You know how it is when you come back from vacation or a long absence from home, and you drink the tap water at your house? And you realize it has a weird taste you never noticed before, and that the only reason you weren't tasting it before is because you were used to it? And that the more you think about it, the worst the taste is?
That's basically how I feel about going back to OK. Life there has a weird taste it took me a long time and a long absence to notice. Oh, and so does the tap water, mostly because it is actually contaminated.
I know the type is too small to read. Suffice it to say,
the size of the red dot is negatively correlated with the
amount of time you have left to live after drinking the water.
I can't believe I haven't written in a month. Well, yes I can, because for a month I've been having crazy experiences, thinking "I should blog this", and then not doing it.
Back in Nash now, after tearfully departing what turned out to be a kickass internship in which many things became clear: 1) history it is, 2) more degrees required, and 3) I don't have to be Someone; I just have to be Somewhere doing Something.
I was really depressed to come back. Leaving my nice host family life, fun work, and friends wasn't easy, and now I'm just in an unpleasant in-between land, where every day is a repetitive cycle of applying for jobs and archiving the attic. Yes, using my new-found archival knowledge, I am now qualified to organize and weed piles of junk and papers and transform them into indexed and searchable collections. It's all stuff from college, so a lot of the process went like:
Oh I still have this?
Yep.
Does it still depress me?
Not so much.
I'm not saying I made an Excel spreadsheet for my clothes, but maybe it's in the works.
My initial plan was to go home before Xmas, but a series of unfortunate events and deaths put me in a fairly catatonic state where I found myself unable to make decisions. I do want to go, sorta... but more I just don't want to be the Other Bad Kid. And once I do get there, there will only be more uncomfortable decisions to make.
Nothing much kicking here. Last weekend Dad took us to what he believed would be an awesome Civil War encampment at a historic fort downtown (probably heavily influenced by his recent discovery of my favorite book Confederates in the Attic). It wasn't quite what we expected: for one thing, all of the re-enactors were African-American. For reasons that are overwhelmingly obvious, Civil War reenacting is pretty much a white man's hobby. Secondly, they had been performing a funeral for a fictional dead drummer boy. And finally, the drummer boy was present, in the form of a large doll dressed in period attire, lying in a a handmade coffin.
Oh, well. If they weren't doing this, they'd just be dynamiting anvils like they do at every other reenactment.
New intern girl at work in the other department. Getting to know her at lunch, she reveals that she went to college at the Citadel. Which sounded terrible enough, but then:
"Being enrolled there automatically makes you a member of the South Carolina militia."
"Oh... that sounds tough."
"Yeah, plus if we ever secede again I'm required to fight for the South."
...
Cue everyone's heads whipping around to stare at her and make the :O face. I was laughing/weeping openly while sliding out of my chair.
So remember that dude in that band I stalk on multiple continents that is marginally aware of my existence?
Just announced a girlfriend on FB.
This is depressing me way more than it should... Thank God I never showed him those Photoshopped prom pictures!
Also, while I was sightseeing downtown today, guess who texted me asking about a lunch or coffee date? VU nemesis! There I was, contemplating the remains of James Smithson, when an invitation came from the last person I would have ever expected it from. He was kind of adamant about it, too: lunch or coffee or something, today or sometime next week. Not like an "I'm around this afternoon and if we happen to meet up, that's cool" thing. We rendezvoused at a DuPont Circle Starbucks, after I walked roughly two miles from Chinatown because of Metro delays. Ummm...
The most unbelievable part is that we had a pretty good time. Also, turns out I wasn't making up his obsession with Arlo Guthrie -- he totally started talking about those awkward moments in thesis class without my saying anything. We also had a moment that went like this:
"Whenever my dad and I drive through Oklahoma [he's from TX], we always stop in the Arbuckles at this fried pie place."
me: "... by the highway and the Sinclair gas station with the dinosaur?"
"... yeahhhh...?"
Keep in mind that the Arbuckle Mountains are more than an hour's drive from my house. Welcome to OK!
I halfheartedly invited him to weekday intern lunchtime... only I think he might actually show up.
I just... cchhh... what?
Street in Copenhagen or swank DuPont Circle? It's anybody's guess.
Despite my uncharacteristic lack of touristy postings, I am taking pretty good advantage of D.C.'s corner on the museum market. Someday, I will post pictures and adequate descriptions of the adventures to be had therein. Not today, though: I feel asleep at work in my chair resting my head on a metal shelf behind me, while recording the contents of a 1955 reel-to-reel tape for digitization. THIS IS ARCHIVAL HELL.
So, a list for when I finally regain my senses:
* Museum of American History
* Natural History Museum
* Postal Museum
* Ford's Theatre
* National Gallery of Art
* the Capitol and White House gardens
* Nat'l Archives
* creeping at the House of Reps
* Nat'l Cathedral
* Mount Vernon
* Washington, Lincoln, Martin Luther King Jr... SO MANY MEMORIALS
* Nat'l Portrait Gallery
* Chiantown
I also saw VU nemesis again, this time through a window, gliding past me as the orange line train pulled into the station. For awhile as the train decelerated towards a stop, I walked beside it, keeping pace with his window and wearing what must have been an incredulous and horrified expression. Then I realized, what if he looks out? I did a 180 and ran like hell, jumping into the last car.
On the phone with mom the other day, she asks if I'll be coming home for Christmas, like I have the past 4 years. Wait, what?
Turns out no one wants to buy our house. This is not terribly surprising: it's a working-class neighborhood, tons of other houses are for sale, and if you hang out in the nearby park for long enough, you will be offered drugs. Still, some people had come to check it out, but no offers or real interest.
So maybe the crisis is averted for a little while, anyway. And maybe I can go home again and even stay a bit, depending on whether I get into grad school for the fall or just give up forever and resign myself to a lifetime of awkwardly chatting up old teachers while I make them smoothies at the YMCA.
I recently wrote a post about the idea of home that prompted me to really think about the subject. What does being home really mean? What's so important about having a place you call home? To me, home feels like a static concept, a snapshot of a time and atmosphere that may never really have existed, that you carry with you to each new place and point in your life. Something you can hold up and say, "This is what it used to be like. This is where I'm from. This is what I go back to."
But it's not really like that, is it? Your home is not a novel where the story stays the same through repeated readings and you can just pick up where you last left off. But it's hard not to think of it like that, and feel the difference when you do go back. When I think of my home, it's one with a steady job, two dogs, and furniture in the living room. But that's not true anymore. How long does it take to readjust, to feel normal in a place that doesn't feel quite like home?
I'd kinda like to be able to find out.
I could be the next Steve Jobs! Wait, nope... don't have hardwood floors.
How do you know when you've followed a band (okay, maybe just one person) around long enough?
When they a) call you by name from the stage, b) afterwards say how excited they were to see you there, and c) refuse to let you pay for their new cd.
They did not, however, offer to clean my bathroom. Even though I undressed and brushed my hair out over a towel on the floor, it's still absolutely covered in glitter.
When we left off, I had just discovered that the unwelcome bedroom visitor was a squirrel, not a mouse. Okay, the one in my brother's room actually was a mouse, but the squirrel is the topic of this horror story.
So, to re-set the scene: Dad's in the basement, I'm on the couch, squirrel's on the wall.
I'm watching this little varmint crawl all over our graduation pictures when Dad reemerges from his lair. To my credit, I didn't start yelling about the squirrel or cause any fuss; rather, I merely pointed, mutely, Chaplin-like, at the wall.
My dad is like me in that, when riled, his real origins become apparent.
"Shoot! Dagnabbit! It's a squirrel! Dang it!"
