What part of “don’t fuck with me” do you not understand?

I’m fairly mild-mannered as I move through my days. And although patience is not one of my virtues—blame my sonofabitch father for passing along that characteristic—years of meditation, qigong, and deep thinking all play a part in keeping my heart rate lowered while confronting “difficulties.” I’m never a dick … unless pushed to extremes. And yesterday I had to rely quite heavily on my coolness as I encountered several people bent on pissing me off.

Eating at Luby’s always stresses me out: I’m never quite sure which (or how many) sides to order. And the servers are rarely under sixty and (even less) display any serenity of their own. The first woman behind the counter didn’t grasp my order of coleslaw (pronounced “coleslaw”), so she ended up repeating it three times before finally spooning some in a bowl for me. Not too much of a problem, but it was enough to put me on edge for the next station.

My order: mashed potatoes. The server grabbed a plate with a huge chunk of pork on it and began slinging mashed potatoes. I asserted, “That’s not my plate.” Most people who know me know I haven’t eaten meat in 22 years. Since the server didn’t know me from Meat-Eater Marvin, I could certainly understand (and overlook) her mistake. But then she scraped the mashed potatoes back into the serving bowl and started slamming dishes around.

The next server asked what else I wanted, and before I ordered broccoli, I looked the previous woman straight in her 65-year-old face and said, “I could use a little less attitude.”

It was enough to make Stephen’s day, I think. He was still laughing about it later at night. The best part about it for me was that I said what I wanted to say, what needed to be said, and then let it go. Usually I’m worked up afterwards, but I was fairly calm while eating my coleslaw (pronounced “coleslaw”), (angry) mashed potatoes, and broccoli—hold the attitude.

After a stressful first day back on campus, filling out paperwork, meeting with students, attending orientation at the college, commuting for more than an hour, dealing with Surly Magpie at Luby’s, and trying to move into an new place, I was looking forward to relaxing a little once I got home.

At some time around 10:45pm, the flipping Filipinos—since I don’t know any racial slurs for Filipinos—started vacuuming. That is a common occurrence, and an issue that has been addressed by both the old management as well as the new. Since the last time I had to walk upstairs to tell them how to be decent neighbors and instead had a door closed in my face (after I was forced to knock three times before they deigned to answer), I decided I was above such face-to-face confrontations. So instead I crawled under our building and turned their electricity off. Fuck you, stupid fucks! Start making unnecessary noise when I’m getting ready to sleep and you’ll stumble your ass around in the dark.

Needless to say, I slept like a baby until about 6:00am, when I turned their electricity back on. Oh, did I say, “Fuck you”?

California Dreamin'

Just a week after returning to the States from Europe I had already had enough of Dallas and crap at the university.... Or at least I knew I was going to have already had enough, so Stephen organized a blissful weekend away to San Francisco (while I was still in Germany) since he and Kris were going to be there for work. And Jola is there.... So many wonderful people I care so deeply about in a wonderful city by the ocean. I read chapters in the U.S. history textbook for the class I TA for on the flight, so technically it was a working vacation.... Anyway, here are some of the photos of that most relaxing getaway (where gallons of coffee were drunk at Bazaar Cafe, we sat through an hour-long reflexology session, did qigong (as well as napped) in the sand on the beach, and ate incredibly delicious meals at ethnic restaurants throughout the city. I guess gluttony is yet another form of relaxation....).

Tiempo libre

I became a free man again as of 1:33 yesterday afternoon when I submitted my grades and went through the official (and ever-so-asinine) “check-out” procedure at the college.

It’s a bit hard to enjoy the sweet relief that should be flowing my way after two nights of disrupted sleep, though. But yesterday when I got out of bed around 4:00 (after waking at 3:00), I spent the time fairly productively: I began working on a creative writing project I’ve been thinking about for a few months now.

And there are so many other projects that need to be started: cleaning (and possibly moving), planning my spring courses at the college (especially the online version), covering some ground in my reading assignments for the next term, and taking care of myself physically, emotionally, and spiritually. I’ve neglected those things for far too long; although I have made it to the YMCA three times already this week.

Last night when I woke up at 3:00, I was too tired to even get out of bed and try to do something. I have an appointment with my neurologist Monday. We’ll see what pills she tries to throw my way this time as I adamantly insist I’m not taking anything she prescribes.

