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shadowkatPretty day...the leaves brilliant shades of fire and gold...sparkling yellows, rusting reds...like looking at a sky filled with slivers of gold and garnet, with spots of orange, a tracing of blue, and leathery brown. Nose itchy though. Eyes too. Catch in the throat. There's always a downside, isn't there?
Wandered around Rufus King Park, big and beautiful with long stretching lawns and giant trees to my city girl eyes, while tiny and dirty to many of my suburban co-workers who inhabit that vast reaches of Long Island. The homeless nap on benches, their clothes pulled up to their eyebrows, basking in the sun. Couples stroll. A few dog walkers here and there. And there's a guy discussing aids on his cell phone.
I was going to talk about other things, about the abuses of modern day pirates and would-be kings...who wield power
like ...it was nothing. But I am tired. This week a friend stated that she felt overwhelmed by the news, it made her feel powerless and tiny and she wanted to pull inside herself, like a turtle in a shell. Impossible to change anything.
I feel that way too. Every day battered by the news. On the phone, chatted with my mother, who told me about the Penn State scandal.
I asked about my Dad, who is recovering from major back surgery bit by bit and I desperately want to find a way to cheer up. Lately he had been getting pleasure from watching football. My Dad ...went to Penn State. He wears his Penn State wind-breaker and sweatshirt with pride. His family, brothers and sisters, nephews, all went to Penn State. He met Joe Paterno, and knows Paterno's wife. Paterno is about 9 years older than my father. Paterno was assistant coach when my Dad went there. My Dad feels great shame about his alma matter. And is glad Paterno was fired. He thinks Paterno may have acted differently 40 years earlier. Power and pride are deadly things. But I don't want to talk about the abuses of modern day pirates and would-be kings - they fill our papers with their exploits, they litter our billboards and our tv sets, our movie theaters and our magazines, our sports teams, and the internet...and the word rape suddenly feels like a hook shaped knife ripping through you the moment you utter it. Rape-culture. Rapey. Rape Trope. A word that is more about power than sex. And I'm not sure it should feel like anything else.
The days pull at me. Long and steady. Work grinds. My mind flutters and grasps at words and phrases pushing them into context, meaning.
Today, I tell a co-worker that I need to somehow cobble together a 20 page discourse on the process of hiring a consultant to design a pocket track on a rail-road, while simultaneously fielding emails on other jobs. Precise words. Careful. Online the same...the careful pull and tuck of words, fitting them into narrow boxes of meaning...to communicate a thought...however fleeting to a world that exists outside my city, my window, my head.
I think back to the days I wrote letters, back in my 20s, before there was an internet. In multi-colored ink, to amuse myself. Occasionally getting a response back, often weeks, months later. Scratched out words, tiny letters, to fit on narrow-ruled pages, my fingers aching from gripping the pen.
Now? I type the words into a box on a blog, that does not even contain my real name, my real name being even more popular and more anynomous online than my fake one. Ironic that. And those who read it? I do not always know or see. Your voices I have not heard, nor have you heard mine. Yet somehow the connection feels real. And we know each other slowly through this babble and cluster of words, translated loosely through the internet. Misunderstandings abound. As does that oh so scary thing - judgment. And I wonder...at times why I do it? Why I enjoy it? More than writing a novel or a story...even. It's easier somehow. Throwing words into a box...writing thoughts as they tumble...although I am selective, even here and now. Careful, or I attempt to be, not to wound or to maim, and I find it difficult and bewildering...to ponder those who are not so careful or seem not to care at all who they wound..yet have so much more power than I do.
But enough. Leaves pretty...news bad...time to shut it all off and just watch the yellow, rusting golden cascade of leaves.
Off to watch mindless tv and make dinner.
Wandered around Rufus King Park, big and beautiful with long stretching lawns and giant trees to my city girl eyes, while tiny and dirty to many of my suburban co-workers who inhabit that vast reaches of Long Island. The homeless nap on benches, their clothes pulled up to their eyebrows, basking in the sun. Couples stroll. A few dog walkers here and there. And there's a guy discussing aids on his cell phone.
I was going to talk about other things, about the abuses of modern day pirates and would-be kings...who wield power
like ...it was nothing. But I am tired. This week a friend stated that she felt overwhelmed by the news, it made her feel powerless and tiny and she wanted to pull inside herself, like a turtle in a shell. Impossible to change anything.
I feel that way too. Every day battered by the news. On the phone, chatted with my mother, who told me about the Penn State scandal.
I asked about my Dad, who is recovering from major back surgery bit by bit and I desperately want to find a way to cheer up. Lately he had been getting pleasure from watching football. My Dad ...went to Penn State. He wears his Penn State wind-breaker and sweatshirt with pride. His family, brothers and sisters, nephews, all went to Penn State. He met Joe Paterno, and knows Paterno's wife. Paterno is about 9 years older than my father. Paterno was assistant coach when my Dad went there. My Dad feels great shame about his alma matter. And is glad Paterno was fired. He thinks Paterno may have acted differently 40 years earlier. Power and pride are deadly things. But I don't want to talk about the abuses of modern day pirates and would-be kings - they fill our papers with their exploits, they litter our billboards and our tv sets, our movie theaters and our magazines, our sports teams, and the internet...and the word rape suddenly feels like a hook shaped knife ripping through you the moment you utter it. Rape-culture. Rapey. Rape Trope. A word that is more about power than sex. And I'm not sure it should feel like anything else.
The days pull at me. Long and steady. Work grinds. My mind flutters and grasps at words and phrases pushing them into context, meaning.
Today, I tell a co-worker that I need to somehow cobble together a 20 page discourse on the process of hiring a consultant to design a pocket track on a rail-road, while simultaneously fielding emails on other jobs. Precise words. Careful. Online the same...the careful pull and tuck of words, fitting them into narrow boxes of meaning...to communicate a thought...however fleeting to a world that exists outside my city, my window, my head.
I think back to the days I wrote letters, back in my 20s, before there was an internet. In multi-colored ink, to amuse myself. Occasionally getting a response back, often weeks, months later. Scratched out words, tiny letters, to fit on narrow-ruled pages, my fingers aching from gripping the pen.
Now? I type the words into a box on a blog, that does not even contain my real name, my real name being even more popular and more anynomous online than my fake one. Ironic that. And those who read it? I do not always know or see. Your voices I have not heard, nor have you heard mine. Yet somehow the connection feels real. And we know each other slowly through this babble and cluster of words, translated loosely through the internet. Misunderstandings abound. As does that oh so scary thing - judgment. And I wonder...at times why I do it? Why I enjoy it? More than writing a novel or a story...even. It's easier somehow. Throwing words into a box...writing thoughts as they tumble...although I am selective, even here and now. Careful, or I attempt to be, not to wound or to maim, and I find it difficult and bewildering...to ponder those who are not so careful or seem not to care at all who they wound..yet have so much more power than I do.
But enough. Leaves pretty...news bad...time to shut it all off and just watch the yellow, rusting golden cascade of leaves.
Off to watch mindless tv and make dinner.
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no subject
Date: 2011-11-11 02:40 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-11-11 03:37 am (UTC)Wish I had a picture - the trees were a brilliant orangey-red, like a cranberry rust.
no subject
Date: 2011-11-11 03:48 am (UTC)Oh I know what you mean... I was wishing I had my camera to capture the beautiful Autumnal glow today... maybe I'll see if tomorrow is as pretty (it is going to be in the 60s tomorrow, which is a plus).
So far we've had a very mild Fall (no snow like you guys had a couple of weeks ago) - I wish it would stay this way through Thanksgiving (my brother is coming to visit).