A series of similar hillbilly curses follow. I haven't seen him this upset since he dropped my camera on the concrete after a Coldplay concert. But then:
This requires some backstory. Anyone who talks to my dad for more than a half hour will hear at least one of two stories: the one about the old guy at the bottom of the mountain who runs a vegetable stand in his front yard and calls slugs "shrugs" OR, the story of the zombie squirrel.
A couple years ago, our house was the target of serial rodent home invasions. My dad finally identified the culprit: a flying squirrel. I thought, as undoubtedly many of you did, that these things were not native to our parts or that they all existed under the watchful eye of Jack Hanna; but, as it turns out, there are tons of them lurking in the woods, just waiting to give us typhus.
My dad ferreted out the intruder and repeatedly removed him from the house. But he kept coming back. Long gruesome story short, Dad was forced to dispatch him with a shovel and buried him in the woods out back. This bought him a few peaceful nights. But not too long afterwards, the signs of the squirrel were heard again. The next morning, Dad went out to examine the grave site.
It was dug up.
If I had been there, I probably would have blamed the innumerable dogs or wild animals or possibly feral pigs that inhabit our neighborhood. But not my dad. Oh no. He insisted that the squirrel had come back to life, dug itself out, and once again taken up residence in our house, this time out of ghostly spite.
The entire process had to be done over, only this time it was even more difficult on account of the squirrel being, you know, undead and all. Eventually it stayed dead -- maybe Dad got it with a toothpick stake through the heart, or shot it with one of those old quarters that actually contained real silver. I didn't really inquire about the details.
After this ordeal, naturally Dad was very concerned that he might have another battle with supernatural rodents (or at least a relative of one) on his hands. Regardless, he took care of it with a broom and set traps all around the upstairs. But something tells me we haven't seen the last of the zombie squirrels...
Back in D.C. after a serious curate's egg of a mini-vaca. The time I got to spend in TN was good, but the reason for said visit couldn't be forgotten. Well, let's talk about that later. Right now, a terrible story.
So we stayed in Sewanee for a couple of days. The story behind this is too long to go into, but suffice it to say that we live there sometimes. And when we do, we live in the woods. Being a university town, our area is a bastion of liberalism and modernity surrounded by thick forest, small towns, and the cousins your mama warned you about. The region's most famous resident was this guy, which tells you more than I ever could.
Anyway, after a busy Saturday escorting my grandma, the craft queen celebrity of a certain nameless town, around a crafts festival, we returned to Sewanee for the night. I drifted off into peaceful slumber in my old room, only to be awoken around 4 a.m. by the scritching and pattering of little mice feet.
I'm not too creeped out. I've heard mice at night before. It's a log house in the woods -- there's bound to be some kind of animals lurking around it. Plus, how do I know it's not coming from the roof? Annoying, but not something to get out of a warm bed at dawn for.
I go back to sleep, only to be awoken a few minutes later by even louder scratching. Okay, this is a mite more disturbing. I turn over with a vague thought to investigate... and see a unusual dark spot on the wall. As I mentioned the house is made of wood, so weird patterns and dark spots are everywhere. However, I've been looking at this wall for ten years and I know this is out of place. I know it will be hard to believe to many people reading this, but I actually try to go back to sleep at this point. Not for too long, though; when I look again and the mysterious thing has changed position, I decide it's time to evacuate the premises.
Bro's old room across the hall: I should be safe here, right? Ohhhhhh false. I slip into an uneasy slumber only to be awoken .5 seconds later to the sound of skittering feet on metal. What fresh hell is this? I look over to see the shadow of a mouse scurrying over the giant crosscut saw my bro has mounted on his wall.
You probably have a lot of questions here, none of which I'm qualified to answer.
Well crap, what now? I'm fine with the idea of sharing a house with mice, but only if they stay in their lairs and out of my sight. I liked Willard, but I don't want to reenact it.
I drag a pillow and blanket downstairs with me and set up camp on the couch. After a few minutes, stepmom comes in and asks what I'm doing.
"Mice. Upstairs."
Stepmom's eyebrows shoot up towards the hairline: she hates critters in the house. She hurries off to alert the authorities, aka my dad, who then descends to the basement and reemerges with a handful of mousetraps. He also brings up his faithful companion of many years, an electric mousetrap he reverently refers to as "Old Sparky".
While he's down in the basement assembling his arsenal, I try to lay down but am disturbed once again by the sound of tiny claws on metal. I look over at the stairwell and vaguely register that the thing has indeed followed me downstairs. Not only that, but it's clambering all over the air grate and the pictures on the wall. These feats are made possible by the fact that this is no ordinary mouse. This...
A funny story to make up for the sparse and depressing posts of the past few weeks.
You may remember "Dr. A" from this post. He's my friend at work, thanks to both of us being generally cheerful oddballs with weird names. His first name, which he is known by, calls to mind a man of Indian or Middle Eastern persuasion, yet Dr. A is a sixty-something redhead from Chicago. I really don't know. Anyway, a few weeks ago, the following exchange took place when Dr. A wandered in to my work space.
Dr. A: Hello!
ALB: Hello!
Dr. A: *in a strange accent* Hello! *a pause* What accent are we doing?
ALB: What accent are you doing?
Dr. A: I was imitating you.
ALB: Oh. That's just... how I talk.
Dr. A: *longer pause* Where are you from again?
ALB: East Tennessee.
Dr. A: Ah.
Undercover hillbilly status = possibly compromised.
This past weekend I was at Target picking up some socks (thank God it was just socks) when a really bizarre thing happened. As I was navigating the aisles of the super crowded store and puzzling over the intercom announcements in Spanish, I lock eyes with a dude over a sea of carts and notice he's looking at me as well.
At first I dismiss this as typical D.C. area behavior. People here stare. And not the way I stare, stealthily -- they stare noticeably, at everyone. Walking down the street, people lock eyes with you as they pass you and sometimes hold it until you're gone. It's really unnerving. I've started playing really uncomfortable games of chicken with dudes at the crosswalk, where we make eye contact from a distance, then I look away (like any normal person would), then look back to see them still looking at me, then look away, etc.. You can repeat this up to five times at a wide crosswalk, and I mean really wide -- they give you like an hour to cross. Okay, not really, but a lot of the timers above the 'walk' sign start at 60 seconds.
Anyway, I see this guy, he sees me, our steps slow and then stop as we both do the narrowed-eyes-tilted-head expression of simultaneous recognition and confusion. Who do I know in Arlington? I'm thinking. No one.
Except this dude, 'cause he's my nemesis from the undergrad history thesis program.
Not Al the triple-majoring, girlfriend-proposing Catholic, who once sent me a bullet-pointed page of critiques on a chapter draft that included remarks on my choice of punctuation. No, the other one, whose politically-centered and colorless thesis made peer reviewing even more painful than it already was. Talk about dry reading -- I'm pretty sure that rubbing two pages of his work together briskly enough could start a fire.
He was a ruthless critic as well. Every time my work was up for review, I could always count on this guy to trap me with questions like"Why do you consider Oklahoma part of the South?" and "Why is Woody Guthrie more important than, say, Arlo?" After giving up on trying to explain the historical significance of our favorite Dub-G, I challenged him to name an Arlo song. He named two. I looked like a fool.
Anyway, it was this guy walking down the same aisle as me in a crowded Target in a state neither of us are from.
We stopped for a minute and talked (apparently he moved here to look for work - yeah, good luck.), exchanged happenings since graduation, enjoyed an awkward moment or two with his mother ("Well you two should exchange phone numbers and meet up!"), and then went our separate ways. The phone thing never happened, so I felt obligated to end this interaction with a noncommittal "Okay, I'll facebook you!" Which meant the nightmare continued, because I had to go home and add him two years after it would've been appropriate.
