kerouac says

oh my god, be over. be over be over be over. everyone else's school is over. it is no longer time for school. weird undergraduate multiple choice spanish final? NO. no more school! no more!

(it isn't even that hard right now, it's just that school has always been cyclical, and may has always meant done, and all my other student friends are done, and, god, it isn't even like this summer is going to be a respite of palms and beach reading, i just . . . change of focus was promised! i may not be able to wait!)

thing one: alarming messages regarding the serious ill health of the loved ones of loved ones have been showing up. like anyone, i never have any idea how to convey my sympathy in manner that approaches both adequate and appropriate. i took a page from a wise man and stumbled in. i'm not going to say anything else because i can't imagine what would be . . . useful, in any way.

thing two: i was watching dooce's interview with kathie lee gifford and hoda kotb re: "mommy blogging," (glak, vomit) and as heather deftly fielded the do-you-have-boundaries-for-what-you'll-share-on-the-blog question, i started realizing that i no longer know all the people who show up here. or rather, there used to be two categories: internet strangers, and friends i gave the URL to. at some point, i could no longer be sure i knew who knew, and the silly pseudonym is no real protection. recently there have been a few references to this thing that made me realize that the words don't only go into the series of tubes, or into the pocket of the five friends who comment here.

which is okay. but my judgment, like heather's, about what's appropriate or where my boundary is has changed over the years. especially since this thing started during a sort of . . . heady time. i think there were rants in those early days that, were anyone to come across them now, would be hurtful, and reflect badly on me, deservedly, and maybe seal the fate of relations that might once have been more mutable. and it might be that they have been comed across already, and that you read the unfair or ugly thing i said about you in a moment of pain or confusion, and that was that.

and it might be that the six readers who still end up here once in a while are thinking, get over it, whatever your real name is. you're not famous and no one's interested. i get that. but i don't like thinking that i was an asshole--a was that becomes an am when you realize it's all still in the archives once the spleen has passed. needing to vent is innocent enough; doing it publicly is different. i guess i didn't quite know this was public, at the beginning. things still felt insulated. i think they're probably not now, if they ever were, and so if you think this applies to you, you are probably right: i'm sorry about that. i am actually very, very sorry.

i think the only reason to send someone this telefl0ra(tm) bouquet, the only appropriate occasion, is if you have just put a hit out on them.

i really like about the status quo, and that's: if you do the humanities right, grad school is the examined life. and unlike most times in my past when "examined life" meant "constant anxiety," what it means now is that i buy a lot of my clothes second hand and i eat a lot of beans and it is perfectly, perfectly fine. i feel more responsible to my own vision of what might count as important. i've let go of a lot of stuff and found out that i'm the better for it. and not in a make-lemonade way; in a thank-god-i-got-here way.

i mean, for the most part. i know there are days that i miss . . . well, shopping. for almost anything. nice steaks and orange juice not from concentrate. and travel remains the Big Wistful, and yeah, i wonder if our accrued student debt and laxity in retirement saving is really a great way to greet the future, but i'm serious about the day to day. i consume less than i ever have, although it's still quite a bit. and this less is not just okay, it's actually better. i have to be feeling good to admit it, but i know it's true even when i whine.

sometimes i think: no matter how much he thinks he got the better deal, really it was me. it was i. i who lucked out. because there is something about the monkey that is just so honestly good that my own heart--occasionally tempted to cook the books, to take friday afternoon off, to steal post-its and not make another pot of coffee after taking the last cup--knows itself as something of a fraud whenever he wakes up smiling, gives me the bigger cookie half, makes me a cocktail as if i deserved it.

this isn't self-deprecation; i'm good at a lot of stuff. this is just to say that really it's me. it is i. i lucked out.

from the hooter frivolity, but i was cleaning out my files today, and found this mary oliver poem. it's for everyone, but also especially for you.




Every year

everything

I have ever learned

in my lifetime

leads back to this: the fires

and the black river of loss

whose other side

is salvation

whose meaning

none of us will ever know.

To live in this world

you must be able

to do three things:

to love what is mortal;

to hold it

against your bones knowing

your own life depends on it;

and, when the time comes to let it go,

to let it go.

so, the best one is coming west this spring--at least as far west as las vegas. and we thought it might be a nice chance to see her and her lovely man. so we plotted and planned, and figured out the likely cost of the drive, and in something like the gambling spirit, secured a bargain room just off the strip via the priceline name-your-own deal, where you don't get to know which hotel it is until after the deal is done.


which is the only way, frankly, i would ever end up staying at THE HOOTERS CASINO.


the HOOTERS CASINO, where according to an online review site,

"The Blackjack dealers wear orange hotpants and want you to stare at their buns. They've got some nice looking buns. Lotsa guys in here. The Nippers Pool is clothing optional. The slots are tight."


ladies and gentlemen, the slots are tight.