Porque Serra que cada vez que vuelvo a México me dan aspiraciones de político. Y no de político como el de "revoluciondelintelecto" ni como el Nino verde o el Peje. Claro esta que todos son distintos pero a la vez, todos se pagan lo que quieran y trabajan poco y de manera ineficiente. Eso si, todos de camionetita blindadita y guarura.
Comencemos entonces con un comentario acerca del mitote que hizo el peje cuando se autodeclaro como presidente legitimo. Claro esta que su mitote en el zócalo con gente comprado, lonches y banderas amarillas fue una desgracia no solo para México sino también para el ejercicio cuasi democrático que ejercemos los mexicanos cada 6 anos. Pero detrás de su intransigencia encontré dos cosas importantes que podrían aplicarse a nuestro gobierno.
La primera: el sistema no funciona.
Cuando el cuerpo electoral es uno sin educación y que puede ser comprado por anuncios televisivos que prometen un futuro abstractamente mejor con expresiones populares y mangas arremangadas, el sistema no sirve. Cuando los funcionarios electos no tienen educación y de vez en vez se les ocurre hacer majaderías en el congreso, rentar jets para irse de viaje mientras su gente se muere de hambre o le falta luz o mandan a volar a su cuerpo electoral en frente de las cámaras de televisión, el sistema no sirve.
La segunda: falta trabajar fuera del sistema.
Esto no se refiere a la corrupción o las "mordidas". Esto esta dentro del sistema. Lo que pasa es que falta trabajar con funcionarios y mexicanos (que a veces no importan que no sean los mismos) que no estén moralmente corroídos por como funciona nuestro microcosmo - México. Lamentablemente son pocos y en peligro de extinción, salen a la naturaleza por la noche y procrean solo cada 25 anos. Lo que intento crear el peje fue un nuevo régimen. Un régimen basado en una verdad que solo el creía pero un nuevo régimen.
Falta que dejemos de pensar que el gobierno es solamente una de esas cosas que duran 6 anos a la vez. Que es algo que hace falta recrear y reconocer que a México le sobran falsas energías políticas.
O que, quien piensa que se puede arreglar este país cuando se reconstruye y reconstruye en un lustro mas uno.
Thursday, December 30, 2010
Monday, December 27, 2010
Felipe
Estimado Felipe:
Déjame empezar disculpándome por apersonarme tan pronto y comenzar el tuteo desde el principio. Pero ya vez que me parece que nos hemos tardado en presentarnos pero casi siento que te conozco. Te veo (más bien te veía) tanto en la tele los primeros dos años de tu gobierno y escuchaba mucho acerca del famoso soldadito de chocolate.
Soy un mexicano estudiando en el extranjero. Soy parte del llamado "brain drain" o brein drein como dirían mis paisanos recién llegados a Laredo o Los Ángeles. Pero la verdad es que no sabrían de que se trata el asunto lamentablemente. Simplemente, no hace dos meses, yo estaba tramitando mi pasaporte en un consulado en el Noreste. Era temprano y había hombres, mujeres y niños todos formaditos según nos decía la secretaria. Un joven tratando de tramitar su pasaporte casi se saca los pelos cuando la amable señorita de la ventanilla le pregunto dónde estaban sus padres. "Porque?" pregunto el joven. "Porque se necesita el permiso de los padres cuando se trata de un menor buscando pasaporte" dijo ella. "Pero yo tengo 18 años!"
"No, usted los cumple el 4 de enero. Si gusta vuelva entonces".
No sabía leer.
Pero esta carta abierta no se trata de eso, así que antes de que continúe divagando permítame.
En estados unidos se burlan muchos de los soldados de carrera en el ejercito. Son aquellos que no saben de donde son, que se piensa que fueron producidos por el gobierno para el servicio del gobierno. Hombres y mujeres dedicados a pelear por el ideal que se les ordene. Jarheads. Hombres de guerra. De pocos o muchos estudios, son aquellos que ansían que se acabe su periodo de servicio para poder enrolarse en el que sigue. Pelo corto, camisas siempre verdes de algodón y pantalones camuflajeados.
Eso es lo que nos falta en este país. Una tribu de gente así. Una tribu guerrera que crea solo en la voz de uno o dos generales de baja o alta inteligencia que piensen solo en beneficio de la madre patria. Creo que hace tiempo los padres de la revolución lo hubieran descrito como patriotismo. Pero seamos honestos Felipe (te puedo decir Feli?) el patriotismo se murió cuando los presidentes de la "ivy" league se la robaron y un ranchero se lo cambio al pueblo por un sentido del humor desabrido y una mujer come-hombres.
Te propongo lo siguiente. Escoge una ciudad pequeña, de entre 50 y 100 mil habitantes. Llamémosle población y bauticémosle MEXICANIDAD. Pero así, todo en mayúsculas. Para que la crean. Todos los habitantes de más de 16 años serán acomodados en otra ciudad. O se les construirá una ciudad gemela que funcione como ciudad hermana, separada de los jóvenes pero unidos por un puente atirantado que cueste 20 veces más de lo que en realidad valga. Entonces, con los jóvenes aislados del mundo, que entren las lavanderas. No precisamente de ropa pero si de mente. Gente altamente preparada y educada en historia de México, economía, guerra, y sicología. Todo con el objetivo de obtener un buen número de jóvenes que griten un grito de guerra (como en nuestro himno que cantamos el 16) cuando se diga México. Que no sea un grito que salga de la boca entre aliento alcohólico. Que sea un grito poderoso y serio que diga: Hago lo que le haga bien a México. Y ese bien es lo que me diga Felipe (o yo porque no) a través de los generales.
Y luego los soltamos en Michoacán.
Sinceramente,
H.C. DHD
Déjame empezar disculpándome por apersonarme tan pronto y comenzar el tuteo desde el principio. Pero ya vez que me parece que nos hemos tardado en presentarnos pero casi siento que te conozco. Te veo (más bien te veía) tanto en la tele los primeros dos años de tu gobierno y escuchaba mucho acerca del famoso soldadito de chocolate.
Soy un mexicano estudiando en el extranjero. Soy parte del llamado "brain drain" o brein drein como dirían mis paisanos recién llegados a Laredo o Los Ángeles. Pero la verdad es que no sabrían de que se trata el asunto lamentablemente. Simplemente, no hace dos meses, yo estaba tramitando mi pasaporte en un consulado en el Noreste. Era temprano y había hombres, mujeres y niños todos formaditos según nos decía la secretaria. Un joven tratando de tramitar su pasaporte casi se saca los pelos cuando la amable señorita de la ventanilla le pregunto dónde estaban sus padres. "Porque?" pregunto el joven. "Porque se necesita el permiso de los padres cuando se trata de un menor buscando pasaporte" dijo ella. "Pero yo tengo 18 años!"
"No, usted los cumple el 4 de enero. Si gusta vuelva entonces".
No sabía leer.
Pero esta carta abierta no se trata de eso, así que antes de que continúe divagando permítame.
En estados unidos se burlan muchos de los soldados de carrera en el ejercito. Son aquellos que no saben de donde son, que se piensa que fueron producidos por el gobierno para el servicio del gobierno. Hombres y mujeres dedicados a pelear por el ideal que se les ordene. Jarheads. Hombres de guerra. De pocos o muchos estudios, son aquellos que ansían que se acabe su periodo de servicio para poder enrolarse en el que sigue. Pelo corto, camisas siempre verdes de algodón y pantalones camuflajeados.
Eso es lo que nos falta en este país. Una tribu de gente así. Una tribu guerrera que crea solo en la voz de uno o dos generales de baja o alta inteligencia que piensen solo en beneficio de la madre patria. Creo que hace tiempo los padres de la revolución lo hubieran descrito como patriotismo. Pero seamos honestos Felipe (te puedo decir Feli?) el patriotismo se murió cuando los presidentes de la "ivy" league se la robaron y un ranchero se lo cambio al pueblo por un sentido del humor desabrido y una mujer come-hombres.
Te propongo lo siguiente. Escoge una ciudad pequeña, de entre 50 y 100 mil habitantes. Llamémosle población y bauticémosle MEXICANIDAD. Pero así, todo en mayúsculas. Para que la crean. Todos los habitantes de más de 16 años serán acomodados en otra ciudad. O se les construirá una ciudad gemela que funcione como ciudad hermana, separada de los jóvenes pero unidos por un puente atirantado que cueste 20 veces más de lo que en realidad valga. Entonces, con los jóvenes aislados del mundo, que entren las lavanderas. No precisamente de ropa pero si de mente. Gente altamente preparada y educada en historia de México, economía, guerra, y sicología. Todo con el objetivo de obtener un buen número de jóvenes que griten un grito de guerra (como en nuestro himno que cantamos el 16) cuando se diga México. Que no sea un grito que salga de la boca entre aliento alcohólico. Que sea un grito poderoso y serio que diga: Hago lo que le haga bien a México. Y ese bien es lo que me diga Felipe (o yo porque no) a través de los generales.
Y luego los soltamos en Michoacán.
Sinceramente,
H.C. DHD
Friday, December 24, 2010
Log, day 2
To start with a story: my aunt bought my grandmother a new kitchen. They asked me for help installing it and I obliged. On my way to the hardware store - I needed a couple of screws and a drill bit - I saw a pair of cops armed with AKs run into a store. The kind of store that sells home appliances. Then I saw them run out in my direction, looking over their shoulder, and yelling at the rest of their squadron to run.
I wasn't wearing my jogging shoes. But I bolted too. Two blocks and straight into the hardware store. They eventually got into their humvee and skidded off. There were no gunshots.
I bought my supplies and walked home.
Later in the day, walking home, I crossed through the town square. There was a mass going on in the middle of it and a crowd rocking the baby jesus. The father kept praying as the crowd moved the baby in sync to an orchestral ave maria. Army men dotted the town square and we all prayed as the manger's spotlight was occupied. Though normally this was something done at midnight, with a much bigger crowd, and candles and fireworks. Today we did it in the middle of the day. No fanfare. Just business as usual.
This is what it feels like to live in occupied territory.
It's funny, you really start worrying when the hotel owner stops you before going out in the morning. Though we're regulars at this hotel - a turn of the century house, remodeled to service the 20th century traveler, along with 5 inch thick board ups in the windows and bullet proof glass to prevent attacks - I wouldn't say we're VIPs. We were offered a security escort today.
So now, we've had our Christmas Eve lunch (not dinner).
And all the while I'm wondering why the government doesn't do something about it. How is it that this para-military, pseudogovernmental organization has all the cards. And by cards I mean bombs.
Felipe?
I wasn't wearing my jogging shoes. But I bolted too. Two blocks and straight into the hardware store. They eventually got into their humvee and skidded off. There were no gunshots.
I bought my supplies and walked home.
Later in the day, walking home, I crossed through the town square. There was a mass going on in the middle of it and a crowd rocking the baby jesus. The father kept praying as the crowd moved the baby in sync to an orchestral ave maria. Army men dotted the town square and we all prayed as the manger's spotlight was occupied. Though normally this was something done at midnight, with a much bigger crowd, and candles and fireworks. Today we did it in the middle of the day. No fanfare. Just business as usual.
This is what it feels like to live in occupied territory.
It's funny, you really start worrying when the hotel owner stops you before going out in the morning. Though we're regulars at this hotel - a turn of the century house, remodeled to service the 20th century traveler, along with 5 inch thick board ups in the windows and bullet proof glass to prevent attacks - I wouldn't say we're VIPs. We were offered a security escort today.
So now, we've had our Christmas Eve lunch (not dinner).
And all the while I'm wondering why the government doesn't do something about it. How is it that this para-military, pseudogovernmental organization has all the cards. And by cards I mean bombs.
Felipe?
Thursday, December 23, 2010
WaW
According to some it might just be the spanish way of saying wow. I know better. I also know that to any half l337 gamer out there WaW means world at war. And that's precisely the one I'm talking about.
I always wondered what it was like to live in a war torn country. How the people in North Korea, or Afghanistan or Iraq lived or live for years with grenades and bombs and shooting going on all around them. What's their new normal?
I'm at a small city in the heart of Zeta territory in Mexico and somehow I feel like a war correspondent. The Zetas were originally a black ops type team trained by the government and meant to take out the drug lords controlling the southwest of Mexico. These were highly skilled, intelligent individuals taught not only in the art of war but also in relating to the culture and the people. They were successful in taking down the drug lords. They then quickly put themselves in charge and became warlords. That is, warlords in the traditional Africa sense - people with small armies and deep ties to the people. Except they might be smarter, they collect taxes, lead public benefit projects, build roads and schools and recruit everyone, from the children to the grandparents.
That's where I am. A deeply catholic country with a pseudo government that refuses to negotiate with the actual government (though I'll admit, even to those actually keeping track, the lines are blurred). The Zetas, to their credit, have made it clear that they will not stand for injustice, and they will not stand for backtalk. They do not reason but state their demands and punish those who step out of line.
There's a curfew on the city. 9pm. It's not coming from the government. Or the government elect I should say.
The roads in and out of the city have military checkpoints. A couple of miles after them come the actual checkpoints. Zeta checkpoints.
Tonight I heard 4 gunshots and what I venture to guess was a grenade. I've been carrying a hammer with me for the sake of feeling safe. I'm sorry if the following story scares me. The city itself is occupied by federal police forces and army soldiers. At this point both bodies are armed with fully automatic weapons, humvees with gun turrets and bread trucks. All bulletproof. The highest ranking commander of the military forces, with full escort, was ambushed and outgunned. Shot. Chopped. Delivered to government offices with a note of warning.
Same place where 10 federal cops (the kind that wear jet black helmets, heavy duty kevlar and carry tear gas bombs by the dozen) were delivered in body bags to the local courthouse. Why? The Zetas - who know simply go by the Family, perhaps aspirationally to their Sicilian betters - attached a note. They love their notes. It read: these were corrupt cops. Let this be a warning to others. The Family does not kill the innocent. We are the righteous.
Great, another false god for my people.
This is where my grandparents live. And where we are now celebrating Christmas lunch not Christmas dinner.
Because we've been warned.
I always wondered what it was like to live in a war torn country. How the people in North Korea, or Afghanistan or Iraq lived or live for years with grenades and bombs and shooting going on all around them. What's their new normal?
I'm at a small city in the heart of Zeta territory in Mexico and somehow I feel like a war correspondent. The Zetas were originally a black ops type team trained by the government and meant to take out the drug lords controlling the southwest of Mexico. These were highly skilled, intelligent individuals taught not only in the art of war but also in relating to the culture and the people. They were successful in taking down the drug lords. They then quickly put themselves in charge and became warlords. That is, warlords in the traditional Africa sense - people with small armies and deep ties to the people. Except they might be smarter, they collect taxes, lead public benefit projects, build roads and schools and recruit everyone, from the children to the grandparents.
That's where I am. A deeply catholic country with a pseudo government that refuses to negotiate with the actual government (though I'll admit, even to those actually keeping track, the lines are blurred). The Zetas, to their credit, have made it clear that they will not stand for injustice, and they will not stand for backtalk. They do not reason but state their demands and punish those who step out of line.
There's a curfew on the city. 9pm. It's not coming from the government. Or the government elect I should say.
The roads in and out of the city have military checkpoints. A couple of miles after them come the actual checkpoints. Zeta checkpoints.
Tonight I heard 4 gunshots and what I venture to guess was a grenade. I've been carrying a hammer with me for the sake of feeling safe. I'm sorry if the following story scares me. The city itself is occupied by federal police forces and army soldiers. At this point both bodies are armed with fully automatic weapons, humvees with gun turrets and bread trucks. All bulletproof. The highest ranking commander of the military forces, with full escort, was ambushed and outgunned. Shot. Chopped. Delivered to government offices with a note of warning.
Same place where 10 federal cops (the kind that wear jet black helmets, heavy duty kevlar and carry tear gas bombs by the dozen) were delivered in body bags to the local courthouse. Why? The Zetas - who know simply go by the Family, perhaps aspirationally to their Sicilian betters - attached a note. They love their notes. It read: these were corrupt cops. Let this be a warning to others. The Family does not kill the innocent. We are the righteous.
Great, another false god for my people.
This is where my grandparents live. And where we are now celebrating Christmas lunch not Christmas dinner.
Because we've been warned.
Saturday, December 18, 2010
The purpose of teams
A better man than me once said to stop chasing the paper and live your life.
I go to a demanding school. The kind where the students are the ones filled with self-inflicted stress wounds and where friends are hard to come by, lest they mess up the curve. I stand looking back and I see freshmen worrying about getting jobs and seniors chilling despite or because of their job situation. How does that make sense?
The concern as educators should not be on whether the students solve a tricky test under time pressure as they worry not about how they did but how their peers did and wether they'll still be better than about half of them.
There's an obvious disconnect between effort and performance.
But we all know you need a 4.0 to get a job. And at least 4 assorted extracurriculars in which you are both a board member, a president and a ground soldier. It's all suits and ties and vault guides all over the place before we stop them and ask them why they're doing all this for?
