Age won’t soften the hidden edges on this man.
man in chair
Age won’t soften the hidden edges on this man.
Month: March 2017
wrapped in
Some days require wrapping not just your ears but your whole being in music. Meaning that such days require more than one song for the soundtrack du jour.
Today’s gems (loud, in headphones) even though there’s a whole lot more:
Catacombs – Vorderhaus
“Have I the right to want you/to say I love when I don’t see you?”
the drive – itneverhappened + Kim Schulke
permanent
“Din’t I tell ya aboot that time I went doon the toon and got masel a perm?”
What has it come to when you discuss Tom Skerritt, and it ends up being a singing match – two people belting out Berlin’s “Take My Breath Away” as if their lives depended on it?
“Turning and returning to some secret place to hide, watching in slow motion as you turn to me and say…”
Does erasing the “I” from the beginning of a personal statement make it impersonal? I am beginning to think so.
A few weeks ago, in the swarm of depressing inactivity, I watched the series Santa Clarita Diet; it held no interest for me at all – not my style. But still, Timothy Olyphant (I still miss Justified). He is the draw, right? Going mad seeking a cure for his zombified wife, the couple has this little exchange:
“You seem really manic, honey.” (Drew Barrymore, as his wife)
“I feel really manic.” (Timothy Olyphant, manic, excited and convincing)
“If only for today/I am unafraid…”
Competitive ghosting
Mid-late February 2017
I am old enough to think the whole idea/concept of “ghosting” is a bad, socially unacceptable idea, but at the same time, I am too old, impatient and tired of nonsense to want to explain myself any more. Or to wait for or want weak explanations from others. My reasons for backing off, backing out, ‘giving as much space as needed’ should be plain and largely self-explanatory to anyone close enough to me that I would see fit to pull a disappearing act, as I don’t have the casual sort of millennial-style “hanging out” relationships to which the term ‘ghosting’ most frequently applies. Actual ‘ghosting’ is more literal. For me, it’s a conscious and deliberate decision to withdraw specific and individual care, put the walls back up, even if a person otherwise remains a part of the ‘coterie’.
This is particularly true when I am not the only one withdrawing, feeling all emotion ebb away. It may never have been an intentional “dual disappearing act”, a race to which one gets sick of this first or finds herself indifferent to it all or wherein he finds somewhere else to hang his hat. With neither one so crass as to stoop to actual ghosting – or aren’t we? – instead it quiets, slows and dwindles down to nothing. Heading it off at the pass, pre-empting any form of bastardized and… competitive ghosting, it is time I go back to being a stranger.
(I know that ‘announcing’ the intent negates the whole concept; it is not really disappearing without a trace, but I suppose I’ve got to preserve some decorum. I am, after all, old. And we will both, after all, be relieved.)
low bar
“My face is going two different ways. My nose is going one way and the rest goes the other. I have to walk around with this face.”
“So what? I have a huge birthmark by my eye!”
“But that builds character! And you have Cara Delevingne eyebrows, a straight nose and … you have TEETH!”
Yes, that’s a high bar: having teeth.
Tired of/much too obvious
This is so today. Headache music. I am not sure I have ever read something that so perfectly captured my mood in the exact moment I felt it.
“I won’t hate you, I won’t love you./There is the possibility of floating”. Sigh.
Tired Of
–Patricia Hampl
Not the wrist of the sunset
which sinks every night
below the electrical wires—
that is pink, I’m not tired of pink.
But cover up the stars, the stars
are the absence of clouds.
Let the clouds come, clouds
are vague.
Say you didn’t betray me,
or am I being too clear again?
I’m a primary color
in your presence.
On the window sill a blue bottle
is filling with pink light.
I won’t hate you, I won’t love you.
There is the possibility of floating,
a pink loud is scudding by.
French-blue is right here,
it is serenity
even though the color is bright
and as you said, much too obvious.
(Edit, in response to this: “This sounds like something you’d like. It’s like bits in your soundtrack track listings. I might not be deep, but I know you well enough.”)
old souls – dead souls
Yesterday I randomly came across this list of ’12 reasons why old souls have such a hard time finding love’. Normally I would think it was mumbo-jumbo – ‘old souls’? And who the hell is out looking for love?
Still it spoke to me in several ways. Truths:
- Left unchecked, their hyper-intuitiveness can wreck relationships
- They often have a greater purpose that must be attended to first – one that love would distract them from (They usually have to accomplish quite a bit on their own before they find love – this is because old souls love deeply, and completely. To be given love too soon would keep them from the other important things they are here to do)
- They’re natural healers, and often attract people who need help, not love (at some point in time, it’s crucial for them to realize that they have to choose a partner, not a student, or a charity case)
I have written in recent months about how I have seen this final point repeat so many times that it is impossible to count by now. I went back to old journals and snippets I’d written down somewhere – the pattern has repeated throughout my entire life, a history I had not even guessed the depths of until I went far enough back into old journals. I remarked on this tendency so many times and more than once resolved to take another path.
But it’s so hard not to get ensnared: by the time you realize that someone needs help more than love, it’s already too late.
Workplace lessons
I started writing this a couple of years ago while working. Haha. Trying to delete old drafts, it made me laugh.
Lessons:
- “Slapdash” is not “agile”
- “Make a video” does not equal “marketing campaign”
desire stuck in plaster
Soundtrack du jour – a blast from the past – The Dø, “Stay (Just a Little Bit More)”. Years ago in the throes of several most ill-advised entanglements I came across this song, and it seemed so perfect. I ran across it again while looking at old journal entries on the mostly defunct LiveJournal platform. It’s still just as perfect as it was back in 2010.
“He was a bore, a true chore and I still wonder why I ever
Wanted to see him more
I know it’s useless to complain all these years after, well
Thanks for asking now I’m fine
I should have muffled my obsession but I was all too pure
And so blindly sure
That he’d always have the satisfying hug I needed
Stay just a little bit more
Don’t let my heart turn sore
Stay just a little bit more
Don’t let my heart turn sore
He was kind, polite and divine in public
Tender as a sleepy child
But when we got slightly more intimate
It wasn’t that bright
Yes he was kind, polite, sound and sublime
In theory
But in practice believe me
There was a nasty fire burning
Stay just a little bit more
Don’t let my heart turn sore
Stay just a little bit more
Don’t let my heart turn sore
‘And when my curves came into play
Oh what a hopeless tumbling down when
His desire was stuck in plaster
I was young but I believed in no tales’
So in the desert of the bed I looked hard for an oasis
But all I could find was a dead camel in pieces
And I got so scared I tried to lure him back to bed
And I whispered stay just a little more
But now I’m grateful to the camel
Cos all the lazy boy could do was run
Then I knew for sure
That he would never be the satisfying shag I needed”
thursday
Now I have been invited to see Lloyd Cole in Stockholm, and that makes me laugh far harder and longer than it should. I won’t be going for it, but it’s awfully funny for a few reasons.
I’ve seen The Salesman; I recommend it. But then I feel that way about most of the Iranian films I see. Someone once accused me of ‘trying to look cool’ by citing Iranian films among my favorites. As if that would impress anyone?