proteanme

The suicide bomber in today’s news was no more than thirteen years old. That’s what I read in the news. Thirteen fucking years old! It’s beyond tragic. Tragedy doesn’t get at it. It’s just horror, man. I keep trying to imagine the kind of madness that led up to a child at a wedding wearing a vest of explosives and pulling the pin on a grenade, and I flail around, numb. I can’t get my brain or heart around it.

I think of the Joseph Campbell quote, “Participate joyfully in the sorrows of the world. We cannot cure the world of sorrows, but we can choose to live in joy,” and I wonder was he thinking of something as horribly fucked up as this. How does one participate in this? Protest the war? Write letters to congress? Give to a peace group? I don’t know how to do this.

Ned linked to this great piece on writing by Barry Sanders.

I do believe that as you write more and age, the arrogance and most of the vanity go. It is a vanity met with vast gratitude: that you were hit by something as you stood in the way of it, that anybody is listening. When you are ashamed and revising your comments to old girlfriends of thirty years ago, you might be shocked to find out you really have nothing much better now than what you said in the first place.

A while back I was dating this femme, who I’ll call C, and around the time of one of our first dates she happened to be dog sitting for a friend. C told me that she was convinced that this dog was her spirit animal. I asked C some questions about how she knew that and then told her I didn’t think I had a spirit animal and really I wasn’t sure if I even believed in spirit animals for myself. C told me that maybe my spirit animal was something that was separated from me by such a great distance, like a manatee out in the Caribbean, that I just couldn’t feel the connection. I loved that answer. It was funny and smart and creative and she wasn’t buying into my cynical front.

The other thing that was implied in that exchange is that it was ok for us to have different experiences and we didn’t have to validate them for each other in order for the experience to be real to us. It’s like I don’t believe in ghosts but my mom swears she’s been visited by the spirit of her grandmother, and who am I to say she wasn’t? It’s not like I can claim to have knowledge of the whole crazy range of human experience to say that it’s not true. I know I could extrapolate out from this position in an unhelpful way, but what I’m trying to get out is how we open up our experience of the world to include another person’s experience, especially when it doesn’t fit in with how we see things or do things. I’m pretty sure that’s where connection happens, that’s where you get this great opportunity to develop compassion and empathy. But if you’re like me you need some help. You need someone who doesn’t buy into your knee jerk contrariness or someone who doesn’t take your cynicism too seriously, which is a tall order for anyone and I can get en-fucking-trenched for sure. But I’m trying harder and harder to have better sense of humor about my own prickly nature and to stop myself, when I can, from putting my foot in my mouth and more quickly make a repair when I do.

I don’t know what exactly has got me fired up on this topic. As I re-read what I’ve written I’m not sure I’ve even really gotten around to whatever point I wanted to make. I’ve been thinking a lot about where I fit it and where I don’t and how hard it can be to really connect with someone. I meet someone new and I start telling them my stories and they start telling me theirs and sometimes that seems like all it is – an exchange of stories. But sometimes something different happens and I realize we’re not just swapping stories, we’re trying to figure out if we can cultivate some shared experience, which can be super challenging when confined to just a conversation.

Hmm. . . I’m posting this more to practice being a little exposed. I don’t I think I’m on to anything profound, but maybe in a couple days I’ll come back and figure out if there’s something else I’m trying to say.

Sunshine lights the kitchen

Originally uploaded by proteanme

Our house faces west and we have these two giant windows in the front. The sun fills up the house like you wouldn’t believe.

It’s the day after my birthday and the sun has come out for a little bit. It’s like a belated wish, which I like because it extends the celebration a touch longer. Plus every bit of sun feels so dreamy right now and I’ve missed that dreamy feeling. I wondered sometimes last year, especially when I was feeling the weight of my grief, if I would ever get that dreamy feeling back. Or more accurately, if I’d ever want to get that dreamy feeling back. I’ve been struggling so much with wanting to want anything. Even now that hardest part of grief seems to have lifted, something about putting myself out there and wanting something – it feels a bit like climbing Mount Everest. But the sun pushes the dreaminess on me before I can figure out how to resist it. It’s a great a trick. Must be the warmth and the light and the color of the sky – how it’s not some cerebral experience – especially from the saddle of my bike. I think that’s part of why I’ve been struggling so much to deal with this record breaking rain. I need the sunshine to open up the things I can’t open on my own.