Of course I'm not talking about the kids born and raised with a deeply rooted desire to be a banker or a consultant. What 4 year old hasn't heard of Porter's 5 forces? Or 5 year old heard about Cialdini's 6 persuasion tactics?
Perhaps it's not only time to revamp the testing process but the learning process. It's time to realize that when we learn the most is in fact at 3 am in the fluorescently-lit hallways of our local universities but it's certainly not coming from the books. Though I'll admit that some of the insights we can derive from professors and from prolonged ours sitting in front of two computer screens and an open book are often cool - I still remembered the moment Finance, my programming class, Chem and Marketing all clicked together with my world history class. It was only a quick and brief and passing thought of clarity but it was worth it. But the truth is that the knowledge comes from the people, our peers, sitting around us, supporting each other maybe by sharing a cheat sheet, or a sample test, or explaining the paper.
It is also, I would contend, a process that takes place when students engage in dangerous and sometimes illegal behavior downtown and they take care of each other. Yes, it's disgusting. Yes, the next day, a saturday or a friday or even a Wednesday if you're particularly aggressive they walk like zombies for the first 12 hours of the day as they trudge from door to door dolling out apologies and looking for his/her cellphone, wallet, credit card and dignity.
It's what some business leaders would call experiential. Give it a little more structure and fewer percentages and you could actually be called a visionary and an educator.
Isn't that what teams were for?
I go to a demanding school. The kind where the students are the ones filled with self-inflicted stress wounds and where friends are hard to come by, lest they mess up the curve. I stand looking back and I see freshmen worrying about getting jobs and seniors chilling despite or because of their job situation. How does that make sense?
The concern as educators should not be on whether the students solve a tricky test under time pressure as they worry not about how they did but how their peers did and wether they'll still be better than about half of them.
There's an obvious disconnect between effort and performance.
But we all know you need a 4.0 to get a job. And at least 4 assorted extracurriculars in which you are both a board member, a president and a ground soldier. It's all suits and ties and vault guides all over the place before we stop them and ask them why they're doing all this for?
Of course I'm not talking about the kids born and raised with a deeply rooted desire to be a banker or a consultant. What 4 year old hasn't heard of Porter's 5 forces? Or 5 year old heard about Cialdini's 6 persuasion tactics?
Perhaps it's not only time to revamp the testing process but the learning process. It's time to realize that when we learn the most is in fact at 3 am in the fluorescently-lit hallways of our local universities but it's certainly not coming from the books. Though I'll admit that some of the insights we can derive from professors and from prolonged ours sitting in front of two computer screens and an open book are often cool - I still remembered the moment Finance, my programming class, Chem and Marketing all clicked together with my world history class. It was only a quick and brief and passing thought of clarity but it was worth it. But the truth is that the knowledge comes from the people, our peers, sitting around us, supporting each other maybe by sharing a cheat sheet, or a sample test, or explaining the paper.
It is also, I would contend, a process that takes place when students engage in dangerous and sometimes illegal behavior downtown and they take care of each other. Yes, it's disgusting. Yes, the next day, a saturday or a friday or even a Wednesday if you're particularly aggressive they walk like zombies for the first 12 hours of the day as they trudge from door to door dolling out apologies and looking for his/her cellphone, wallet, credit card and dignity.
It's what some business leaders would call experiential. Give it a little more structure and fewer percentages and you could actually be called a visionary and an educator.
Isn't that what teams were for?
Wednesday, December 15, 2010
Short age
I've always been of age. Of a certain age that is. At first I was 0 years old and then quickly that became a question better answered by I am this (hand up) old. At some point in the 6-7 year range that changes but you still want presents. Then you turn twelve and people start running for the hills as you lurch up.
Then, a couple of years later, maybe a little bit of facial hair tells people a good guesstimate for your age. Then your little plastic id badge lies to people about your age. Then it doesn't. First in one country (16), then in another (18), then in a third (21).
From hereonafter it's not polite to ask. Unless you're making sure it's not jailbait. Just pay close attention to the wrinkles and white hairs.
A momentary musing regarding that which is often taken for granted. The passage of time.
Then, a couple of years later, maybe a little bit of facial hair tells people a good guesstimate for your age. Then your little plastic id badge lies to people about your age. Then it doesn't. First in one country (16), then in another (18), then in a third (21).
From hereonafter it's not polite to ask. Unless you're making sure it's not jailbait. Just pay close attention to the wrinkles and white hairs.
A momentary musing regarding that which is often taken for granted. The passage of time.
Wednesday, December 8, 2010
Pretend I'm on a podium
And there's a huge crowd in front of me, 2500 of them are dressed in all black.
It's not a funeral.
'm still steadfast on the decision to change the world. However, I don't know if I'll ever achieve the cult-like status of Jobs or the political status of a senator. Call this a trial run. Or is it a dry run?
The first.
Think of those times you stayed behind in a room in Huntsman working with your friends because they needed help rehearsing. Keep doing this. Today it was for them. Tomorrow, for you. It might not be a status report and your first big college level presentation but the combination of diffused lighting, lack of windows, camraderie of knowing that you are bearing what must be born, together, and structure you are providing each other will give you enlightment no teacher on this campus can hope to give you.
The second.
Go out with your friends. Now I know that this might not be a popular idea because of the negative connotations of drinking, dancing and doing mistakes. That's not what I mean I assure you. What I want is for you to work really hard at choosing your friends and pursuing a depth in those relationships that only college affords. Take a second to relax, stop working on the assignments you have due next week and enjoy the freedom of choice. No longer are friendships a matter of custom or tradition. You have at least 2500 options - all pre-screened for "interesting".
And speaking more generally.
These past 4 years have been some of the greatest in my life. I didn't understand the big ado about college coming from a small high school in Mexico and a family where my parents spoke no english. Sure - there was animal house and american pie but i knew these to be comedies. I watched the movie "Accepted" during application season. I hoped for something like Dead Poet's society without the suicidal tendencies. An inspired teacher a la Coach Carter that also carried a PhD in everything and could speak with ease about the grand world stage I was joining. The ride was supposed to be an ever increasing spiritual high. It turns out that it's part of the experience to have incredible high points and terrible low points. This semester, I've hit the sweetest one yet.
These past 4 years have been an education. It took me till junior year to figure out just how trivial the little number at the end of each semester was. How much definition it lacked. I focused on learning, not earning (a grade). It hit me that I was working hard to prepare myself, yes as an educated college grad, but also as a grown man living independently in the world. I have been working hard, inside and outside the classroom to make my story as great as possible. The 4 years of college are the greatest years of your life - if you commit yourself to making them so.
I did. I recommend doing the same.
*P.S. Maker's with apple cider make a good drink to mop up the tears.
It's not a funeral.
'm still steadfast on the decision to change the world. However, I don't know if I'll ever achieve the cult-like status of Jobs or the political status of a senator. Call this a trial run. Or is it a dry run?
The first.
Think of those times you stayed behind in a room in Huntsman working with your friends because they needed help rehearsing. Keep doing this. Today it was for them. Tomorrow, for you. It might not be a status report and your first big college level presentation but the combination of diffused lighting, lack of windows, camraderie of knowing that you are bearing what must be born, together, and structure you are providing each other will give you enlightment no teacher on this campus can hope to give you.
The second.
Go out with your friends. Now I know that this might not be a popular idea because of the negative connotations of drinking, dancing and doing mistakes. That's not what I mean I assure you. What I want is for you to work really hard at choosing your friends and pursuing a depth in those relationships that only college affords. Take a second to relax, stop working on the assignments you have due next week and enjoy the freedom of choice. No longer are friendships a matter of custom or tradition. You have at least 2500 options - all pre-screened for "interesting".
And speaking more generally.
These past 4 years have been some of the greatest in my life. I didn't understand the big ado about college coming from a small high school in Mexico and a family where my parents spoke no english. Sure - there was animal house and american pie but i knew these to be comedies. I watched the movie "Accepted" during application season. I hoped for something like Dead Poet's society without the suicidal tendencies. An inspired teacher a la Coach Carter that also carried a PhD in everything and could speak with ease about the grand world stage I was joining. The ride was supposed to be an ever increasing spiritual high. It turns out that it's part of the experience to have incredible high points and terrible low points. This semester, I've hit the sweetest one yet.
These past 4 years have been an education. It took me till junior year to figure out just how trivial the little number at the end of each semester was. How much definition it lacked. I focused on learning, not earning (a grade). It hit me that I was working hard to prepare myself, yes as an educated college grad, but also as a grown man living independently in the world. I have been working hard, inside and outside the classroom to make my story as great as possible. The 4 years of college are the greatest years of your life - if you commit yourself to making them so.
I did. I recommend doing the same.
*P.S. Maker's with apple cider make a good drink to mop up the tears.
Sunday, December 5, 2010
Pub
It's an interesting sensation that I sorely missed from high school. Having your words printed not in the permanent ink of the internet but in the old-school style that Ben (Frank really) used to practice.
It's not a bar though. Or better yet it is a bar that you need to meet.
So writers write, most times, to be read. They slave away at sentence construction and word choice and grammar and other persnickety little details attempting perfection. That's not to say that everyone who touches finger to keyboard is in trapped in a permanent attempt to write Ulysses. In fact, I'd venture to say that the people who are published in the NYT best sellers know that 6 out of 10 times they have done just that. Sold themselves out in the best possible fashion shooting for a now true and tried mix of sexiness, scandal, new york and pseudo science to write a book that provides readability.
It's reminiscent of coors.
But some writers do write. Not dribble and not the quasi-intelligible writing that I often put forth as esoteric though I assure you my attempts are typically heartfelt.
Then they write letters - emails these days - and attach their work in hopes of getting a congratulations. It's college acceptance all over again but instead of a promising future you get affirmation for the present.
lished.
It's not a bar though. Or better yet it is a bar that you need to meet.
So writers write, most times, to be read. They slave away at sentence construction and word choice and grammar and other persnickety little details attempting perfection. That's not to say that everyone who touches finger to keyboard is in trapped in a permanent attempt to write Ulysses. In fact, I'd venture to say that the people who are published in the NYT best sellers know that 6 out of 10 times they have done just that. Sold themselves out in the best possible fashion shooting for a now true and tried mix of sexiness, scandal, new york and pseudo science to write a book that provides readability.
It's reminiscent of coors.
But some writers do write. Not dribble and not the quasi-intelligible writing that I often put forth as esoteric though I assure you my attempts are typically heartfelt.
Then they write letters - emails these days - and attach their work in hopes of getting a congratulations. It's college acceptance all over again but instead of a promising future you get affirmation for the present.
lished.
Monday, November 29, 2010
Id?
States of mind have been in my thoughts. Exploring the subconscious reactions of our brains. I'm sure that a quick google search and a slight in-depth analysis of one of those how-to books at barnes and noble would quickly tell me whether a protective reaction in a time of danger is either voluntary (the brain) or involuntary (the heart though scientists might disagree and burst my romantic bubble and call it nerves).
I had a great weekend involving single letter hostels, unions of squares (think of the quadratic venn diagram) and socarrat. That sweet tasting slightly burnt rice at the bottom of a paella pan. The 7 flavored rice that is my favorite spanish gets an eight when it clings to the blackened metal. There was also a gray, or blue dog and a hotel that aspires to be a ship in the sea of hipster.
But enough of this.
I've entered a business transaction. One without dollar signs on it but certainly a lot of hope. The kind that sparks from beginning an uncertain enterprise with no real visibility into success.
My older brother, not political, or unlawful or blood but my older brother nonetheless is part of a higher education now. An elite group of people I some day hope to join. He said that love is not a feeling but a decision. That "being in love" is a rush of hormones that actually disappears. You need to decide to love someone.
A priest told him that.
Two things. My body obviously doesn't function like their scientific studies. I don't know how much behavior we can scientifically define when talking not about reactions, or patterns but the subtle subjects we call emotions.
Originated in the brain. We still point to our heart.
I had a great weekend involving single letter hostels, unions of squares (think of the quadratic venn diagram) and socarrat. That sweet tasting slightly burnt rice at the bottom of a paella pan. The 7 flavored rice that is my favorite spanish gets an eight when it clings to the blackened metal. There was also a gray, or blue dog and a hotel that aspires to be a ship in the sea of hipster.
But enough of this.
I've entered a business transaction. One without dollar signs on it but certainly a lot of hope. The kind that sparks from beginning an uncertain enterprise with no real visibility into success.
My older brother, not political, or unlawful or blood but my older brother nonetheless is part of a higher education now. An elite group of people I some day hope to join. He said that love is not a feeling but a decision. That "being in love" is a rush of hormones that actually disappears. You need to decide to love someone.
A priest told him that.
Two things. My body obviously doesn't function like their scientific studies. I don't know how much behavior we can scientifically define when talking not about reactions, or patterns but the subtle subjects we call emotions.
Originated in the brain. We still point to our heart.
Sunday, November 28, 2010
J(a)une
That's roughly six months from now though anyone who knows me knows that the order of the months of the year is of little consequence to me. To me it is sufficient to know that from our limited perspective time flows mono-directionally.
I think that's what Kerouac and Eggers are trying to tell us.
Come June I'll be in a new city struggling to keep the friends I've left (once again) and juggling the big city that did its best on me last summer. I didn't feel squished. I felt energized and invigorated by such a large city in such a small place. By a city with a strong personality and unique character that carries it's B.O. and leaky, oozing wounds with pride.
There's a new priest in my local church.
Today he warned us to be alert. The book he teaches tells of a parable in the form of a rhetorical question. Do you think that the master of the house, had he known the time his house was going to be broken into, would not have stayed up during that hour to defend his house?
Though normally I attend for the white noise - and the entrance ticket is free - today I was reminded of something.
Six months from now certain things will inevitably change. I'm not looking at life mono-directionally for however many years I have left (and the question of whether or not thats 1 or 70 is absolutely terrifying though my genes indicate statistical longevity). From now on I'm parsing it in manageable bites - a practice I'm adopting for my eating habits as well.
The human body is capable of impressive things. Adaptability. As long as we don't get in our way.
I think that's what Kerouac and Eggers are trying to tell us.
Come June I'll be in a new city struggling to keep the friends I've left (once again) and juggling the big city that did its best on me last summer. I didn't feel squished. I felt energized and invigorated by such a large city in such a small place. By a city with a strong personality and unique character that carries it's B.O. and leaky, oozing wounds with pride.
There's a new priest in my local church.
Today he warned us to be alert. The book he teaches tells of a parable in the form of a rhetorical question. Do you think that the master of the house, had he known the time his house was going to be broken into, would not have stayed up during that hour to defend his house?
Though normally I attend for the white noise - and the entrance ticket is free - today I was reminded of something.
Six months from now certain things will inevitably change. I'm not looking at life mono-directionally for however many years I have left (and the question of whether or not thats 1 or 70 is absolutely terrifying though my genes indicate statistical longevity). From now on I'm parsing it in manageable bites - a practice I'm adopting for my eating habits as well.
The human body is capable of impressive things. Adaptability. As long as we don't get in our way.
Friday, November 26, 2010
Fraternally
I always wished for a brother. Not the half pleasant sweethearts intermittently in my life known cryptically as half brothers -- nature, age and a little bit of faith separated us in more ways than simply geography could.
One married a swede she met online.
Another studied engineering. Traveled (not went) to india and came back to doggedly become a doctor. Now he specializes in physical rehap for olympic athletes.
The last - but oldest - and hence the farthest, lived in the same city I did.
I used to wish to know them better. I wanted one of my own, not someone to keep me company but someone to play daredevil with. To solemnly swear I was up to no good was my only request. I wanted someone who could play me in one-on-one without heigh being much of an issue. If he was slightly older he would beat me to 21 every time until I outstripped him in our mutual search for height. We would be able to signal to each other when our parents were being illogical and blame each other for whatever was required.
This I explained to my parents who would smile and patiently explain to me that this was not possible. That this, request, of mine was not as simple as it appeared. There was more to it than just sex (though in all fairness my young mind conveniently took leaps of faith in an effort to ignore the question of where do baby's come from).
When my father's mother passed I saw chaos. Though emotionally my father is a calm and articulate man, what truly tore at him wasn't my grandma's forgetful memory in her twilight, it wasn't the extinguishing candle on her full life - it was his brothers and sisters.
I note: I don't speak from personal experience.
His brothers and sisters. Shared background growing up in the outskirts of rural mexico with little more than my fathers car, a small house and their wits. This ragtag group somehow climbed the mexican prosperity ladder and stayed where it most pleased them. Some in the same little town - el llano en llamas - where the prairies are dedicated to the planting of chilis that make the whole place seem alight with fire at sundown and some made it to a seven figure city where the standard of living is "higher" but a doctors coat still speaks god.
There was a struggle.
And now with new empirical evidence I still struggle to resolve what I would have liked and would I have changed anything. It's all up to me now, that's the scary part.
One married a swede she met online.
Another studied engineering. Traveled (not went) to india and came back to doggedly become a doctor. Now he specializes in physical rehap for olympic athletes.
The last - but oldest - and hence the farthest, lived in the same city I did.