Wednesday afternoon I met Shellie and Blake for lunch at the Polish deli/café in Plano. We shared plates of pierogi (blueberry and potato-cheese) and naleśniki. It is really nice to finally feel like I’m part of a cohort (of sorts) at the university. It’s been years since I felt like I was part of a group of like-minded people who enjoy each other’s company.

Since submitting my last term paper (the one the professor called “brilliant”), I’ve spent far too much time on MySpace, that horrible online (anti)social network. If anyone wants to add me as their “friend,” please feel free, but you’ll have to use “soleo” as my last name. I try to ensure that my students will (at the very least) have a difficult time finding me anywhere online. And if there are any bloggers out there who want me to add their site to my links, send me the URL.

Ah, so much housecleaning … and most of it metaphorical.

I am the walrus.

There's nothing quite as funny as the number of drugs I've taken over the past few months (years) to help me sleep. But the week of Thanksgiving, I stepped down from the Amitriptyline pony I've been riding since September. Now I've reverted to constantly waking up throughout the night and then waking up for good around 4:00 AM every morning. What's funny is that I don't seem to mind too much: with the meds, I was groggy even with eight hours of sleep, and now without them I'm considerably more awake. Even when I'm tired. The next step: get off this shit Rozerem that never did do anything it was supposed to do. According to several friends, it only makes me angry and bitter. I certainly have felt very on edge since I started on it in May. At first I thought it was just all the coffee I was drinking in Europe and all the shitty administrative annoyances I had to endure in Marburg. But it wasn't. Well, at least not just that. Even without the strong Euro-kava, I've been one angry fucker all term.

And yesterday I grew even angrier after spending almost three hours at the dentist office. One must suffer if one wants to be beautiful. And yes, my teeth are indeed beautiful. For the first time in my life. Too bad it took throwing almost $700 at them before they took on the glamor sheen of celebrity. But I'm only now enjoying my first coffee since yesterday morning. And I'm sipping it through a straw. And I must go brush my teeth immediately after I'm done. But even with the unbearable pain, the expense, and the inability to eat or drink for most of the past 24 hours, it really is worth it.

Once, on an osobowy (oh-so-slowly) train from Warsaw to Szczecin during the summer of 1991, my compatriots/companions decided to sing songs by the Smiths to help me sleep. (And to support my growing dependency on angst and ennui.) I need those friends now to sing me to sleep....

• Asleep
• Unlovable
• This Night Has Opened My Eyes
• Back To The Old House
• Heaven Knows I'm Miserable Now
• William, It Was Really Nothing
• Girl Afraid
• Half A Person
• There Is A Light That Never Goes Out
• Last Night I Dreamt That Somebody Loved Me
• Reel Around The Fountain
• That Joke Isn't Funny Anymore
• The Boy With The Thorn In His Side
• Please, Please, Please, Let Me Get What I Want
• Some Girls Are Bigger Than Others

Bullet-Point Friday

• Ah, the last of the Bullet-Point Fridays!
• I started this segment when I returned from Germany and began the fall semester just to ensure that throughout the long and difficult term I would sit down at least once a week and post something on my blog. And now it’s almost over.
• Well, not quite: I still have to submit another essay Monday. My research on the Redon painting has been fairly interesting, but—ohmygod!—I have no energy to just sit down and pound it out. I wrote about half of it Thanksgiving Day. While most of my compatriots were stuffing turkey down their throats, I was fasting and writing—what I tend to do best on that holiday. And I spent more than three hours at the museum Wednesday, so I have plenty of information to write about. Just tired.
• I exhausted myself with the first essay due before Thanksgiving. And thankfully that proved to be worth the effort. My professor wrote that I was “gifted.” (And I’ve hence decided to start a “Gifted & Talented” program for my Ph.D. curriculum! Too bad few of my colleagues will meet the requirements….) Of course, I started the research and reading on the flight to Germany last July, so it’s fairly accurate to say that I’ve done some serious thinking about my topic over the past 4½ months.
• Perhaps I will start my Bullet-Point Fridays again come January. But I think I’ll change the name: no good ever came from bullets. And “bullet points” imply a reduction and a leveling that I hope to never be guilty of.
• I submitted my translation portfolio for the term this morning. I feel like after the first draft I was no longer doing translation but merely leveling, making the text palatable to the pack of illiterate philistines who were in the class with me. After several classmates complained that one particular sentence was “hard to understand,” I declared, “Perhaps I should just translate it back into Polish, and then we’ll see how well you understand it!” If nature abhors a vacuum, then I’m certain she would indeed hate my classmates as much as I do.
• So, it’s time to go to bed. I still have so much more work to do over the next couple of weeks: exams to write and grade, essays to grade, grades to submit. And my winter break is quickly filling up with things wanting to be done and read. (And I’ll try to write so much more consistently throughout the week that Bullet-Point Fridays will be unnecessary.)

