumanism, and socialism. But sometimes, a prayer is the only way to describe a rush of goodwill one has for another, which is quite annoying. I’ve discussed this problem with Julie, and she says that regardless of what one calls it, the intentions are good enough that the term used doesn’t matter. I don’t necessarily agree, because I believe that words, while not innately containing any meaning or power, can be associated cuturally in ways that make them representations of social patterns that influence others, especially in ways I personally find positive or negative, negative in this case.

But I do imagine a life of happiness for her. Just for a moment.

I hope that’s enough.

p.s. This post has been written entirely on my phone over the five hours, four bus rides, and three store stops I’ve made since seeing her enter her bus. I’ve stopped multiple times, so that hopefully will explain any disjointed contained within. My apologies to you who read this.

tl;dr: Fuckin’ memes, how do they work?

Batch 1 – Reviews Errday

Wednesday, February 23: Wake up late, hit up work. Through Twitter, Ashley and I chat, make plans. Amanda’s glad for me, which is nice. She’s having fun with people, why not meeeeee? I get out late, cuz Abera’s replacement at his first job is late, chaining everything. Hop in the shower at home, change quickly, get back into the car, and drive up to Currito.

Ashley is fucking awesome. I had forgotten, but really, people. Come on. She’s fucking awesome, always. She’s getting married, in May. Fucking awesome. I’m so happy for her. We chat about life, for both of us, her plans, my plans. Catch up, of course, but it’s always easy with her. Every sentence, I’m filled with a feeling of intense warmth and care for her. I miss working with her at Starbucks.

We part with love, and I head home. The rest of the day isn’t worth talking about.

Thursday 24: Wake up late, run/drive to work, chat with the construction gys working next door, eat a hotdog from the local and adorable hotdog vendor, Uncle Mike. Get home to a mess, become pissed off while watching the Wire, so I clean the desk, try setting up a second monitor. That doesn’t go too well, cuz I find out I need a special adapter. Purchased! for $2.93, and it’ll be here free shipping in three days. Holy fuck, the internet is awesome. Some excellent lines in the Wire. Like this back and forth:

McNulty: We’re good at this, Lester. In this town, we’re as good as it gets.
Freamon: Natural police.
McNulty: Fuck yes, natural police.
Freamon: Tell me something Jimmy, how exactly do you think it all ends?
McNulty: What do you mean?
Freamon: A parade? A gold watch? A shining Jimmy-McNulty-day moment, when you bring in a case so sweet that everyone gets together and says: “Oh shit, he was right all along. We should’a listened to the man”. Freamon: The job will not save you, Jimmy. It won’t make you whole, it won’t fill your ass up.
McNulty: I dont know, a good case-
Freamon: Ends. They all end. The handcuffs go click and it’s over, and the next morning it’s just you in the room with yourself.
McNulty: Until the next case.
Freamon: Boy, you need something outside of this here.
McNulty: Like what? Dollhouse miniatures?
Freamon: Hey, hey, hey. A life. A life, Jimmy. You know what that is? It’s the shit that happens while you’re waiting for moments that never come.

Friday, Feb 25: My notes say, “Work”, so I’m gonna assume I worked in the morning, then I worked at night. Oh fuck, yeah. Amanda tells me about her adventures at the bar. (The time difference means she calls me when she gets home at 3:45, and I’m only just thinking about bed, at 10:45.) She went out with her friends, to the pub, and being off in a new country, she decides to go adventurous! Two shots of Jager and the British equivalent of an apple-tini later, and she’s feeling a litle drunk. It’s actually fucking adorable. She calls me up, giggling her head off, unable to contain herself. Words don’t describe how cute it is.

I love her so goddamn much. I’m reminded by this story, but wow.

Saturday, February 26: Hang out, redditing and Eve-ing all day, till I work at 9:30. I get there at 9 pm, ready to work my face off, and they all look at me like I’m crazy. “Why are you here?” What do you mean? “You work in 30.” Oh. Duh. But I’m with cool cool people, so fuck it. I love them all. The night sucks, of course, and I have to close, so a bunch of hours later, I get out at 5:30. Rough rough rough.

Sunday, February 27: “wake up at” What does that even mean? Who knows. Alls I know, I woke up, did some shit, then went back to sleep.

Monday: Work in the morning, work in the afternoon/evening. Boring day. The days like this, they’re draining.

Tuesday, March 1: Fuck yes, March. At work, I remember I need to buy my bus pass, but for reasons I don’t remember, I don’t, today. At home, I find I’ve received in the mail the adapter needed for the second monitor. Having set that up, I try out Eve, and find it is glorious. Left monitor, glorious EVE full screen. Right monitor, so many windows: Firefox, iTunes, Teamspeak 3, Jabber, Evemon Skill planner, Eve Fitting Tool. I feel glorious by this configuration. So badass.

