Maintaining an Online Presence

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1194986841687768360kiddy_train_orlando_kara_.svg.medI have not gone anywhere. I am still here. My presence is almost imperceptible, but it has not vanished completely. I am not, however, contributing anything noteworthy or intellectual to the virtual dialogue. I am not lending any philosophical insight to the overall online discussion.

In other words, I’m just hanging around. Lurking on the fringes of acceptable social behavior. Like the pest who returns again and again even after you’ve extinguished its entire family. Or maybe because you’ve extinguished its entire family.

But I am not out for revenge. I am not bitter. Or resentful. I have no ill feelings toward anyone or anything. Except perhaps toward my intellect for failing to produce words and thoughts and ideas that matter. And maybe toward my desire for hiding somewhere deep underneath my emotional makeup.

But even then, I cannot bring myself to be angry. It is not their fault. It is no one’s fault. No fault is to be had or given. It is what it is. I am just an observer, going along for the ride. I may get off the train now and then, but I always get back on.

I ask the imaginary conductor where she plans on taking me, and when she doesn’t answer, I appreciate her silence, interpret her indifference as a signal that it is I who in reality am driving the train, and it is I who can direct it anywhere I want.

Right now, I am choosing to direct the train to the end of the page that I am writing on, and then to the kitchen for a glass of water because I am thirsty.

 

Daily Fresh Sushi

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Photo Mar 11, 11 26 30 AMI’m trying to find inspiration from somewhere! That’s why I’m writing about the tri-colored Daily Fresh SUSHI sign at the checkout counter at Burlingame Produce, right next to the check-writing platform, across the aisle from the bins of fresh nuts and grains, and the shelves of crackers and cereals and breads.

None of that is very interesting, or even descriptive, or relevant. It’s all just nothing, mindlessness, the fact that I’m writing about any of it an act of desperation, proven by the fact that I just wrote in melodramatic fashion the phrase “an act of desperation.”

Yes, my friend, these are low writing times indeed. So low, in fact, that not a word more should be written.

The Probable Reception of Total Consciousness

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123709985625180017Angelo_Gemmi_pitchfork.svg.medI have nothing particular to say. I’ve finally contracted the cold that the rest of the world has had at some point over the last three months. I’m engaged in a staring contest w/ another mundane day of work.

As I do my work on the computer – navigating between two web browsers w/ multiple open tabs, chatting in several Skype conversations, pondering numbers on excel sheets, and checking incoming email messages – I notice my notebook and pen sitting over on the coffee table.

They are nondescript. They look lonely. I pick them up, turn to the next available page in the notebook, and start writing the words you’re reading right now. I’ll be done in a few minutes, and then I’ll post what I’ve written.

Before I return to work, I’ll blow my nose a few times, go upstairs to fill my water cup, cut up a bell pepper for a snack, take a piss, and then come back downstairs to settle in at the computer again.

I won’t have written anything of interest, but I will have written. My head will still be stuffy, but I’ll feel better nonetheless. I will probably receive total consciousness. So I’ll have that going for me. Which will be nice. . .

An Unread Stack of Political Magazines

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“It’s a war of culture, politics, religion
Struggle of our soul. . .”

- from “Pockets” by Giant Panda Guerrilla Dub Squad

5206699402_edf4b5c778In front of me on my desk are three unread copies of The Nation magazine. Each week a new one comes in the mail. Each week I look at the cover, read the headlines, maybe glance through the table of contents, tell myself I’ll try to read an article or two later, and then create unread Nation magazine piles throughout the house.

I’ve been a subscriber on and off for close to ten years. When I do read The Nation, I find it informative, accurate, and perspective-shaping. Lately, though, I’ve had little desire to read it. Lately, I’ve had little desire to be politically active at all. It’s not that I don’t think it’s important to know what’s going on in the world, because I do. I’ve just chosen not to have the mental capacity for excessive political discourse at this time in my life.

About eight or nine years ago – when I read every article, feature, and op ed piece in every edition of The Nation; when I dared not miss an episode of Amy Goodman’s Democracy Now! daily radio program; when I read political book after political book after political book – I got into a protracted political discussion w/ a good friend of mine that ended in a mutual feeling of us not wanting to talk to each other about anything, let alone politics, for a couple of years.

The entire episode can only be described one way: totally fucking stupid. He had his opinion. I had mine. We tried w/ all of our powers of persuasion and righteousness to convince each other of the one correct view. At times we were civil. At times we were not. We got angry. We got desperate. We pleaded for ideological sanity. We reached levels of disbelief never before or since experienced in humans.