I'm pretty sure this has happened to me multiple times. Hey, I know we met years ago but I've spent the whole time being afraid of you and not wanting you to judge me on my profile on a social media site. But now we're cool, right?
Apparently not: six days and counting, friend request not accepted.
I had in mind a really coherent and funny post about several awkward things that have happened to me recently, but then I got a call from my mom and now I feel terrible. I mean, moving is one thing, but doing it before I can come home (getting out asap, like next month, is the plan) and say goodbye/salvage my stuff is another. No, Mom, I don't know how much you should sell my bed for, because I was planning on putting that in my own house someday. Although now that I realize I will never be able to afford a house, I suppose this is less of an issue.
Does putting this kind of stuff here bother anybody? I mean, since the point of MLILT (ostensibly) is to laugh at my terrible life, not cry at it, do depressing and emotional posts detract from the blog? I'm thinking they may be annoying or off-putting to the dozens of A-list editors whom I know are reading this and just waiting to offer me a lucrative book /screenplay deal. I'm going to put a poll over on the right sidebar so you can weigh in.
In related news, heavily influenced by CB's love of positive psychology and the dollar bin at Michael's, I started a gratitude journal. I'm liking it so far, because it's such a motivating force to look for good things throughout the day and remind yourself of the little positive things that happen. However, even my positive psych journal is somewhat tainted with failure: yesterday's entry included being thankful that it wasn't raining when I rode the bus too far and had to walk back home through a strange neighborhood. Oh, well.
I've felt a little better since starting it, but I think my problem is not that I don't appreciate the little good things in life; it's that the good things are so small, and the bad things are so big.
Things here continue on as usual: archiving ad nauseum. When I was in NY, I briefly considered the attainment of an MLS as a solid career move. Now, if you offered me the option of getting a library science degree and say, drinking bleach, I'd be hard put to make a choice. Oh, well.
I've been doing more research into school options lately because, let's face it: the high life of living in cars and basements isn't going to last forever. I haven't said anything to anyone, but MTSU has a fairly applicable straw I could grasp at while remaining under the fam's roof in Nash. I know that living on your own, or even the pseudo-independent thing I've been doing, is supposed to totally turn you off from ever living with parents again, but in my case it did pretty much the opposite: I will gratefully put up with any rules or requirements provided that I get a worry-free place to stay. Surely I can't be the only one thinking this. Right now I bet millions of recent grads are having the same conversation: Yeah, what now parents? You said the real world was horrible and you were right -- so I'm moving back in with you forever!
So it looked like there might be a tiny little flicker of light at the end of this tunnel of perpetual unemployment, which was a cheerful thought. But now I can never live back home in Nash, and I'll tell you why. This is the horrible story, and I'll end with a funny one so everyone who reads this doesn't get the urge to go out and just end it all. I know there've been a lot of depressing entries lately.
Long story short, my brother's been house hunting. But isn't your brother, like, 24? Yes. Is this the same one who makes ungodly amounts of money with a degree from an institution that advertises on television? The very same. So when I was briefly back in Nash, I spent a lot of time being dragged around to look at houses all over town that I thought were perfectly nice, but which were never good enough for him. Yawn. But wait... aren't you in the process of losing your home right now? Why yes, we are. So probably you can understand the ragecanoe that erupts whenever I have to listen to this dude's fake problems of finding a house in a neighborhood without kids (yes, he is bothered by even seeing other people's kids -- how is it not abundantly clear to everyone that he has sold his soul to the Devil, I'll never understand), or whether he wants carpet or hard wood floors, and all I can do is remember when he refused to loan my mom a cent to keep the damn lights on. It takes a special kind of evil to show off what you have in front of the people you've wronged (also via FB, so my mom knows all about it), especially when they've swallowed their pride and asked you for help.
My anger at this shmuck could go on for pages and/or years of therapy, so I'll get right to the point. Today I talked to my dad and he told me bro's finally found a place. Hurray! No more looking at houses and trying to figure out how to key his car (or motorcycle!) and make it look like an accident. Then my dad tells me where the place is.
Our neighborhood.
Um, what? My dad lives in a condo development on the outskirts of town, and allegedly found my bro a great deal on a place in the same subdivision. I did not ask for more details of this nightmare, but wherever he lives it will not be more than a tenth of a mile from us. Every day I stay at my dad's I will be have to be reminded that this tool lives around the corner, in a far better situation than anyone his age or character should have. And he's doing it while screwing the rest of us.
So I think living there will be awful from now on, and perhaps not a viable grad school residence once I finally lose it and put a brick through his window. Back to the drawing board.
Let's get to the funny story before I resort to slitting my wrists casually.
One department of the place where I work is the Smithsonian Folkways record label, which specializes in world and historic music. They produce all kinds of recordings, from Amazonian war songs to Appalachian banjo to some dude playing a recorder near a wolf and calling it "interspecies communication." Folkways was the world's most democratic record label, and now that Smithsonian has acquired it, it's even better. You can buy any record that was ever recorded for the label since its inception, and they often acquire labels that are going out of business or just want someone awesome to take care of their catalogues and make sure they reach as many ears as possible.
So last week we get the word that a tiny label in VA that specializes in historic local recordings is donating their catalogue to us (that means we get the master tapes and right to reproduce the albums under the S-F name forever). And since the owners are buds of the CFCH team, they're coming up to deliver it personally. Interns are invited to lurk in the back and observe the momentous occasion.
In walks the label owner, a man I can only describe as a cowbilly. Graying hair past the collar, long curled moustache, granny glasses, cowboy boots... he looked like either a young Wildford Brimley or an old George Custer. He swapped folk song fieldwork tales with the staff and invited us all down to the annual Blue Ridge Folklife Festival, which features such events as a tractor competition and coon dog racing. Seeing the puzzled expressions on the faces of some of our more citified employees, he explained that a pack of coon dogs are raced across a pond by hauling the carcass of a raccoon on a zip line overhead. The first dog to swim across the pond, plant four feet on dry land, and bark is the winner. That is all I needed to hear - sign me up.
But wait, there's more. As the meeting adjourned and everyone was filing out of the room, there was a point where only me, Wilford Custer, Jr., and a CFCH director ("Dr. A") were left. I went back to my desk, out of sight but not out of earshot. The man from the mountains approaches Dr. A with a grin and a conspiratorial air:
"If you get everyone together later, you can all have a little celebration on us."
There was the rustle of a package being opened and some quiet chuckling from WCJ. Dr. A politely thanks him and I poke my head around to see what I anticipate being the presentation of a bottle of champagne.
Dr. A is stuttering. "Um... is this... spring water?"
"Not quite."
Another long pause. And then, "How did you get this past security?"
As WCJ and Dr. A leave the room, I get a look at what's just been exchanged. It's a quart Mason jar full of clear liquid.
...
Yes, WCJ congratulated us on the label acquisition by bringing us a gift from his homeland: moonshine.
After I picked my jaw up off the floor, I told the other intern, but she seemed skeptical. Un-be-lievable.
So the plot thickens vis-a-vis the last post, in which it was revealed that we are pulling up stakes in OK and getting the hell out of Dodge. There's a 'for sale' sign in the front yard and the contents of our house can be found on Ebay at increasingly sad prices.
For awhile I was pretty upset about leaving our house -- I mean, yeah, the dining room flooded when the drains got blocked up and more often than not you could only get out the back door with a screwdriver and a knowledge of locksmithery -- but it was ours, the only thing we ever had together and totally to ourselves. Everywhere else we were living on borrowed time, waiting for the money to run out or relatives to get tired of us or something else that would necessitate a move. But here we could finally chill out and happy times (well, marginally less miserable times, were here again.