I used to wish to know them better. I wanted one of my own, not someone to keep me company but someone to play daredevil with. To solemnly swear I was up to no good was my only request. I wanted someone who could play me in one-on-one without heigh being much of an issue. If he was slightly older he would beat me to 21 every time until I outstripped him in our mutual search for height. We would be able to signal to each other when our parents were being illogical and blame each other for whatever was required.
This I explained to my parents who would smile and patiently explain to me that this was not possible. That this, request, of mine was not as simple as it appeared. There was more to it than just sex (though in all fairness my young mind conveniently took leaps of faith in an effort to ignore the question of where do baby's come from).
When my father's mother passed I saw chaos. Though emotionally my father is a calm and articulate man, what truly tore at him wasn't my grandma's forgetful memory in her twilight, it wasn't the extinguishing candle on her full life - it was his brothers and sisters.
I note: I don't speak from personal experience.
His brothers and sisters. Shared background growing up in the outskirts of rural mexico with little more than my fathers car, a small house and their wits. This ragtag group somehow climbed the mexican prosperity ladder and stayed where it most pleased them. Some in the same little town - el llano en llamas - where the prairies are dedicated to the planting of chilis that make the whole place seem alight with fire at sundown and some made it to a seven figure city where the standard of living is "higher" but a doctors coat still speaks god.
There was a struggle.
And now with new empirical evidence I still struggle to resolve what I would have liked and would I have changed anything. It's all up to me now, that's the scary part.
Sunday, November 7, 2010
Calendar Year
Inspired by the sophomoric endings brought to light by more senior visions of the future. I'm grateful for the lack of junior at the end of my name nowadays.
I was hoping to avoid metaphors but without them I'm left standing on my own behind nothing but a third wall.
What follows are a consolidated statement of accounts as of Dec. 31. 2009 in which the company saw a new vision of the world - the economic downturn and the events that led up to it have forced to reassess our primary focus and planing. We are now a stronger firm because of it and we are confident that with the help of our dedicated board members, stockholders and the cooperation of the "rational" markets we will achieve an explosive growth once again.
Begin with a divestiture. A forced one to boot - one of those situations where union reps tell the management that trust is lost. Management fires the union, picks up shop and heads to a downtown bar with a group of friends and strangers and drowns in Jose.
The CEO finds himself at a company rally at his house surrounded by his peers and friends. The wine (Milwaukee's finest) has been flowing like water out of a fire hydrant and as the leader, he's been trying to mop it up. One of his friends is doing laundry and holding a bottle that were he to be blind and have a difficult time distinguishing shapes and weights and sizes, one might confuse for a bottle. He drinks. His mouth is clean. Tide (Home expressions) is really too strong a drink. A minor panic attack later a girl asks him why he tastes like laundry detergent.
He asks for gum.
1030 am and a full day of work ahead begins. A quick visit to the Russia office, he's on the Concorde to the Caribbean. Rum-ba dancing and all that Jazz he is on a College campus for a speech. The Russians followed him and they brought his family (Tequila - the drink not the town) with them. A quick sip of orange juice - for the vitamin C - and cranberry - to clean the prostate - and the day keeps going. His shirt has changed colors but it's not his doing. The paramedics tackle him after his escape. The music pounds in sync with his fist and people cheer him on. 5 hours later, dehydration gone and his mack is on.
He spends the night alone in a sweet dance of cold sweats, dizziness, fainting and nausea.
You'd think he had enough.
Enter the iceberg stage left. He crashes. She pulls him down with threats and emotional blackmail Tony Sopranos' mother would be proud of. There's physical distance between them but only the nightly nightcap with his colleagues (soledad y verdad) help the 8 hour flight between here and requiem.
2010
Benjamin Button-like rebirth - minus the creepy psychological and sexual derivations.
I was hoping to avoid metaphors but without them I'm left standing on my own behind nothing but a third wall.
What follows are a consolidated statement of accounts as of Dec. 31. 2009 in which the company saw a new vision of the world - the economic downturn and the events that led up to it have forced to reassess our primary focus and planing. We are now a stronger firm because of it and we are confident that with the help of our dedicated board members, stockholders and the cooperation of the "rational" markets we will achieve an explosive growth once again.
Begin with a divestiture. A forced one to boot - one of those situations where union reps tell the management that trust is lost. Management fires the union, picks up shop and heads to a downtown bar with a group of friends and strangers and drowns in Jose.
The CEO finds himself at a company rally at his house surrounded by his peers and friends. The wine (Milwaukee's finest) has been flowing like water out of a fire hydrant and as the leader, he's been trying to mop it up. One of his friends is doing laundry and holding a bottle that were he to be blind and have a difficult time distinguishing shapes and weights and sizes, one might confuse for a bottle. He drinks. His mouth is clean. Tide (Home expressions) is really too strong a drink. A minor panic attack later a girl asks him why he tastes like laundry detergent.
He asks for gum.
1030 am and a full day of work ahead begins. A quick visit to the Russia office, he's on the Concorde to the Caribbean. Rum-ba dancing and all that Jazz he is on a College campus for a speech. The Russians followed him and they brought his family (Tequila - the drink not the town) with them. A quick sip of orange juice - for the vitamin C - and cranberry - to clean the prostate - and the day keeps going. His shirt has changed colors but it's not his doing. The paramedics tackle him after his escape. The music pounds in sync with his fist and people cheer him on. 5 hours later, dehydration gone and his mack is on.
He spends the night alone in a sweet dance of cold sweats, dizziness, fainting and nausea.
You'd think he had enough.
Enter the iceberg stage left. He crashes. She pulls him down with threats and emotional blackmail Tony Sopranos' mother would be proud of. There's physical distance between them but only the nightly nightcap with his colleagues (soledad y verdad) help the 8 hour flight between here and requiem.
2010
Benjamin Button-like rebirth - minus the creepy psychological and sexual derivations.
Friday, October 22, 2010
From a half-decent guy
Don't take that to mean the other half is indecent, or that from the belt down I'm little more than an animalistic being.
I'm the kind of guy that asks girls out on dates - I'll shell out the 50 bucks and a bottle of wine for the sake of entertaining conversation and the potential to get to know someone. Call me crazy since in this tiny little bubbly-filled world I live in that seems like a prohibitive cost. Especially because parties provide academically overachieving but socially awkward kids sufficient lubrication to let their inhibitions out.
The rise of the BOMO. Black-out make-out.
And I'll begin my argument by saying that my gender has thrown chivalry by the way side. Most no longer even consider letting a girl go first, standing on the street side of the curb when walking or offer to help them with their bags. Some, both guys and girls, would argue that this is not a sign of disrespect but merely an evolution of the times - feminism happened. I know, but respect never went out of fashion.
But guys can only get away with what girls let us get away with. See in a world where the Gaga soundtrack blasts and a guy and a girl grind their way into oblivion as they try to fuse their bodies into one while still leaving their clothes on (for now) all the while pretending to have a pseudo meaningful conversation which really involves exchanging first names and numbers so they can hook up later - a guy like me is fighting the odds. They sloppily make out and leave the party wondering if they'll have to be the first to text.
The guy goes home happy he hooked up but wondering if something more could have been. He might text but he'll be nervous about it and pretend to be cooler than he is. The girl goes home happy she hooked up (presumably) but she might only text if she's truly curious. "A guy should be the one to pursue" seems to be one of those tenets the times have not managed to change.
So where does the "date asking" kick in? Post hook-up? Pre hook-up, on the dance floor(That's a story for the grandkids)? Guys and girls are both looking for meaningful, loving relationships, and the notions on how to get to them are the same. But it's easier to put that off when there's a pair of willing lips at the bar.
I'm asking you, girls of the college dating scene, to hold off on the dance floor mating ritual for a week. See how many guys realize that maybe a night downtown, with a bottle of wine and awkward waitress has suddenly become the right approach.
A bientot.
I'm the kind of guy that asks girls out on dates - I'll shell out the 50 bucks and a bottle of wine for the sake of entertaining conversation and the potential to get to know someone. Call me crazy since in this tiny little bubbly-filled world I live in that seems like a prohibitive cost. Especially because parties provide academically overachieving but socially awkward kids sufficient lubrication to let their inhibitions out.
The rise of the BOMO. Black-out make-out.
And I'll begin my argument by saying that my gender has thrown chivalry by the way side. Most no longer even consider letting a girl go first, standing on the street side of the curb when walking or offer to help them with their bags. Some, both guys and girls, would argue that this is not a sign of disrespect but merely an evolution of the times - feminism happened. I know, but respect never went out of fashion.
But guys can only get away with what girls let us get away with. See in a world where the Gaga soundtrack blasts and a guy and a girl grind their way into oblivion as they try to fuse their bodies into one while still leaving their clothes on (for now) all the while pretending to have a pseudo meaningful conversation which really involves exchanging first names and numbers so they can hook up later - a guy like me is fighting the odds. They sloppily make out and leave the party wondering if they'll have to be the first to text.
The guy goes home happy he hooked up but wondering if something more could have been. He might text but he'll be nervous about it and pretend to be cooler than he is. The girl goes home happy she hooked up (presumably) but she might only text if she's truly curious. "A guy should be the one to pursue" seems to be one of those tenets the times have not managed to change.
So where does the "date asking" kick in? Post hook-up? Pre hook-up, on the dance floor(That's a story for the grandkids)? Guys and girls are both looking for meaningful, loving relationships, and the notions on how to get to them are the same. But it's easier to put that off when there's a pair of willing lips at the bar.
I'm asking you, girls of the college dating scene, to hold off on the dance floor mating ritual for a week. See how many guys realize that maybe a night downtown, with a bottle of wine and awkward waitress has suddenly become the right approach.
A bientot.
Friday, October 15, 2010
Life Block
A life block should be something like 20 years.
Like the sort of thing that a 40 year old man is told - you've just become half dead.
Though at the rate we're going and with people surviving without sunlight and limited air in gaeas womb for over two months - the number 40 might soon become 55. The French will obviously protest the logical or the sensical in favor of government institutions that bear little resemblance to the needs of a changing world. I tested 90th percentile for openness hence my slight condescension. You'll excuse.
Life block would be as curable as the writing kind. A simple excercise like free-writing for 20 minutes would provide solutions. Picture 20 minutes of free living. Whatever that means it sounds exciting, like you might have to be a tree hugger or a really good faker to actually experience it. The kind of person that has a sherpa story in his repertoire but also cares little enough to only tell it if he's really high and wondering how he's avoiding getting messed down. Messed up is a lot more fun.
Or that we could write an acrostic poem with our life. Something where we wrote a one line pseudocoherent text for every year of our life. The first year would be a one word brilliance - "Gurggle". The second year we would have almost two words "Ma-ma". And so on and so forth increasing the number and complexity until we hit 13. At this point we'd settle for three letters - "nvm" or "w/e". A symbol. I know. Crazy. Then, evolution again until we hit the 18-22 sweet spot where people have no names but instead go by "dude, bro and bitch".
At 40 we'd have some elaborate sentence decoding the socioeconomical, political and cultural demise that our nations youth and government are bringing unto itself. At 60 we'd settle for being quiet and loosening our belt after meals. At 70 we'd make a remark "I remember the good old days". The news organization better known by a delicious food staple would tell us that happened a long time ago and won't ever happen again.
At a 87 we'd say "Who are you?"
At a 100 we'd be quiet.
We can't rid ourselves of this. This writer block. So I'm drinking tea (iced, slightly sweetened) and waiting for it to pass.
Buenas noches abuelita.
Like the sort of thing that a 40 year old man is told - you've just become half dead.
Though at the rate we're going and with people surviving without sunlight and limited air in gaeas womb for over two months - the number 40 might soon become 55. The French will obviously protest the logical or the sensical in favor of government institutions that bear little resemblance to the needs of a changing world. I tested 90th percentile for openness hence my slight condescension. You'll excuse.
Life block would be as curable as the writing kind. A simple excercise like free-writing for 20 minutes would provide solutions. Picture 20 minutes of free living. Whatever that means it sounds exciting, like you might have to be a tree hugger or a really good faker to actually experience it. The kind of person that has a sherpa story in his repertoire but also cares little enough to only tell it if he's really high and wondering how he's avoiding getting messed down. Messed up is a lot more fun.
Or that we could write an acrostic poem with our life. Something where we wrote a one line pseudocoherent text for every year of our life. The first year would be a one word brilliance - "Gurggle". The second year we would have almost two words "Ma-ma". And so on and so forth increasing the number and complexity until we hit 13. At this point we'd settle for three letters - "nvm" or "w/e". A symbol. I know. Crazy. Then, evolution again until we hit the 18-22 sweet spot where people have no names but instead go by "dude, bro and bitch".
At 40 we'd have some elaborate sentence decoding the socioeconomical, political and cultural demise that our nations youth and government are bringing unto itself. At 60 we'd settle for being quiet and loosening our belt after meals. At 70 we'd make a remark "I remember the good old days". The news organization better known by a delicious food staple would tell us that happened a long time ago and won't ever happen again.
At a 87 we'd say "Who are you?"
At a 100 we'd be quiet.
We can't rid ourselves of this. This writer block. So I'm drinking tea (iced, slightly sweetened) and waiting for it to pass.
Buenas noches abuelita.
Friday, October 1, 2010
Borrowed
A new blue sweater that's both expensive (literally) and cheap (trashy).
I'm going to share a story.
Picture to friends racing each other across the northeast but one is predetermined to win because of his advantageous position. He sits on a train. She sits on a train. But he's on the 9'o'clock and hers was delayed.
But that's not a borrowed story, that's my own. Next to me on the train sat a Connecticut girl who could have been from Europe and giggled at the ad-campaign textbook she read. Face scrunched up in concentration I tried reading about thefacebook.com in the awkward weeks before the "the" was dropped. Someone should tell Betty White that "thetwitter" is no more.
A fraternity house where the floors are so sticky flip flops are lost all the time. A fraternity house lacking beer pong, beer bong and with a plethora of toilet papers and cleaning supplies. The kitchen is not a second grade science experiment on growing mold and the couches are shockingly clean - lacking all good things that come hither from human beings when they are their finest.
We made pancakes in all sorts of lovely forms - letters, swirls, mickeys and snowmen. ALL PG13. But best of all wasn't the plethora of chocolate chips or the brief game of "let me toss candy at your mouth and see if you catch it". I did.
It was a nice morning. One that felt familiar for a first time and one that allowed for jokes, inappropriate and witty and viceversa. A morning with an awkward encounter and lite cough syrup. A couple of "aw's" later I realized that it's one of those random college memories that make it an entirely unique experience.
Now shotgun a beer.
I'm going to share a story.
Picture to friends racing each other across the northeast but one is predetermined to win because of his advantageous position. He sits on a train. She sits on a train. But he's on the 9'o'clock and hers was delayed.
But that's not a borrowed story, that's my own. Next to me on the train sat a Connecticut girl who could have been from Europe and giggled at the ad-campaign textbook she read. Face scrunched up in concentration I tried reading about thefacebook.com in the awkward weeks before the "the" was dropped. Someone should tell Betty White that "thetwitter" is no more.
A fraternity house where the floors are so sticky flip flops are lost all the time. A fraternity house lacking beer pong, beer bong and with a plethora of toilet papers and cleaning supplies. The kitchen is not a second grade science experiment on growing mold and the couches are shockingly clean - lacking all good things that come hither from human beings when they are their finest.
We made pancakes in all sorts of lovely forms - letters, swirls, mickeys and snowmen. ALL PG13. But best of all wasn't the plethora of chocolate chips or the brief game of "let me toss candy at your mouth and see if you catch it". I did.
It was a nice morning. One that felt familiar for a first time and one that allowed for jokes, inappropriate and witty and viceversa. A morning with an awkward encounter and lite cough syrup. A couple of "aw's" later I realized that it's one of those random college memories that make it an entirely unique experience.
Now shotgun a beer.
Thursday, September 30, 2010
Frogs
They say that to find your prince you're going to have to kiss a lot of frogs.
It implies that all men are french and therefore lovers of wine and the finer things in life. Or that we are green like childhood stories. Or that we are slimy.
It is a metaphor meant to relate the fairytale story to the reality of the basic nature of human existence.
But the problem to be studied here is one relating to frogs and witches cauldrons - I borrowed this story from a person much wiser than me.
If you boil water and then try to toss a live frog into the pot, the frog will jump out. And before anybody screeches at the inhuman treatment of our slimy little friends, consider whether or not you've ever eaten lobster. If, however, you place a frog in a pot of ambient temperature water and let it rise to a boil the frog will do nothing about it until it finally perishes into what is a delightfully gamey yet palatable dish.
Three words: Elite Higher Education.
It implies that all men are french and therefore lovers of wine and the finer things in life. Or that we are green like childhood stories. Or that we are slimy.
It is a metaphor meant to relate the fairytale story to the reality of the basic nature of human existence.
But the problem to be studied here is one relating to frogs and witches cauldrons - I borrowed this story from a person much wiser than me.
If you boil water and then try to toss a live frog into the pot, the frog will jump out. And before anybody screeches at the inhuman treatment of our slimy little friends, consider whether or not you've ever eaten lobster. If, however, you place a frog in a pot of ambient temperature water and let it rise to a boil the frog will do nothing about it until it finally perishes into what is a delightfully gamey yet palatable dish.