Wednesday: Doug calls me around noon, and I take the shift. After work, I remember I want to get my bus pass, so I call him back, asking to work at 6, not 5. He’s cool. I walk downtown to the Go Metro/SORTA business front, and buy my pass. I feel like a motherfucking champ as I walk out. I love public transportation. Feeling on top of the world, I wander over to the downtown Starbucks, using most of the gift card Mom gave us kids for V-day. I start walking back to the car, and decide to enter the library branch down here. Cool place, though a lot emptier than I expected, fro the size of the building. I wander around, pick up a China Meiville book I haven’t read yet, and leave, feeling good. Back to the car, home for changing, off to Tops for an easy night. Dougs in a good mood, as is everyone else. Quick work. I accidentally stay up till 12:15. Not the best idea.

Thursday: I meant to take the bus this morning, but waking up too late, means I gotta drive the car. Annoying. When I get home, I nap until 7:45. At work, over reddit and through twitter, I’d chatted up another redditor, who’s also going to Bokfest, a German-drinking-thing this weekend. We chat and drink coffee over at Sitwells. Goes well. He’s a cool guy. Redditor, gamer, etc. Glad to know more of us in the area, though! Beyond Good And Evil, the classic gamecube game, has been released for the XBOX Arcade, so I pick that shit up. I play an hour of it, and know it’s going to be fucking awesome. I think Amanda would like it, though she might not like the “combat” parts, she’d love the camera aspect, and all of the dialog. Also, fuck yeah strong female protagonists. Let’s hope this one isn’t raped…

Friday, the fourth: I wake up bright and early at 6, which is awesome. Reddit until it’s time to head out, but see my bus pass before I can get to the stop, so ONCE AGAIN, I take the car, vowing this to be the last time. Fuck. With all this extra time, however, I stop over at the Starbucks next to Tops, and pick up a cream cheese danish and a coffee. Delish. At work, Uncle Mike isn’t around, cuz it’s Friday, but Rob sends me over to Coffee Emporioum to pick us both up coffee, which turns into my lunch.

On reddit, I read about mint.com, so of course I sign up for that shit in a second. The Android app is sexy as well, so after fucking with it for about an hour, I’ve got most parts figured out, though I need to organize my transaction names at home. Dad and I chat about the Wire. He’s nearing the end of Season 2, and loving it. I try very hard to not give anything away, cuz some shit goes down in the last seconds of that show. We break with talks of plans. Amanda calls, and I tell her about my plans. She’s happy for me. I love her. I don’t spend enough time telling you all AT GREAT LENGTH about her. I should, one of these days. See if I can parse an essence of her, into a series of disfigured electrical signals trapped between pieces of metal, constantly being made to do backflips forever. One of these days, I think.

I call Jason Nix up, after work, and he says he’ll pick me up for Bockfest tonight. We get down there wit his buddies, and drink a bit. I end up spending my time with Nix and his bandmate, whose name I’ve forgotten but who is fucking awesome. Just, a super cool, nice dude. I really dig him. We chat and drink and chat and drink until about 10:45, when they decide they want to hit up the main event down the street. As we walk over, I realize I’m done, so I break off, looking to catch the bus. Through some misjudgements on my part, and a bit of bad luck, I end up in between two stops as the first bus passes me, and then having to run my ass off back to a previous stop in time to catch the second, half way up the Clifton Ave hill. Thankfully, I find sleep easy when I get home.

Saturday: Holy fuck do I feel like shiiiiiiiiiiiiiit. Hungover a bit, yeah, but also I wake up at 8:15 from the cat. Gross. I spend all day at home, doing whatever, probably eve and reddit, but not really feeling well. Work at 10, till close. The night sucks, full of shitty customers and annoying pizzas, but clean up goes pretty fast. As we’re working, towards the end, Jill and Katie start talking about drinking after work, so I jump into the conversations, and invite them over. When we get out, we hit up the local stop-n-go, I buy a six pack of Moerlein OTR, and we sit on my couch, drinking and listening to Earth and bullshitting about work. These people are really cool. I’m glad I work with them. I’m glad I know them.

(I’m slowly realizing how much like Grandpa Charles I am. Deep down, I’m really sentimental, and I really fucking care for people. Deeply. I mean, I’ve known these two women for 5 months, and we’ve never hung out outside of work, but this one time is enough to cement feelings of care for them. I don’t know. It’s weird. I have an urge to see them succeed in life, if that’s the right description. To be happy. Like the Raffi song, “The more we get together, the happier we’ll be. Cuz your friends are my friends, and my friends are your friends. The more we get together, the happier we’ll be.” Fuckfuckfuckfuck. Magnolia: “My name is Donny Smith, and I have a lot of love to give.”)