One thing I accomplished this year was teaching myself to cut my own hair, a little longer on top and shaved down on the sides and back. Sometimes I cut it better than others, but just doing it is one of my secret pleasures.

I’ve hardly taken any photos this year, except when I went to Palm Springs and then there’s my ongoing obsession with how the sky looks from my front window, but I just uploaded a few to flirckr. I love the one I posted of RU on the boat. She didn’t know I was taking it and she’s hard to get a good photo of. Plus it captured the joy of being on this little boat in the SF bay, heading toward the Golden Gate as the sun was just starting to begin it’s drop.

The rain came back with a vengeance, but friends and family countered with an out pouring of well wishes and good times. Thanks to everyone who celebrated my birthday with me today. You all really made the day. Seriously. I’m feeling kinda sentimental about it. I had some of the best dang food, shared some terrific company and heard from a whole slew of people I really like but don’t get to see nearly as often I wish I could. Good fortune. That’s what I call that. Thanks everyone for making that happen. You all rock.

Sunshine finally came to Portland and the blues skies and long shadows have wiped out the bitterness about the rain, just like that. No lingering bad feelings. If you sent me sunny wishes, thank you. If you’re sweaty and sitting in front of a fan, I still envy you a little. Portland’s pretty sexy in the sunshine. It’s like finally noticing the bookish girl who sat behind you in English class is actually a fox and then you can’t stop thinking about her. RU and I went for an epic walk to savor all that foxiness. Spectacular stuff – the foxiness of sunshine.

How is it a song from Hello Dolly can pop in your head when you’re not a queen or a diva? The other night all of  the sudden I was belting out “Put on your Sunday clothes when you feel down and out, strut down the street and have your picture took.” And somehow this led to “Easy to Be hard” from Hair. These lines from that song are really pretty terrific.

How can people be so heartless
You know I’m hung up on you
Easy to give in
Easy to help out

A friend at work asked me my opinion on concept records and I told him they were fine with me as long as the concept didn’t get in the way of the music. I’d even consider myself a fan if the concept produces something that kicks ass, like Tommy or Pet Sounds. And thinking about that made me realize why I’m not a big fan of conceptual art – too much concept, not enough art, especially when the concepts aren’t very interesting in the first place. I know that it’s a pretty broad and sweeping statement and maybe I’ll bite my tongue later. Or not. I’m open to being wrong on this.

I read this poem yesterday that had the air of a Dylan song or maybe something from Leonard Cohen, beautifully narrative. I’ve not been reading all that much poetry lately, which made discovering this a real pleasure.

I’ve had the headphones on a lot at work lately. Today started with Al Green, which is my default setting when I can’t figure out what I want to listen to. After that I let a random sampling of singles play, including the April March’es Chic Habit, which makes me feel like a letch, although maybe I feel that way for other reasons, Annie’s Chewing Gum, which I’ve never gotten tired of hearing, The Antler’s Bear, which I always forget how much I like, and Aretha doing Until You Come Back to Me, which reminds me why I love a divas.

As a late bday gift to myself I got RU and myself tix to go see Sharon Jones. I’ve not been to a show in a while and I can’t think of a better way to break the live music fast than some old school soul. If you’ve never seen Sharon Jones and the Dap Kings, you are missing a show and I mean a show with a capital “S.” Sharon has tapped into the energy of James Brown and Little Richard and the Dap Kings are the reincarnation of a Motown studio band.

I was helping a friend move the other day and giving a ride to this super nice 20 something year old. We were listening to  my 2009 fave playlist and she said “I think I want to steal you Ipod.” I was pleased as punch, secretly, of course. I wish I could say it was about making a connection through music, but at the moment it was about having my tastes affirmed. I am self-indulgent.