Three words: Elite Higher Education.
Monday, September 27, 2010
11:11
I think I've started writing at a similar time at some point in the past.
Time (and by extension clocks) are so repetitive it's boring. Not repetitive interesting like a tesselation or two opposing mirrors though - that should be clear.
I have friends I want to visit but dont know how to. In my mind they are brave souls who greet life with a smile and say charmed life as much as I am now prone to do. And while I worry about such petty things about school and people they should know I worry about them - friends. That although my back can't tolerate more than 10 hours in bed theirs might just have to for spells at a time. It's the thing about friendship, I see them once a week if I'm lucky but inevitably I'm the one who feels like the needy one though they should be the ones with a complete get out of jail card. Testament to who's stronger despite the fact that I'm over 200 pounds and 6ft6.
7 hugs. Some of them awkward, some of them real. One of them has that weird end of it where it's almost like you're reticent about ending it and your right arm outstretched lingers in the direction of her outstretched left arm. One given in a bout of emotion. So maybe it's more like a 14, I blame my warmth-driven culture and call it a day.
Blue October. Red October. And November is a day not a month and it's spent in celebration in some parts of my world while in utter concern about things that happened over 20 years ago (Tlaltelolco). And if you want an interesting thought then realize that if you are reading this you are most likely not a Baby Boomer, not part of Generation X but a part of Generation Me.
I'd like to think that the Me stands for Millenium because we were infinitely blessed with luck to be born at just the right time to see it. A sinking part of me has the rising suspicion that it's actually meant to point to our egotistical view of the world. Thank god for blogging, tweeting and bbery updates. Status messages. Away messages. Hotkeys and all that other good stuff. At least we can now stream live video onto the internet.
GenMe is one with a work to live focus but we also have a sense of self-entitlement. A sense that we are on the right path to success independent of whether there are cobble stones or pavement. We need more supervision. I guess that's why I study management.
And for now dear friend, i leave you with a long-winded departing shot that's more like a canon filled with ball bearings. Though I feel like I'm so blessed and so lucky I wish I could get a cleansing (not the magical kind) but one that would rid me of petty worries and leave me with those I care about. I hope the tangled mess of lines and dotted dashes that spells out the rest of my life will inevitably keep those I hold near and dear to my heart in a tightly wrapped cocoon of what I hope is love.
Paz.
Time (and by extension clocks) are so repetitive it's boring. Not repetitive interesting like a tesselation or two opposing mirrors though - that should be clear.
I have friends I want to visit but dont know how to. In my mind they are brave souls who greet life with a smile and say charmed life as much as I am now prone to do. And while I worry about such petty things about school and people they should know I worry about them - friends. That although my back can't tolerate more than 10 hours in bed theirs might just have to for spells at a time. It's the thing about friendship, I see them once a week if I'm lucky but inevitably I'm the one who feels like the needy one though they should be the ones with a complete get out of jail card. Testament to who's stronger despite the fact that I'm over 200 pounds and 6ft6.
7 hugs. Some of them awkward, some of them real. One of them has that weird end of it where it's almost like you're reticent about ending it and your right arm outstretched lingers in the direction of her outstretched left arm. One given in a bout of emotion. So maybe it's more like a 14, I blame my warmth-driven culture and call it a day.
Blue October. Red October. And November is a day not a month and it's spent in celebration in some parts of my world while in utter concern about things that happened over 20 years ago (Tlaltelolco). And if you want an interesting thought then realize that if you are reading this you are most likely not a Baby Boomer, not part of Generation X but a part of Generation Me.
I'd like to think that the Me stands for Millenium because we were infinitely blessed with luck to be born at just the right time to see it. A sinking part of me has the rising suspicion that it's actually meant to point to our egotistical view of the world. Thank god for blogging, tweeting and bbery updates. Status messages. Away messages. Hotkeys and all that other good stuff. At least we can now stream live video onto the internet.
GenMe is one with a work to live focus but we also have a sense of self-entitlement. A sense that we are on the right path to success independent of whether there are cobble stones or pavement. We need more supervision. I guess that's why I study management.
And for now dear friend, i leave you with a long-winded departing shot that's more like a canon filled with ball bearings. Though I feel like I'm so blessed and so lucky I wish I could get a cleansing (not the magical kind) but one that would rid me of petty worries and leave me with those I care about. I hope the tangled mess of lines and dotted dashes that spells out the rest of my life will inevitably keep those I hold near and dear to my heart in a tightly wrapped cocoon of what I hope is love.
Paz.
Friday, September 24, 2010
Writing about candidacy
I once wondered what it would take to make me a good candidate. A candidate for what you might ask (as I cringe at the Plato-ic stylings of my writing right now) and I would be forced to answer - a candidate to play in the field of life.
But faux deepness aside.
Imagine a dream in which you find yourself stranded on a single strip of land that runs for as far as you can see both in front and behind you. On one side are the calm waters of your favorite childhood lake (complete with orange guppies and the one corner of the lake with a patch of high grass somehow (magically) floating and thriving strictly on the water). On the other if your favorite childhood sea (the kind that took you under its wave, flipped you inside and out and made you lose a bathing suit but that you still ran for eagerly every time your parents finished parking the car and inflating your floaties).
An interesting excercise is not to judge a book by its cover but attempt to describe its plot line based entirely on the title. In some instances, like Oscar Wao's, it's easy to make something up. In other, like Suite Francaise or Relativistic Physics the problem gets exciting. The excercise is akin to the idea of coming up with a story for random strangers in the waiting room of a bus terminal.
My mind is a cat chasing the light from a flashlight, trying to untangle the tangled mess I've made of the ball of string without the benefit of opposable thumbs.
But I'm running.
not physically, dear god, never that.
But I am and I hope to tell you what it feels like.
But faux deepness aside.
Imagine a dream in which you find yourself stranded on a single strip of land that runs for as far as you can see both in front and behind you. On one side are the calm waters of your favorite childhood lake (complete with orange guppies and the one corner of the lake with a patch of high grass somehow (magically) floating and thriving strictly on the water). On the other if your favorite childhood sea (the kind that took you under its wave, flipped you inside and out and made you lose a bathing suit but that you still ran for eagerly every time your parents finished parking the car and inflating your floaties).
An interesting excercise is not to judge a book by its cover but attempt to describe its plot line based entirely on the title. In some instances, like Oscar Wao's, it's easy to make something up. In other, like Suite Francaise or Relativistic Physics the problem gets exciting. The excercise is akin to the idea of coming up with a story for random strangers in the waiting room of a bus terminal.
My mind is a cat chasing the light from a flashlight, trying to untangle the tangled mess I've made of the ball of string without the benefit of opposable thumbs.
But I'm running.
not physically, dear god, never that.
But I am and I hope to tell you what it feels like.
Monday, September 20, 2010
Je me souviens
Yo me acuerdo de una cancion en frances que cantaba el yo recuerdo.
I remember a song in french that sung the I remember.
Je me souviens.
The truth is that tonight I write in spanish because I woke up this morning and spoke in spanish for a second and thought in spanish for a minute before I caught wind that that was no longer the useful approach to life. You see I know my language inside and out and I like to think that I ellaborate complex puns with the same ease in 2 languages as I quote old wife's tales in three languages and say no in 4.
Pero la verdad es que de vez en vez extragno mi casa.
Extrano la letra egne.
Extrano noches de fogata con la luces de los carros, las ventana abajo para alegra el silencio con un poco de musica y chela. Donde no hacia mucho frio pero igual usabamos sudaderas. De buenos amigos que han cambiado agno con agno y mes con mes pero con los que igual se terminaba la noche explicando porque todos seguiamos siendo el rey.
Con dinero y sin dinero.
Y mientras tanto me trato de acordar de como sentia esa situacion en la prepa donde buscaba mi propio lugar que no encontre hasta cambiarme de pais. Veo el mapa de la ciudad semi grabado en mi mente, claro que sin nombres y no me acuerdo de muchas cosas.
Alzheimer de la memoria.
I remember a song in french that sung the I remember.
Je me souviens.
The truth is that tonight I write in spanish because I woke up this morning and spoke in spanish for a second and thought in spanish for a minute before I caught wind that that was no longer the useful approach to life. You see I know my language inside and out and I like to think that I ellaborate complex puns with the same ease in 2 languages as I quote old wife's tales in three languages and say no in 4.
Pero la verdad es que de vez en vez extragno mi casa.
Extrano la letra egne.
Extrano noches de fogata con la luces de los carros, las ventana abajo para alegra el silencio con un poco de musica y chela. Donde no hacia mucho frio pero igual usabamos sudaderas. De buenos amigos que han cambiado agno con agno y mes con mes pero con los que igual se terminaba la noche explicando porque todos seguiamos siendo el rey.
Con dinero y sin dinero.
Y mientras tanto me trato de acordar de como sentia esa situacion en la prepa donde buscaba mi propio lugar que no encontre hasta cambiarme de pais. Veo el mapa de la ciudad semi grabado en mi mente, claro que sin nombres y no me acuerdo de muchas cosas.
Alzheimer de la memoria.
Wednesday, September 1, 2010
Sphere
Some of the ancients considered the sphere the most perfect shape in the world. Point and case - the earth. Before you get finicky about stuff that doesnt matter and utter the word "geoid" - when was the last time your eyes discerned anything with 97% certainty.
So I met a man in this lofty pursue today. Round as a ball; head, round as a ball. I suppose his legs fell a little out of place but let's ignore the picture. His glasses, twin circles. The man is serious.
And though I've lunched and dined with him several times in my life today we looked for granularity in his rotund state. Not dirty.
I've seen him eat and he does so with gusto. He eats a lot but he does so enjoying new and unexpected flavors every time, is always willing to try new restaurants and foods and cooks up storms (the kind seen on the surface of the sun). He enjoys every mouthful and sits at meals like most people sit at mass. He has a ritual and enjoys the little things that hardasses (both literally and figurative) focused on rigorous diets and specific ingredients cannot. Butter on roll. Real oil when it is required, eevo only when the flavor enhances things.
A poached egg rather than scrambled egg whites.
So at least a significant portion of his shape is due to his passion.
But he has two.
He's a well known researcher published in Medical Journals in the US and Latin America. He's studying the effects of controlled obesity on diabetes and hypertension.
He might be on to something being patient zero.
Utter commitment.
So I met a man in this lofty pursue today. Round as a ball; head, round as a ball. I suppose his legs fell a little out of place but let's ignore the picture. His glasses, twin circles. The man is serious.
And though I've lunched and dined with him several times in my life today we looked for granularity in his rotund state. Not dirty.
I've seen him eat and he does so with gusto. He eats a lot but he does so enjoying new and unexpected flavors every time, is always willing to try new restaurants and foods and cooks up storms (the kind seen on the surface of the sun). He enjoys every mouthful and sits at meals like most people sit at mass. He has a ritual and enjoys the little things that hardasses (both literally and figurative) focused on rigorous diets and specific ingredients cannot. Butter on roll. Real oil when it is required, eevo only when the flavor enhances things.
A poached egg rather than scrambled egg whites.
So at least a significant portion of his shape is due to his passion.
But he has two.
He's a well known researcher published in Medical Journals in the US and Latin America. He's studying the effects of controlled obesity on diabetes and hypertension.
He might be on to something being patient zero.
Utter commitment.
Monday, August 30, 2010
Fresa Mexicano
Como describirlo?
My father is an idealist which in his time constituted the best kind of realist. My generation is more of an opportunistic factualist focused more on fixing potholes than building roads - if that makes sense.
Picture 3 circles dividing a 60 person group with a couple of people intersecting here and there.
In one lies a group of girls perfectly polished by make-up, careful natural tanning and hours on that spinning bike. They ask for nothing from the carefully styled women walking new york. Their fashion is copy pasted from the previous month's people or instyle and their hopes and aspirations are pleasantly asleep inside our large city. The groups of friends may have changed and the hair dye might be different but the nature of their beauty is essentially the same. Magazine cover and social pages in the sunday newspaper just like any other big city in the world. Except here we care.
Another if a group of indie's, alternatives, generally hippy'ish vibe (and yes, all three here are never mutually exclusive. Add a cardigan here, a knitted bag there and a whole lot of dark make up or where available, facial hair to find this other group that still rides tight from high school. We didn't have football heroes or local bad boys but this is a crowd that would often hang around the local (cheap) bar and recount the stories of this or that time when they were plastered and drove and got away with it.
Then there are those who have left and are comfortably outside and inside. Who wear stuff not meant to impress but simply to dress. Who tell the true stories of fantasies and cerebral drain.
Fresa Mexicano. Everyone smells of cleanliness and wealth. As the country falls apart around us.
bulletproof vest and metal and tires lock us in. :)
My father is an idealist which in his time constituted the best kind of realist. My generation is more of an opportunistic factualist focused more on fixing potholes than building roads - if that makes sense.
Picture 3 circles dividing a 60 person group with a couple of people intersecting here and there.
In one lies a group of girls perfectly polished by make-up, careful natural tanning and hours on that spinning bike. They ask for nothing from the carefully styled women walking new york. Their fashion is copy pasted from the previous month's people or instyle and their hopes and aspirations are pleasantly asleep inside our large city. The groups of friends may have changed and the hair dye might be different but the nature of their beauty is essentially the same. Magazine cover and social pages in the sunday newspaper just like any other big city in the world. Except here we care.
Another if a group of indie's, alternatives, generally hippy'ish vibe (and yes, all three here are never mutually exclusive. Add a cardigan here, a knitted bag there and a whole lot of dark make up or where available, facial hair to find this other group that still rides tight from high school. We didn't have football heroes or local bad boys but this is a crowd that would often hang around the local (cheap) bar and recount the stories of this or that time when they were plastered and drove and got away with it.
Then there are those who have left and are comfortably outside and inside. Who wear stuff not meant to impress but simply to dress. Who tell the true stories of fantasies and cerebral drain.
Fresa Mexicano. Everyone smells of cleanliness and wealth. As the country falls apart around us.
bulletproof vest and metal and tires lock us in. :)
Friday, August 27, 2010
Hero
Of Heroic proportions.
Music blasting.
I had the idea of writing a whole story through dialogue alone but I'm sure someone has done that before. Then i thought of doing vignettes or something equally spastic but I've also done that before. i once suggested POV pieces to a friend who should now know that I wish I could call her from this god forsaken cornucopia of a country I've inherited.
So instead I'll adopt my stream of consciousness staple but avoid the half obscure, half inane references to things only my mind (and maybe just another one) might get in full and proceed.
There's a story in which I wish I were the protagonist but end up winning the oscar for supporting actor at this rate. Maybe I'd settle for the photography oscar if I could muster a meaning in a photograph that goes beyond "it's not only what's in the frame, but also, outside of it".
That's how I walk around home now. Affairs settled I leave my SLR at home and imprint the images in my mind instead. Take Tepic, Nayarit.
A town that hopes to be city with battles and bombs raging through it. It cover the face of a hill and nothing more and the circular road that is the height of city planning in mexico is really just a straight line to the side of the city. The transit police ride 4 cylinder cars that a moped could easily outpace and the water floods the bottom third of the city when it rains. Some streets are cobbled, some streets are paved and others look like the perfect set for a jarhead styled movie. Craters, not potholes, are filled with mud, and disease and bacteria.
Streets are known not by name but by shape and somewhere in the labyrinthine hedge of an urban spit that the city is, there is a restaurant called New Port...sometimes Armando's. Of modest origins the place serves shrimp about 400 different ways without falling into the commercial vomitous that some other "Mexican" chains within Mexico meant to offer a tourist experience. The jokes are insider Mexican but easily explained to outsiders. The waiters are two brothers and the cooks, the chefs really, are a mother and daughter team sometimes joined by the sister in law. Of course the streets outside are sometimes lined with soldiers bearing AKs protecting the commander in turn who loves the restaurant as well - all in an honest day's work.
Then there's the drive which should have been described before the meal but I suppose the drive back is equally significant. You pass valleys and ridges and a fragmented landscape capable of hiding a lost cow in the corner or a plantation of agave or something. Something. Get it? But there's a 5 minute period across a plain of sorts where there is green jutting out of sharp, black, jagged rocks. Volcanic rock to be precise and as you look around you realize that you've carelessly been driving through the wide open mouth of a volcano that's deep in its REM cycle. Such pretty contrast - bright living green and black dead rock.
Drive home and realize that it's the bicentennial of your independence and there's nothing to be proud of. That you wrote a thesis 6 years ago where you discovered that independence was an ill-fitting word for a movement better described as a failed insurgence. 200 years and nothing to be proud of. 200 years to crawl ahead as countries with far less independence or history have outstripped us in intellect and power. And the war rages on and 72 were murdered last night in a northern city. A grenade was thrown in a bar injuring 20 - at least I'm glad the grenades they are using, the military or otherwise are old enough to injure and not kill. Yet.
Just fyi.
Rock beats both paper and scissors.
Music blasting.