Thanksgiving Thursday

A random selection of music to be thankful for:

• "Beaten Thursdays" by Prefuse 73
• "The Columbia" by Lackthereof
• "Elvis Cadillac" by Rickie Lee Jones
• "Four Three All India Radio" by Echo Other
• "In a State" by Mojib
• "Kitten Who Did Not Want To Give Up" by BrainStorm
• "Masca" by The Duke Spirit
• "North American Scum (Radio Edit)" by LCD Soundsystem
• "NYC" by Interpol
• "When Under Ether" by P.J. Harvey

Just thinking about the multitude of ghosts that haunt every Thanksgiving and the network of friends around the globe who have made this a special holiday: 44 years ago President Kennedy was killed just a couple of minutes drive from my home; 10 years ago Michael Hutchence was found dead; Sonia in Kumamoto and the apato I painted green with the windows closed--I don't think my brain cells have really fully recovered; Tak & family in Osaka with my first bottle of beaujolais; Jola & the girls in Warsaw with several other bottles...; Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade way back in 1986 and the crappy meal in the basement of the Empire State Bldg.; "In this fateful hour..." over and over; and now me alone with a stack of books and one painting by Redon to keep me company.

Northern Latitude Dreaming

Instead of just sitting still long enough to grade 39 quizzes in US history over my break/office hour I've instead read through a couple of blog posts, did a search for Joris-Karl Huysmans' novel À rebours at my university's library (we have several copies), and ate a 280-calorie dark chocolate "energy" bar. I've holed up on the 5th floor of the library, sitting next to a window from where I can see--apart from a few office buildings in the distance and a handful of cars in the parking lot--a line of trees running alongside the western creek on campus. I seem to have caught fall fever: I don't want to be in love or run naked in nature. Instead, I'd really prefer to wrap up in some warm clothes in front of a fire somewhere and read a good book (perhaps Huysmans' novel) with a warm drink and even warmer cats. Considering this is Texas and today's high is in the mid-80s, it is unlikely I will get to have this experience any time soon. Even the promised thunderstorms don't seem to be on their way.

I have slightly more than a week to complete my term paper over Celan, about two weeks before submitting my final drafts for the translation workshop, and maybe three weeks before my project on Redon is due. Then there's final exams in US history to grade and then finally my final for philosophy is scheduled for December 11th. Now if only I can get through these damned 39 quizzes to set the rest of the term in motion. Ah, December! when life comes due.

Bullet-Point Friday

• Conversation over breakfast of Swiss oatmeal this morning included Alan Watts’ lecture over the coincidence of opposites, Huston Smith’s Zen training, and the metaphysics of becoming (as opposed to the Heideggerean notion of Gellasenheit, a letting be). All this before 7:30 a.m.
• There is no front without a back, no heads without tails, no sickness without health, no I without you.
• Now that it’s almost 9:00, I can also think about bringing in Parmenides’ attempt toward deduction: one can’t make negative existential statements, nor can one make positive existential statements (because by saying what something is, then one is implicitly saying what something is not—if this is a dog, then it is necessarily not a cat—which takes you back to the first premise).
• Therefore (in all of its metaphysical/rhetorical glory), all is one.
• There is no Buddhist monk without a dictator-general.
• And every poet has her other.
• But who is the poet’s other? The rhetorician? The philosopher? The linguist? The poem’s reader? The poem? The poet herself? All and (n)one::all is (n)one.
• It’s now 9:02, and I still have so much more work to do....

