Fall

Meaningful blogging has stopped.  All of the blogs, well, most of them which I used to regularly read have stopped updating.  It has been months.  I hope all is well and there lives are going through dramatic changes which they will look back at and remember fondly.

My parent’s house is very isolated. As days pass, it seems more of a challenge to get out of here.  My social life is a bit wonky now.

For a long time, I have had mixed feelings about illegally downloading music.  I used to get in long drawn out arguments with friends and siblings concerning the different moral stance one could have.  On a lot of issues like this I find myself taking a more conservative position than I think acceptable for myself.  It always seemed like cheating somehow.  The idea that some music had to be sought after, some work had to be gone through to get a piece of art, that seemed like a good process to me at least.

I have started downloaded music voraciously over the past few weeks. It has been awesome.  Sometimes music just sounds better.  Maybe it is my part-time job as a dishwasher that has allowed me to really begin to enjoy music again.  It is something, I think that there have maybe been two albums that aren’t getting much attention out of the several which are new on my iTunes.  I even think that I like Animal Collective now, and my distaste for that particular band had very personal and emotional ties to the person whom I thought I was.  Isn’t it funny how ridiculously people (or at least me) can act for extended periods of time without even realizing it.

This post is so poorly constructed.  There should be themes and overarching structures, a frame story, a running gag would be great.  It is really the scattered, journal-y nature of my blogging  that keeps me from doing it more often.  It makes me feel immature, but shit. That’s where we are.

I had an amazing hat last winter.  Anyone remember.  It was toboggan style, green at the crown and white around the edges.  In hindsight, I am not sure if the hat was really that amazing or I was able to wear it pretty consistently all winter without misplacing it. Not important, it’s gone now, is the thing, and I needed a hat so the other day I went to goodwill.  There were these crocheted toboggans that made me thing, that someone’s Grandmother spent some serious time making these.  I am excited about my new hat.  I will try and wear it when the weather permits.

The next time you see me ask if I have written a CV, if I answer no, or try and stall, just walk away. walk away.

I have been putting off the res of my life like it isn’t going to happen and time is slipping away quickly, the weather has already changed.

So, I like historical reenactment, but this is ridiculous.  I was volunteered to participate in Rediscovery Historic Cleveland: Cemetery Tour, or whatever it is actually called this year, which is fine.  I think it is an amazing program for Lee students and for people who live in Cleveland, but now I am getting dressed up three separate time, in front of three separate groups of people to give the same spiel about Fate Hardwick (great man by the way).  I am not nervous yet, but there is a tiny sense of dread growing in the pit of my stomach. The costume budget did get upped this year, which is good.  The clothes look better, my gunpants are fabulous. The costumes will make it easier.

I feel nauseated from all this “free writing”.  It’s okay.  I am going to watch that Levi’s commercial with the Walt Whitman Poem, and get down to business.  I can’t wait any longer.

end of july

And then the weather changed and celebrities started dying.  Suddenly summer is finished and my plans all seem confused.

I can feel my throat tightening all the way down into my chest.  A year and a half ago, the sinus infections which have been a mainstay of my life, began to trigger a lingering acid reflux which convinced me for a time that I was moments away from CHF, a heart attack or a stroke, in my chest!

There was a stretch of maybe four months awhile back where i never really got past a particularly stubborn sinus infection, my lungs felt small, the back of my throat singed, and all of my energy evaporated.  Now summer is ending and deep breaths are becoming more difficult to manage.

I guess that these things are brought on by stress or by the ups and downs of my life: exercise then no exercise, no smoking then smoking, lots of eating then normal eating.  Intentions are so true, but seem to change so quickly.

My sister is moving back to Tennessee, and this fine state welcomes back one of its favorite daughters with her arrival.  My best friend/roommate has suddenly moved to Portland to start a new life.  I feel isolated, all these interpersonal shakeups magnify my post-grad manic-depressive mood as of late.

I am not prone to shout outs, but here goes: Bad Housekeeping’s latest entry made me proud to have hosted its author at a Christmas party once.  It is written with a certain skill, confidence, and knack that makes me want to remove the keyboard from my feeble laptop.

I am most likely moving back into my parents house in a month.  This chaps my ass a bit.  My parents are absolutely wonderful people.  They are willing to provide me with food, a roof, support, not many rules out side of common courtesy all to allow me to save money during the fall season at the lab (I am working at a photo finishing lab this fall, it’s the busy season.).  Now in an almost empty apartment which I have called home for four years, I need some sort of change, and my parents house is the best option, logistically and financially at least until the end of this year.

It all just feels like a failure.  It, of course, is not but somehow, the very idea of being back in my parents home living there seems to be the opposite direction from which I was hoping to move during these short hot months.  This is pride, the is nerves, this is frustration at my life suddenly being so unstructured, and it is taking me a minute to shake it.

