Here’s hoping everybody had a good weekend. Independence Day is a sacred day for our nation, and I am doing my duty by watching HBO’s “John Adams” on DVD. It’s really good. You should rent it if you haven’t seen it. Also, I saw a lot of explosions this weekend. If that doesn’t shout “patriot,” I don’t know what does.
(Keep reading…)
Filed by Bil at 9:40 pm under General
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The more time progresses, the more private I’m becoming; I’m not sure if that’s a good thing or not. One immediately noticeable consequence is that my desire to write — at least through this outlet — diminishes considerably, as from the outset I’ve sought to keep my personal details as much in the background as possible, something I feel even more strongly today. But in the spirit of goodwill, I will let you in on an embarrassing discovery I made this week: I actually like a Josh Groban song. I won’t tell you which one, though, because I really don’t wish to discuss it further. And if you ask me, I’ll lie.
In the past few weeks my life has become a grand exercise in making peace, both with my life as a whole and with others as well. I can’t speak too much to its success, although I will say this much: it’s immeasurably difficult to make peace with a stone. And I’m questioning my sanity at continuing with it any further. Furthermore, to my surprise my desire to elaborate any further on the specifics to anyone at all has disappeared entirely — it’s a strange new feeling. What I’d really like is a therapist, but for the time being my stack of Intervention episodes will have to suffice.
Filed by Trevor at 12:10 am under General
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I know that money cannot buy happiness, but I’ll tell you this – I just spent twenty dollars and I am pretty darn happy for it.
On what did I spend this fortune, you ask?
A new cell phone. The cheapest phone in the store. Tough beans for the salesman who works on commission, sweet peaches for the consumer (me) who needs a phone on a budget.
I wasn’t desperate for a new phone. My old phone was still in working condition. But – to put it in perspective – the battery was held on with Scotch tape.
(Keep reading…)
Tim Wise, anti-racism activist and author of one of my favorite and oft-recommended books, White Like Me: Reflections on Race from a Privileged Son , has written some essays recently on Obama voters and the myth of reverse racism. I’m keeping up with them because he is my MySpace friend (the only person listed as both a friend and a person I’d like to meet), proving that MySpace CAN be used for good as well as evil.
I won’t quote his most recent article extensively here, because I want you to read it. But here’s a little taste:
In other words, if voting for a white person because of their race is racism, then so too must be voting for a black person because of theirs. So see, those black Obama boosters are every bit as racist as we are, maybe more so, because they’re breaking his way by about eighty-five percent, while whites are splitting between Obama and Clinton by about fifty-fifty. So if anything, the e-mailer said, it was blacks who were more racist and whites whose voting behavior portended open-mindedness.
Such an argument–which is really the political equivalent of “Why can’t we have white history month, I mean, we have black history month?”–suggests how far we have to go in this nation simply to have a productive dialogue about race, let alone to really conquer racism.
Check out the full article here: http://www.lipmagazine.org/~timwise/Obama2.html and give yourself a pat on the back for keeping up with political critique. Even if you (I) do it on MySpace.
Filed by Chelsea at 9:48 am under General, Social Issues, Politics, Racism
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It’s true. Devon is my personal dresser. She doesn’t actually put my clothes on me, but she tells me what to wear. Not because I pay her, and not because she wants me to be happy. For the most part there are two motivating factors for making me wear the clothes that I wear: 1) she does not want to be embarrassed by me; and 2) she derives pleasure from watching me embarrass myself.
(Keep reading…)
Filed by Bil at 8:32 pm under General, Love
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To wake up every morning.
To have faith.
(We are drawn to edges,)
To be your own best friend.
(to our own parapets and sea-walls)
You find out that the years don’t span wide. They hang flaccid, rotted. And remain so.
You wake up not the same person, but as someone who willfully exchanged time for hollowness.
More insular. More brittle. All of this in the name of protection.
(finding our lives in relief)
So many faces, so many lives, and you wake up: you must bear the cross of allowing them to have fallen away.
(in some forked storm.)
I watched my grandmother’s hands, with their parchment-like skin, scooping coffee, making a sandwich, cutting a banana. Those mundane tasks that in ten years time will have become so dear as to be excruciating. And you realize: everyone deserves to have someone to love. It really is that simple.
We rob these of others; we’re doing it now. And we rob ourselves of the same.
(Returning with our unimaginable gifts,)
To keep moving.
To live for the moment, for self-pleasure.
(badged with salt and blood,)
You wake up: not with a lifetime, but with thousands of days lived in one spin of the earth.
You wake up: not as the same person, but as someone else. The number of your counted days eroded past recognition.
(we have forgotten how to walk)
Flaccid, rotted. Protected.
(Thinking how much more we wanted)
And you discover that single-mindedness is seldom rewarded with instant success. Few things are.
To reflect.
Reading a tome that spilled from your fingers, but long before you sold your soul to mediocrity.
(when what we had was all there was;)
And every day bleeds you out, silently, painlessly. A thousand pinpricks.
To start over.
