the bliss of solitude

"sorry for putting my foot in your face i want more french fries." - a little girl at my restaurant, to her sister, when asked to apologize by their mother.  

NO ONE try to use my piece of mail from 'the economist'!

"daffodils" by william wordsworth



i wandered lonely as a cloud
that floats on high o'er vales and hills,
when all at once i saw a crowd
a host, of golden daffodils;
beside the lake, beneath the trees,
fluttering and dancing in the breeze.

continuious as the stars that shine
and twinkle on the milky way
they stretched in never-endling line
along the margin of the bay:
ten thousand saw i at a glance,
tossing their heads in sprightly dance.

the waves beside them danced: but they
out-did the waves the sparkling waves in glee:
a poet could not be but gay,
in such a jocund company:
i gazed--and gazed--but little thought
what wealth the show to me had brought:

for oft, when on my couch i lie
in vacant or in pensive mood,
they flash upon that inward eye
which is the bliss of solitude;
and then my heart with pleasure fills,
and dances with the daffodils.

--



it is an unpleasant feeling, slipping into old habits.

reassociation

"do you believe in life after love?" - pope francis

no one wants to sit next to spilled fried chicken

"people are the worst"

if you want someone to give you a reason that you shouldn't go to the gym; ask me.

if you want to experience one person being a lot less fun than everyone else in a room; ask me to play "apples to apples".

the person who thinks that everything is funny.
the person who wants to win.
and one person who is being a lot less fun than everyone else.

i took the subway in from manhattan to crown heights at nine thirty on a sunday night. i walked from ninth street and avenue c to union square. i caught the five express heading downtown.  i didn't realize until i was on the train that it stopped running at bowling green. i noticed this as we got to "the second to last stop on the train" and had that moment of panic where you aren't sure if this train is going to get you where you want to go. i learned that you can get on the four train at bowling green. so i transferred.

i got a seat because i know that you need to make sure you get a seat because it is a long way to stand.

borough hall, nevins street, atlantic avenue/barclays center, bergen street, grand army plaza, eastern parkway, franklin avenue. there are fewer white people as the stops get further out. i have never gotten off at nostrand avenue.

on the train, i hear that there is a man playing a guitar and singing. it sounds like it is maybe an evangelical song except that it is sung like reggae music.

then i hear that the song is about nelson mandela and i think "oh, i like this guy".

then i hear him say "nelson mandela is still alive" and i think "oh, he's crazy".

then he finishes the verse with "in out hearts" and i conclude that i do really like him.

he is not close by, but after a minute of deliberation, i decide to give him a tip. at first i don't want to in case he is crazy. then i think that he is doing great work, and that all of the old and newly historical figures he is summoning for me (with his songs via my own mind's association) would want me to demonstrate my appreciation.  then i wonder if he might be offended if i offer to give him money. who am i to assume that is why he is here? then i think that i work for tips too, and i pull out the last two dollars from my pocket (which was tip money anyway, so better it not stay in the same hands too long). we stop at atlantic avenue/barclays center and i am afraid that he is going to leave the car without making it to my end.  so i hold out my two dollars and he kind of meets me half way to grab it but neither one of us really moves from where we are stanidng.

here you go. 

thank you. 

it was an unremarkable moment.

the doors to the train close and he stays in my car as we head to bergen street. immediately as we begin to move, two white men my age with backpacking gear call out to the man with the guitar.  one of the men extends a hand with a few dollars and in the same breath utters "you're great, can i take a picture of you."

the man with the guitar (whose name i don't know) stops playing to pose for the picture. i turn away because the image as a whole confuses me.  a few seconds go by with no more music, and i realize that it is because the boy with the camera is taking multiple pictures of the man with the guitar. many pictures. then the man with the guitar starts to play and sing while his photographs are being taken. but instead of finishing the interrupted chorus to "redemption song" by bob marley, he begins to play "who let the dogs out".

the man with the guitar moves on down the train car after the man with the camera finishes.  he begins where he left off with his original tune.

i get off at frankin avenue, along with the two white men my age with backpacking gear.

it's not too cold in crown heights four days after the blizzard, and the snow has finally been cleaned off the streets.

i stop by the grocery store on the way home to pick up some coconut flour to bake triple chocolate chips because my roommate is gluten free.

