Divisions between us

This morning I was thinking about the things that divide us. I'd woken up to NPR and a report on the House and Senate races, and I was feeling good about being a Democrat, being on the offensive and not backpedaling from the issues anymore. When I got to the kitchen, I saw an unopened bottle of ketchup that I'd forgotten to put away, and it reminded me of another division I used to see in the world: into mayo lovers and mustard lovers.

Growing up, I thought mayo was the king of condiments, one of three things that defined a sandwich, the other two being white bread and cold cuts. At lunch in elementary school I'd look at the kids slathering mustard on their burgers and wonder with pity and curiosity: What made them like the yellow stuff? In my head I tried to piece together what they had in common. Whatever it was, hopefully it was genetic. Then I'd be safe knowing my kids would be good mayo-loving people too.

People who used ketchup were always okay with me. After all, what else would you put on French fries? (I'd no knowledge of the British, Dutch, and Canadians back then and what they did to their fries.) But if people who used mustard were harmless oddities to me, another group evoked my outright disgust: people who mixed ketchup and mustard at the same time. I'd see these select individuals squirting one condiment and then the other on top of their burgers and then swirling the two together using a fry or -- worse yet -- a finger, as if they were making a spiral galaxy in red and yellow right there on top of chopped meat. I could barely hold my lunch down.

Sometime during my sophomore year in high school, I started dating a girl who I later found out was a mustard person. Obviously some pretty intense soul-searching followed. There were several different possibilities, but they all fell into two categories: either I'd changed or mustard people had changed. Neither was pleasant to think about, so I called a truce in my head and let the matter go.

After college but during my stint as a teacher, two things happened that broke the uneasy mayo-mustard truce. First, being away from home and my mom's cooking had allowed me to indulge in food big-time. Big like three- and four-chalupa dinners big. Big like 215 pounds big. (That's me on the right ca. 1999.) My health was starting to suffer, and when a dental assistant finally told me that my blood pressure might be too high for the oral surgeon to use anesthetics before he took out my wisdom teeth, I thought, "That's it! Ridiculous!" Changes would have to be made: mayo was out, mustard was in.

The second thing that happened was that I saw Undercover Brother which might be the movie I look back on as saving my life. I won't go into details except to say that mayo comes off looking (and sounding) very badly.

Other dietary changes followed, as did regular exercise. That was over five years and sixty pounds ago. To this day I still get all my sandwiches with mustard, hold the mayo. I guess sometimes you just can't be bipartisan.

Picard and pizza

If Patrick Stewart kept a diary, today's entry might look like this:

"Got up in Ann Arbor after playing Antony in Antony and Cleopatra last night. Had breakfast, took a shower, shaved. Watched a little of this drivel the Yanks call television. Had lunch. Spoke to an audience about acting, how I got started, politics, &c. Passed some guy on the street who said 'Thank you very much, Mr. Stewart'. I said 'You're welcome' and walked on. That was nice."

And if he had, that some guy would have been me. Yes, I walked past Patrick Stewart on the streets of Ann Arbor today, recognized him beneath his baseball cap, and said hello. Behold, my brush with the famous.

This evening, I had a slice of NYPD's marinara pizza and was biking home afterward when I passed by a homeless woman whom I'd seen before. She asked what time it was. I stopped, unpocketed my cell phone, and answered, 10:30. As I rode off, it occurred to me that the last time I'd seen her was Sunday night when she'd asked for a dollar and I'd given it to her. And then it occurred to me that I'd had a slice of NYPD's marinara pizza that night as well. Clearly, this pizza is causing poverty, or at least aligning the universe so I run into this same woman everytime I have it.

Gray's a gnat to me

Gray days have arrived, robbing the landscape of color:


Along with the color's gone my sense of time.

You wake up. It's gray outside, no shadows on the ground, no discernible light source. The clock alone says it's morning.

You step outside during lunch. The sky's now a lighter shade of gray. The clock and a little rumble in your tummy are all that say midday.

You go home. It's dark gray out. The bus seems crowded with people fleeing the center of town, but unlike people really fleeing, these people have stoic faces, move slowly, and say nothing. You barely make them out in the pallor of the fluorescent bus lighting. It must be evening.

Around this time of year I lose touch with the diurnal cycle and feel like I've lost something else. My mood heads south with the mercury and the birds. I'm no longer revived by the outdoors: the sun cuts a low arc in the sky, the wind puts a harsh whip to my face, and I hardly look up to see the eyes of passersby. In short, I've lost my summer self.