But I guess your problems always catch up to you, even if it takes ten years. I sat down and cried for about thirty seconds before I realized it wouldn't do any good -- there's nothing else we can do, and my feeling bad about it won't make it any different. It was always pretty much understood that we would eventually leave OK. When I was looking for grad schools, my mom even suggested that she would move where I was and we could share an apartment. So that was about 10x the pressure on that particular venture, which didn't pan out anyway. The town I won't miss unduly and my remaining friends there are few, if important. I only came home once a year in college anyway to save money, so it's not like it's been my home since then. As things have continued to roll downhill, it's become an increasingly inhospitable environment anyway -- no internet, cable, or phone, and unless our bills are magically mixed up with someone else's, by next month no water or electricity.
I guess the only thing I'll really miss is my house, where I know where everything is and where everything came from. This probably sounds pretty weird; I guess I mean to say my house is the only place where I ever felt like myself. I felt like I belonged there, I didn't have to try and act normal for anyone, and if I needed something, I didn't have to ask anyone. My life since then has been a story of perpetual guesthood, where my existence is transitory, easily displaced, and totally ignorant of where anyone keeps the light bulbs. It's not really your house if you have to ask where everything is and if you can use it, or if your area is routinely altered without your knowledge or consent, is my thinking.
I suppose that's what I'll miss: feeling at home, in my home. Where I'm qualified to conquer the problems that come up (provided they do so within the boundaries of the bus lines) and can take care of myself with minimal invasion into the lives of others. But how long will I have to wait for another place to call home?
I think maybe growing up is a process of steadily weaning yourself off of things you used to think were permanent, or at least stable.
Well, while we all wait for the motivation to write What I Learned: Part 2 to present itself, I think an update on the new city and internship will tide us over.
I'm living in Arlington, VA, a nice suburb very close to D.C. I work in the city, very close to the National Mall and all kinds of fun sights (although everything's been obscured by fog and rain of biblical proportions since the day I arrived -- an omen?), and carpool to and from work every day with the woman I live with. There are two daughters at home and a dog. For what is looking like an ever more reasonable price for rent, I get my own giant bedroom, bathroom, use of everything in the house, and a ziploc bag with my name on it and a PB&J inside every morning. As in, they feed me. I honestly don't think anyone has packed my lunch since the early '90s, so this is truly the high life.
The job is awesome if a bit disorganized (luckily the downtime/time when none of the supervisors are available can be filled by listening to one of the thousands of records that line the walls of the office -- the complete catalogue of Folkways Records and then some). Well, awesome like the last one was awesome: I don't think anyone really aspires to spend their life alphabetizing a huge file box of folders containing business records for a defunct record company, but if you like who you're working for and feel like what you're doing is important and making a difference for the archives, it's no trouble at all. So yeah. More on the work later.
The other interns seem like good people. There are 5 other people in my area, 4 of whom are girls. 2 are still in college, 1 already has a Master's, and 1 is floating around like me caught between rounds one and two. I actually don't know where the guy is in his education, but I will say this for him: he knows his folk music and is a dead ringer for someone initialed JS. So much it's almost alarming. We're set to work on the same projects, so at some point I will probably address him as J when he inevitably starts praising Bob Dylan's later work or lets that beard get out of control.
So basically things here are good, and I'm not worried about riding it out til December. Which is just as well, because apparently life in the outside world is terrible and occasionally calls in. Two internships procured, successfully living away from home, and unexpectedly living the high life in D.C. on the cheap: of course it was only a matter of time before Life snuck up behind me and kicked me in the back of the knees. I'm currently selling the contents of our house on Ebay and apparently we are abandoning the S.S. Oklahoma as soon as we can strip the sails. I would say FTS, but that's just life.
This blog is looking like a hot mess. I'd make it a little easier on the eyes, but hey! if I had those skills I'd be selling them.
Anyway.
Am now housed and interned in the D.C. area, and as usual, am comically unprepared for the weather. The autumn and winter clothes stayed at home so I am traipsing around this cold and sodden city in shorts and river shoes.
I started the internship today, which was kinda like the first day of school in that there were loads of introductions and a couple of videos. I earned some street cred with the other interns because the boss knew about my time at WG and kept bringing it up -- they thought I was a full on MLS degree holder! Sorry kids, I am about as unqualified as they come.
These past two weeks spent in comfy air-conditioned Nashville, I've had a lot of time to think about the things that happened this summer and what I learned. Although nobody could've predicted all the weird turns my life took over the course of three or so months, the lessons I had to consider as a result were even more unexpected. Am I glad I went? Of course. Did things turn out like I had planned in the beginning? Well, no. Do things ever? See question two.
I didn't write some brilliant article during my free time at the archives and get a publication to show off, and no brilliant researcher, dazzled by my historical acumen and wisdom beyond my years, whisked me away to become their precocious understudy and collaborator. I didn't find out definitively that archiving is the only profession I could ever love, or even that it's one I could realistically do. Nothing was decided or even clarified much by this internship. At the end of the job, the only thing that really changed was the handwriting on a couple boxes of archival material and the "work and volunteer experience" section of my resume. But was it worth it?
Of course. And I'll tell you why: because of the things I found that I wasn't even looking for.
I'm gonna tell you this story in two parts. I would condense it, but a) things I learned fall into one of two distinct categories, and b) I just gotConfessions of a Prairie Bitch from the library and am eager to start in on it tonight. So, two parts.
Part One: Things I Learned about WG (I'm going to assume you know who I'm talking about, but probably need to distance this blog from anyone or any organization I recently worked for...)
WG was my folk music idol from high school. He helped me ace AP history (everything I know about the Depression, I learned from WG), taught me that hard times and situations can be funny, and even gave me an intro to the world of songwriting when a poem I wrote at school won a competition and a cash prize. I took his word as the honest, sensible observations of a poor man who had the great misfortune to live through the lean times of the '30s as many did, but whose talent in writing about the suffering of the common people set him apart. I thought that he was the legitimate article, come to the city and consciousness of the middle-class to show the nation how a great many forgotten souls were living out beyond the streetlights and paved roads. Uneducated but wise in the ways of the world, WG wrote simple songs that told it like it was for the poor people, his people, the dusty dustbowlers.
Well... not exactly.
WG was an artist trying to make a living in the '30s and '40s, and even as a folk singer (or really, especially as a folk singer) this meant conforming to a certain image. Just like VU educated Dr. Humphrey Bates and his band were dubbed "The Possum Hunters" to give people what they expected to hear on the Opry (see before and after), WG was playing into a stereotype for profit. While spinning himself as the humble son of toil who observed the modern world with an aw-shucks and a snap of the suspenders, he proved himself an articulate, political, well-traveled, and thoroughly modern songwriter whose business sense was confirmed when the public took him at face value.
This was a really weird thing to learn, especially coming from a state that, when they even bother to acknowledge him, tends to frame WG in similarly romantic and cliched terms. Getting the full story was a months-long affair, reinforced every day by conversations with my bosses or material found buried in the archives.
Asking my boss why NY had the archives instead of his home state: well, because he lived in NYC longer than he did in OK. But who was gonna listen to the "Brooklyn Balladeer"?
Poring through letters to his wife from aboard a WWII Merchant Marine ship: "Did he just name drop Buddha, God, and Marx in a single sentence?"
Digging through '40s photo albums: "Is that... a turtleneck?"