I had the idea of writing a whole story through dialogue alone but I'm sure someone has done that before. Then i thought of doing vignettes or something equally spastic but I've also done that before. i once suggested POV pieces to a friend who should now know that I wish I could call her from this god forsaken cornucopia of a country I've inherited.
So instead I'll adopt my stream of consciousness staple but avoid the half obscure, half inane references to things only my mind (and maybe just another one) might get in full and proceed.
There's a story in which I wish I were the protagonist but end up winning the oscar for supporting actor at this rate. Maybe I'd settle for the photography oscar if I could muster a meaning in a photograph that goes beyond "it's not only what's in the frame, but also, outside of it".
That's how I walk around home now. Affairs settled I leave my SLR at home and imprint the images in my mind instead. Take Tepic, Nayarit.
A town that hopes to be city with battles and bombs raging through it. It cover the face of a hill and nothing more and the circular road that is the height of city planning in mexico is really just a straight line to the side of the city. The transit police ride 4 cylinder cars that a moped could easily outpace and the water floods the bottom third of the city when it rains. Some streets are cobbled, some streets are paved and others look like the perfect set for a jarhead styled movie. Craters, not potholes, are filled with mud, and disease and bacteria.
Streets are known not by name but by shape and somewhere in the labyrinthine hedge of an urban spit that the city is, there is a restaurant called New Port...sometimes Armando's. Of modest origins the place serves shrimp about 400 different ways without falling into the commercial vomitous that some other "Mexican" chains within Mexico meant to offer a tourist experience. The jokes are insider Mexican but easily explained to outsiders. The waiters are two brothers and the cooks, the chefs really, are a mother and daughter team sometimes joined by the sister in law. Of course the streets outside are sometimes lined with soldiers bearing AKs protecting the commander in turn who loves the restaurant as well - all in an honest day's work.
Then there's the drive which should have been described before the meal but I suppose the drive back is equally significant. You pass valleys and ridges and a fragmented landscape capable of hiding a lost cow in the corner or a plantation of agave or something. Something. Get it? But there's a 5 minute period across a plain of sorts where there is green jutting out of sharp, black, jagged rocks. Volcanic rock to be precise and as you look around you realize that you've carelessly been driving through the wide open mouth of a volcano that's deep in its REM cycle. Such pretty contrast - bright living green and black dead rock.
Drive home and realize that it's the bicentennial of your independence and there's nothing to be proud of. That you wrote a thesis 6 years ago where you discovered that independence was an ill-fitting word for a movement better described as a failed insurgence. 200 years and nothing to be proud of. 200 years to crawl ahead as countries with far less independence or history have outstripped us in intellect and power. And the war rages on and 72 were murdered last night in a northern city. A grenade was thrown in a bar injuring 20 - at least I'm glad the grenades they are using, the military or otherwise are old enough to injure and not kill. Yet.
Just fyi.
Rock beats both paper and scissors.
Wednesday, August 25, 2010
Indie Mexicano 2.0
Picture a crowd of thousands dressed in what people magazine tells us is indie. Better yet they picture indie pop artists in skinny jeans, v-necks and lots of polka dots and we all imitate.
I wear madras shorts and a tshirt.
The singer faces a particular challenge. A third wall that cant be broken where he sings for a crowd that in truth only half understands the semi mumbled subtext between the lyric lines. We speak spanish, he speaks english and the crowd frenzies when he says Mexico.
He raises both hands in the air, we mirror it.
Like zombies we follow. Then again, the same thing happens at church.
Heat is rising. My shirt is sweaty and his has changed color and though the observant eye is prone to believe that it's an Urban Outfitters thermo color change it really is just salt water.
People jumping up and down, the beer man is nowhere to be seen and we are all having the best of times.
That's mexican indie. When the mike points at us, the locale is at its quietest as we are put on the spot to enunciate the right lines. In that we are like our politicians.
Put them on the spot and they go quiet. Give them a mike and we all like what they say. We are swayed with th ekey words - mexico, gracias, you!
And look they even wear mexican hats.
It occurs to me that hydration might be of utmost importance right now however.
I wear madras shorts and a tshirt.
The singer faces a particular challenge. A third wall that cant be broken where he sings for a crowd that in truth only half understands the semi mumbled subtext between the lyric lines. We speak spanish, he speaks english and the crowd frenzies when he says Mexico.
He raises both hands in the air, we mirror it.
Like zombies we follow. Then again, the same thing happens at church.
Heat is rising. My shirt is sweaty and his has changed color and though the observant eye is prone to believe that it's an Urban Outfitters thermo color change it really is just salt water.
People jumping up and down, the beer man is nowhere to be seen and we are all having the best of times.
That's mexican indie. When the mike points at us, the locale is at its quietest as we are put on the spot to enunciate the right lines. In that we are like our politicians.
Put them on the spot and they go quiet. Give them a mike and we all like what they say. We are swayed with th ekey words - mexico, gracias, you!
And look they even wear mexican hats.
It occurs to me that hydration might be of utmost importance right now however.
Monday, August 23, 2010
Indie Mexicano
Today I knew I wanted to write.
See the thing is I enjoy writing because I enjoy story telling and I enjoy the latter because carrying a person slowly and gently to a story with no punchline but with a definite climax is a thrill ride.
I've been writing in schizophrenia for the past week and a half with a purpose but no string to tie it all together. I've been settling my affairs in Mexico like a person prepared to never come back. Mentally I think I've checked out - I hope. I've talked to a lawyer, a dentist and doctors (the beginning of a bad joke). They've told me, in order: youre good, youre cavity free and there's this and that and we'll do this and that and youll be ready for life.
I want to pick up the harmonica.
But paralegal busywork and secretary work aside - I've been telling one story.
More times in my mind than in person but the score is almost tied.
So I write in one liners in an attempt to be clever.
Or witty (wiry).
I'm visiting a prune's center with passion on Wednesday and the Monday blues were elevated by several bottles of veenoe and a michelada that reminded me of friends thousands of miles away. I'm missing my half orange (not the kind you have with breakfast).
There were tears at lunch, there was naughty talk and laughs. We scared the locals as we pretended to be above it all for a second only to fall back and note the sad lack of gallon bags of boxed wine (in memoriam Franzia's inventor). We ate argentinian and paired it with a teahouse screaming indy on the third floor of an old house with an awkward balcony overlooking an aged tree and an RC car wash. The man outfitted by what looked like the streets of LA was actually set up in Cd. Guzman and the owner kept massaging the clients as we saw a flower bloom in boiling water.
Tea will never be coffee.
But that is neither here nor there. I'm doing a new kind of praying now and it occurs to me that having a long lasting tv show in which the kids play a semi-significant role is fundamentally flawed as they have the annoying tendency to grow up. Then again, 4 women tend to grow old no matter how many Lawrence's they've met or hideous black tiaras they wear.
Sedaris and Fitzgerald have been an inspiration of sorts lately. The one thought me ocurrences and the interesting perspective of being naked. Not the hot and sweaty heavy naked that is features in sleazy paperbacks but the one in which you walk around the house and everything seems pointy and you relish the 20 second sprint when you're trying to answer the knock on your door. The other gave me some perspective on the 60s? and society and how little society changes despite individuals and bubbles moving ahead or behind as fast as they possibly can.It reminds me of minor things that make major impacts on the life's of thousands of those of us who are overly gifted in ways of values, intellect and materials.
Maybe I should hitch a ride to frisco.
See the thing is I enjoy writing because I enjoy story telling and I enjoy the latter because carrying a person slowly and gently to a story with no punchline but with a definite climax is a thrill ride.
I've been writing in schizophrenia for the past week and a half with a purpose but no string to tie it all together. I've been settling my affairs in Mexico like a person prepared to never come back. Mentally I think I've checked out - I hope. I've talked to a lawyer, a dentist and doctors (the beginning of a bad joke). They've told me, in order: youre good, youre cavity free and there's this and that and we'll do this and that and youll be ready for life.
I want to pick up the harmonica.
But paralegal busywork and secretary work aside - I've been telling one story.
More times in my mind than in person but the score is almost tied.
So I write in one liners in an attempt to be clever.
Or witty (wiry).
I'm visiting a prune's center with passion on Wednesday and the Monday blues were elevated by several bottles of veenoe and a michelada that reminded me of friends thousands of miles away. I'm missing my half orange (not the kind you have with breakfast).
There were tears at lunch, there was naughty talk and laughs. We scared the locals as we pretended to be above it all for a second only to fall back and note the sad lack of gallon bags of boxed wine (in memoriam Franzia's inventor). We ate argentinian and paired it with a teahouse screaming indy on the third floor of an old house with an awkward balcony overlooking an aged tree and an RC car wash. The man outfitted by what looked like the streets of LA was actually set up in Cd. Guzman and the owner kept massaging the clients as we saw a flower bloom in boiling water.
Tea will never be coffee.
But that is neither here nor there. I'm doing a new kind of praying now and it occurs to me that having a long lasting tv show in which the kids play a semi-significant role is fundamentally flawed as they have the annoying tendency to grow up. Then again, 4 women tend to grow old no matter how many Lawrence's they've met or hideous black tiaras they wear.
Sedaris and Fitzgerald have been an inspiration of sorts lately. The one thought me ocurrences and the interesting perspective of being naked. Not the hot and sweaty heavy naked that is features in sleazy paperbacks but the one in which you walk around the house and everything seems pointy and you relish the 20 second sprint when you're trying to answer the knock on your door. The other gave me some perspective on the 60s? and society and how little society changes despite individuals and bubbles moving ahead or behind as fast as they possibly can.It reminds me of minor things that make major impacts on the life's of thousands of those of us who are overly gifted in ways of values, intellect and materials.
Maybe I should hitch a ride to frisco.
Friday, August 13, 2010
123 or 456
Here’s the truth. I like subways.
Hurtling through a dank overheated and under ventilated channel like scurrying rats gives me a sense of thrill for no good reason. The person next to me is dressed in full suit – banker garb – that screams senses of power and influence.
I once talked about how I enjoyed walking around proper establishments blasting improper musical niceties from pre-packaged eccentricities called singers. Listening to the caramelized tones of Bocelli as il mare calmo starts rolling of his throat is soothing beyond believe. Brownian motion in my brain just calmly adapts to the pleasant acoustics and I let my arm loosely hang on to the ceiling bars. Cold-recycled air hitting the back of my neck and I’m trapped in an awkward embrace amidst strangers.
This is the end of a small beginning. 10 weeks were once my lifetime. Then they came to be an ever smaller fraction of my ever increasing life. I’m sitting at a desk feeling just as hungry as I felt 2 and half months ago and, I hope, infinitely more prepared to begin taking the world by storm.
Standing at the brink of an interesting new world I write more like a preacher today than I do most days. Memories of Mexican style swimming classes come to mind: a father, hopeful and ecstatic at having a child walks the 5 or 6 year old tike to the edge of the deep end. The tiny little hand grabs his fathers harder and harder as the ominous dark blue seems to grow infinite deeper (Jacuzzis tend to look like Mariana when you’re 3 feet tall). His father looks at his friends and family eating and drinking on the terrace. All the adults know exactly what’s happening, the child’s mom confuses her eyes as she tries to both lock her eyes on her child’s ability to breathe and divert her vision to avoid what is still seen by many as a rite of passage.
Dad kneels and whispers something (hopefully positive) and then, like a captain baptizing a new ship with a bottle of champagne – shoves the kid into the ocean (pool). Screams. Panic. White water. Instincts, survival, tears. Hugs all around and the beginnings of a deep distrust for his fathers ulterior motives for the next 2-3 weeks. I’m not worried, there’ll be ice cream in store tonight.
I’m here to say I love swimming and I’m ready to dive head first like the Amazonians. There’s still a lot to be said about where I will be in 10 years, or in the next 2 weeks for that matters but the yields are dropping and the spreads are tightening.
All I can say is that despite the ozone hole, the undoubtedly impending disaster stemming from economics, religion, politics, greed or general maximum capacity I’m more excited to be alive today for all the possibilities that these sources of friction represent. Here’s a toast to my generation based on those few around me that I call my friends and who I know have the capacity, drive and intellect to overturn a problem – big or small – if only because more so than any other generation before us, we have the most to lose and the most to gain.
Salud.
Hurtling through a dank overheated and under ventilated channel like scurrying rats gives me a sense of thrill for no good reason. The person next to me is dressed in full suit – banker garb – that screams senses of power and influence.
I once talked about how I enjoyed walking around proper establishments blasting improper musical niceties from pre-packaged eccentricities called singers. Listening to the caramelized tones of Bocelli as il mare calmo starts rolling of his throat is soothing beyond believe. Brownian motion in my brain just calmly adapts to the pleasant acoustics and I let my arm loosely hang on to the ceiling bars. Cold-recycled air hitting the back of my neck and I’m trapped in an awkward embrace amidst strangers.
This is the end of a small beginning. 10 weeks were once my lifetime. Then they came to be an ever smaller fraction of my ever increasing life. I’m sitting at a desk feeling just as hungry as I felt 2 and half months ago and, I hope, infinitely more prepared to begin taking the world by storm.
Standing at the brink of an interesting new world I write more like a preacher today than I do most days. Memories of Mexican style swimming classes come to mind: a father, hopeful and ecstatic at having a child walks the 5 or 6 year old tike to the edge of the deep end. The tiny little hand grabs his fathers harder and harder as the ominous dark blue seems to grow infinite deeper (Jacuzzis tend to look like Mariana when you’re 3 feet tall). His father looks at his friends and family eating and drinking on the terrace. All the adults know exactly what’s happening, the child’s mom confuses her eyes as she tries to both lock her eyes on her child’s ability to breathe and divert her vision to avoid what is still seen by many as a rite of passage.
Dad kneels and whispers something (hopefully positive) and then, like a captain baptizing a new ship with a bottle of champagne – shoves the kid into the ocean (pool). Screams. Panic. White water. Instincts, survival, tears. Hugs all around and the beginnings of a deep distrust for his fathers ulterior motives for the next 2-3 weeks. I’m not worried, there’ll be ice cream in store tonight.
I’m here to say I love swimming and I’m ready to dive head first like the Amazonians. There’s still a lot to be said about where I will be in 10 years, or in the next 2 weeks for that matters but the yields are dropping and the spreads are tightening.
All I can say is that despite the ozone hole, the undoubtedly impending disaster stemming from economics, religion, politics, greed or general maximum capacity I’m more excited to be alive today for all the possibilities that these sources of friction represent. Here’s a toast to my generation based on those few around me that I call my friends and who I know have the capacity, drive and intellect to overturn a problem – big or small – if only because more so than any other generation before us, we have the most to lose and the most to gain.
Salud.
Thursday, August 5, 2010
Ballet
Wake up. Lunch.
Uniform on – black pleated pants, white shirt and combat boots shined black to disguise them as dress shoes.
Check-in. It’s 12:30pm.
Open door, wave hand out – an invitation to step outside into the brave new world.
“Hello! Welcome to…”
“Don’t scratch the paint! I left it on park! It doesn’t like the sun! Let’s go babe!”
“Of course Sir! My pleasure (pee my pants with it actually)!
Tool.
Again.
“Hello! Welcome to…”
“Hi, just want to be sure. Tips are optional right?”
“Of course! (So is paying taxes and being a good human being!)
Cheap.
Again. Sell the smile this time.
“Hi, hello! Welcome to…”
“…the worst night of my life and would you believe it, she asked to come back?”
“Uh, sir?”
“Keep it here, I’m only running in”
Of course! I love blocking the entrance at my workplace.
Dinner service – here come the big bucks.
“Good evening! And Welcome to…”
“…”
“(Incomprehensible gurgle)”
Wow. She. Was. Beautiful.
Come on now, final ticket.
“Good evening! Welcome to…”
“Hey buddy, do you need reservations for this joint?”
“Yes!”(The owner likes to think of the place as more of a “tapas bar” but joint will work)
Aaaaaand here they come.
Quietly hands me the slip.
“Have a good night sir!”
Check out. 330am.
Dinner. Get in bed.
Uniform is still on.
Uniform on – black pleated pants, white shirt and combat boots shined black to disguise them as dress shoes.
Check-in. It’s 12:30pm.
Open door, wave hand out – an invitation to step outside into the brave new world.
“Hello! Welcome to…”
“Don’t scratch the paint! I left it on park! It doesn’t like the sun! Let’s go babe!”
“Of course Sir! My pleasure (pee my pants with it actually)!
Tool.
Again.
“Hello! Welcome to…”
“Hi, just want to be sure. Tips are optional right?”
“Of course! (So is paying taxes and being a good human being!)
Cheap.
Again. Sell the smile this time.
“Hi, hello! Welcome to…”
“…the worst night of my life and would you believe it, she asked to come back?”
“Uh, sir?”
“Keep it here, I’m only running in”
Of course! I love blocking the entrance at my workplace.
Dinner service – here come the big bucks.
“Good evening! And Welcome to…”
“…”
“(Incomprehensible gurgle)”
Wow. She. Was. Beautiful.
Come on now, final ticket.
“Good evening! Welcome to…”
“Hey buddy, do you need reservations for this joint?”