Then we got sick of it all. We accepted that our escapade failed. We departed ways. After years of antagonism, we began speaking again. We had learned something.

I learned that it’s easy to cross the line between being political savvy and being a douche bag. I learned that while being well-informed on current issues has its advantages, it is not the absolute necessity I once thought it was. I learned that it’s okay to not know the details of important events that are affecting the world. I learned that it’s okay not to have a fucking opinion about everything.

Before these revelations, I had been engrossed in my formative years – discovering who I was, what I thought, and how I was going to present my ideas and opinions to the unlearned masses. I’m past that stage now. I’m politically stable – comfortable in my views; willing to read, listen, and change if it feels appropriate; and not interested in engaging in futile political arguments w/ people who are trying to convince me of their preponderance.

I decline informal approaches to discuss contentious political and social issues w/ those who have opposing views, not because they have opposing views, but because of the vibe of unrelenting righteousness given off by the proselytizer of the opposing views. The proselytizing qualities I see in others, I now recognize as the same proselytizing qualities I possessed back in my heyday.

I know where these discussions go. I’m no longer interested in going where these discussions go. I’ve been there. It’s not a fun place. It’s not rewarding, or intriguing, or enlightening. I am conscious of the fact that I get to choose not to go to that place. The more I choose not to participate, the more I am reminded that I have made the right choice.

I’m not sure when my current subscription to The Nation runs out. I’m not sure I’ll renew it when it does. I sometimes catch Democracy Now! on the car radio, and I sometimes listen for a few minutes before switching to something else. I have political books on my to-be-read shelf that are not jumping out at me begging to be put on the top of the list.

I’m fine w/ all that. I’m informed enough to not be a political ignoramus, confident enough to admit that I don’t know or care about everything that is going on, wise enough not to get into cul-de-sac arguments, and tidy enough to collect all the unread magazines from around the house and put them in one stack on the shelf.

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Don’t Write Quickly, Or Slowly, Or Passionately, Or Creatively, Or. . .

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The road to hell is paved w/ adverbs. – Stephen King

Photo Mar 05, 4 26 18 PMI’m trying not to use adverbs as much as I have been. Sometimes I use them too much. The lure of the -ly is strong, even though I know that if I am clear w/ my words I don’t need them. If I just say what I want to say, there is no need to modify or qualify.

When I write without adverbs, my writing is stronger. I notice it. The people who read my writing notice it, too. I can tell by their comments.

Adverbs cloud the page w/ unnecessary clutter. They tell too much. They show too little. They don’t allow the reader to fill in any blanks.

When I have the time, I write without adverbs. I put them in the first draft, and then I take them out of the next draft. I like what I read when I take them out. I wish I had more time to take them out. My writing would be better if I did.

 

Death Don’t Have No Mercy

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He’ll come to your house and he won’t stay long
You’ll look around and one of your family will be gone
Death don’t have no mercy in this land
- Reverend Gary Davis

4526805177_4dd5986047I wonder if I’m getting to that stage in my life where more and more people I know start to die.

- – - – -

Yesterday, after writing about my dad, I left his urn on my desk. My kids saw it and asked what it was. I told them it was an urn.

What’s an urn?

An urn is where some people put their ashes when they die.

What are ashes?

I don’t remember if I told them that ashes were your body all mashed up and sprinkled into a tiny bag. I don’t think I did. I probably didn’t.

I told them that this urn was their grandpa’s, and the ashes were somewhere in the ocean. They asked why, and I told them that that’s what you do sometimes w/ ashes – you sprinkle them somewhere peaceful like in an ocean, or on a mountain, or in a lake.

Oh, they said, and we got in the car to go to the grocery store.

- – - – -

Last night I learned that the father of two boys I had taught passed away. He died of a sudden brain aneurism. One of his boys is a senior in high school. The other is in eighth grade. They now have no father. Like me.

I didn’t see the father that often. I saw his wife more. I always liked seeing her because she laughed a lot. And she made snide comments about things that teachers and parents weren’t supposed to share w/ each other. I liked her boys. She knew I liked her boys. We all got along well.

- – - – -

Last fall a friend of mine died. A sudden brain aneurism, too. She was in her mid-thirties. I went to her funeral service at Grace Cathedral on Nob Hill. I had never been in a building so spectacular.