The food will be really good though, and the spectacle of having my entire family reunited in the same house for the first time in five and half years will be fun, to visitors at least.

The future, in all its groovy mysterious glory is so great.  In my mind I imagine all of my wildest dreams (on a small scale) coming true, and packing it all up and moving to a new city to attend grad school a year from now, and no matter what, in my own fantasies for god’s sake, I am just coming apart at the seams, just a loose bundle of nerves, fraudulence, and fear.  It’s going to be so wonderful. I will throw myself a party or something for people to see.  I hope it gets here.

I am not good at blogging.  I lack the wit, and use the pronoun I far to often. Regardless, it feels good to type.  It would be so great to tell stories, to make arguments, to teach in this small public space, but now is the time for complaining, or at least looking at what the complaining i do to myself or others might look like.  this is good, this is constructive.  this is the end of summer, almost.

bees

Honey bees have long fascinated me. This fascination stems from a memory from childhood, which concerns candy as opposed to insects.

My father had taken me with him to a local nursery to purchase a Christmas tree. I was maybe 7 years old.  I remember it was quite cold and there were spotlights above the lot full of dying trees. There seemed to be a somewhat festive atmosphere. I have no explanation for this, perhaps it is just memory overriding fact, but there were booths, and food vendors, at the very least hot chocolate. My father led me to the booth of a man selling honey, and they began to talk about whatever it was I thought adults spoke of when I was that age. The man gave me a piece of candy he had made. It was wrapped in wax paper and looked like a cough drop. After popping it in my mouth I discovered that it was rather bland. The man at the booth told me to bite down, and there it was. Full of honey harvested from his very own apiaries. This is why I want to keep bees.

There are some unanswered questions about this memory. Why did my father lead me over to that booth, and begin speaking with this man?  Why was there a man selling honey in December? Honey is collected in June and July. Homemade (i suppose that is the way to characterize it) honey tends to be a summery, farmer market-y type endeavor. Nevertheless, this is where it all starts.

Bees communicate by dancing. This isn’t newly discovered information. It seems that before I began doing any research I  knew this fact, but only vaguely from a web comic.

Karl von Frisch was born in Germany in 1886. Born into a family which included doctors and naturalists, Frisch seemed predisposed towards the sciences and would eventually be a professor of Biology at the University of Munich. In 1973, Karl Von Frisch was awarded the Nobel Prize for his research, published as The Dance Language and Orientation of  Bees, which amounted to the end of nearly fifty years of research and observation.

 

Karl von Frisch

 

When von Frisch first published his research on honey bees it was widely met with skepticism.  There were several viable reasons why concluding that honey bees have a true system of communication would be met with doubt.  Insects are not highly evolved and it simply seems unlikely that such comparatively simple creature could have a system of communication which could possibly approach a level of complexity which would allow it to be classified as a language.   Time has in many ways vindicated von Firsch’s original propositions that in fact the dance language of honey bees is quite precise and explicitly and consistently communicates information from an individual worker bee to the rest of the hive.  While research into pheromones, and other chemically based form of communication has greatly expanded our knowledge of how honey bees communicate, the basics of the dance language have held up over the past thirty years.

There are two dances, mostly, which make up the dance language.  The dance which is most often used by bees is the wag tail or waggle dance.  This dance is used in a number of circumstances, mainly to alert worker bees of a food source which is more than 100 meters from the hive and to alert the hive of new potential hive sites during swarming.  the actual action of the dance consists of a worker bee wagging its tail from side to side in a straight line usually not for more than two lengths of its body and then circling back around to its starting position.  It was hypothesized that the angle of the worker bee to the sun indicates direction, while the duration of the waggle indicates distance from the hive.  During swarming similar information is communicated.  A number of workers (150-200, usually) are sent out from the swarm as scouts to find new hive sights, as they return they begin performing wag tail dances which indicate the location of a potential site.  The hive as a whole (including the queen) will not move to a new hive site until all of the scouts are preforming the same dance, and thus have agreed upon the same location.

wag tail dance

There are still many detractors.  Those who simply don’t agree with the von Frisch’s premise.  I am no biologist.  I make no claims to fully understand the intricacies involved in the claims of the honey bee dance language.  In my limited reading and amateurish interest, I have operated from a platform in which the dance language has been observed and is real.  Because rather or not animals have “instincts” or if there is some intrinsic understanding in all animals.  These questions are not my primary concern.  When I think about honey bees communicating using the dance language it makes me think about how amazing it is that a creature so small, who life is so uncomplicated, who only lives between six weeks and six months, can fully communicate everything it needs to through movement.  I think about the complexity of communication in my own life, and wonder if humans got off track far back on the evolutionary cycle, and if maybe there are traces of this more direct system of communication still around.  Words are so messy, they mean so many different things, I am envious of the directness of the dance language.  Sometimes I wish that my angle in relation to the sun, the duration of my movements could communicate what so often seems to escape me.