Pieces of Me

If it’s not the hunger and lack of interest in any of the food I find on the streets here—I mean there’s only so many cheese pizzas, cheese sandwiches, tomato salads, falafel pitas, and gummy, cheesy pasta dishes with limp vegetables I can stomach—that will kill me, then it will be the utter inexplicability of my inability to sleep throughout the night. Last night I went to bed at a reasonable hour (11:30), but I was wide awake (again) by 12:45, and I couldn’t get back to sleep until almost 3:00. In the meantime—and I mean this in its meanest and most unreasonable sense—I began reading another life-changing essay by Derrida about Gadamer and the poetics of Paul Celan. And then I took out my iPod and listened to some tracks from my Lazy Sunday Afternoon playlist, just allowing my mind to drift and reflect in a letting-be (perhaps—as if—a move toward Gelassenheit). Perhaps it will be the anticipation of the arriving/letting-go that will finally do me in.

“There are pieces of me you’ve never seen. Maybe she’s just pieces of me you’ve never seen.” These lyrics by Tori Amos continually float through my head. Knowing that people—and ultimately all things, including the great to be (it)self—are ultimately unknowable, I know that I don’t even really know myself. So, how can anyone else know this me that I don’t even know, this no-ing, unknowable I that reverts to a me when faced with the face of the radically alter in its (own/un-owning/un-(kn)ownness) radical alterity? A good question to reflect upon and face at two-fucking-thirty AM. Kids: don’t try this at home without adult supervision. I am a trained professional, and it still hurts when I do it.

I like the subtle subversion of irreplaceability these lyrics hint at: as if to say, you don’t need to replace me with her because we are the same. Do you not see that which draws you to her is also present here in me? Do you not see that the continual/continuing race toward the (metaphysics of the) new is just as questionable as the issue of knowledge of self and other (it)self? We are ultimately reflections of one another, each other: “The killer in you is the killer in me.” (Lyrics by Smashing Pumpkins. Maybe I should just stop listening to music altogether.)

I like how da in German can mean both there as well as here. I like how nach can mean both to(ward) as well as after. This is a great language in which to lose oneself, especially when the first person-pronoun is never capitalized (except, of course, as the first word of a sentence) and the second-person polite Sie is always capital(ized). But true Gesprach takes place only between (ein(e)) ich und (ein(e)) du....

Speak my language.

Ich bin ein Amerikaner

That's right: I'm a donought! After eyeing the Amerikaners over the past couple of weeks, I decided yesterday to take the plunge and actually purchase one just to see what it tasted like.Kinda bland: vanilla cake with vanilla frosting. It could've used a spritz of lemon or some other flavor. Now I wonder what the Berliners taste like....

Spent yesterday afternoon at the super luxerious bath here in Wiesbaden, but as with everything that's supposed to be relaxing, it came with an equal measure of stress. The naked people didn't bother me. In fact, it is always refreshing to be one of the most fit and most attractive people in a room full of naked people. And I was definitely lowering the average age of the bathers. But knowing neither the specialized vocabulary of public baths nor how anything really worked, I ended up going back and forth from the Russian suana to the cold pool. I couldn't remember the order of the recommended bath experience: was it 5-10 minutes in the 45 degree room with 25% humidity before or after the pool of 22 degree water for 20 minutes? And where did the hot foot bath fit in? It wasn't that I was shy and couldn't bring myself to ask questions; I just couldn't find any attendants who knew the answers. And after my severe farmer tan from the bicycle tour of Barcelona, I wanted to spend a few minutes in the solarium soaking in some UVA and UVB rays. But I stayed there only about 3 minutes because the bed turned off and I couldn't figure out how to add more time. Oh, and the most stressful: slipping on the wet floor in bare feet about 2 feet from the top of the marble staircase. I wonder where my body would've ended up: here's this dead naked guy with a farmer's tan and no forms of identification. I'm sure the Germans have a recycling bin out back for that as well. (But don't forget to segregate the bones from the flesh; and gristle goes in a different bin!)

This afternoon I head to Koln for a much needed stay in a large city with some culture and nightlife.

Arrival/Departure

We arrived yesterday morning in Germany without too many travel scars despite the simply lovely family that not only tried to take over our seats before we settled on the plane for the next 8 1/2 hours but also proceeded to talk throughout the entire flight. And by talk I mean whine incessantly, slap one another (mostly a mother-daughter ritual), and--as we from the hills say--holler up a storm. When I logged on to the Internet today I saw a headline about some mother arrested for beating her child on a flight in the US. I followed the link just to see if it was Indira Slapsalotta travelling on to the Gulf States (as in Persian and not "of Mexico"). I felt like hollering myself, "If you don't fuggin behave, I'll turn this plane around. So help me, Allah!" But then I'm not too sure if I'd be able to blog from Guantanamo.