Her husband and her sisters talked about how wonderful she was. They didn’t know how they were going to live without her. They all cried. I cried. Everyone cried. The organ played, and it echoed in the vastness of the church.

We all walked across the park to the social club for drinks. It was a sunny day. People sunned themselves on the grass. People read books. People ate sandwiches from picnic baskets. The widower remarked that life was just carrying on like nothing had happened. Nothing had happened. To the people in the park.

His wife had died on the same day as their son’s first birthday. I have often wondered these past few months what it would be like to grow up w/ no memory of your mother. When you’re older, is the pain lessened because you can’t recall specific events from the relationship?

- – - – -

I recently read two books by Joan Didion: Blue Nights, about the death of her daughter, and The Year of Magical Thinking, about the death of her husband. Her husband’s death was sudden. Her daughter’s more protracted.

I thought about how difficult it must have been to write those books. To fully engage yourself in the projects. To write about events so personal. To be so reflective. I thought it must have been cathartic.

Or maybe it wasn’t as difficult as I thought. Maybe the necessity of it all made it easier. Maybe she had no choice but to write them.

- – - – -

I’m not the kind of person to wait for bad stuff to happen. But I sometimes wonder when the next tragic death of someone I know will occur. Not in any morbid sense though. It’s just that something is bound to happen unexpectedly, and I kind of want to know ahead of time. To see that person more often. I know that sounds ridiculous.

- – - – -

I put the urn back on the shelf in the garage. My kids haven’t said anything about it since. I’m not worried about talking to them about death. I’ll figure it out when the time is right. Probably.

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Books on Sunday Chapter 9: March 3, 2013 – Holden Caulfield, My Dad, and Me

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4360879352_5c13d49497

not my copy

Currently reading: Self-Help by Lorrie Moore
Recently finished reading: Raven: The Untold Story of Rev. Jim Jones and His People by Tim Reiterman; Brooklyn Was Mine by Chris Knutsen and Valerie Steiker (Editors)
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Learn more about Books on Sunday here.

When I graduated high school I could count the books I had read for pleasure on both my hands. Maybe even on one hand. It just wasn’t my gig, reading. I hadn’t yet discovered its full potential. I didn’t know that ideas and perspectives and experiences that other people shared in books could profoundly affect my own ideas and perspectives and experiences.

My dad had given me a copy of The Catcher in the Rye by J.D. Salinger – the classic burgundy paperback edition w/ the gold writing – when I was fourteen. He said it would change my life and that I should read it right away. I didn’t believe him when he said it would change my life, and I didn’t read it right away. I had unknowingly, despite my adolescent omnipotence, delayed my life changing experience.

Four years later, on my first day of college, I was mired in a long, winding, slow-moving line outside the University Center, waiting to get my financial aid. I realized that I was going to be there a while with few entertainment outlets. I pulled out the burgundy copy of that so highly recommended book, and began reading. Now the answer to my dad’s ad nauseam could finally be, Yes, I’ve read the god damn book!

By the time I got to the front of the line, I had read two-thirds of it. I read the rest when I got home. Holy shit! Dad was right. I knew right away that this book had changed my life forever. I understood my dad so much more clearly now, and I had just enough of a speck of maturity to understand why he so desperately wanted me to read it.

The world and many of its inexplicable complexities now made sense. The things I thought were cool before were now not cool. The things that I had never recognized about people, and what they thought and how they behaved, had become clear and obvious. My perspective had been instantly shaped by Holden Caulfield’s, as had, I now saw, my dad’s.

It didn’t matter that I had read the book four or five years later than most kids read it. It didn’t matter that I didn’t know any kids that went to private school. It didn’t matter that I had never been to all the places in New York that Holden went to on his adventures. It didn’t matter that this was a work of fiction. It didn’t matter that Holden’s life was different than mine. None of that mattered because I was able to relate to his experiences and his ways of thinking and his quirks and idiosyncrasies because, really, they were universal.

By the time I was 22, a senior in college, I had read The Catcher in the Rye several times. I even kept that burgundy copy by my bedside, and I would flip through it every once in a while. The number of books I had read for pleasure had increased since my first reading, but not significantly; perhaps now I could count them all on my fingers and toes. Keeping a book at my bedside – like others might keep a prized piece of jewelry or a favorite picture – was an action that fell outside the realm of my expected behavior at that time in my life.

I still have that original copy my dad gave me. It has survived a lot over the years, including a mauling at the hands (paws) and sharp teeth of my roommate’s puppy, rendering it unreadable.