“Yes!”(The owner likes to think of the place as more of a “tapas bar” but joint will work)
Aaaaaand here they come.
Quietly hands me the slip.
“Have a good night sir!”
Check out. 330am.
Dinner. Get in bed.
Uniform is still on.
Tuesday, July 20, 2010
Acustica
I've never written a song though I imagine the experience is about as cathartic as reaching the fourth act of a greek tragedy. Hubris gone there's only passion and witty speech left to enlighten the reader (listener) as to the complicated details going on, not in the characters' mind but on the writer's tribulations.
Standing here wishing this musical musings would drive pen to pentagram and drive a chromatic scale to new unmet bounds of glory. But wishing does as little for music as squishing an ant does for cleaning my room. Remember it's a butterfly that's important.
I'd write a song to my peeps. The ones made of human flesh and not confectionary sugar meant to fulfill a tiny desire locked away deep in our frontal lobe. It wouldn't be an indie version of things with one stanza of ambiguous lyrics and an abstract word like "coldness-city" or "peaceful-ighty" to be repeated constantly throughout.
I'd model my song after the greats attempting to cover a lifespan of a story in a few choice words crammed into tiny lines meant to fit into the little squares of printed paper inside a CD. A song written not for glory or riches but for guts and soul.
Choosing the genre would be difficult and so I would probably opt for a mash-up. The type that mixes happy go lucky songs with sentimental heart-throbs of decades past and a sprinkling of thug-thumping hip-hop born and raised in streets where warriors wear Air Jordans and hope to god they make it home before their light goes out.
Eyelids closed.
The song you play on repeat for days at a time and you skip through all the other tracks on the cd. The song you and all your (my) friends nod and smile to on road trips. Constantly played at the end of nights out and memorializing your wedding I hopefully toasted and playing in the background of your musical life.
My friends. It's as simple as Do. Re. Mi.
Standing here wishing this musical musings would drive pen to pentagram and drive a chromatic scale to new unmet bounds of glory. But wishing does as little for music as squishing an ant does for cleaning my room. Remember it's a butterfly that's important.
I'd write a song to my peeps. The ones made of human flesh and not confectionary sugar meant to fulfill a tiny desire locked away deep in our frontal lobe. It wouldn't be an indie version of things with one stanza of ambiguous lyrics and an abstract word like "coldness-city" or "peaceful-ighty" to be repeated constantly throughout.
I'd model my song after the greats attempting to cover a lifespan of a story in a few choice words crammed into tiny lines meant to fit into the little squares of printed paper inside a CD. A song written not for glory or riches but for guts and soul.
Choosing the genre would be difficult and so I would probably opt for a mash-up. The type that mixes happy go lucky songs with sentimental heart-throbs of decades past and a sprinkling of thug-thumping hip-hop born and raised in streets where warriors wear Air Jordans and hope to god they make it home before their light goes out.
Eyelids closed.
The song you play on repeat for days at a time and you skip through all the other tracks on the cd. The song you and all your (my) friends nod and smile to on road trips. Constantly played at the end of nights out and memorializing your wedding I hopefully toasted and playing in the background of your musical life.
My friends. It's as simple as Do. Re. Mi.
Monday, July 19, 2010
Craving.
I sometimes crave things like chocolate and pickles. As often as not the cravings come separately and at least a week apart from each other. Sometimes I crave for singing birds, golden rings and the salty sea breeze feeling of being under a palm roof.
I've craved a hug received for a while now. The type where you can pull your arms in, tuck your head between your shoulders and fall into it. For some reason I have images of a mechanical hand closing in for the hug, me standing in the middle of it all calmly taking in the whirring noises as I get my hug. It's safer to think that the analog controls within the machine couldn't possibly turn on me like a swarm of hornets or an angry person.
A wiser man than me told me he was always looking for something new. He's been looking for what I think is 40 years but what very well may be 50 or 29 - this business we've gone into has a glory or guts attitude towards aging.
A new voice. A new beat. A new garage band feel that reminisces with the 80s, embraces the modern chemical nature of cooking but also remembers what a mixed tape feels like.
Not the plastic casing or the crackling in the first few second where you cleared your throat for a dedication and the proceeded to stumble across something wrought in care.
2 sides, maybe 12 songs, vinyl scratching in the background.
See, what worries me is that I spent too long on that mix tape and then forget why I started it. Or wonder why the mix tape has to be one and I can't hold a conversation instead that transmits the thoughts running all over my head. Borrow all that bottled glory.
Maybe I should just talk. Maybe I should write down my thoughts and attempt an explanation that doesn't sound like an excuse. But all I want to do is start afresh with the memories that brought brilliance to the past. One full of late nights, tortellini and graceful dancing to middle school dancing.
I miss the "at home" feeling of wooden spoons, simmering pots and morning, freshly brewed coffee.
I've craved a hug received for a while now. The type where you can pull your arms in, tuck your head between your shoulders and fall into it. For some reason I have images of a mechanical hand closing in for the hug, me standing in the middle of it all calmly taking in the whirring noises as I get my hug. It's safer to think that the analog controls within the machine couldn't possibly turn on me like a swarm of hornets or an angry person.
A wiser man than me told me he was always looking for something new. He's been looking for what I think is 40 years but what very well may be 50 or 29 - this business we've gone into has a glory or guts attitude towards aging.
A new voice. A new beat. A new garage band feel that reminisces with the 80s, embraces the modern chemical nature of cooking but also remembers what a mixed tape feels like.
Not the plastic casing or the crackling in the first few second where you cleared your throat for a dedication and the proceeded to stumble across something wrought in care.
2 sides, maybe 12 songs, vinyl scratching in the background.
See, what worries me is that I spent too long on that mix tape and then forget why I started it. Or wonder why the mix tape has to be one and I can't hold a conversation instead that transmits the thoughts running all over my head. Borrow all that bottled glory.
Maybe I should just talk. Maybe I should write down my thoughts and attempt an explanation that doesn't sound like an excuse. But all I want to do is start afresh with the memories that brought brilliance to the past. One full of late nights, tortellini and graceful dancing to middle school dancing.
I miss the "at home" feeling of wooden spoons, simmering pots and morning, freshly brewed coffee.
Sunday, July 18, 2010
9:48
An interesting thought in audiovisual sensory overload reminded me of a new cult-classic in the making. One less involved with faux leather overcoats and more involved in an eclectic mix of waking life, eternal sunshine and the time traveler's wife.
2+2=5
Funny how traders are fond of saying that 1+1=1/2
Like all things, it was/is all relative. A walk down the block in humid, thick as amazonian air, heat feels like a mile ran alongside a chilly schuykil night.
I'm no longer a part of philly. Or as much a part as I could ever have been without having been born there or lived a particularly large portion of my life there. Though proportionally it'll come to roughly 20% if I ignore the next 50 years.
I wish we could aggregate years in number to something being more like years experienced rather than years lived. That we could tell people we were a certain age and everything else would fall into context.
tbc....
2+2=5
Funny how traders are fond of saying that 1+1=1/2
Like all things, it was/is all relative. A walk down the block in humid, thick as amazonian air, heat feels like a mile ran alongside a chilly schuykil night.
I'm no longer a part of philly. Or as much a part as I could ever have been without having been born there or lived a particularly large portion of my life there. Though proportionally it'll come to roughly 20% if I ignore the next 50 years.
I wish we could aggregate years in number to something being more like years experienced rather than years lived. That we could tell people we were a certain age and everything else would fall into context.
tbc....
Truth is complicated.
But truth is golden.
And this weekend wasn't one that started with the end of a week. It started on a Thursday with a presage of better things to come or of worse things past. Either way it was an allowance, a permission for excess and revelry involving beach-sipped crowns and limes. Lobster, steak and ragu.
Some french tunes thrown in by the 60 year olds in the crowd that rang particularly well with my old bones and august soul.
And on Friday I worked on a model, not the photographed kind but one equally elegant and complicated in the insightful righteousness of their eyes (i's).
And I've thought of filial connections a lot as of late. I once contributed to a piece of collective thought called brosperity. The almost too-collegiate-for-writing word inspires in me a feeling of home and success, the idea that behind the frattiness and ice and tanks and boat shoes lies a stronger connection that is always tangible if only rarely visible. Vineyard vines tie stronger bonds than the knots on a 25 foot skiv.
Bro. Bros.
Term does not only apply to guys. It has a broader context that allows it to refer to anything, friend, best friend, co-worker, cousin.
I met a lot of them this weekend and even though my night ended before Jimmy appeared in the picture, Timmy did make a solid A.
A bottle of russia sneakily hid in the scoops bag (Tostito's of course) and failed to surprise its target who instead calmly reached for it, failed to adopt the one knee stance and instead popped the cap and sipped happily.
Jose also made friends that night, even after a couple of Maggie's on the rock and an insufferably hot spell on Mexico's rooftop we hid in the dungeon-like coolness of the first floor of my home.
The truth is that familiar settings like this are rare and far between. Throughout the years the bros around me (of all flavors) have followed a sinusoidal wave of closeness. Never farther than one but only touching at one brief instant near zero. And though I find myself finding a y=0 equation, or nearly so, I find other experimenting with the scatter plot around me.
Some follow a tri-asymptotic curve I didn't know it was possible.
For now Ill revel in those I still have and consider to be a part of my filial family in a country that keeps my two different life's apart.
Adios.
And this weekend wasn't one that started with the end of a week. It started on a Thursday with a presage of better things to come or of worse things past. Either way it was an allowance, a permission for excess and revelry involving beach-sipped crowns and limes. Lobster, steak and ragu.
Some french tunes thrown in by the 60 year olds in the crowd that rang particularly well with my old bones and august soul.
And on Friday I worked on a model, not the photographed kind but one equally elegant and complicated in the insightful righteousness of their eyes (i's).
And I've thought of filial connections a lot as of late. I once contributed to a piece of collective thought called brosperity. The almost too-collegiate-for-writing word inspires in me a feeling of home and success, the idea that behind the frattiness and ice and tanks and boat shoes lies a stronger connection that is always tangible if only rarely visible. Vineyard vines tie stronger bonds than the knots on a 25 foot skiv.
Bro. Bros.
Term does not only apply to guys. It has a broader context that allows it to refer to anything, friend, best friend, co-worker, cousin.
I met a lot of them this weekend and even though my night ended before Jimmy appeared in the picture, Timmy did make a solid A.
A bottle of russia sneakily hid in the scoops bag (Tostito's of course) and failed to surprise its target who instead calmly reached for it, failed to adopt the one knee stance and instead popped the cap and sipped happily.
Jose also made friends that night, even after a couple of Maggie's on the rock and an insufferably hot spell on Mexico's rooftop we hid in the dungeon-like coolness of the first floor of my home.
The truth is that familiar settings like this are rare and far between. Throughout the years the bros around me (of all flavors) have followed a sinusoidal wave of closeness. Never farther than one but only touching at one brief instant near zero. And though I find myself finding a y=0 equation, or nearly so, I find other experimenting with the scatter plot around me.
Some follow a tri-asymptotic curve I didn't know it was possible.
For now Ill revel in those I still have and consider to be a part of my filial family in a country that keeps my two different life's apart.
Adios.
Thursday, July 15, 2010
The subject line matters
Often as an afterthought I let my fingers float above the keyboard in a half second that is comparable only to the moments leading to the release of a jump ball as a basketball game starts.
I read a new source today that spoke of character development and theories. A move from sometimes angry feminist literature to a maturity of a character willing to tackle everything from sex to broad political hot topics. The kind that a certain Cajun talks about and not the middle America mall outlet with ironic people who claim they feel the pain that their retail experience inflict upon their undying soul.
I'm just saying.
I'm saying that today was a sunny day with a variety of sports and seashells and glass types and sizes. A nice 20something incited me to jump into a pool fully clothed with the ever effective technique of chanting a name repeatedly until it becomes one big mush of magical incantations. Abracadabra was definitely a sentence before it degraded into what it is today. It was probably a result of the need to hide one's magical self and mutter it under one's breath.
The inquisition burned practitioners of magic - or those accused of it. The government attacked communists for a time - or those accused of it.
One of them even worked in a capitalistic machine.
Im charged with energy after an exhausting day. A feeling I'm sure my pillow could smother and one that will eerily escape me tomorrow the moment I hit the midday wall.
So for now, and in Ricky Bobby style, Clam and BAKE.
I read a new source today that spoke of character development and theories. A move from sometimes angry feminist literature to a maturity of a character willing to tackle everything from sex to broad political hot topics. The kind that a certain Cajun talks about and not the middle America mall outlet with ironic people who claim they feel the pain that their retail experience inflict upon their undying soul.
I'm just saying.
I'm saying that today was a sunny day with a variety of sports and seashells and glass types and sizes. A nice 20something incited me to jump into a pool fully clothed with the ever effective technique of chanting a name repeatedly until it becomes one big mush of magical incantations. Abracadabra was definitely a sentence before it degraded into what it is today. It was probably a result of the need to hide one's magical self and mutter it under one's breath.
The inquisition burned practitioners of magic - or those accused of it. The government attacked communists for a time - or those accused of it.
One of them even worked in a capitalistic machine.
Im charged with energy after an exhausting day. A feeling I'm sure my pillow could smother and one that will eerily escape me tomorrow the moment I hit the midday wall.
So for now, and in Ricky Bobby style, Clam and BAKE.
Monday, June 28, 2010
Shuffle
The truffle one. Or the cupid one? Maybe it's just Jobs' thing.
Today at work I realized that I'm the kind of guy that thinks that every time a pretty person laughs angels get their wings.
And that process is magical and painless and there's not gut-wrenching noise of muscle, bone and skin tearing out of their shoulder blades and stretching out in one satisfying creak.
I'm the kind of guy who thinks every time a corny line is used and meant on a girl, we add value to our race.
I saw relatives all over the place this weekend, from my brother Jimmy to her sister Billy.
I saw one of my favorite bros and met a couple of his relatives.
I mean relatives in the most loose adaptation of the word. Relatives are those we get to pick if we're lucky. They are the friends - bros, GIRLfriend! (screamed in a high pitch squeal), friends and best friends - we surround ourselves we. Life throws a countless number of people in front of us everyday and we get to click with personalities.
Strangely nice ones in the subway who want to tell us nothing more than their life lessons and how we should conduct our life's from here on out. Her name was Ashley and she told us to do something between college and the real world - like teach in France. Her friend Alix (pictured in the same frame here) was proof enough that it was worthwhile. She then commented on a perfectly matched height situation and yelped FRIENDS!
One or two or three of them might be your friends friends. A good enough standard by which to measure most enough yields the discovery of great friends. And then they fight about how good oreos are and they offer kit-kats with devilish grins on their faces because they hope you'll say no because all they really want is to enjoy the chocolatey/caremely/cookiesh goodness of the candy bar.
One of them will tell you she really likes her shirt because it's like she's naked.
And the bonding continues over a multi-colored fish bowl of happiness that stands as a stark contrast to the army of black-cloth-clad youngsters lining up around the block for a Japanese artist who may or may not be the next big thing. Only in NY.
Meet friends and have a pickle.
A fried pickle.
Frickles.
Today at work I realized that I'm the kind of guy that thinks that every time a pretty person laughs angels get their wings.
And that process is magical and painless and there's not gut-wrenching noise of muscle, bone and skin tearing out of their shoulder blades and stretching out in one satisfying creak.
I'm the kind of guy who thinks every time a corny line is used and meant on a girl, we add value to our race.
I saw relatives all over the place this weekend, from my brother Jimmy to her sister Billy.
I saw one of my favorite bros and met a couple of his relatives.
I mean relatives in the most loose adaptation of the word. Relatives are those we get to pick if we're lucky. They are the friends - bros, GIRLfriend! (screamed in a high pitch squeal), friends and best friends - we surround ourselves we. Life throws a countless number of people in front of us everyday and we get to click with personalities.
Strangely nice ones in the subway who want to tell us nothing more than their life lessons and how we should conduct our life's from here on out. Her name was Ashley and she told us to do something between college and the real world - like teach in France. Her friend Alix (pictured in the same frame here) was proof enough that it was worthwhile. She then commented on a perfectly matched height situation and yelped FRIENDS!
One or two or three of them might be your friends friends. A good enough standard by which to measure most enough yields the discovery of great friends. And then they fight about how good oreos are and they offer kit-kats with devilish grins on their faces because they hope you'll say no because all they really want is to enjoy the chocolatey/caremely/cookiesh goodness of the candy bar.
One of them will tell you she really likes her shirt because it's like she's naked.
And the bonding continues over a multi-colored fish bowl of happiness that stands as a stark contrast to the army of black-cloth-clad youngsters lining up around the block for a Japanese artist who may or may not be the next big thing. Only in NY.
Meet friends and have a pickle.
A fried pickle.
Frickles.
Tuesday, June 22, 2010
Remember sunlight?
It comes from the windows brightly shining in the dark.
It's in a basket and in the form of two alkaline batteries powering a flashlight.
It's in the middle of a battlefield and it flickers eerily every other beat. The other beat is the rat-tat-tat of a gat.
According to a certain man's band it's in the smile of a pretty girl.