I get to bed at 830, cuz Amanda calls me the women leave. She’s off to have an adventure, wonderful love of mine. She feels bad to keep me up, but I demand conversation. I don’t even remember what we talked about, but I was so tired and a little tipsy that all I remember is the warm conversational glow.

Sunday 6: I wake up at 130, a little out of it. Hungry and lazy and feeling the wanderlust, I take the bus up to the Calhoun strip, and eat some potbellies. Delish sandwiches. Amanda calls as I leave, and we chat as I take the bus home. What’s funny about all of these conversations: I don’t ever really remember what’s said, but I know what was said was mildly important when it was spoken, and I cared enough when it was happening. Just weird, to think about. Endless mimetic referencing and reinforcement. I get home, play Eve, and go to bed.

A feeling…

A feeling, as if the temperature had suddenly dropped, signalling an over-the-horizon storm, but full of sunlight and Spring wanderlust.

I don’t know. Times are, when I feel them, changing, each one different than the last.

But I’ve work, and I’m late and naked, so.

Amanda, I love you. We can fix every problem.

Day 29

Feb 22: Maybe the boringest day yet. Woke up just in time to drive to work, reddit all day instead of Howards End, get home in time to change and go to work at Toppers, make pizzas until I leave at 10, get home in time to go to bed. Blah. Fuck everything.

Day 28 – A Review

February 21: Amanda calls me in the morning, before work. We talk, and I tell her about yesterday and my potential half day in front of me. She is very excited for me. Yesterday on the phone, Robb’d said I could come in at 6 or at 7:30, so I roll into work at 7:30, feeling good. BJ is already spraying down the lot, and I get to work cleaning all the glass and fixtures. Two hours later, I go home.

Amanda and I talk again, before I put on more Season Two of The Wire. So very good. Then it’s Reddit and Eve until I go to sleep at 12:30. Every day, people. Every goddamn day is the same. I don’t notice when I’m experiencing them, but on looking back, the bile rises.

Day 27 – A Review

February 20th, 2011: 4.5 hours of sleep later, I wake up to my alarm. The clock says 10am, and I feel like shit. I lay back down for a moment to catch my breath, and my phone goes off. Mom says she’s just leaving church now, so she’ll be by to pick me up in a minute. I tell her I need to shower first, so we hang up and I hop in the water. Everything feels far away.

15 minutes later, I dry off and clothe myself quickly right as she calls me again. She’s outside, so I check the cats food and water, and exit the house. Hop in the car, and we chat as we drive north. At the house, meet up with Liam and Caitrin, and rebundle into the car. The drive is pretty wonderful. I love all of them, and the younger two aren’t too loud yet. Mom points out how far a marathon is (she’s training for one); we all are amazed. The drive goes quickly by, and we’re soon in Columbus. Jo and Jacob quickly pile into the car, which quadruples the volume of every conversation, and we decide on an Italian pasta bistro.

Because Mom traded the old van for a snazzy new Camry, four of us have to sit in the back. It’s very crowded, and very silly. We make it to the shop, and all tumble out of the car. Piada is super delicious, and eeryone seems to dig the food they got. Johannah tells us about how she and her friend once tried to bike here, accidentally on the hottest day of the summer. They became so out of breath and so overheated and so dehydrated, they had to walk their bikes to the local quick-mart for water and lay on the grass until they felt better enough to walk their bikes all the way back. Pretty silly.

After the food is finished, we drive out to the local “mall”, and wander around Target for a moment, looking for shoes and other things. I don’t find any, to Moms consternation. With our purchases, we walk over to the DSW Shoes, and once again, no shoes for me. Mom decides she’s done with me, without specifically saying it. I feel bad, but not really. Shoes are stupid. We wander next door to the Barnes and Noble, and each go our separate ways, checking out the books. Fun. I think about buying some books, but money’s tight, and I gotta save.

We stuff ourselves back into the car, and drive up to Kroger, where Mom helps stock the college kids pantries, then it’s off to their houses, and we head home. I end up sleeping for most of the drive. I wake up 5 miles from the exit, and share my love with the three of them before exiting the car and going into the house. It’s very late.

Sitting at my computer, I turn on the Wire, and check out reddit. Finally finding my balls, I apply to the Dreddit Eve corp. Two episodes later, I hit the sack, hoping I don’t have to work very long tomorrow, on President’s Day.