ornoth

Well, hasn't this been an interesting month? Unfortunately, you haven't heard much about it, because I don't tend to go on about day-to-day stuff, and the stuff that was significant required the approval of a bunch of people to share, so I just bagged it. It's too bad, because some of it was truly amazing, but those emotions are gone now.

It all started out amazingly well. First I got to see my favorite reggae band, Culture, with my buddy Atticus. Then I made a weekend trip to Detroit to stay at a B&B on the shores of Lake Huron with four very close friends. The intensity and intimacy of the connections we forged were absolutely humbling. I would have written a great deal about this amazing experience, but I felt limited by my friends' privacy concerns. Let's just say that it was pretty mind-blowing.

Even through the middle of the month, things were pretty damned good. Inna and I took a two-day foliage trip through the Berkshires that was really marvelous. And the very next day I got to meet one of my magazine's newer writers for the first time, which is always a treasured experience. We got along pretty well and had a good time together.

But the nights got longer and colder and we had our first light snow squall, and things really seem to go to hell. The intense connection I shared with my friends in Detroit completely soured when I discovered one of them lying to me. From there, things rapidly spun out of control, until the whole group is now making completely baseless accusations about me, telling me what I think and feel about them. And their little fantasies are complete fabrications of their paranoid insecurities. While I think it'll blow over, it's causing me endless frustration and anger, which are emotions I usually have no difficulty controlling, but not so right now.

At the exact same time, I developed a large fluid swelling in my right knee that was diagnosed as pre-patellar bursitis. While it's not an immense inconvenience, it does limit how much walking I can do, and prohibits me from doing any cycling at all. Now, two weeks later, the symptoms haven't changed at all – if anything they've gotten worse – and I find that, too, frustrating.

Today was, of course, also my 39^th birthday. Happy birthday, indeed! Between having class in the evening and the limitations my bursitis places on my mobility, I wasn't able to do anything special. That, of course, left me free to dwell on my close friends' betrayals and our ongoing disputes.

And my usual end-of-year angst plays into all of this. The holidays are always the most painful, difficult time of year for me, mostly due to the obligations of family, friends, work, and school. And having a Halloween birthday, this is the official start of the holidays for me. I'm feeling pressured by my obligation to go to Maine to visit my mother, and I have just two weeks to do all four of my projects for my Quark class. As Inna has helped me see, I have a very dysfunctional relationship with "obligation", so the holidays and end of semesters really stress me out.

But I guess it's not all bad. I turned in a pretty good art project tonight (which only one other student out of ten completed), and I cracked open my Craggymore 12, which will soon be followed by a CCIC chaser. Party on. <shrug>

If you could only choose 1 cd to ever listen to again, what would it be?

Well, I'm torn between two. First, there's the Toasters' 1998 "Live in London" disc. It really captures the essence of their incredible and energetic live shows at the height of their skill. And, of course, it's ska, which is practically a necessity of life! Songs like "2-Tone Army" and "Weekend in L.A." are pure happiness, built to order.

Then there's the industrial might of KMFDM's 1995 "Nihil". Their most polished effort, "Nihil" is an angry stomp through a world of angst and misery. Songs like "Ultra", "Juke Joint Jezebel", "Flesh", "Disobedience", and "Trust" all set the tone of submission and preversion that reaches a crushing crescendo in "Brute", the most compelling song of submission I've ever heard:

Touch me — hate me
Give yourself to me and break me
Cut these eyes and I will see
Kiss these lying lips for me
Stroke this skin and I will kneel
Brutalize me; I will heal

If you could only choose 2 movies to watch ever again, what would they be?

Although I generally dislike movies, perhaps that's why I find this one easy to answer. The first and obvious answer is Richard Linklater's 2002 "Waking Life", a rotoscoped nonlinear romp through pop philosophy. It's a saturation-bombing of introspection for a slacker population who haven't yet woken up to the real questions of life, and is thus an absolute treasure trove of questions for the enquiring mind. Don't leave home without it!

My other selection is a little more embarassing: "Star Trek: the Wrath of Khan". People really don't seem to realize what a literary masterpiece WoK really is. From a writers' standpoint, it does an expectional job of using all the literary elements: character development and change, dramatic tension and action scenes, a believable but larger than life villain, several archetypes, incredible imagery, unexpected plot twists, and above all it manipulates the viewers' emotions with a skill that most movies fail to accomplish. And on top of it all, virtually every line of dialogue is fantastically quotable! It's an amazing piece of writing, and no matter how stupid it might sound, it really does make my list of movies that are actually worth seeing.

If you could only choose 3 books to read ever again, what would they be?

I suppose, as a writer, I ought to have an opinion here, but I don't. To be honest, there aren't many books that I really find very compelling. For me, books are pretty interchangeable, at least those designed to entertain. But if I really had to make a list, here's what might get considered:

Tanith Lee's "Cyrion" (good atmosphere)
Something from Terry Pratchett (good humor, but they're all interchangeable)
Elizabeth Scarborough's "Song of Sorcery" (good "innocent" fantasy)
Michael Shea's "The Color Out of Time" (like Lovecraft, only well-written!)
Clark Ashton Smith's "Monster of the Prophesy" (one of the trailblazers of horror and fantasy)
Bram Stoker's "The Jewel of Seven Stars" (even better than his "Dracula")

If you could only choose 4 things to eat or drink ever again, what would they be?

Ice cream (one of the necessities of life; either chocolate chip, or Haagen-Dazs' Cookies & Cream)
Coca-Cola (an ancient addiction)
Some form of chicken curry (Indian food, and meat!)
Baby carrots (fresh garden veggies steeped in butter!)

If you could only choose 5 people to ever be/talk/associate/whatever with ever again, who would they be?

Inna — One of the most insightful and interesting people I know. She's helped me really come into my own as a person, and is quite the cutie!
Ailsa — Each time she's come into my life, she's heralded major change, and always for the better. She's been my role model for successfully incorporating emotion and impulsiveness into my otherwise very staid personality. And she's a cutie!
Rhonda — Another woman who helps me explore that part of life that I don't understand, Rhonda has an intuitive grasp of emotion. And as a fellow writer, I appreciate her intellect and skill. And she's a cutie, as well.
Pam — Unlike the others, Pam is me in a woman's body. She seems to understand me in a way other women can't: she empathizes with my social ineptitude as well as my passion for perfection and order. She knows what it's like to be happy being alone, and things like that connect us in a rare "kindred spirit" kind of way. And being a writer, she understands what I'm about. And she's a cutie!
Margot — Margot is also a writer, as well as an artist, and I really appreciate her intelligence and her supportiveness. And wouldn't you know it? She's a cutie, too!

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