The state in which I have found myself most often over the past weeks, has been overwhelmed.  I find myself staring into the eyes of a loved one, or the space in front of me, the road ahead of me, literally, and I can’t find the words to get across the beach ball of feeling pressing down upon me.  the last few weeks and days I was required to walk around Lee’s campus I would find myself wanting to break into a sprint.  I still feel that expectancy now.

There seemed to be so much dancing  at the end of 2008.  Maybe it was the season, the holidays, or something unexplained, but now it seems like I never dance, and as a result it is more difficult to get across what needs to said.  Maybe there is some space in my brain, in everyones brain,  which still recognizes the immediacy of movement, a dance language all our own.  I don’t mean body language necessarily, I have never been good at reading between the lines.  Something more basic, instructions instead of emotions. 

If you could see me, maybe you would understand.

summer

I have committed to a week of vacation.  A week without working or saving.  Essentially seven days of waiting, culminating with a wedding.

My family took summer vacations throughout my childhood.  Never longer than a week, the one year we experimented with two weeks in a condo in Panama City Beach, Florida.  I witnessed an unusually fierce argument between my parents which ended in my father driving around and my mother, sister and I watching movies and not speaking very much for the rest of the evening.  My parents rarely fight with such force.

It feels wasteful to not already be doing all the things I have planned.  I am waiting, patiently, to find out if I have a job this summer, this provides a frame work for the next week, and for that I am grateful.

It seems difficult to know what exactly to do with myself right now, but in a calm way.  It is not displeasing or upsetting.  It feels like a situation which rarely presents itself, and needs to be taken advantage of.

Books are continueing to go unread, blogs lightly updated, poems still misunderstood, but I feel light and free, riding a wave of well-wishes and gifts.

I like thinking about my life right now.  I am so happy, so surprised by this happiness.  There seems to be great potential, or at least potential for many new experiences all about me, and that deserves a few days for reflection.  It is easy, for me to just assume that I am scared to take the next step, but I’ll be cynical when I don’t get this job.  There will be plenty of time.

The backyard of my apartment is smaller than it used to be, and consists of bushes, overgrown weeds, two gradens which are slowing turning into bushes overrun by weeds, and a picnic table.  It’s best just before it’s dark.

Thank You

I graduated from college yesterday.
Thank you to everyone who helped so much.  This weekend and over the last four years.

I have accepted that I tend towards sentimentality.  If it is kept in check, there’s no problem, but as to be expected a big weekend with lots of ceremony is a touch overwhelming.  There are so many people who love me so much, that it is hard to feel anything but surprise and gratitude.  Again thanks to all.

Also, if you haven’t gone up the Incline Railroad in Chattanooga recently, you should consider it, it’s fun.  I have the commemorative penny to prove it.

blank

I try and wait until I have something to say to update this. There have been no updates for weeks, months maybe. I have lost all track of time.

What does it mean that my mind is perpetually blank? Not much, obviously.

There is something just over the horizon.  Some breaking loose, rushing forth of creativity or at least emotion.  Something feels pent up right now.  Everyone looks like they have something on their minds that they aren’t saying just yet.  It must be the weather.  This feeling always come swooping down on me during the spring, the tendency to get wrapped up and stressed out.  School will be over soon.

In my frustration, I have wasted most of my break between classes today looking at facebook, pitchfork, and the itunes music store.  If too much time is spent in any of these places, especially facebook, it makes me feel sad.  Not sure why, and its not an incredibly negative type sadness.  Just sort of hollow, maybe its all of the people i used to know, or music I won’t ever listen to, all the information being created and updated and moved around in front of me.  Just makes it feel like all of this is going by quickly and I can’t get caught up.   There are some pretty sweet apps out there though.  that’s a lie, facebook applications are very cumbersome.

Spring break is over now.  I hope everyone had a good time.  I slept a lot in a really big bed in a new state.  It was great.  Now, I have to trick myself into finishing the work ahead of me, of not sitting idle in front of computers, of thinking and acting and feeling immediately.

I have a lot to do today.

library

David Anitin contends that poetry simply doesn’t exist beyond the performative utterance.

We are poets as we give thoughts voice, I think is the contention.

I don’t know how much I believe that, but I like to think about it, especially after I see someone who is a good public speaker. Robert F. Kennedy Jr. is a good public speaker. This thought has been on my mind lately. About the creative, imaginative characteristics of mundane thought, speech, and action. There is a sort of poetry to day planners. Visually I think they can be very striking. Announcements can be, news shows, advertisements, conversation, talking about the weather I think are creative acts, are moments of creative experession people have trained to view as commonplace. Maybe I am just painfully boring, and find these things interesting, but I don’t think so. There needs to be someone who understands these things better, to explain them to me, or at least discuss. they’re out there. We can talk about how crazy the weather has been lately.