Morning mashup

Apparently I had a few too many things going on at the same time this morning.

On the CD player: The White Stripes' Get Behind Me Satan (which should have a comma between Me and Satan, unless Jack and Meg are trying to sound like pirates and suggest they possess Satan -- oh hey, that's interesting...). The speakers were grinding out the first track, "Blue Orchid":

"You got a reaction...
You got a reaction, didn't you?
You took a white orchid...
You took a white orchid, turned it blue."

On the TV: C-Span and the daily Pentagon briefing. Some mid-level military official taking questions from the press. Really, did it matter that I had the sound off? As if you can't see words like "progress in Iraq" being mouthed.

Actually, I love C-Span. It's a bit public access, like when the morning show host holds up a newspaper and reads lines struck through in yellow highlighter -- I love that! But watching C-Span with an alternative soundtrack, especially when you know the person speaking has nothing new to say -- that's priceless. May I suggest The White Stripes for the next White House press briefing you see?

Speaking of music, is anyone else slightly disturbed by the new red iPod Nano? It's linked to a campaign co-created by Bono that ostensibly raises money for HIV/AIDS in Africa, but the campaign goes by the name Join Red and has a "Manifesto" posted on its website. Now, I'm no McCarthy lover, but come on! "Mr. Gorbachev [ahem, Bono], tear down this wall [between iPod lovers and iPod haters]!"

Further misadventures of H. Dumpty

I swear, some days if it wasn't for my bike and the falls I take from it, I wouldn't have anything to write about at all. Today's tumble takes place right next to where I work, at the bottom of the hill where Catherine Street meets West Medical Center Drive:


In the pastel colors of Google Maps, the turn (circled in red) looks pretty harmless, but, trust me, going west down this hill you can pick up a lot of speed, especially if you don't brake.

After this week's meteorological misery (see Thursday's post), today's conditions -- full sun, blue sky, mid-50s temperature -- came as a buffet to the famished. I was taking everything fast, playing a little too reckless with intersections, turns, curbs, and stops, and I knew it. The road was dry, and I thought, tires never fail to grab dry road. Oops.

As I often do, I was making the turn off the seat, hanging off to one side to coax the bike in one direction. Most times she responds: I'll hear the rubber peel the road, and I know things between us are capito. Today she made the turn but then slipped out from under me.

Luckily, being off the seat and a little closer to the ground, I didn't have far to fall. But I still fell: right hand, right arm, right leg, chest, the rest of me, until I was all splayed out. Breathe -- I'm alive. A quick look around -- no oncoming traffic -- thank God, I'm not going to die today. I got up -- no immediate pain, that was good -- righted the bike and gave myself a push down Medical Center Drive. All this took just a few seconds. By the time a pedestrian thirty feet ahead turned to check out the ruckus, I'd already passed her.

I got home and headed straight to the bathroom to survey the damage, took my shirt off and saw this:


Ouch! Apparently I'd sandwiched my sweatshirt zipper between my chest and the pavement. A closer inspection of the wound revealed two parallel curves -- I think you can see this in the photo -- representing the bite the boxy zipper enclosure put on me. A little roughed-off skin on my right shin, not even worth taking a picture of, rounded out the damage. Overall, a better situation than last July's fall.

I'm finishing this post midday on Sunday, the next day. The weather's again great -- a virtual repeat of yesterday's sun and sky -- and I'm feeling good enough, just good enough, to go out and try my luck again.

Rough start

Woke up this morning a bit unbalanced. A tune going through my head. Sat down, found a piece of paper, scrawled five horizontal lines across. Started writing quarter notes and eighth notes, still half-asleep. Weird because I haven't looked at sheet music in years. Lyrics too: "I'm not pay-ing at-tention. You're not to-tal-ly fine." I've never been much of a songwriter.

A dream started coming back to me. Ramshackle old building on a dusty road, two bars inside connected by a hallway, white wood paneling. Midday. Hungry, I went to one of the bars to get something to eat. The hallway, a closed door, a sign taped to it: "Private party". I checked the side door, saw a Hispanic man I knew sitting at the bar, he was wearing a checkered shirt. I waved, pointed to the closed door, and shrugged. He waved back, told me they'd let him in anyway. Chicken in a chile verde sauce, I smelled it. Went to the other bar. Girl who worked there, maybe thirteen, standing next to a table smoking a cigarette. Something familiar about her -- didn't know how exactly, but we'd spoken before. Two boys, both about six, were bothering her for a toke. She hesitated, gave the cigarette to the nearest one, told him, Only one toke. I realize, this is the girl from Carson McCullers' Heart is a Lonely Hunter -- the character Mick -- funny, I didn't even like that book, didn't even finish it, not even close.