Rubbing elbows with the Greenwich Village intelligentsia and becoming a labor activist while maintaining the persona of the country rube requires more sophisticated navigation and aplomb than I possess, I know that. I don't think he was playing his listeners for fools, really... just that, to broadcast his message out and across, he had to adopt the frequency they were expecting it to come in on. Not that that stopped him from getting political and topical:
"Can you make up a joke that'll get us all a job?" Will Rogers Highway
My time at the archives revealed my old idol to be a much more complex, human, and ultimately tragic figure than I was expecting. It's hard not to get some kind of insight into a person's life and mind when you're paging through years of their journals and letters. Like how he felt about his wife, his children, and occasionally himself. Turns out you can be famous and genius while simultaneously experiencing all the stuff us mortals do, like jealousy, anxiety, and self-doubt:
"I don't feel any too well pleased when I hear my voice because it is dry and dull and thin and it rattles like a bucketful of rocks." 1944
His letters to his wife during the war were almost comically human, in their chronicling of the everyday aboard a ship and repeated requests for more frequent letters. What? I thought. If WG were my husband, wouldn't I be writing him every day? Geez lady, don't you know you're married to a folk legend?
Well, no. He was just a dude -- her husband, but still just a person. Just W.
One of the most eye-opening days was the one where the archivist showed us one of the few recorded clips of WG (others can be seen here and here). It's a home video they usually keep under wraps because of its private and sensitive nature. It's WG and fam having a visit after his disease got really bad and he'd been hospitalized for years. From the late '40s to his death in 1967, WG suffered the effects of a genetic degenerative nerve disease, the same that had plagued his mother and led to her hospitalization and death. I'd always known what he had and vaguely what happened to a person with HD, but seeing a scrawny withered little man whose limbs were going every which way without him telling them to, and knowing that the boxes of heart-breakingly hopeful letters marked "Greystone Asylum" and "Brooklyn State Hospital" came from him was almost too much.
"And I will never dread the day I will die/ 'cause my sunset is somebody's morning sky." My Battle
The letters themselves are almost enough to make you wish you hadn't seen them, or at least couldn't compare the unsteady, childish, nearly illegible handwriting and repetitive childish thoughts with the fluid, articulate letters of ten years previous. Where once he had filled every inch of a sheet with tiny neat cursive, now there were only pages and pages of wobbly misspelled words that documented the decline of a great mind that was failing even faster than the body that housed it.
"Just be patient and one day I'll write you a letter you can read." c. late '50s
When I first saw them in the archives, I thought they were notes and doodles from one of his kids, which also crop up a fair amount in the archives. But no, they were from the man himself, as each day he lost a little more control over his body and mind and the person who inspired millions gradually and cruelly slipped away.
"Teach me how, how to love this battle of life." My Battle
The return to Nash has not exactly been the non-stop party I wanted it to be -- there's been no music, no parades, and my bacon/pancake consumption is extremely deficient. Currently waging an all out war against a thrift store item in my bathtub that is eerily familiar to an episode from earlier this year that had disastrous consequences. The problem may lie in the inability to procure cold water from any faucet in the city during the hellishly hot daytime hours, a dilemma I halfway solved with throwing a couple of those freezer packs into a full tub, but that particular stroke of genius may have come too late.
As you can tell, I'm not going to have any good stories today. But that's okay, because I know someone who does. CB of xkcblag has graciously agreed to be our guest blogger for the evening, an agreement we arrived at after she sent me what has to be one of the top ten funniest letters ever penned by human hands. Without further ceremony, we bring you the story of:
"The Dishwasher Burn"
"We really thought we were living the high life. Actually, we are, but high life doesn't mean disaster-free. Our beautiful apartment does come with some issues... nearby train tracks (apparently trains run from dusk til dawn, regardless of light sleepers who dream about noises they hear in their sleep. Let's just say being ran over by a train is much scarier in dream than in reality. I know because I've experienced both.), toilets that sound like women dying a horrible death (probably by train) even when no one has been near in hours, and a dishwasher...
I've never used a dishwasher, except maybe to help (my grandma) load up after Sunday dinner. The only thing I really know is you still have to rinse dishes off before they go in and some things never go in. What things? I don't know! [...] Maybe those are old rules like don't wear white after Labor Day or bathing suits should go from neck to ankle (clavicle to lateral malleolus -- if those are wrong, just don't tell me. I like to pretend like I've learned something besides how to survive Broke Diaries style from VU). So, I decided we should put everything in there. Plates, silverware, wooden spoons. The first wash, everything goes great! Even if you have to rinse everything you're still saving 10 minutes standing at your sink.
High. Life.
The next night, we do the same thing. Everything in! And the next morning there is a sticky note on my bathroom door:
"Cousin, why does our entire apartment smell like PORK?"
I thought, "Shit! I didn't clean up after breakfast. Now everything smells like ham!" But... I'm not smelling anything... so I forget about it.
When [my cousin/roommate] wakes up, she says she suspects our magical dishwasher. So, I open it up and stick my entire face in. And almost DIE! It was so nasty. It didn't smell like someone left a frying pan w/ ham grease out -- no, it smelled like someone slaughtered a pig and washed it in our dishwasher! I just slammed the door and walked away.
Later, I found the problem. Our wooden spoons had fallen down to the bottom and burned like my breakfast ham. The smell would not go away! Tried lemon juice and vinegar and prayers. Still smelled like a raw pig. Then it happened again! We thought rearranging the spoons would help. No! Three or four fell back down there. Only one was damaged beyond use; the others were just charred.
Plan 86 (because obviously, 1-85 failed) was to let the dishwasher air out and light some of my candles to cover the pig. So far, so good.
Lesson learned: the one thing that is not dishwasher safe is, of course, spoons!
Shoulda asked Johnny."
Other highlights from the CB repertoire include this gem, carefully edited to conceal what/who we were laughing at:
"... just thinking about [something terrible that happened last semester to us] made me laugh so hard that my entire face hurts and tears were streaming down my face like some sort of sad Jesus fountain -- for the first time this summer, they were not tears of sorrow/pain, but fear/laughter."
Needless to say, CB writes awesome letters... all of which I keep in a locked box in my closet, where they are safe from the eyes of those who just wouldn't understand.
What what what. I have too much to write about. If I carried around a tape recorder and a time machine, I still wouldn't be able to document and experience all the ridiculous crap that happens to me on an hourly basis.
Currently sitting in D.C.'s Reagan airport, waiting on a delayed flight to the homeland while listening to some Satanicide and dodging the sketchy glances of a dude five seats down. I'm gonna be lazy and bullet point this list of things to write about while spending two car-less and sweltering weeks in the Nash. I'll spare you the entries from what I call "Angry Glovebox Journal" (things written in my actual journal late at night while waiting for people to vacate my parking lot so I could sleep in it -- might have to start a separate blog for that) and just hit the high points:
* last days of the internship. Why yes, I will be putting this sweet autographed book on my shelf, although I also wouldn't turn down your Grammy.
* NYC Sleepover with first college friend, who is there for a year mentoring program. Highlights include a giant apartment (even compared to real ones, not just the postage stamp size Manhattan variety), sage advice about the neighborhood ("You're little and white. Don't go any further south."), and hospitality, Bronx-style: "Good morning! I hope those gunshots didn't wake you up earlier." It was awesome -- I wanna move to the Bronx! Between Fordham and Kingsbridge and during the hours of daylight, that is.
* the ill-advised overnight drive from NY to VA -- oh my holy God, the drive. Eleven hours on the road, minus a brief sleep in, you guessed, a Walmart parking lot, and several stops on the hellish turnpike. Exhausting but fairly uneventful except for that part where I rear-ended a guy at a Jersey tollbooth. Can't have it all, I guess.
* sunrise over Philadelphia: the bridge was beautiful but what is all that stuff up in the air?
* sociological observations of the trip on I-95 south -- by Maryland, it was hella hot. By Virginia, everyone was hella friendly. Welcome baaaaaaaaacccckkkkk...
* sweet digs in Arlington. Maybe the price is worth it -- this room in the basement is bigger than any room I've ever had and I might not have to live off ramen anymore. Am I dreaming?
