"i know you like to linedance/everything's so democratic and cool/but baby, there's no guidance/when random rules"

Alright, so i was not hospitalized in 1984 for approaching perfection (though i did visit my mom in the hospital in 1984 when she gave birth to my little brother and accidentally broke the hospital bed or something. I was so punk rock when i was three...) Nevertheless, the first chorus of D.C. Berman's ode to loss, disorder and the pain of memory and forgetting, the introductory track to the Silver Jews' third and best album, seems to speak to my current aporia over work, school, and seemingly everything else. And maybe it's just the use of the word "aporia," but that last sentence was more pretentious than i meant it to be. I like "aporia" - the word, not the state. Partially because it reminds me that i used to know ancient greek before i forgot it all, which is exceedingly obnoxious, and for which i immediately apologize, and partially because it encapsulates a certain kind of terror and frustration i think it's otherwise very difficult to express with only a single word. And I really am "at a loss" right now. I mean, it's something i've gotten used to over the last seven or eight months, certainly, but it's there. ("Aporia" comes from greek. The verb "aporeusthai" means, more or less, "to be at a loss.")



I saw the Bridget Jones' Diary sequel with my cousins and their 8 and 11 year old children, barely preserving the now 12 or 13 year old tradition of the post-thanksgiving cousin movie, what with Nellie, Kyla, and Jenny all elsewhere, and Andrea's kids all down in DC with Ray's family, and Lev in fucking england for the year (although i did talk to my brother tonight on the phone for the first time in months. Whatever the failures of the telephone as a means of communication, it dwarfs Instant Messenger.) Thanksgiving last night was oddly small and subdued - only 11 people or som, a far cry from the usual 27 - and i somehow managed to be the youngest person in the room, until caleb and lena (the 11 and 8 yr old cousins) showed up with their parents for dessert. Until this year, being the youngest person anywhere was something i'd rarely experienced - getting held back in Kindergarten will do that to you. The movie itself was mediocre, racist, and preoccupied with unfunny fat jokes. I hear the first one was better, but I haven't seen it. At least i didn't have to sit through Alexander, which seems like it would be good material for a paper or article someday, but neither a particularly good movie, nor particularly fun to see with my cousins. But i bet it was still better than Troy, Julie. Caleb's becoming a pretty amazing guitarist.



Playing around on my dad's computer, i found old faux catullo-ginsbergian love and breakup poetry that i wrote in high school. The breakup poetry is hard for me to look at, not because i identify with it, but because i can sort of remember where i was when i wrote it, but i'm ashamed at how misogynist and vicious it is, and i don't really think like that anymore and haven't in half a decade. The love poetry, written while I was in the relationship with the person i later wrote the mean and self-destructive breakup poetry about, is much more benignly embarassing. Both because it's pretty pretentious, and well, other reasons i will not divulge on the Internets. But, oh yeah, my real point is that if I was sexually active in high school, then the pork-barrel politics of abstinence education bullshit is a really, really bad idea.



Anyway. So, yeah. Aporia. What will i tell my lead on monday? If i leave boston, where will i go and what will i do? Can i really apply to grad school with like a month till final application deadlines having not taken any tests yet? If i leave the job am i breaking a commitment and precluding myself from ever doing work with the union again? Do i really want to leave the job? If i don't, can i make this boycott work?



More later.