--

and what feels better than walking around with your jacket unzipped? nothing! nothing! nothing! nothing!

i understand the "dough" part of "doughnut"

"no you're not.  you love her? how long have you been hanging out?  not long.  no you're not." - the louder half of an overheard conversation between a realist and an idealist

this is where the kid i babysit keeps his pair of khaki pants

"life as death-in-waiting"

the one time of day that i get to interact with my beta fish named william is when i feed him breakfast.

i like to feed william his breakfast while i eat mine.  william always eats the same wardley's premium beta fish food.  i always eat nature's path organic optimum power blueberry cinnamon flax cereal with unsweetened soy milk.  our breakfasts don't look so different (and they both contain wheat flour).  the main way to distinguish between them is that i eat mine sitting down with a spoon while reading the new yorker, and william eats his mostly by waiting for the pellets to disintegrate then scooping the dust up with his mouth once it has sunk to the bottom of his tank.

william and i don't talk much while we eat breakfast together because neither of us are very much morning creatures.

sometimes, while i am eating my cereal and reading the new yorker, i wonder if william even realizes that he is not eating his breakfast alone.  i wonder if he even realizes that there is a person one thousand times his size sitting next to him who is also trying to get a health start to their day.  and not only is that person eating with him, but that person is also the person who fed him and the person who spent two dollars and ninety-nine cents on a container of wardley's premium beta fish food for him--and will spend another two dollars and ninety-nine cents on another container of wardley's premium beta fish food when the first container runs out in what will seemingly take about three years.

then i wonder if william will survive to see the day when the first container becomes empty. 

this thought makes me sad.  so i stop thinking about william and go back to reading about lunar planet biology or the origins of greek yogurt or female lingerie saleswomen in saudi arabia or whatever news is being covered in that weeks issue of the new yorker.

the other main occasion when i get to interact with william is when i clean his tank.  william seems to hate it when i clean his tank.  he seems to hate it more than most humans hate going to the dentist or studying for a math test or being broken up with.  he always hates it as if it is the first time.  

it is during these cleanings that i am glad to know that beta fish have an memory span of about three seconds.

--

" a person's life consists of a collectin of events, the last of which could also change the meaning of the whole, not because it counts more than the previous ones but because once they are included in a life, events are arranged in an order that is not chronological but, rather, corresponds to an inner architecture. "

jealousy is the feeling you get when you see women wearing burkas in the wintertime.

happy belated

"i know it was probably a hard day.  but look! it's tomorrow already!" - my sister, to me, at 12:26 am, referring to the day i had.

it's still christmas somewhere!

“the unbearable embeddedness of being”

I am staring at two Australian people who are eating Chinese take-out at my kitchen table.

I met them about seven minutes ago when they immerged into my apartment from the blizzard outside—each carrying roughly their body weight in supplies separated into backpacks and duffle bags.

They have been traveling for the past fourteen months—all around continental Europe and the United Kingdom.  They flew over to Canada and spent some time in Toronto before they headed to Buffalo to work on a dude ranch in exchange for room and board.  Now they are in my apartment because they will be sleeping here for the next two nights in a “railroad” bedroom that I have to walk through in order to get to mine.  They were going to spend the night camping on abandoned airport runway near Coney Island, but the snowstorm condemned them to a night indoors. 

I can’t remember their names, but somehow, given that I am sitting on my couch watching them eat Chinese take-out at my kitchen table, it feels rude to ask to be reacquainted.  

They finish eating.  The boy-Australian wraps up the leftovers and asks if he can stick them in the fridge.  I tell him of course, and explain in an inarticulate way that everyone who lives in this apartment is very “chill”, so they should make themselves at home.  As I am stumbling through my sentences, I wonder to myself why I am so nervous.  But entertaining that thought while trying to speak to these two Australian strangers (who I am fairly certain are not here to murder me) makes my language even less intelligible.  He tells me to help myself to their Chinese food, if I want any for breakfast.  He tells me that it’s “mostly veggies”, which makes me want to ask if they are vegetarians, like me.  But then I think to myself that after tomorrow evening, I probably won’t ever see them again, so it doesn’t seem worth it to ask. 

Not continuing the conversation was the right choice, because as soon as the refrigerator door closes, the apartment buzzer rings.

It is Cedric.

Cedric is another person that I don’t know.  I learn when I meet Cedric at the front door that he is not Australian like the other two strangers in my apartment.  I also learn that he is a little shorter than me, has a beard, is black, uses headphones, holds his belongings in a backpack, and is covered in snow.  My favorite thing about Cedric so far is that he is covered in snow, because it instantly gives us something to talk about.  There is a blizzard happening outside the apartment, and nothing creates community like extreme weather conditions. 