At that point, the music started playing in my head and I woke up. 7:16 am, it's going to be a long day.

Crusades, then and now

Lately I've become fascinated by the Crusades, and I mean fascinated in the sense that I'm reading books while brushing my teeth in the morning.

One reason may be that the weather here in Michigan has turned to crap, literally cold, rainy, and painful:


and I've been thinking of how nearly every battle during the Crusades was fought in the scorching desert heat of the Levant. Lucky bastards. Another reason may be that I saw the 2005 Ridley Scott movie Kingdom of Heaven on DVD and liked it. A lot. Enough to want to check out how trebuchets really worked, who this Saladin guy really was, and how a bunch of religious zealots could triumph over more level-headed men in the conduct of war. Hey, wait a minute....

Whatever the reason, I've picked up two books on the Crusades. The first, Jose Saramago's History of the Siege of Lisbon, is only peripherally about the Crusades and more about a proofreader who decides to change one word in a manuscript about the Crusades, thus setting off a butterfly effect. The second, James Reston Jr.'s Warriors of God, is a more straightforward history of the Crusades, especially of the Third one, but not at all dry. The man can write.

As I brushed my teeth this morning, the toothpaste tube held open the pages of Warriors of God describing the Battle of Cresson. In May of 1187, a Muslim force of 7000 ventured west of the Sea of Galilee doing reconnaisance in territory overseen by a Christian count with whom a truce had been struck. Given forewarning, a band of 130 Crusaders, including the Masters of the two principal orders, the Templars and the Hospitalers, gathered to watch the Muslims from a nearby hilltop arguing over whether they should attack. Eventually, the Master of the Templars won out, citing how their forefathers "overcame the enemy not by force of numbers but by faith and justice and observing God's mandates." He turned his horse toward the Muslims and charged; the others followed. By morning, all but five of the Crusaders were dead and 60 of their heads were on pikes.

An undersized military force charging into a Middle Eastern land at the behest of a single man who believes that he has God on his side and that victory is certain. Hmmm.... To believe that miracles can happen, that's faith. To believe that you can make miracles happen, that's hubris.

After a long weekend

Sitting outside of Sweetwater’s in Kerrytown a few minutes after three on a Sunday afternoon, I took in the scene around me. Sunlight arced over the building to my right, and a breeze fluttered in from the southwest. I was in short-sleeves – others wore sweaters – but I wasn’t feeling cold. Books and papers were spread on tables around me, inside the coffee shop and out, reminding me that school was in session and that this place, Ann Arbor, was a college town after all.

I’d spent the weekend in non-stop motion which began Thursday night, continued into Friday and Saturday, and was finally beginning to slow today. A lot of people were in town for the Michigan-Michigan State game, SHB and bf NMS from SF, CA among them. Three nights of bar outings had left me tired of ordering drinks, much less drinking them, and I was now glad to have a few still moments to myself. I looked at my paper coffee cup and admired the font scrolled across it. This was, I thought, my more natural state: noticing the things around me and wondering how I fit in with them.

The leaves have started to turn color here in Ann Arbor; the trees have begun to withdraw their chlorophyll back into themselves.

On Tuesday AMM leaves town for Washington D.C. I’ve never been in Ann Arbor when she wasn’t here, and I’ve grown close to her over the years. Her departure leaves me feeling like I’m looking out over headstones more than milestones. Graduation looms. In league with my advisors I've decided to defend my PhD in February or March. Applying for jobs will soon become habit.

Fresh-faced kids cross the street in front of me, walking to the artists’ market off to the right. Girls in oversized sunglasses chatter away. The breeze picks up, and I pull my jacket around me.

Here's to favorite books

This day in 1847 saw the publication of one of my favorite books, Jane Eyre by Charlotte Bronte. It's been over ten years since I first read this book, but the experience has never left me and never quite been repeated. I remember one night especially, lying in bed, holding the book over my head with its pages dimly lit by a faraway desk lamp. Jane works as a governess in a stately old mansion and starts drifting off to thoughts of Rochester, the older man who employs her:

"I hardly know whether I had slept or not after this musing; at any
rate, I started wide awake on hearing a vague murmur, peculiar and
lugubrious, which sounded, I thought, just above me. I wished I
had kept my candle burning: the night was drearily dark; my spirits
were depressed. I rose and sat up in bed, listening. The sound
was hushed.