The book now makes its home inside an urn originally used to hold my dad’s ashes. The ashes, floating somewhere in the Pacific Ocean, are no longer in the urn, but keeping Holden company inside the hand-crafted rectangular wooden box are several other items related to my dad: his death certificate, social security card, and passport; a gold money clip w/ his old partner‘s initials engraved on it; a small bronze Buddha figurine; the program from his funeral service; some stencils of his name from the Circle of Friends; and a handwritten note accompanying a few photographs of me in college (around the time when the book was mauled by the puppy) taken w/ his favored fish-eyed lens.

Now, over twenty years since my first introduction to Holden, his impact on my daily living is not as immediate. I have grown and matured in multitudes of other directions, and have been influenced by hundreds of other authors and fictional characters, many who have contrasting or even directly opposing views to Holden’s.

My dad is no longer here, but his memory never goes away. Holden never really goes away either, once you’ve had the pleasure of meeting him. My dad and Holden both pop up and say hello regularly, and I always welcome their conversation. They guide me often, providing purpose and direction where purpose and direction are not always easily findable.

I’ve learned a lot of lessons from my old man, and from that teenage kid from New York. Many of those lessons I’ve applied. Many I’ve ignored, like “Don’t tell anybody anything. If you do you start missing everybody.”

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Second Person Saturday Volume 9: March 2, 2013 – The English Beat at Bimbo’s in North Beach

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Dave Wakeling at Bimbo's 365 Club, San Francisco - March 1, 2013

Dave Wakeling at Bimbo’s 365 Club, San Francisco – March 1, 2013

Learn more about Second Person Saturday here.

You’re not sure if this going to be a good show or not. After all, it’s been well over 25 years since the heyday of The English Beat. But your friend got tickets, and the show’s at Bimbo’s, a place you’re kind of embarrassed to say that you’ve never been to, and it’s a Friday night, and what the hell?

You walk in the door, and immediately you know this is a special place. It feels like an old cocktail lounge from the 30s or 40s, in a sophisticated but not too pretentious way, very classy. There’s a bar area, and you hang out in there for a bit while the opening band plays in the main room.

You see couples sitting, sipping drinks and enjoying appetizers and talking loudly to be heard over the music. You order a drink and find a table in the corner and sit down a shoot the shit w/ your buddy.

When the opening band is done, you make your way into the main room up toward the front of the stage on the side. The crowd is vibrant, there’s an energy, an expectation of something special about to happen. There are a few young people, but the majority of the crowd is in its forties and fifties, people clearly for whom The English Beat is a happy memory of their childhood or early adult years. There is a lot of nostalgia in the air. Good nostalgia. You’re feeling it, and liking it.

The band walks on stage. Dave Wakeling is kind of round, and smiley, and full of energy. He straps on a left-handed guitar. You didn’t know he was left-handed. He says a few words into the mic in an accent that sounds more Australian than Brittish.

Within twenty seconds of being on stage the band launches into Rough Rider, and the crowd sings along w/ every word, bounces to every chord, is taken back to 1982 w/ every skank of the keyboard.

Hit after hit, non-stop, w/ the briefest of introductions for each song. The crowd loves it. You, being part of said crowd, love it. You’re bopping around, amazed that you know all these songs so well, that you really like all these songs so much, that the band is actually much better than you thought they’d be. They don’t seem washed up, or cliche, or like they’re just trying to make a few bucks off old glory days.

Of course, Dave Wakeling is the only member of the original band. All the rest are young guys, including the keyboard player who looks like a teenage Japanese foreign exchange student. Rankin’ Roger is not there, but you think you heard that he’s been replaced by Rankin’ Roger Junior, his son? You’re not sure. You’ve had a few Tanquerays. You’re not paying that close attention.

The band plays straight for about an hour and forty five minutes. There is not one song that you don’t recognize, not one song that is not high energy, not one song that doesn’t get the entire crowd in a happy state of frenzy.

They finish w/ Mirror in the Bathroom, and the crowd goes wild. The band extends the chorus. You find yourself singing along at the top of your lungs like you probably did when you were twelve years old.

Dave Wakeling plays the last chord, thanks the crowd as they cheer for more, shakes hands w/ the folks at the front of the stage, smiles, waves, and trots off stage w/ the rest of the band. There is no encore. The lights come up. You walk back to the coat check line to get your coat. You walk out into the warmer than usual March San Francisco night air, feeling buzzed from your drinks, but more buzzed from the music you just experienced.