Cedric is thinking about living in my room for the month of January.  I will be living in Rebecca’s room (which is currently mostly full of supplies brought by the Australians, and a little bit full with the Australians themselves).  This is because I had the idea that it would be easier to get someone to live in my bedroom for the month than it would be to get someone to live in Rebecca’s bedroom for the month because you have to walk through Rebecca’s bedroom in order to get from my bedroom to the living room (because Rebecca’s bedroom is the most “railroad” part of the “railroad bedroom” situation).  My bedroom, on the other hand, does not serve as a hallway for anyone and has it’s own private entrance which I have never used.  Rebecca will not be living in either of these bedrooms because she is in California getting surgery on her leg that she almost completely ruined by landing the wrong way while jumping on a trampoline.  That wrong landing is indirectly why I am meeting all these people for the first time in my apartment in my pajamas. 

Cedric leaves.

I think he liked the apartment, which indirectly means that I think Cedric will be living in my apartment for the month of January.  The wall that separates my bedroom (which will become Cedric’s bedroom) and Rebecca’s bedroom (which will become my bedroom) is paper thin.  That means for the next month, Cedric will hear me masturbate and I will hear Cedric masturbate (assuming that is something Cedric likes to do).  He does not know that this is something I am thinking about while I am forming unintelligible sentences about the weather as I walk him to the door.

Once Cedric is gone, the Australians come out of the room full of their things.  It is possible that they don’t like short people, or people with beards, or black people, or people who wear headphones and keep their things in their backpacks, and that is why they didn’t come out and say “hello” to Cedric.  I don’t know them well enough to rule out any of these possibilities.  The boy-Australian asks me if there is a good place for him to smoke.  I tell him outside, even though the main activity that happens inside this apartment is smoking.  He doesn’t know me well enough to be able to identify the signs I exhibit when I lie.

He and the girl-Australian go outside for a smoke.

I am alone in the apartment as I had been an hour before. 

And I think to myself, I don’t really know myself well enough to be able to identify the signs I exhibit when I lie.

--


what i learned today is that, when you live in a part of town that is predominantly populated by people of color and low-income individuals, you are the last ones to get the snow cleaned off your sidewalks.

winter is about moisturizing

"that's not your hair! that's a wig!" - a toddler on the subway, to his mother, about her weave

virgin!

"practicing the art of solitude"

to

the

woman

on the subway

listening to 

"my prerogative"

and singing 

at an audible volume:

way to really live what that song is about.

--


' what is sometimes called "neocatastrophism", but is mostly now just considered mainstream geology, holds that the world changes only very slowly, except when it doesnt. '



if everyone is the best at something, i am the best at eating hummus.

i miss the rains down in africa

"we could still make it to brunch!" - a person i passed on the street, discussing some very important issues with his friend

much like penguins, wild hotdogs huddle together in mass to protect themselves from the cold.

no one likes feeling left out

"valentine's day 2012"

we planned to meet late that night, after we were both done with our separate days.

we met.  we looked for a spot to grab a bite to eat.  nothing looked great, so we settled on a wine bar on west fourth street that has since closed.

we each ordered a glass of red, or maybe we split a bottle, i don't remember.

time to exchange gifts.  i had for you a brick that i painted--each face of the cube with a different images referencing conversations past.

you had for me tag-along-cookies that you made from scratch because you knew they were my favorite, in a wooden box that is now full of trinkets from our relationship and kept in a dresser drawer along with several pairs of shoes that i no longer wear because they are too big or out of style.

it was sweet.  both were the most dense displays of affection that could be given after only having known someone for  a month.

then you told me you loved me.  in a note that you put in the box along with the tag-along-cookies.

i didn't say i loved you back, but i bought you a toothbrush to keep at my apartment in alphabet city as we walked back to have valentine's day sex and go to sleep with each other in what still felt like a remarkable way.

--

every day, a little older.

old endings

"should i get a bloody mary or a mimosa?" - a customer at my restaurant, to me, in the midst of an identity crisis

 anyone interestd in purchasing a gently used bananna and/or piece of chewing gum? message for details!

just in case you want to ensure that you have a miserable tomorrow

"nostalgia, pt 2"

Nostalgia is derived from the Greek words "nostos", meaning "homecoming", and "algos", meaning "ache". It literally translates to "the ache associated with coming home". The term was first coined by a Dutch medical student named Johannes Homer in 1688 to characterize the anxieties of Swiss mercenaries serving abroad.  Homer wrote in his dissertation that, due to brain damage caused by the clanging of cowbells during their childhoods in Switzerland, Swiss mercenaries were more prone to exhibit high fevers, stomach pain, indigestion, fainting, and death--all symptoms of the newly discovered medical affliction, "nostalgia".

Nostalgia was recognized by U.S. armed forces as a medical condition until the end of World War II.

During the Romantic period at the beginning of the 19th century, the literary world positioned the German concept of "wanderlust" as the antithises of nostalgia.  "Wanderlust" is derived from the German words "wandern", meaning "to hike", and "lust", meaning "desire".

--

happy nude year!