This semester I am required to write three book reviews on historical monographs. This is not in all truth, that big a deal, but for a student who is really trying to stay current with readings in his final semester of his undergraduate, it feels daunting. People read so much more than this all of the time. I wonder how they keep all of the divergent strains of thought, examples, and theses  straight in their brains. I feel that the American Civil War is tripping over the War of the Reform which is smashing into the Venetian republic which Nathanael West is making fun of in grand fashion. At first, alarming, as the semester gears up, as there is actually more to do, it is somewhat enjoyable, my mind swimming with so many things in combinations no one else can guess.

I just read this a few minutes ago, “I held the feeling in my heart; the urge to discuss it died out. There was all the time in the world. In the endless repetition of other nights, other mornings, this moment, too, might become a dream.”

That is a beautiful thought, I thought.

school

I have been here before.

It always comes as a shock, not quite a shock, but certainly a surprise how excited I get at the beginning of each new semester.  Walking around campus with an idiot grin on my face for at least a few weeks.  It is a mystery to me how people cannot feel incredibly invigorated by the sort of odd mass of humanity that wanders around a college campus in January.   Being sentimental is something with which I am well acquainted and it really flairs up walking in between classes the first few weeks of spring semester.  There is just so much pent up, not even that, just beneath the surface something, it is obvious in people not knowing what room they need to sit down in.  It is  some energy, mostly misguided, which I feel I get to be a part of just showing up to class those first few days.  I will look back years from now, and be pleased with all of the text book introduction I have so diligently read.

This feeling fades, but its strong this time around, and that feels good.

I enjoy the environment of a classroom as well.  Really just for the poor sense of humor that people with terminal degrees tend to exhibit.

I have no more safety net now.  People might actually be reading this.  Creativity is funny.  It exists and doesn’t at the same time.  The above paragraphs were near novel length this morning.  They felt like they were, anyway.

I guess that’s why there is a blog in my life now.

illness

My entire life my sinuses have been aggravated.  Last year throughout the fall and winter months, and would develop a moderate to severe head cold every two and a half weeks.  I thought that there were deep seated problems, and once discovered my life would be radically changed, or i would die.

I greatly dislike going to the doctor and being on antibiotics, oddly enough i feel like these two things happen far to often.

my throat had that feeling of hollow pain two days ago.  As if my esophagus was much more spacious than it really is and all that space were filled up with phlegm that ached.

I am not cured but i feel better, i have not visited a doctor, my mother did give me some low dose antibiotics, but its okay.  laying around all day trying not to feel so bad makes one think about themselves.

I need to express myself better. tell me tell me tell me.  i so desperately want grand things to happen, but i don’t really like grand things, i like quiet small things made by peoples hands.

i don’t know.  i feel better,  school starts in three days, and then life is up in the air again.  again.

motivation

I am waking up earlier each day.  The idea is that I will preapare myself a decent breakfast and go to the YMCA, but in practice I drink coffee and sit around my apartment for most of the day unshowered.  My new years resolution was half-hearted.  I was well aware of this from the beginning, but here I am.

My mother and I drank two bottles of wine and each smoked a half pack of ciggerettes on her back porch last night.  Talking to my mother is fascinating to me.  It never seemed feasible to have such a good friend in a parent.  I am grateful for this, but also somehow cautious.  I fear, however slightly, that developing such a familiar relationship with my parents will somehow come back to me with more emotional baggage than normal, but this feeling is totally ungrounded, as I type I realize how silly it really is.

I wish I could blog.  I came to the table today with nothing much to say, and will spend the rest of my waking hours thinking up really great things to say in this space, but that is the story of my life most of the time.

I need a new scene.  I have a new scene, but the decision has been made as much as I can make a decision.  I love Cleveland deeply.  I have spent my whole life here, and there is not a strong desire to leave it.  It feels like my home, it feels like there is still room to grow here, but now other feelings, other thoughts have crept into my head.  I don’t know if I have the ability to do all that I want, but I see a path, which isn’t to unreal, so hopefully I will be writing these sad little blog posts from a different time zone this time next year. University of Montana

I read only a few blogs, mostly of people I have only met a handful of times, and it is interesting to me how the chronicle their personal lives without being very personal.  Layer up layer.  I want to put down into words so much, but feel that I would be breaking some unspoken rule of blogging by being to forthcoming.  This is the most inane paragraph published on the internet.

my excuses are exhausted.  I have to go workout now.  goodbye.