Now I'm going to transcribe the lyrics for Satanicide's "Jer-z Nights", so a) I can try transcribing something that's not recorded on a scratchy record 80+ years ago like I've been doing all summer, b) you can understand why this band (a Tragedy-esque tribute/mocker band of 80s hair metal) is so fantastic, and c) so if anyone googles the lyrics (which I don't think exist online yet), they'll hit my page. Because that's the kind of people I want reading my blog.
Jersey nights, Jersey lights
I wanna get into a Jersey fight
Oh nooooo
I'm going back to Jersey
Feathered hair, souped-up cars
And don't forget the Jersey local bars
Oh nooooo
I'm going back to Jersey
To be this cool oughta be a law
I've seen the world and traveled far
I already know there's a place for me
I'm going back to Jersey
Jersey nights, Jersey lights
acid-washed jeans so nice and tight
I'm going back to Jersey
"Hold on a second, fellas... listen up. Remember back in the day, getting pissface drunk and dropping some beer in my GTO? Cruising the high school parking lot... yeah. Well, it's good to know that times have not changed. Who's with me?"
Tailgate nights, party down the shore
when we run outta booze, we'll just steal some more
well, we're all going down to Atlantic City
because a man put the stop to the New York city
To be this cool oughta be a law
I've seen the world and traveled far
I already know there's a place for me
It starts with Jer and ends with Z
After that, it's more of the same for roughly seven minutes, complete with superfluous drum solos and screaming hordes of fans to simulate the arena rock experience. It's genius.
How am I allowed to walk around on my own? I clearly need some sort of keeper.
While the first one was purely accidental and could've happened to anybody, this incident is is solely a result of my own stupidity. I had heated something up in the microwave and used a glass bowl since, as previously mentioned, the fancy pants ceramic bowls can't go in there. When I took it out, it was hella hot and I could see some of the pasta sauce starting to get baked on. Oh my, I thought in my culinary naivety.I'd better soak that immediately to ensure easy cleaning!
Stupid.
I put it in the sink and turn the faucet on it. The water wasn't cold, but turns out it didn't have to be. I heard a tiny pop and had just enough time to look down at the still intact bowl and think Huh... before it suddenly and anticlimactically split into three pieces. I don't mean it shattered or even cracked dramatically -- just one minute, it was whole, and the next, it was lying in jagged pieces while the faucet ran blithely on. It was like a cartoon.
Undoubtedly anyone I tell this story to will be shocked that I did not see it coming. To them I say (preemptively): I'm not a freakin' chemist. And fourth grade, which was the last time I heard anything about molecules and states of matter, was several lifetimes ago. But apparently life is full of just such things that you are expected to know. Sometimes I feel like the only first timer in a world full of reincarnated Newtons. Thank god for wikihow.
Anyway.
After I comprehended what had happened and looked around for the hidden cameras that were surely broadcasting my incredulous expression to millions of viewers nationwide, disposal was the next order of business. I'm not going to Kisco til Monday, so last week's plan was out. In desperation I stashed the broken glass inside an empty ice cream carton, which I'm going to throw out in a street trash can at the earliest available opportunity. Maybe I can make it more secure, but maybe not: I hate to think of city workers getting cut while emptying the trash, but if anyone sees me lobbing a taped up box into a public trash can in NY they're liable to send in the bomb squad.
That's today's "adventure". WPR came back briefly, and I do mean briefly, between his international flight and driving up to see what is apparently his steady girlfriend. If someone wanted to see me after roughly a day of travel, not to mention a hellish time change, they'd be waiting at least three days. WPR drops his stuff, takes a shower, and bolts out the door with gifts in under 45 minutes. What a guy. So I've got the apartment to myself, although surely not for long once he realizes I'm destroying it. Might should go down to Our Lady of Wal-mart to see about some bowls...
Writing today from the comfort of a $2k a month apartment in White Plains, sadly bereft of its owner's presence til his flight arrives from Dublin this evening.
The major takeaway from this adventure seems to be: stick with WP roomie. He's kind, easygoing, and frankly, financially loaded. He leaves papers, including his lease, laying around (hence my incredulous discovery of the price of the WP high life) but that may be counted as his only fault. In a space of about five hours, dude rescued me from car camping and offered to set me up at his place, no questions asked. And he did it all from across the effing Atlantic.
I'm going to convert just so I can nominate this guy for sainthood. People of the world, take note: WPR is a god among men.
Here's how this miracle went down.
Thursday at work I get a short email from WPR just saying hey, asking what I've been up to. We've been messaging on and off since I left his place in June, so there's nothing odd about it. I mention I'm on a new adventure in Westchester (namely car camping), but kind of joke about it and go on to talk about other things. Within hours, he's posted onto my ad on the CS site begging someone to give me a couch, and sent me the phone number of his friend in a nearby town who has his apartment keys.
I contact the woman via phone, text, and carrier pigeon. In short, I hound her like a third grade nickname. She agrees to pass along the keys. I get a half tank of gas and wile away my last hours at the A&P as I wait for her to get home from work. I am pretty much vibrating with excitement at this point that I might have a place to stay. I roll into this woman's neighborhood around 10:30 p.m. (she must be southern, or at least not from Westchester, as she immediately hugs and offers to feed me), get the keys, and speed to White Plains, where the giant, empty, and blissfully immobile apartment was waiting for me.
So that's where I am now. WPR should be back tonight -- I offered to go get him, but trying to get from an airport in the city to the suburbs on a Friday at 5:30 seemed like too much of a suicide mission. I also offered to take a bullet for him if need be but hopefully it won't come to that. Already visited the Wal-mart Temple, got a parking ticket (oops -- I guess my fall from grace is nearly complete), and am currently soaking the river shoes and pillowcase because it smells like my car and gives me nightmares. I swept and cleaned up the kitchen today as well. I guess having a math Ph.D. doesn't guarantee good housekeeping skills after all.
The kitchen particularly was like a murder scene, or, more accurately, the ruins of Pompeii. Flour, crumbs, bowls and knives as far as the eye could see. It was like he'd been Raptured in the middle of baking bread. Maybe he'd just forgotten about his flight to Europe til the last minute, as these absentminded professors are apt to do. Whatever. I fixed it, and if he asks how the counters got so clean, I'll blame it on fairies. He's Irish, he won't argue.
While I was doing the dishes, a pot fell off the drying rack and cracked one of his fancy ceramic bowls right in my hands. Flower pattern, delicate fluting... these are the kind of bowls that can't even go in the microwave. I was horrified. Not so horrified that I told him, though. There's no way he will ever find out what happened, as I disposed of the evidence in a public trash can in another town. I counted the others in the cabinet: only ten! Since the set was already incomplete, maybe he won't notice. Five seconds later I found another one in the fridge. So much for that. But who needs twelve bowls anyway?
It is 80 freakin' degrees and smells like fall outside -- am I dreaming? How am I gonna go back to 95+ Nashville in a week? My brief bout of homesickness was a direct result of briefly not having a home, so now that that's resolved I feel fine taking up permanent residence in NY, especially in White Plains where the people are friendly (aka, normal). I don't know where the chocolate pretzels thing came from -- I literally never had those til I came here and started sneaking them from the boss's snack basket. The SNL craving was the result of my being disappointed in not having seen a taping whilst in NYC because the procedure and wait for getting standby tickets is reminiscent of Depression era breadlines or some Soviet bureaucratic nightmare. Ed Helms, you may be famous, but I can't line up at 3 a.m. to see you crack jokes at 8 that night. I just can't.
Last weekend in NY -- what am I doing hanging 'round?