"I tried again to sleep; but my heart beat anxiously: my inward
tranquillity was broken. The clock, far down in the hall, struck two.
Just then it seemed my chamber-door was touched; as if fingers had
swept the panels in groping a way along the dark gallery outside.
I said, 'Who is there?' Nothing answered. I was chilled with
fear."

Yikes, I just got the chills from reading that again. The same thing happened over ten years ago when I suddenly noticed how quiet my parents' house was. Normally I could hear my dad's low snoring from across the hall; that night, I heard nothing save hedge branches brushing up against my bedroom window. I dug into my sheets a little deeper. Meanwhile, Jane comforts herself by remembering how one of the servants sometimes got up at night to check the doors. She drifts off again but is startled by something "marrow-freezing":

"This was a demoniac laugh -- low, suppressed, and deep -- uttered,
as it seemed, at the very keyhole of my chamber door. The head of
my bed was near the door, and I thought at first the goblin-laugher
stood at my bedside -- or rather, crouched by my pillow: but I
rose, looked round, and could see nothing; while, as I still gazed,
the unnatural sound was reiterated: and I knew it came from behind
the panels. My first impulse was to rise and fasten the bolt; my
next, again to cry out, 'Who is there?'

"Something gurgled and moaned. Ere long, steps retreated up the
gallery towards the third-storey staircase: a door had lately been
made to shut in that staircase; I heard it open and close, and all
was still."

Geez! What the hell was that?! Now I have the serious heebies-jeebies. Time to get out of here. That's what I was thinking over ten years ago, and that's what I'm thinking now. If you want to see what happens next, you can check out the rest of Chapter XV online, thanks to Project Gutenberg, here.

Decisions

On a personal note, those who read this blog might like to know that big decisions loom on the horizon for yours truly. Tomorrow I face a decision that is somewhat artifical but hard to diminish in its significance: whether I should graduate by the end of this semester. To answer yes sets up what is sure to be an arduous three-month trek to the end, with the first month devoted to getting out one more manuscript and the next one devoted to the writing of the actual thesis itself. To answer no brings some immediate relief but prolongs my stay here in Michigan between one and five months.

Right now, the feeling that I've already overstayed my welcome is gnawing at my marrows. The prospect of facing another winter with all that that entails -- from missing the bus, to missing the sun, to cursing my thin dry skin -- saddens me. But the thought of busting my chops at breakneck speed doesn't feel too good either. Adding to the dilemma is a job opening that arose recently that may, who knows, disappear at any time. Do you lock it down now and damn the consequences or let yourself let it go, trusting in fate to see you through? I'm up late these days for a reason.

I have a (political) dream

One of my labbies, Italian postdoc SM, has a political theory (actually more like a political dream) that some bomb is going to drop about President Bush that results in his impeachment. Looking up the details of impeachment this afternoon, we reminded ourselves that you need a simple majority in the House followed by a two-thirds majority in the Senate to dislodge the standing president from office. And then we talked about some of the different House and Senate elections coming up at the midterm.

As an avowed Democrat, I'm finding it difficult to contain my excitement as one-by-one Republicans get called on some hypocrisy that's just salacious enough to get the public interested: first Katherine Harris in Florida, followed by George Allen in Virginia, and now Mark Foley, again in Florida. (Que pasa, Florida?) Mix in there a leaked National Intelligence Estimate that says the WoT is failing in terms clear enough that it's difficult to spin the other way and you're practically icing the cake for the We Took Back Congress! post-election celebration.

But we've seen this all before: Republicans apparently self-destructing while Democrats stand by to reap the benefits like a group of Dickensian orphans waiting for the soup pot to come its way. To invoke the words of Han Solo (and Luke Skywalker and Princess Leia and, if you count the prequels, Obi-Wan Kenobi): I've got a bad feeling about this. And then comes this report in Time Magazine that the Republicans have patiently stashed away money to build a metaphorical beaver dam against the swelling tide, and I'm now waiting for November with equal parts dread and excitement. (I know, I know: beavers live on rivers and rivers aren't affected by tides -- it's a metaphor!)

But that's one thing about dreams. Even if you know you're having one, it can turn on you in an instant -- right into a nightmare -- and leave you grabbing at the sheets.