A Random Collection of Unconnected Thoughts

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2517411063_77aca34113I have no idea what I’m about to write. I say that not to brag, or to be melodramatic, but as an observation of my mentality at the moment. I haven’t penned a single word since Monday morning, and after only a relatively short four day break, my fluidity of thought has noticeably worsened, my writing momentum has been punched in the face, broken.

I knew that would happen. I knew I would simultaneously miss writing and thoroughly enjoy not feeling like I had to write. Writing’s weird like that – I need to do it, and yet I don’t always want to do it. Although, really, need is a little much. I don’t need to do anything except breathe, eat, drink, and take a shit every once in a while.

I can tell I’ve been off for a little bit, that I’ve lost my way slightly, because I’m using the simplified logic of a ten year old. I guess that’s what happens, and I guess I’ll just have to accept that those are the consequences of my choice to lay down the pen for the week.

I have had a chance to think about the whole writing business though, and while not a conclusive thought, nor one that will keep from writing here at Lick the Fridge, I feel like blogging is getting in the way of my writing.

The thing is, I have no goal. I have no objective. I’m not working toward completion of a special project. I have no book idea, or planned collection of essays. Rather, all my writing on this blog – while some of it is quite good – is just a random collection of thoughts and ideas on any number of topics that are mostly unrelated to each other.

What happens, then, is that I get into a groove for a while, and find that I have lots to say about lots of things – one day I’ll write about my kids, the next day about the writing process, the next day about riding the trains, the next about mindfulness or Scientology – but there is nothing unifying any of it. There is no connection.

And after a stretch of writing all this stuff, I inevitably stop and say, What am I doing? Who cares? None of this is going anywhere. Only a few dozen people are reading, maybe more if I participate in a link-up that, while giving me the opportunity in theory to draw inspiration from other pieces and make invaluable connections w/ other writers, eventually just ends up being a big time suck that prevents me from doing other non-writing related things, and is the catalyst for my recurrent burnout.

I feel like I need some direction, but I don’t have the time, money, energy, or resources to get me going on finding that direction. I feel like if I was working toward a bigger project, this blog would serve a bigger purpose. It would be more necessary, a vital propellent toward greater success. But it’s not. Right now the blog is the project, and one that resembles a poorly constructed grade school diorama w/ unidentifiable hardened clay figures and glitter glue that gets all over the house. Thus the feelings of ambiguity and occasional bouts of apathy.

All of this that I describe is what I imagine people are talking about when they say writing is hard. Writing the actual words is the easy part. Having some sort of unifying sense of the point of why you’re writing them in the first place is what’s difficult.

Who knows? Maybe I’ll land on something soon. Maybe I’ll find an idea that will spark a larger idea that will give my writing some purpose. In the meantime, I’ll just keep on writing my random collection of unconnected thoughts, until I get tired of it, and stop.

Then I’ll repeat that process again. And again. And again. And again. . .

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Taking a Break from the Blog

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2840195_1c8a95fc6cEvery day since my writing resuscitation toward the end of December I have posted something here on the blog. I had taken several months off and focused on other things, and it has been good to get back into the writing swing of things.

I have developed a routine that works for me, my commitment has been continual and total, and it has yielded positive results that I am proud of. Through my participation in yeah write I have made many new connections and I have been challenged to improve my writing. I have filled up two notebooks, and I have covered a wide array of topics.

While incredibly mindful of momentum, I am also equally mindful of burnout. A few weeks ago I wrote about sustainability – for how long would I be able to write every single day? Although I like to tell myself that I don’t put pressure on myself to write every day, the fact is that that’s just not true. Some days I just don’t feel like writing, but I do it anyway.

As I’ve said before, once I’m done writing, I also like to say that I have written, but the ends don’t always justify the means. It’s one thing to have discipline and another thing to run yourself into the ground.

In looking ahead to my week this week, I can see that it’s going to be tough to maintain my routine w/ any consistency or enthusiasm. Rather than force my way through it, I am making the conscious decision this morning to take a few days off from writing. I plan to return on Friday when my unusually busy week settles down a bit.

I’m hoping the small break does me good and that I return w/ renewed vigor. In a way, it’s quite silly that I’m writing this post, speaking as if this three day planned break were some major world event worthy of a press release and a press conference.

I’m not sure whether the fact that I am writing this post is a reflection of my serious commitment to writing or of me taking myself too seriously. I guess it doesn’t really matter. Either way, I’m outta her for a few days. I’ll see you on Friday. Enjoy the week!

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