As of late I've thrown myself, like I've done some times before, head first into waters unknown. Head first, arms holding my sides and nose and my feet pointed - low profile. Or low key as some west coasters would be inclined to say. But it's different know because someone is swimming already.
I've been delving in this coward old world (if only to make a play on a well known piece of literature).
The nice man at the Chockful'o'nuts knows that when I walk in I'll have a large, skim, 2 splenda french vanilla latte...and a red bull. And today I discovered a secret recipe behind the energizer bunny's brilliant drumming: a drink, one part coffee and three parts coke zero. Saying it's a rush of caffeine to the head would barely do it justice. Saying it makes me the life of the party, the shadow-caster in the room (a positive no matter how negative it sounds) or the big kahuna - would be an understatement. I made two new friends this way - their eyes equally wired in a similar stasis of sugar and raw, FDA approved POWER.
But enough about the fast pace of the week and more of the gentle lapping of the east river.
Picture a suburban town with an urban feel and a hipster vibe. The major of the town wear skinny jeans, pointy shoes, wears a fedora and carries an old SRL leica. His clothes are vintage.
And then there's a stage awkwardly placed so that you face the conundrum: stage or view? Because behind you, quite quite quietly, like a cobra before striking, stands New York - boldly proud. Rand would have been proud. In front are 4 men sporting various degree of facial hair reminiscing about equine ways.
The choice is simple, go with the beard.
It's in a basket and in the form of two alkaline batteries powering a flashlight.
It's in the middle of a battlefield and it flickers eerily every other beat. The other beat is the rat-tat-tat of a gat.
According to a certain man's band it's in the smile of a pretty girl.
As of late I've thrown myself, like I've done some times before, head first into waters unknown. Head first, arms holding my sides and nose and my feet pointed - low profile. Or low key as some west coasters would be inclined to say. But it's different know because someone is swimming already.
I've been delving in this coward old world (if only to make a play on a well known piece of literature).
The nice man at the Chockful'o'nuts knows that when I walk in I'll have a large, skim, 2 splenda french vanilla latte...and a red bull. And today I discovered a secret recipe behind the energizer bunny's brilliant drumming: a drink, one part coffee and three parts coke zero. Saying it's a rush of caffeine to the head would barely do it justice. Saying it makes me the life of the party, the shadow-caster in the room (a positive no matter how negative it sounds) or the big kahuna - would be an understatement. I made two new friends this way - their eyes equally wired in a similar stasis of sugar and raw, FDA approved POWER.
But enough about the fast pace of the week and more of the gentle lapping of the east river.
Picture a suburban town with an urban feel and a hipster vibe. The major of the town wear skinny jeans, pointy shoes, wears a fedora and carries an old SRL leica. His clothes are vintage.
And then there's a stage awkwardly placed so that you face the conundrum: stage or view? Because behind you, quite quite quietly, like a cobra before striking, stands New York - boldly proud. Rand would have been proud. In front are 4 men sporting various degree of facial hair reminiscing about equine ways.
The choice is simple, go with the beard.
Tuesday, June 15, 2010
Visibility
Hundreds of people breeze past the sad duo every day. They both sport the prerequisite bright green shirt with company logo and carry a clipboard or a binder in a death grip that makes you wonder how much they are charged if they ever lose it. ***Note to self: interesting career choice. Snatcher of binders from the street solicitors.*** I wonder how many people they actually touch with the meaning[fu(l)]ness of their message.
Hi do you have some time today for [Insert Reasonable cause like saving Baby Whales or Protecting the Ecosystem of the blue footed armadillo in the Mississippi Delta as a result of the spill]?
Yes! Thank you! I often stroll the streets hoping to pass the time with perfect strangers in an engaged conversation neither of us want to have. I'm so glad there's always two of you and you face opposite directions of the street so you don't have to miss people like me! Yes I was reading about the family news in my email on my blackberry but psha! that can be saved for later.
There are very few times when I find myself at the right place and time - whenever I find "them" I know it'll be a good day.
I wonder how the delivery men who bring my food nearly daily now get by speaking such rudimentary english. Then again, I wonder how they got a work visa and how uncomfortable that interview must have been with the official.
Name? Blank (stare). Purpose of request? The applicants eyes quietly but expressively reflect a deep desire to make Food Delivery Systems that will blow the minds out of the average Domino's technician who tracks your pie from creation, to baking, to en-route, to in-yo-face. Do you have a job here? Giggles. A sigh, I'm not sure from who, and a stamp later and he's on the pursuit of happiness.
-"Hi...Delivery...Food...Here?"
-Thanks. I'll be right down."
Monday, June 14, 2010
Elevator Music
I had a man in combat boots, soviet issue army fatigues and white bandana offer me 40 dollars in the elevator if I could name the actor, winner of two Obie awards, born today some time ago.
I said I couldn't, not even for a hundred dollars. The rain maker in me considered a Monte Carlo approximation to it figuring out how many name combinations I could spew in the time the elevator travelled from the fourteenth floor to the third floor laundry room. The exercise was futile. Instead I went with the awkward nodding of the head as I muttered something lacking in words in an attempt to convey NO.
A banker today showed me what it's like to be boss. Not in the Hugo Boss kind of way. Not in the "Olivia! Fetch my coat and hat - I'm due at the Waldorf in 10 minutes" way. In the nerdy kind of I've done this particular lecture enough times to know what you will ask, how you will ask and when you will ask it. He also showed prodigal skill at hot key shortcuts.
In a matter of seconds he formatted and linked and hyperlinked things on screen without taking his eyes off of his audience in a quiet, passive challenge.
BRING IT.
I suppose this is how people in the real world. Wake up in the morning, go play with hundreds of millions of dollars and notional amounts of trillions and then go home and grill (for) the kids.
And now I get to spend afternoons dissecting seconds and interpreting verses written 10,20,50 years ago. The building I'm standing on has a shell that's ancient but an inside that hollow and sparse but the window outside looks at my second home - lit up for the night.
Often I travel so far away from the two little blocks I know as home to enjoy a taste of the tobacco continent only to hopscotch to a city of soup (Alphabet please) and then non-chalantly stroll through a village (or two if you walk for long enough. A place where you can run into friendly were-once's and sit on a stage while eating brunch. The elevated platform just enough to comfortably allow for one's imagination to fit in an idea that we are VIP.
And at the end of the day I get New York the way I liked it best.
Dark, gloomy and rainy while it holds my hand.
I said I couldn't, not even for a hundred dollars. The rain maker in me considered a Monte Carlo approximation to it figuring out how many name combinations I could spew in the time the elevator travelled from the fourteenth floor to the third floor laundry room. The exercise was futile. Instead I went with the awkward nodding of the head as I muttered something lacking in words in an attempt to convey NO.
A banker today showed me what it's like to be boss. Not in the Hugo Boss kind of way. Not in the "Olivia! Fetch my coat and hat - I'm due at the Waldorf in 10 minutes" way. In the nerdy kind of I've done this particular lecture enough times to know what you will ask, how you will ask and when you will ask it. He also showed prodigal skill at hot key shortcuts.
In a matter of seconds he formatted and linked and hyperlinked things on screen without taking his eyes off of his audience in a quiet, passive challenge.
BRING IT.
I suppose this is how people in the real world. Wake up in the morning, go play with hundreds of millions of dollars and notional amounts of trillions and then go home and grill (for) the kids.
And now I get to spend afternoons dissecting seconds and interpreting verses written 10,20,50 years ago. The building I'm standing on has a shell that's ancient but an inside that hollow and sparse but the window outside looks at my second home - lit up for the night.
Often I travel so far away from the two little blocks I know as home to enjoy a taste of the tobacco continent only to hopscotch to a city of soup (Alphabet please) and then non-chalantly stroll through a village (or two if you walk for long enough. A place where you can run into friendly were-once's and sit on a stage while eating brunch. The elevated platform just enough to comfortably allow for one's imagination to fit in an idea that we are VIP.
And at the end of the day I get New York the way I liked it best.
Dark, gloomy and rainy while it holds my hand.
Tuesday, June 8, 2010
Pigeons
I'm allergic to them but I'd use them in a pinch if I had to send a message.
In so many ways the advent of the text message and the bbm and the email have allowed me to express myself best - though I rather enjoy the conversation I end up having with friends and friendly strangers.
But those who know me know that I've never been a fan of speaking on the phone. The cold feeling of plastic pressed up against my ear or barking at a loud speaker sized conversation have never appealed to me. Skyping is barely tolerable and most my conversations are quick splinter cell operations:
Hi! How are you? Stated purpose of phone call. Ciao!
But as of late I find myself hoping to call. Hoping to get a call and hear the angsty screams of Caleb drive me to the phone.
What's worse? From the moment the sometimes bad connection based on poor reception in the new york subway allows me a breath of voice I smile.
And then I find myself speaking. No... Talking. On the phone. And as I walk past other people I'm not the Wall Street type clearly angry both at the phone and the entity behind it. I'm enjoying a conversation with a person and I get to laugh and be silly like I usually do when I'm in person.
I like 215.
In so many ways the advent of the text message and the bbm and the email have allowed me to express myself best - though I rather enjoy the conversation I end up having with friends and friendly strangers.
But those who know me know that I've never been a fan of speaking on the phone. The cold feeling of plastic pressed up against my ear or barking at a loud speaker sized conversation have never appealed to me. Skyping is barely tolerable and most my conversations are quick splinter cell operations:
Hi! How are you? Stated purpose of phone call. Ciao!
But as of late I find myself hoping to call. Hoping to get a call and hear the angsty screams of Caleb drive me to the phone.
What's worse? From the moment the sometimes bad connection based on poor reception in the new york subway allows me a breath of voice I smile.
And then I find myself speaking. No... Talking. On the phone. And as I walk past other people I'm not the Wall Street type clearly angry both at the phone and the entity behind it. I'm enjoying a conversation with a person and I get to laugh and be silly like I usually do when I'm in person.
I like 215.
Sunday, June 6, 2010
Jitters
Jeepers creepers
Goosebumps
Translated from Spanish: chicken skin
And then there's the heebiejeebies
I imagine a chilly breath of I don't know what that makes me arch my back - cat-like.
The soft graze of a hand on my chest or an arm lazily draped around your shoulder.
Everywhere you look in this city is anything you could ever want.
One moment I have a portobello mushroom stuffed with fresh provolone and toasted to perfection exploding at first bite and the next one I have a nice gentleman dressed in a button down and slacks threatening to urinate on my face. Yes! Hello! And Thank you VERY much!
And then there's the helpless family of 5 with all three children safely tethered to the mothership and a confused father, fanny pack and all looking at a MAP completely bewildered by the brightly colored metro lines. The problem is he's never heard the words courier bag and man used in a sentence that heightens the sexuality of the male. He needs to make it in the big town for that.
We sat at a place - McSorley's - where the sawdust on the ground, the gray vested all-male employees and the track broadcasting on the TV indicated that this wasn't a place for music. Two drinks offered: light or dark. No more questions asked although their specialty in fare is crackers with mustard. I wish that last part was a joke.
The place reeks of musty humidor and foam and history. And you meet strangers who either shyly or proudly tell you they work for the machine (a bank) or joyously tell you they've been flying regional jets since age 18. They have a family back home and enjoy conquering their fear of heights by controlling a flying tube. There was a nice man from Long Island with a compelling story of the Mexican Chrysler General Manager asking him to fly down to Mexico with a gift of canned peanuts. He was very eager and would constantly lie flat across the table in order to introduce himself and the rest of his adoptive entourage if only briefly and quite drunkenly.
His wife later dragged him to a show.
And when you're ready to wrap up and get either a late night dinner or go trolling around the town you close your tab with Scott (great man who refers to his customers in a loving voice as - F****ers). One look and then.
I'll bring you one more round so you finish at an even 100.
Goosebumps
Translated from Spanish: chicken skin
And then there's the heebiejeebies
I imagine a chilly breath of I don't know what that makes me arch my back - cat-like.
The soft graze of a hand on my chest or an arm lazily draped around your shoulder.
Everywhere you look in this city is anything you could ever want.
One moment I have a portobello mushroom stuffed with fresh provolone and toasted to perfection exploding at first bite and the next one I have a nice gentleman dressed in a button down and slacks threatening to urinate on my face. Yes! Hello! And Thank you VERY much!
And then there's the helpless family of 5 with all three children safely tethered to the mothership and a confused father, fanny pack and all looking at a MAP completely bewildered by the brightly colored metro lines. The problem is he's never heard the words courier bag and man used in a sentence that heightens the sexuality of the male. He needs to make it in the big town for that.
We sat at a place - McSorley's - where the sawdust on the ground, the gray vested all-male employees and the track broadcasting on the TV indicated that this wasn't a place for music. Two drinks offered: light or dark. No more questions asked although their specialty in fare is crackers with mustard. I wish that last part was a joke.
The place reeks of musty humidor and foam and history. And you meet strangers who either shyly or proudly tell you they work for the machine (a bank) or joyously tell you they've been flying regional jets since age 18. They have a family back home and enjoy conquering their fear of heights by controlling a flying tube. There was a nice man from Long Island with a compelling story of the Mexican Chrysler General Manager asking him to fly down to Mexico with a gift of canned peanuts. He was very eager and would constantly lie flat across the table in order to introduce himself and the rest of his adoptive entourage if only briefly and quite drunkenly.
His wife later dragged him to a show.
And when you're ready to wrap up and get either a late night dinner or go trolling around the town you close your tab with Scott (great man who refers to his customers in a loving voice as - F****ers). One look and then.
I'll bring you one more round so you finish at an even 100.
Friday, June 4, 2010
Suburbia, USA
Cities are built differently in every country.
Sometimes public transportation has to pass through the wealthy neighborhoods to allow for the "help" to come in in the morning. In some cases, public transportation is kept away from the rich neighborhoods lest it be too easy for the mob to invade the small castles built on their foundation.
People can't wait to live in the city and experience all the excitement. Up to a point. Then you get a house out in the country and mock the hicks mercilessly as you realize you also enjoy Friday nights filled with PBR and dip.
In Some Cases WE FAIL to understand WHY it iS thaT we crave living in a shoebox.
Or read in mild shock about Hoovervilles - the cardboard cities that are all pervasive in the third world. I know my government hides them by planting tall and meager trees to prevent drivers from appreciating the magical delight they represent. Engineers and architects could attempt to build such tittering structures safely and they wouldn't be able to match the ingenuity and creativity of master builders.
It's cardboard and mortar and tin and sheets of plastic. It's city planning where city is a substitute for destitute and planning is in place of living.
The streets are dirt - packed hard by hundred of feet and pickup trucks (the kind that carry 20 people in the back for 5 pesos a head). The government has spewed patches of pavement here and there.
Those are my suburbs.
Suburbia existed inside the city and behind high, electrified fences. They'd have security guards and outposts so as to better simulate the sense that we lived in a safe first world country - if only for an isle.
Except here instead of a melodrama based around murder and desperate moms we have the very real force of green. And no. We don't recycle.
Swat style and armed to the teeth with 20 year old Kalishnikovs that jam in the middle of the night the army rushes into one of the house on any given day with the hopes of arresting the ultimate businessman. 9 out of 10 they won't get the right guy or the right house will be empty having been alerted.
The largest industry in Mexico has powerful businessmen with families and vested interest in protecting their little slices of heaven.
Now that we have LV and Cartier in Mexico - they don't even need the visa.
Sometimes public transportation has to pass through the wealthy neighborhoods to allow for the "help" to come in in the morning. In some cases, public transportation is kept away from the rich neighborhoods lest it be too easy for the mob to invade the small castles built on their foundation.
People can't wait to live in the city and experience all the excitement. Up to a point. Then you get a house out in the country and mock the hicks mercilessly as you realize you also enjoy Friday nights filled with PBR and dip.
In Some Cases WE FAIL to understand WHY it iS thaT we crave living in a shoebox.
Or read in mild shock about Hoovervilles - the cardboard cities that are all pervasive in the third world. I know my government hides them by planting tall and meager trees to prevent drivers from appreciating the magical delight they represent. Engineers and architects could attempt to build such tittering structures safely and they wouldn't be able to match the ingenuity and creativity of master builders.
It's cardboard and mortar and tin and sheets of plastic. It's city planning where city is a substitute for destitute and planning is in place of living.
The streets are dirt - packed hard by hundred of feet and pickup trucks (the kind that carry 20 people in the back for 5 pesos a head). The government has spewed patches of pavement here and there.
Those are my suburbs.
Suburbia existed inside the city and behind high, electrified fences. They'd have security guards and outposts so as to better simulate the sense that we lived in a safe first world country - if only for an isle.
Except here instead of a melodrama based around murder and desperate moms we have the very real force of green. And no. We don't recycle.
Swat style and armed to the teeth with 20 year old Kalishnikovs that jam in the middle of the night the army rushes into one of the house on any given day with the hopes of arresting the ultimate businessman. 9 out of 10 they won't get the right guy or the right house will be empty having been alerted.
The largest industry in Mexico has powerful businessmen with families and vested interest in protecting their little slices of heaven.