A recent study (last night) of a panel of experts (me) empirically proves (in my opinion) that sleeping on a reclined front seat is superior to backseat sleeping. You keep instinctively trying to get more horizontal than the seat allows, but it beats folding yourself in half in the back. It also helps to be really tired. I actually woke up to daylight this morning. I know I'm risking discovery and possible arrest by going to the same place every night... but it's the best place around.
I congratulated myself with a terrible donut from the A&P. Attention shoppers: we made this pathetic excuse for a chocolate burger by covering an already piss-poor donut with Magic Shell. Side note, although CBs are my favorite donuts, it just occurred to me that I've never heard anybody else call them that. Is this a Cleveland thing or just a me-and-my-mom thing? This is, well, a graphic rendering of the product in question, because looking at a real picture makes me too sad that I don't have one in my hand right now. Essentially it's a hole-less donut glazed in chocolate and filled with cream. I'm aware that a bastardized version exists in which custard is the filling, but I refuse to even discuss such a thing.
Maybe a housesitting job in the next county for next week... oh please please please!
Just got off the phone with my mom, who asked why I don't say much when I call her. I think it's probably because I can't keep straight all the lies I'm telling her. I feel a member of the BSC in any of the Super Specials where every chapter opened with a cheerful postcard to family re: the weather, the kids, missing them, etc., then immediately transitioned into "There's so much I didn't tell my parents!" with the baby-sitters being shipwrecked, or the inn being haunted, or Stacey being seduced by eighteen-year-old lifeguards. Maybe I'll have more to say when I feel like less of a bum / secret agent.
I'm making a list of everything I want to do in Nash when I get back. It starts with 1) sleep forever, 2) take a bath... forever, 3) watch some SNL, 4) eat chocolate pretzels, and 5) see T&B and hopefully C.
In the mean time, check out this trailer for an awesome short film that will never be finished:
It was actually pretty easy… I mean, uncomfortable, yes. Paranoid, yes. Depressing, oh yeah. But easy enough to park behind a building, read by streetlight, make a nest in the backseat and go to sleep. The dreams are wacked out, but you do sleep. And since last night was undisturbed by the police or a murderer with a hook for a hand, this would seem to be the best temporary solution I can come up with.
At work now. I keep waiting for boss to offer her basement now that the party business is over, but just remembered their cat is coming home from an extended absence, so theoretically the house will already be too disturbed for them to consider taking on a guest, even one as unobtrusive as I try to be.
So… that’s where I’m at. No plans beyond finishing these ten or so days, driving down to D.C., and flying back to my bed in Nashville, which god forbid I ever leave again.
It goes without saying that if any readers talk to anyone (especially family) about this, our friendship is dissolved. Sorry, but them’s the breaks.
You made homelessness sound so good, Woody! I feel cheated!
Haven't left the apartment all day, which is kind of maddening when you know there's a world of interesting things to do and see just a subway ride away. The perpetual dimness of an apartment with no natural light makes it feel weirdly frozen in time in space, since there are no glimpses of life beyond the fire escape. But I've been trying to keep close tabs on the cat (and give hourly text updates to the owner). Plus, you know, homeless research.
I've pretty much accepted that I'm going to be living out of my car for the next two weeks. No response from Couchsurfers, WP roomie still out of the country, even a tip from an unknown CSer (helping out a stranger in true CS spirit) about a restaurant that rents rooms upstairs on the DL proved fruitless. I know someone staying in the Bronx part of NYC and she's offered me the landlord-stated-maximum visit of two nights, so I may do that til Tuesday. No other real leads. Only NYC has hostels (pricey), and this county is so geared towards rich folks that the only normal hotels are in the next state. So, car it is.
I'm not too panicked about it, although there is no way in hell I will ever tell anyone at home. If one has to be homeless, Westchester Co. in late summer is about the best place to be. It's warm but not hot, everyone's rich and the streets are safe, and parks and strip malls with parking lots abound. I got used to inconspicuously hanging out in public places for long hours (see pre-Kisco entries), and I've definitely slept in a car before. With access to phone service, internet (work and library), a car, and even a fridge (at work), I'm doing light years better than millions of homeless people. So really it'll be like more of a short term camping adventure.
Trolling the internet for tips (urban legend that Wal-marts let you sleep in the parking lot = confirmed! Only downside is that uppity Westchester doesn't have Wal-marts.), I came across the "Survival Guide to Homelessness" blog. Wow... check the comments for some of the most eye-opening experiences in modern America that rarely get heard. I'm most concerned with finding access to a shower, but I guess I'll cross that bridge when I come to it. My favorite pieces of advice from this guy? "Get used to lying" and "Fashion is for the rich." A-men.
Long story short (although the long story will be told), my guaranteed housing til Aug. 9 was shortened to Aug. 3 on a few days' notice. Then, the offer of interim emergency housing was also reneged, leaving me, not to mention BB, with nowhere to sleep on three hours' notice.
What in the actual eff.
Grateful as I am for the awesome free housing I've had thus far, it's difficult for me to comprehend that I was ousted twice soley for someone else's convenience. The first time because another expected guest at the Kisco house decided she didn't want to share the place (it's 3 floors, and I stay in the basement...), and the second when my boss's husband decided putting me up in their basement would interfere with their four-year-old's birthday festivities this weekend. Thus, two people feeling awkward equals me homeless.
My other boss thankfully stepped in and offered us her couches in Manhattan this weekend, so at least BB had accommodations her last night in NY. I'm playing cat nurse while my boss is gone til Sunday afternoon, at which point I have to vacate the premises for... well, nowhere. I have nowhere to go. Couchsurfing ads have gone unanswered (understandably -- it's just not reasonable to spring requests on people three days before you need a place), and I don't know anyone here.
The most infuriating part (well, maybe not) was the surprising lack of indignation on the part of my bosses:
"Can't you go stay with that guy in White Plains again?"
"No, he's in Sweden."
"You can't go stay at his empty place?"
"It's an apartment. How would I... no."
... as if temporary homelessness is an everyday and easily resolvable problem, and I'm silly for being concerned about it.
Well, maybe it does seem like that for them. Boss #1 suggests I book a hostel in NYC (which runs about $50 a night, plus the $25 daily train commute). Meanwhile I'm scheming on how to camp out without being detected in the Sleepy Hollow Cemetery. Boss #2 pointed out a hobo jungle by the train tracks on the way here as a point of interest; I marked it down as a point of possible future residence.
All this while I'm booking a flight from D.C. to Nash while contemplating the unexpectedly high rent that D.C. woman has decided to charge me. I also took off my shirt in the aisle of a Salvation Army thrifty this afternoon (no, not to raise funds! Get your mind out of the gutter! There's just no dressing rooms in there), so things have taken a turn for the crappy. Including this entry, which should've been about last effing Friday night, which featured such highlights as flirting with TrageJake, missing the last train home at 2 a.m., and passing a sleepless night on Times Square benches and McDonald's.
Just let the rain wash tree sap and two months of dirt off my car, then rinsed it with tap water from a watering can. Sometimes even I'm surprised at how good I am at being a professional brokeass.
Before I left, my dad insisted on us washing and waxing my car, for some unknown reason that immediately became nullified the minute we bounced onto the dirt road I briefly lived on. But even then, I doubted New Yorkers would be judgmental of my dirty and/or matte (some parts are never shiny -- I think bits of it were painted with house paint) auto. If anything, they'll be judging me because of my Williamson County plates or the fact that I'm driving 70 miles an hour with my arm hanging out the window. Not because my car's a little dusty.
Yesterday was an epic boxing marathon with BB. Fifteen or so boxes with some great stamps, though we were on this hellish trail for roughly four hours. The mosquitoes were also out in full force and must have sensed weakness because they attacked with surprising ferocity. I'm totally covered in bites: it looks like I have about four elbows on each arm. This is the itchiest I've been in quite awhile, which is something considering I get chiggers almost every summer from wandering into swamps, etc. with shorts on.