Wiesbaden is even more wonderful and relaxing than it was in December. After a painfully short nap, Stephen and I walked the pedestrian mall, eating a hefty sandwhich at Perfect Day. I also stopped at a couple of bookstores just to see what kinds of gift purchases I could make for my professors who made it possible for me to be here for the next six weeks (by writing letters and suggesting I apply to this program). When Chris and Mary returned from work, we walked back into town for Italian. Last night I slept from 11:00pm until about 5:45am. It was a recent record!

Today we plan more cups of coffee, more casual strolling, perhaps some sweets, and maybe a short visit to one of the old thermal baths--a mainstay of Wiesbaden. (The "bad" in Wiesbaden means bath; it was known as a Roman spa town a couple of thousand years ago.) Tonight we head to Barcelona, where our all-too-short vacation goes to a whole 'nother level.

Thanxa notta latté

Yes, it’s time again to see my neurologists regarding my latest case of insomnia. Today I woke up at 2:30am. And one day last week I wasn’t able to fall asleep until 5:30am.

Memorial Day was utterly forgettable in the drizzle. It has pissed rain in Dallas every day for the past couple of weeks. At first, I thought maybe my sleep was off because of the cloudy, gray skies. But that’s no excuse even if it is true. Tomorrow I see the dentist, and then I’ll call about an appointment at the sleep lab.

I haven’t had a decent cup of coffee out in Dallas in such a long time. I’ve been compiling a list of places not to order coffee from. The list is tentatively entitled “Thanxa notta latté.” First on the list: Whole Foods. (Of course, why are you even buying a latté at Whole Foods in the first place? The only things you should buy from that big “green” monster is soap, lotion, and Snapea Crisps (because the World Market only sells the Caesar-flavored kind), and that’s only because you can’t tear yourself away from the fetish of “organic” and “biodegradable,” and “not tested on animals.” Each word worth a premium according to the posted prices down each aisle. At this rate, only the rich will be able to afford “-free” food!)

Next: the newest coffee shop to open up: Saxbys. Had a terrible latté over the weekend and then made it back yesterday for an even worse café au lait. The only thing more unforgivable is the Jesus-vibe: Biblical quotations from Proverbs and Zechariah in the bathroom, for fuck sake! And KLTY broadcast in the sterile, less-than Starbucks interior. (KLTY, pronounced clitty, is the local Jesus-fucking-Christ pop song station; you know, where they remove all the “baby girls” and “sweet-things,” and replace them with “Jesus.”) If Starbucks is Starsux, then Saxbys has quickly become Suxbys. Make me a fuckin’ decent cup of coffee!

I’m gonna be real mad when my doctor tells me it’s all because of this shitty coffee that I can’t sleep....

Grocery List

Ham Salad
*Cheese Danish*
Fruit
Sausage
Gravy Mix
Milk
Clothes Soap
Foil
Bread
Ice Cream
Imodium A.D.
After Shave

I found this list in the men’s restroom at the grocery store this evening. It reminded me of the scraps of paper Jola would find on the streets of Warsaw and would spend several days attempting to decipher the personality of the person who wrote such a thing.

I image the man who composed this list to be a 57-year-old, 230-pound African American who walks with a slight limp. His face is marked by laugh lines that a less generous person would assume were solely wrinkles and by kind eyes that have seen both too much sorrow and too deep joys. He calls everyone sir or ma’am, and makes sure to tip his fedora to his neighbors as he ambles down the sidewalks. Sometimes he stops at the freedman’s cemetery to pay his respects to those who have passed on and over; he’s never too busy to listen to children sing songs.

He doesn’t much care for dogs: they’re much too hyper for his sensibilities. Cats are fine, but he knows they’re the enemies of the birds he feeds scraps and crumbs to off his back porch every day.

He’s worried about the pain he’s been feeling in his left shoulder for the past three days, but medicine is a luxury and only as a last resort. Maybe tonight after supper he’ll soak a little in the tub to ease out some of the ache from the past several weeks. His feet smell, and he still tastes onions on his breath from lunch.

It sure was hot this afternoon, so he’s planning to take it a little easier tomorrow. Maybe water the plants hanging from his porch, maybe a game of dominoes with his niece who always comes over for a visit after church.

He knows he’ll be fast asleep when his head hits the bed tonight: a good conscience is the only pillow he needs.