A bad case of the hollows.

Yeah, this band is rad. I love new music that gets under my skin. Angry words about how fucked-up stuff is. Makes me wanna burn it all down. Singing at the top of my lungs … before I cough up a ball of phlegm the size of my head. Calls me back to Berlin, to that basketball court where it all began. At 11:11 (or was it 3:32?) last night I fell asleep only to wake up within 20 minutes. I read some Gadamer. Watched porn. Went back to bed more frozen than when I first laid down. Sometime around 2:00am I woke up to the sound of Spic-O-Rama, but without that adorable John Leguizamo. I dialed 9-1-1 on speed-dial to report the disturbance. Today’s shot. Tomorrow probably too. It’s now 4:00pm, and I’m only thinking about the things I should’ve already done by now instead of the things I have to do next. Can’t use the sink downstairs because of the leak. Don’t know when I’m going to get back to the gym that overcharges me on a monthly basis. Sick of the scams all utility companies pull with new service contracts. The bruises up and down my arms have finally faded from the boxes and boxes of books I moved. Ordered two new books from Amazon today. Eventually I’ll bruise myself by moving them as well. Benjamin’s greatest fear was losing his library. Before I slip away into nonbeing, I wanna pile everything I still possess into a gasoline-soaked mound and flick a match in its general direction. Just to see what would happen. Dreading Friday. Not because it’s my birthday but because it’s the anniversary of when the sky over Texas caught fire and rained down on our heads. Dead astronauts and all.

Listen when your hair gets pulled. Don’t get caught. It’s gonna be alright. As soon as the embers die.

As I lay me down to fall asleep
with my demons dying and my pilot light weak.
I curse the last six months I’ve been hiding behind a mustache.
To those last ten years I’ve been howling at a paper moon: Fuck you.

The New 30

I think it’s fairly telling that I should lose my earrings just a couple of weeks before I turn 40. I had to remove them at the doctor’s office while they were taking an EKG. I wanted to get my heart a little look-see since midlife is fast approaching. I put them in my shirt pocket, joking with the nurse that I couldn’t remember the last time I had removed them. Afterwards, I sat at Nodding Dog Coffee Shop in Bishop Arts for an hour working since I haven’t had an Internet connection since Friday afternoon and I’m supposed to be teaching an online section of philosophy this term. When they closed, I returned to the old apartment to do some more gathering of my things to move them to the new flat. It seems most of our things are finally here, and there are even some books already on the bookshelves! Today we finally got phone and DSL. (And AT&T sucks absolutely, but that’s another post altogether.) It must’ve been while I was cleaning and packing that my earrings slipped out. Perhaps I’ll find them when I go back for that last transport of framed art and a vacuum cleaner. So, my heart is healthy. The doctor said I have the heart of an athlete. That’s good news, especially since both my maternal grandfather and my father died of heart disease. No diabetes. No high blood pressure. And he’ll send me the results from the thyroid tests once they return from the lab. Another year. Another decade. Another (new) home. (It wasn’t until we were saying goodbye to Mary that I realized I spent my entire 30s at my last home: I moved in when I was 29, and I just now left—not counting a couple of years in Japan and Europe.) My 30s were good, and so much better than my 20s. I’m looking forward to the future, no matter how short that may prove. This is probably the first time in 17 years that I don’t have any of my rings in any of my 7 holes. I miss body jewelry. I miss the sleepless nights that turned into blissful decadence instead of exhaustion. Now it’s off to bed. Or to work.

Year of the Whirlwind

In honor of a Japanese tradition I recently learned about, I have chosen sempū as the kanji to represent the passing year. Sempū means “whirlwind” and is written thus:

From teaching new courses to conducting some of the most advanced research of my academic career, from hitting the gym up to six times a week to beginning to learn German, this entire past year has whirled about my dizzy, complicated, overly complex, and insomnious head.

My wish for 2008—itself admittedly a silly designation that has nothing to do with science or any other respectable metaphysical system—is for the wind to continue to whirl but that the center to remain forever (and always already) still.

Other things to look forward to this year: the first major move in more than ten years, the fortieth anniversary of my birth, a vacation to Istanbul, completion of my coursework and exams and the beginning of my dissertation, teaching new courses, conferences, writing projects, relaxation and meditation, better health (and less of me to love), and—the gods willing—more than a few nights of blissful sleep.

Happy New Year.

Overheard v. 4.0

Overheard between a Blockbuster employee and an anonymous caller: “Can you check to see if you have Last Tango in Paris?”

Overheard at Bianca Jagger’s soirée: “What is this K?”

Overhead at a Kandy Lixx concert: “Didn’t she die of a heroin overdose in the ‘80s?”

Overheard on Oprah today: “Amen! We’re singing about a wiener!”

Overheard at Casablanca: Ching-cha-ching-ching.

Overheard in East Texas: “Come ‘ere, dog!”

Overheard at a Mesquite apartment complex: “Chuy!”

Overheard on a flight to London: unintelligible Arabic greeting.

Overheard while watching Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil: “A tear in the bucket; mathafuggit!”

Overheard in a private bathroom in Austin: “Don’t shave my junk too close.”

Happy birthday, Kris. I hope to continue overhearing voices in my head for years to come.

Happy Kitty/Happy Birthday

March 19th we celebrated our babies' birthday. Bolesław, Zimba, and Griga turned 13. Here are some photos the day after their big celebration that included games, treats, and lots of pets. Bolesław is the oldest, being born about 20 minutes before Zimba, the middle boy, who in turn was born about 20 minutes before Baby Griga. Bolesław is orange, loves to sing, and is definitely a morning guy. Zimba smells like pine cones, also likes to sing (albeit unintelligibly to the human mind), and his hobbies include standing on his hind legs ("squirreling") and being brushed. He also is known for his "crooky" tail. Griga is solid black except for a small white dot on his neck; he smells like wet grape vine and adores to be either "little spoon" or in the middle when in bed--his favorite place in the whole house.

H. B-day, Yo!

I feel compelled to speak. To write. Something brilliant and profound should come out any moment now. But it does not come. Today I turn 39—an age that doesn’t sound very profound at all. At least I’ll have greater cause and public support for a revolution next year. But this birthday comes, came, and will soon be … is gone. In this, it’s a reminder that revolutions are not turning the status quo on its ear but rather the cyclical nature of the universe as this one planet revolves around that one star. And knowing full well that there is no “this” and no “that,” I still have nostalgia for a here and a now. Yet I remain now and here: nowhere. Nostalgia for an I that can experience something deep and profound. Yet meaning eludes me, alludes to something tricky, concludes something without my input, excludes me altogether. On this, my birthday, I feel quite arbitrary and contingent. Ill-defined and infinitely pretentious. Superfluous. A spectre, a non-spectacle. Unseen, unmoving, and unfelt. Unreal. No, really, I’m happy to have a day all to myself (although shared with Lisa Marie and Pauly Shore), but it’s difficult to continue on with this life knowing full well that the babies were mixed up at birth and that someone somewhere else is most truly me and I sit here languishing in the life of a has-been, never-was-to-be. Smile. Wink. Nod. I’m god yet again … and good to go. H. b-day to me, bitch.