The depression over the alc situation was short-lived -- while it's sad to think that everything I took for overtures of romance was all in my mind (and the minds of every friend I ran the story by), it's not like I really lost anything in my brief period of pretending to live a normal teenage life. That doesn't mean, however, that I'm not ducking his messages asking when I'll be back. Leaving me hanging for two months was kind of a dick move and not something I'll forget quickly. Also, I think we can put the blame for the misunderstanding squarely on his shoulders -- before he started acting like he liked me, I had no idea who he even was despite the fact that he lived down the hall.. I thought his name was Patrick for at least six months, for crying out loud. But I'm pretty past it. Number nine on Sheldon Kopp's Eschatological Laundry List says it all: "There is no particular reason why you lost out on some things."
Back to what I actually meant to post about: last Friday. I'm going to summarize because, just like it did two years ago, thinking back on periods of intense awesomeness makes me kind of sad in the present because they're over and my life is no longer loud, glittery, and full of dudes in spandex making inappropriate jokes and embracing me.
Anyway.
The day didn't get off to a particularly auspicious start -- I got sick and we missed the morning train a total of three times -- but things began to look up after we got into the city. We started off at the New York Public Library to ride the lions out front and check out the redonk interior. Aside from boatloads of tourists, there were actually people in there trying to use it as a legitimate library. I have no idea why they even bothered -- how much studying are you getting done while nerdy bibliophiles (us) are posing for pictures in the stacks?
Did that for awhile, then booked it to the Met (my second attempt -- damn you, Madame X!), only to find the American wing still closed. What? At least more of the European painting rooms were open, so I got to see some new things, if not what I actually came for.
After that we hightailed it across Central Park to the legendary Shake Shack (though in true Broke Diaries style, I had brown-bagged a PB&J for the commute), which may well be NYC's only legit burger establishment. People regularly line up around the block for this place, and it was pretty delicious. I think the secret ingredient that so captures the hearts and palates of NYers has to be the banned trans fat they can't get anywhere else. But I could be wrong. Then to Alice's Tea Cup, a cute little tea room where we experienced pumpkins scones, Trafalgar Square tea, and the jarring realization that there was no way in hell we were going to make Brooklyn by 7 p.m.
Outside it was starting to rain. Ruuuuun to the subway, ride a couple stops while trying to map our route, then emerge above ground to find it still raining. More running as we try to make it to the venue before 7 (show isn't til 8:30, but before 7 there's no cover -- our choice is clear), and suddenly it is hurricane.
It was one of those things that is so awful it's good: I'm soaked to the bone, maps and papers disintegrating in my pathetically non-waterproof bag, Brooklynites staring as we sprint through puddles and yell in the rain about where the hell Wythe Avenue could be.
We finally make it there (albeit too late to get in free) and truck it on up to the ladies' room to dry our hair and selves under the hand dryers, and in my case, whip out my Tragedy t-shirt.
H'okay, so I'm going to finally make an entry about my Friday and Saturday in the city, which for some reason I have been able to put off on account of my busy schedule of xeroxing and pancake-making.
After my morning at the LES Tenement Museum, I started thinking about how little time I had left in the city and planned an ill-timed trip to Coney Island that afternoon. I was scared I wouldn't get to go to the beach / site of most of WG's songwriting in the late '40s and '50s, so I packed my swimsuit and took the subway (which after awhile, actually emerged above ground) about an hour out to the island. It was cloudy and cool when I got there, and the boardwalk was almost deserted. The beach and amusement park were practically ghost towns, and it quickly became apparent why: it was raining. Oh well. I came here to see a beach and I was going to see a beach. Despite the weather, I went down to the ocean to wade and hunt for shells. I found Mermaid Avenue but couldn't find 3520, unfortunately.
After my beach adventure I hurried back to get ready to see Tragedy. Allegedly the show was starting at 8 at the Brooklyn Bowl (a bar/concert venue/restaurant/bowling alley... really), but it's free if you roll up before 6. I figured I could kill two hours to save some cash. I ended up sitting on a bench in front of the stage for very cold and boring wait. Bought a Tragedy t-shirt, bypassed the Tragedy thongs for sale, and settled back into my corner as the opening bands start playing some redonk music. The audience started to fill up and some people were sharing my table. Eventually the skinny guy across from me leans in and shouts in my ear, "So why are you here alone? I think it's absolutely ridiculous that we're both here alone and sitting in silence." We chat for a little while, but it becomes clear that nothing exciting is going to happen as soon as he realizes I'm a Tragedy groupie and I realize he's gay. Oh well.
The show was hysterical and awesome, as expected, although not as long as the one in York and Jake didn't end up in any compromising bondage gear. They played almost all the songs from the first album and a few new ones, including a metal version of the terrible Olivia Newton John tune "Xanadu" as their alter-ego band, The Xanadudes. There was glitter, profanity, and a huge, lyric-singing crowd mobbing the stage that I weaseled my way to the front of. For the last song, they pulled all the girls up on stage and despite my best efforts (ducking behind dudes while "Mo'Royce Peterson" and "Andy Gibbous Waning" beckoned from the stage), I ended up there as well. It was a definite "WTF am I doing?" moment, but I just went with it.
When the show was over, the band announced that the crowd was invited to their party bus parked outside to continue the debauchery. This invite was quickly restricted to "only the ladies". They left the stage around midnight so some other band could come on, and I went back to my seat to check in with my new-found lonely friend.
NFLF: "So are you gonna go out to the bus?"
me: "I don't know... is that sketchy? Would it be fun?"
NFLF: "Well, I'm sure if you like blowjobs and cocaine, you'll have a great time."
I'm pretty sure I don't like either of those things, but I was really curious about how far the night was going to go. I exited the club and wandered past the bus like I was walking home that way so I could peek in the windows and make an assessment. As I walked by, someone inside shouted "Come on the bus!". So, that was pretty convincing.
I stepped onto the bus and it was one member of Tragedy (conveniently, the one I stalk) and a few... dudes. Despite the call for "ladies only" on the bus, everyone that actually got on was a dude. The girls were probably motivated to decline based on the same concerns expressed by NFLF above. But never one to turn down an opportunity to have an awkward interaction with multiple 30-something year old men, I got on the bus. There were pitchers of beer near the front and someone poured me one. I took baby sips to look normal, but it was terrible. I loitered in the background and make small talk with whatever dudes came on the bus. Eventually Jake walked by and noticed a new face and started talking to me. I held his attention (not) with some super exciting stories of how I was from Nash but cat-sitting in Manhattan and I realized yet again why I should just not talk to strangers. He drifted away but would periodically see me standing by myself in the corner and extend his hand for me to... high five? Shake? What was I supposed to do here? I clearly missed the memo and ended up just awkwardly holding his hand in a horizontal position for a few seconds. Smooth.
I talked to the bus driver and the band's assistant and some Israeli dude named Avi before figuring I should try to get out of Brooklyn before daylight. I slapped Jake on the back as I walked by but he didn't turn around. Alas -- rejected by a man wearing a bedazzled spandex jumpsuit!
Got home, collapsed, slept til noon, woke up and went to Coney Island again, this time on a sunny day. The beach was packed, I got burned, Eastern Europeans everywhere, some dude was laying in the surf with a snake... glorious. Boss texted me they were coming home early, so I beat it back to the apartment and cleaned up. Came home Sunday morning.
So finally that's the entire NYC week. Haven't been back since, but going tomorrow since I'm off work and it's the last Tragedy show. Stay tuned.
In non-NY news, radio stalker asked me to go for a drink when I'm back in Nash and ALC keeps asking when I'm coming back. I'm ducking both of them. I'm asking about the note tonight...