(looking too late to the ones we loved,)
To pick up where you left off.
For you must willfully be something else entirely.
But you wake up: to continue yesterday’s work.
(we stretch our our hands as we fall.)
And you sleep: on a crest, to ride it out to shore.
(”Apart” ©2002 Robin Robertson)
Filed by Trevor at 4:13 am under General
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Bil tagged me a week ago, and I’ve been attempting to come up with a suitable response. Rather than come up with ten random facts about myself (seeing as how those who know me best already know more than they ever cared to), I’m going to switch it up a bit.
25 Things I’m Still Learning
1.) When a person recounts the dialogue from a recent disagreement with a third party and tells you “And then I said…” what they really mean is “I wish I had said…”
2.) People who are overly critical are hiding something, and it’s usually something big. And you might be one of them.
3.) Those who are described as being “good Christians” ostensibly are those who merely exercise common sense and decency.
4.) Being “too busy” is a worn-out excuse; there is always time for the things most important to you, no matter how busy you think you are.
5.) I still have no clue what I want to be when I grow up.
6.) Be your own best friend first.
7.) No one will ever remember how much money you had. What they will remember is how you made them feel.
8.) All I want from anyone is their time.
9.) Any straight man who pretends he can’t tell if another guy is attractive or not is lying.
10.) Adulthood is the struggle to reconcile who you truly are with what you always hoped you’d be.
11.) The hand-written word is a dying art.
12.) There’s no excuse for poor grammar and spelling.
13.) The more wrong a person is, the louder he speaks.
14.) There is no hatred on earth that was not once love.
15.) The key to winning a debate isn’t to know more than the other party. You must make them think you know more than they do.
16.) Too much leisure is almost as exhausting as too much exertion.
17.) I think like a woman; if you don’t already know why I’m upset, then I’m certainly not going to tell you. I also know how stupid that sounds.
18.) Call your grandmother.
19.) Getting up at noon sucks.
20.) Don’t say in thirty words what you could say with zero.
21.) Not returning phone calls is the height of rudeness.
22.) Everyone is addicted to something; some addictions are just more public than others.
23.) Everyone is a racist.
24.) Optimism without action is stupidity.
25.) Be suspicious of anyone who claims to know what God thinks.
In other news, the BBC has published their yearly list of 100 things we didn’t know this year — check it out. I’m a particular fan of the fact that I can make a cell phone call from Mount Everest, I can have a diamond that was originally a peanut, and both Richard Dawkins and I enjoy singing Christmas carols. And, incidentally, one year from today we will finally see the end of the most disastrous administration in the history of this country.
By the way, Bil, what’s the score? Do I get a point for this one?
Filed by Trevor at 3:31 am under General
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Filed by Stephen at 7:32 am under General, Pop Culture, The Arts
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The Jingle-Tune-Or-Catchprase Title Contest begins today!
This contest, which I’ve just made up, will be a competition to see who can post the most eligible entries on this blog in the next month. For your entry to be eligible, the title of the post must contain a refrain (or the entirety) of a commercial jingle that reminds us of days long past or long present. For example, Trevor’s post “Like A Good Neighbor” makes us finish the tune in our head with “State Farm is there…” (Trevor starts this competition with one point.) Alternately, you can use a slogan or catchphrase from a commercial product (as long as that product does not carry its own jingle…like Lucky Charms — they are magically delicious, all right, but there’s no song). Also, TV show themes will count for points.
Here’s the thing, though. It must pertain to the subject. You can’t just title your post “Save Big Money At Menard’s” and then not talk at all about money (or Menard’s). Use your head. Make a good choice. I will moderate, since a) I initiated this contest, and b) that way I can change the rules if I want to. I’ll leave a comment notifying you that you’ve received a point.
Also, for all of you out there who aren’t contributors to this blog…you can play, too. If you leave a comment that slyly incorporates a jingle tune phrase or slogan into your comment, you will also get a point. But you must use complete sentences. I will not have the rules of the language abandoned for the sake of crushing your opponents. That’s what fists are for.
Good luck, everybody!
Filed by Bil at 1:31 pm under General
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I don’t make New Year’s resolutions. Instead, I prefer to look at each morning like a fresh start, a blank slate — helpful when you make as many mistakes as I do.
I don’t believe in sin, but I believe in grace. And, oh, I believe in forgiveness. From others, from myself, but always to others.
I started the year here in Chicago with a weird cyst on my sternum, and I’m ending it here in Chicago with a weird cyst on my sternum. But it’s snowing this year — it started just an hour or so ago — and Frank is at the ledge looking out at it. I can see the lights from the Christmas trees through the windows from the building across from me. It’s a nice effect.
I’m resolving to keep moving — the same resolution I make every morning.
This evening I’ll brave the Red Line with my impossibly large Beetlejuice-inspired scarf Devon knitted for me, steeled in my resolve that yes, this evening someone’s going be kissing me to ring in the new year whether they approve of it or not.
Filed by Trevor at 4:14 pm under General
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