Now that we have LV and Cartier in Mexico - they don't even need the visa.
Tuesday, June 1, 2010
Taco Tortilla Grill
It saddens to see my compatriots so downtrodden and lacking that general sprit de corps that characterized our nations in the younger political years where ideas were supported by weapons and impassioned speeches by half-educated pseudo-religious catholic priests with a penchant for women and something akin to honey mead.
We've named our cultural embassies whatever string of stereotypes we can fit onto a billboard. In some cases we've forgotten the idea of Mexican food and gone with the Mexican inspired salads, baby-sized burritos and something called "hard" tacos.
But this isn't a tirade against a particular brand of restaurant which I love which doesn't carry the namesake sauce.
This is about the cosmo part of cosmopolitan. It's about the tomato, lettuce, cucumber, onions, raisin, tofu and oil and vinegar mixed in the salad bowl I'm living in right now. Perhaps I should see it as my castle with a moat to keep outsiders funneling through the tunnels - drawbridges - in which they transport their wares from the outskirts.
I stand upon a hill, Murray's actually. But I'm caught next to a piece of flat metal triangles and place they call Grammercy.
I walked back from the 70s in a time traveling machine all they way down the 20s. Throughout it I saw flappers and pant suits that would have made American Dreams shed a tear of happiness. But I also saw hot little pencil skirts paired with running shoes and flipflops. A man wearing camo shorts with cowboy boot and a tank escorting a nice little emo girl with an obvious desire to become vampire.
In a building for a minute. Then a storm that lasts but 5 minutes. Then out again as you paddle your own little canoe into this curious stream where I'm learning how to set the rhythm. I don't like the swinging arms, burrowed brow and slight hunch of back that some of them sport. I don't have the swagger that some sport accompanied by track jackets, 3/4 basketball shorts and shinny Dwayne Wade's. The power walk characterizing the suits is intimidating but easily replicated - a sense of purpose without one. The leisurely tourist pace seems to taunt everyone behind them as they fly in concord formation.
The place around the corner is called the American Dream. Apparently it involves grimy windows and yellow artificial light.
TBC.
Incommunicado
and the uncertainty of guessing.
It would be great if I could reveal some insight into a city that for a very long time has held a place of awe and inspiration in my mind. My day was consumed by a trip uptown, a trek through a jungle from the East to the West (in what I'm sure will be seen by historians as my second expansionist movement), Zabar's and an expression of new york sparkle.
Seems to me that it would be fitting for me to write about berries and how to pluck, harvest and make into a sweet sweet tasting smoothies of communication.
Because I want to walk down Madison
Yelling into my phone
SELL! SELL YOU MORON WHAT DO I PAY YOU FOR!!!!!
Follower by a series of expletives
Like 3rd rater
Monkey
Arse
(All three of those for warm-up)
And run over an old lady
not bothering to excuse myself
f'get about it!
I am young and hip
and executive and associate
and analyst and a wannabe MD,VP
Hear me meow!
But rather than do that, I stand in a clinical white bathroom with a nice lady waiting outside the door. I imagine her ear is plastered to the door with a cup to amplify her hearing, ready to barge in swat-style with her stethoscope and rectal thermometer to accuse me of turning the water on.
And the truth is I'd rather whisper stories of my youth and hear thoughts often left unspoken but brought forth by request and giggle () about the silly things we might say.
LML
It would be great if I could reveal some insight into a city that for a very long time has held a place of awe and inspiration in my mind. My day was consumed by a trip uptown, a trek through a jungle from the East to the West (in what I'm sure will be seen by historians as my second expansionist movement), Zabar's and an expression of new york sparkle.
Seems to me that it would be fitting for me to write about berries and how to pluck, harvest and make into a sweet sweet tasting smoothies of communication.
Because I want to walk down Madison
Yelling into my phone
SELL! SELL YOU MORON WHAT DO I PAY YOU FOR!!!!!
Follower by a series of expletives
Like 3rd rater
Monkey
Arse
(All three of those for warm-up)
And run over an old lady
not bothering to excuse myself
f'get about it!
I am young and hip
and executive and associate
and analyst and a wannabe MD,VP
Hear me meow!
But rather than do that, I stand in a clinical white bathroom with a nice lady waiting outside the door. I imagine her ear is plastered to the door with a cup to amplify her hearing, ready to barge in swat-style with her stethoscope and rectal thermometer to accuse me of turning the water on.
And the truth is I'd rather whisper stories of my youth and hear thoughts often left unspoken but brought forth by request and giggle () about the silly things we might say.
LML
Saturday, May 29, 2010
101
Most religions on this green earth end in a somewhat similar tale - the idea that we leave our earthly bounds and provided we were decent human beings who never approved of genocide, stupidity or jay-walking we will go to a better place in the afterlife (or come back in a position > than the goose we were two lifes ago). The getting in through the pearly whites is a little more complicated, sometimes there's a saint, a boat with a man requiring the payment of two coins or a dragon guarding the entrance.
JC! Sup homie!
I would use the term "true understanding" in what is about to follow but that would be a paradoxical phrase to the idea of "faith". How can we, despite what Thaler and Sunstein might want us to believe about the predictability of irrationality, understand the irrational? Nash found patterns in the social movements of doves in the university courtyard - he understood them, but those movements weren't random. The moment we begin predicting the drunk stumbles of a half-crawling college students will be the day I ammend this thesis.
A grasp on the concept of "happily ever after" in religion and a true faith should allow us to grapple with death rather well. It would allow us to deal with ti in the same fashion as births, a terminally ill patient healing or a rock statue weeping. With celebration (and papal judges) where we'd hope for those around us to rejoice and celebrate and slap each other in the back at their good fortune.
I don't understand why'd we say losing someone. No. Someone has left and taken a part of you with them and that's why even the most methodical and precise analysis of religion falls through here. The bioethics committee my parents once ran would be proud at my vulcan approach to the final days.
When a person is in pain and the childhood solution - band-aids - is no longer sufficient, when the JV encouragement to "WALK IT OFF!" isn't likely and the doctors don't get to say - fortunately we caught this on time - it's the logical illogical that takes precedence.
But now the binary says 101 with a character of 5.
This isn't angry, it isn't sad. It's a confused mapping of ideas that circle around the idea of a lot of questioning beings.
I wonder what answer the agnostic, dyslexic, insomniac arrived at.
JC! Sup homie!
I would use the term "true understanding" in what is about to follow but that would be a paradoxical phrase to the idea of "faith". How can we, despite what Thaler and Sunstein might want us to believe about the predictability of irrationality, understand the irrational? Nash found patterns in the social movements of doves in the university courtyard - he understood them, but those movements weren't random. The moment we begin predicting the drunk stumbles of a half-crawling college students will be the day I ammend this thesis.
A grasp on the concept of "happily ever after" in religion and a true faith should allow us to grapple with death rather well. It would allow us to deal with ti in the same fashion as births, a terminally ill patient healing or a rock statue weeping. With celebration (and papal judges) where we'd hope for those around us to rejoice and celebrate and slap each other in the back at their good fortune.
I don't understand why'd we say losing someone. No. Someone has left and taken a part of you with them and that's why even the most methodical and precise analysis of religion falls through here. The bioethics committee my parents once ran would be proud at my vulcan approach to the final days.
When a person is in pain and the childhood solution - band-aids - is no longer sufficient, when the JV encouragement to "WALK IT OFF!" isn't likely and the doctors don't get to say - fortunately we caught this on time - it's the logical illogical that takes precedence.
But now the binary says 101 with a character of 5.
This isn't angry, it isn't sad. It's a confused mapping of ideas that circle around the idea of a lot of questioning beings.
I wonder what answer the agnostic, dyslexic, insomniac arrived at.
Wednesday, May 26, 2010
Castillos de Mexico
En tiempos de antaño y más que nada en Europa la mayoría de la gente vivía en humildes chozas de algo parecido al adobe y techos de paja y Madera. Los nobles ricos así como los no tan nobles pero igualmente venditos por el poder divino del dinero construían castillos, pequeños y grandes a la semejanza de los reyes.
Pequeñas construcciones palaciales con torretas, torres y murallas que los defendieran del mundo exterior. Bloques de piedra y gigantescos troncos de Madera viajaban cientos de kilómetros con el poder loco motivo de bueyes y mulas para construirle un techo digno a la gente con el poder adquisitivo necesario. Está claro que esto solo sucedía en tiempos buenos cuando las cosechas no fallaban y no había impuestos adicionales del reino y no había ni guerra ni iglesia que destruyera los planes de los simples mortales.
Y hoy en día miles de turistas viajan a los bosques de Europa donde se esconden estas estructuras que a la vez inspiran melancolía y respeto.
Lo bueno es que México está en proceso de convertirse en la nueva Europa – estamos atrapados en la edad media Europea donde la iglesia es gobierno aunque el Cardenal y Fecal digan lo contrario. Ah! Y la ley también dice lo mismo.
Lo que sucede es que por todo México surgen mansiones por no decir palacios en zonas exclusivas que si no son boscosas son costosas. Del día a la mañana aparecen docenas de albañiles listos para trabajar y hay material como si estuviéramos en remate de aseguradoras. Los permisos para construcción fluyen del gobierno y nadie le pregunta al prestanombres de donde viene el dinero porque el dinero contesta.
Pero son empresas majestuosas de colores chillantes mexicanos con pilastras donde no hay lugar para pilastras y cúpulas árabes que no van con el concepto pseudo vanguardista que los líderes de la más grande industria Mexicana buscan reflejar. Lo mejor de todo es el horror que les ha de dar a los diseñadores contratados a quienes se les indica que dejen este cuarto para el altar de la virgencita – porque ella nos protege – y que por favor le pinten el techo verde obscuro con estrellas DORADAS. De los balazos y las mordidas.
Bardas muy altas, como de 3 pisos para que nadie los vea (y el gobierno no se les meta) con la mayor protección que aprendieron en su pueblo – botellas rotas incrustados en el cemento a lo largo de todo el perímetro de la barda. Al fin que ni a los genios se les ocurriría usar guantes.
Ya acabadas llegan las picops (pick-ups) de rines altos, llantas anchas y las Navigator para que la señora se vaya de Chopin (shopping). Quien quita y la casa este abandonada dentro de un ano.
Wednesday, May 19, 2010
Dry-Freeze
Picture a house of the sort that is common in Allende or Safon books - a house sort of frozen in the past with crumbling adobe walls, corners filled to the brim with dust and a lost cat or two that make us think of deja-vu.
These houses are always abandoned relics of yesteryear in neighborhoods that saw better days when the Spanish (or the French or the English) ruled over a country now ruled by indigenous left-wing zealots that make up for their lack of education with misguided idea(l)s. The next door cafe - once a sign of progress and richness with a bottle or two of fine wine still left - pleads the passerby for a momentary glance that's teased out of them with a plate of delicately crafted charcuterie.
I walked into such a place but it wasn't frozen; it was alive in its stillness. Because of the memories gathered in the form of forgotten matchbooks and restaurant coasters as well as pictures of the sort you buy on a cruise and that is poorly glued to a laminated piece of fancy looking plastic you could have thought the owner had left the place in a hurry one lazy afternoon and had never come back.
A piece of me lives there.
And that's a poetic way of saying a family member is very much alive in it.
A woman who projects more life than she actually has.
Consider the technological marvel of the project. A small, lightweight box of black magic that makes tiny images - for they must be tiny to pass through those skinny cables connecting it to the computer - into huge high definition pieces of art that would have made 12th century European artists ooh and aah with marvel. We've come a long way since human statues.
Though examples in Paris and Puerto Vallarta might suggest otherwise.
She moves carelessly through a clutter precariously balancing her past and present with no obvious consideration for the future. A yell erupts from her in frustration as she looks for the notebook she is holding and searches desperately for the glasses she has calmly sitting atop her head. Of course it makes sense for the crows' footsteps all over her face to be stretched tight by a magical combination of pigs something or other, blended platelets (her own thank god) and ozone and Co2.
She's obviously found the fountain of youth.
Prescription:
Though the reader might be inclined to finish reading this and perceive a sense of dripping sarcasm I would hope that the melancholy of the beginning be kept throughout.
Maybe we'll all grow up to be whatever age we're supposed to be.
These houses are always abandoned relics of yesteryear in neighborhoods that saw better days when the Spanish (or the French or the English) ruled over a country now ruled by indigenous left-wing zealots that make up for their lack of education with misguided idea(l)s. The next door cafe - once a sign of progress and richness with a bottle or two of fine wine still left - pleads the passerby for a momentary glance that's teased out of them with a plate of delicately crafted charcuterie.
I walked into such a place but it wasn't frozen; it was alive in its stillness. Because of the memories gathered in the form of forgotten matchbooks and restaurant coasters as well as pictures of the sort you buy on a cruise and that is poorly glued to a laminated piece of fancy looking plastic you could have thought the owner had left the place in a hurry one lazy afternoon and had never come back.
A piece of me lives there.
And that's a poetic way of saying a family member is very much alive in it.
A woman who projects more life than she actually has.
Consider the technological marvel of the project. A small, lightweight box of black magic that makes tiny images - for they must be tiny to pass through those skinny cables connecting it to the computer - into huge high definition pieces of art that would have made 12th century European artists ooh and aah with marvel. We've come a long way since human statues.
Though examples in Paris and Puerto Vallarta might suggest otherwise.
She moves carelessly through a clutter precariously balancing her past and present with no obvious consideration for the future. A yell erupts from her in frustration as she looks for the notebook she is holding and searches desperately for the glasses she has calmly sitting atop her head. Of course it makes sense for the crows' footsteps all over her face to be stretched tight by a magical combination of pigs something or other, blended platelets (her own thank god) and ozone and Co2.
She's obviously found the fountain of youth.
Prescription:
Though the reader might be inclined to finish reading this and perceive a sense of dripping sarcasm I would hope that the melancholy of the beginning be kept throughout.
Maybe we'll all grow up to be whatever age we're supposed to be.
Tuesday, May 18, 2010
Brecha
A common term used for a road that is not a road. It's more of a path but to call it one would be an exaggeration. A flat (sort of) rocky piece of sinewy way meant for mules but used by cars - the sort of road where you wouldn't be surprised if you had to drive past a creek or two to get to your final destination.
The views are inevitably beautiful and precarious as your soccer mom van teeter totters over a 50 foot cliff with little more than a sand bank between you and that beautiful weightless feeling that led us to explore the skies. People say it's part of tradition, that it's part of a Mexico that's fading into nothingness and that the youth will sorely miss 10 years from now.
The youth 10 years from now will wake into a world where internet has always existed, where we pop a morning pill to protect us from the penetrating UV rays because the ozone hole is now just the hole. Where communication could travel at faster than light speed and everyone has flying cars and last names like Jetson. And yes, robots work for us and follow Asimov's laws except that in this movie they don't go psycho on us.
We even put a stopper on death for a while.
Saramago has detailed a thesis on just this topic and the results are not pretty. As much as we would like to extend our brief instance on this earth nature (like England) prevails.
And as always I digress down a brecha myself only to get to my point (insert a sardonic remark here).
The brecha is the last bastion of true Mexican expression; ignoring of course all of the artisan work that the indigenous populations hock in flea markets around Mexico as well as the family run businesses selling everything from hand-made corn tortillas to spicy chillied candy of unclear origin.
A piece of road that washes away two or three times a year during raining season - a road that would be better of if it were only cobblestoned or paved. It's always a quick fix and a hopeful prayer that leads to the reconstruction and people like. Curves so tight and lanes so narrow so as to only let a car pass at a time - and the local farmers will never cease to park on the banks as well as host entire fiestas completely unaware of how horribly they disturb Mexico.
I love it here.
The views are inevitably beautiful and precarious as your soccer mom van teeter totters over a 50 foot cliff with little more than a sand bank between you and that beautiful weightless feeling that led us to explore the skies. People say it's part of tradition, that it's part of a Mexico that's fading into nothingness and that the youth will sorely miss 10 years from now.
The youth 10 years from now will wake into a world where internet has always existed, where we pop a morning pill to protect us from the penetrating UV rays because the ozone hole is now just the hole. Where communication could travel at faster than light speed and everyone has flying cars and last names like Jetson. And yes, robots work for us and follow Asimov's laws except that in this movie they don't go psycho on us.
We even put a stopper on death for a while.
Saramago has detailed a thesis on just this topic and the results are not pretty. As much as we would like to extend our brief instance on this earth nature (like England) prevails.
And as always I digress down a brecha myself only to get to my point (insert a sardonic remark here).
The brecha is the last bastion of true Mexican expression; ignoring of course all of the artisan work that the indigenous populations hock in flea markets around Mexico as well as the family run businesses selling everything from hand-made corn tortillas to spicy chillied candy of unclear origin.
A piece of road that washes away two or three times a year during raining season - a road that would be better of if it were only cobblestoned or paved. It's always a quick fix and a hopeful prayer that leads to the reconstruction and people like. Curves so tight and lanes so narrow so as to only let a car pass at a time - and the local farmers will never cease to park on the banks as well as host entire fiestas completely unaware of how horribly they disturb Mexico.
I love it here.
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