I've been waking up early, not of my own accord, the past few days and I feel anxious about leaving for Asia very soon, in a matter of hours. I'm really sleepy, but thought wins the battle over fatigue. I wanted to think about the past year before I travel, because I think post-travel SF will be different from pre-travel SF. It's been good to me. I waver between talking about it generally because I'm a little weary from ending things, and talking about it with some more shape because I might see it differently now than in five weeks when I return.
As amazing as I know it will be, going to Asia and heading into this personal and physical transition makes me aware of finishing the year here. The more transitions I experience, the more I realize how much they stand on their own, even as they flow into before and after.
I will miss so much about my life here. I worked up until the day I'm leaving, and I'm sad to leave a place where I learned a different kind of responsibility and day to day routine. I became competent at my job, and I had a good though stressful time finishing things up and training the summer person. I'll miss the organic thought, as well as the concrete procedures.
San Francisco is half my true love, my counterpart to New England. Because of the drives between SF and Fremont, as driver and passenger, I've grown less weary of bridges. During one moment when you're on the upward slope it becomes all water to your sides, and your rearview mirror reflects the ocean behind, so you're surrounded. Then the city peaks up in front of you, more and more until your car is level again.
I love my street and my neighborhood and my apartment. A blue preschool with handprints in the window marks the corner of my block where I turn right onto 10th Avenue. The houses stick together, distinct through their odd colors, differing balcony and window designs, and random shapes on their exterior (in my case, trapezoids). I have Mount Sutro from my brothers' windows and the peaks of Golden Gate and sunset from the right window in my living room. I have a long hallway, a closet with folding shutters, and wallpaper in my kitchen and bathroom. Ocean Beach is a long straight walk in one direction, and Baker Beach holds the Golden Gate in its sand like a sturdy lightweight Lego structure.
I've soaked in days of roaming, of polaroid pictures, of steps and hills, of food food food and delicious company. The fullness of days full of nothing really. Something about the mixture of sun and fog is conducive to this haze, but the crispness keeps you cold and aware of your skin. Houses sit next to restaurants; Irving Street is multipurpose for errands and food and shopping and quirks and people; a million distinct neighborhoods are compressed in this seven by seven mile place but feel expansive.
The sleep deprivation makes it hard to know what I want to say at this moment. I want to hang on to something because I know this trip will be wonderful and challenging and it will give me new feelings and I want to remember the feelings of now.
So, what do I feel now?
-Love for this small big city, in the way that you love things you feel you are and want to be.
-A scared excitement for what comes after Asia: newness. A new thing, new people, new school, new city. Yes, an old coast and old structure, but the new dominates.
-Gratitude for all the things the people in my life give me, for the ones who are still there. How each one offers something valuable that makes it natural to give back.
-Some pride in a year's work and some disappointment for lack of time to tie loose ends. Glad for the real and more vague things I learned about work, scientific thought, patients, disease, jobs well done, after-work dinners and nights.
-A fierce determination to meet the challenges of this trip which include, among many things: not fighting too much with my brother and renewing aspects of our past closeness while understanding our newfound differences; travelling alone and exploring well and growing from the solitude; winging substantial parts of the journey; completing rough parts like climbing Mt. Fuji or our two-day boat trip to Laos; surviving the backpacking; relishing the rainy season. And most of all, to take this time to do this at once: look at what's come before and what's to come, and to be away from all of that.
So I'm off, but I'll come back.
Wednesday, June 27, 2007
Wednesday, June 20, 2007
my one thing
I remember Aud talking once about how everyone is really good at one thing and she didn't know what her one thing was, and her roommate told her that she was good at people. That's a good thing to be good at. I, on the other hand, am not good at people. I'm not the greatest conversationalist and as of now I'm only good at connecting to a certain slice of people. I can talk to people relatively well at first meeting, depending on who it is, but for some reason these don't often turn into longer connections unless the person is the type to connect well with a lot of people in which case the success is much more on their end.
Everyone has this dilemma, I think, of pinpointing one thing; except it's harder for some than others. I am passionate about words, but I'm not spectacular at making them. Like, I could never do it for people who don't already know me in some form. Not good at poetry or fiction, because I think straight reality's hard enough for me to digest. On the other hand, I liked journalism but I couldn't commit to reality to that extent. I can write a decent English essay, but I would never survive in grad school and I'm not good at articulating my arguments aloud. I relish in the detail of words but much of it goes unnoticed by me unless I'm pushed to examine it. So there it is, I can't be a writer or a critic or scholar. I don't mean that I won't seek ways to write and read in the future, only that it's not "my thing."
I love music, but I'm mediocre at making it and I don't have the ear for technique or the nuances. No amount of practice would have made me great at the piano, because I dislike counting beats and even if I did get good at playing, I would never be able to distinguish keys or catch a melody well enough to play it without sheet music. I barely understand acoustics which is why I never know how to describe a band to someone who hasn't heard them.
A lot of the things I was passionate about in college--Project Health/SPI, thesis, my editing job, ASK--I never threw myself fully into. I still feel guilty about how much more I could have done for ASK, how few families really got anything from me because I always had something to study for. I hate that what was supposed to be the culmination of my English studies in college was nowhere near my best writing because I had to take the MCAT (which I didn't even do well on). I regret never getting into the specifics of the Summer Policy Institute--not learning more about the speakers and what they did, how I could incorporate their ideas in future work--because I was so entrenched in summer physics. I'm not always even that good at balance, because the sacrifices I make to have two things can make neither one really worth it.
There are other things, some of which don't seem like anything but that I find indicative. I like some of the photographs I've taken, but that's a result of taking so many that a few inevitably come out okay, and being in beautiful environments rather than anything I give to them. I'm not Victo, who has art as her thing. I'm pretty neat and organized, but I also spent five hours locating my Coachella tickets the night before leaving for it and I am no Melkis who knows how to use office supplies like no other and has a togetherness as her thing. I do my job well and I work hard, but I'm not meticulous and quick-thinking enough to be really excellent at it. Though since I've been training a new person, it's been easier for me to see how much I've learned this year, but still, it's not my thing.
I know it doesn't really matter if you have one "thing" or what it is, but it matters to yourself a little bit. So I was thinking about how I value stories, and how that underlies everything that I love. I'm not good at making them or telling them, but I can be good at finding and listening to them. Sorry, this is the only thing I could think of. If you want to tell me something, I'll listen and I'll remember, likely a good deal of it including how and where you said it. I'll try to understand the thread of your story and it will most always interest me. This is not to say that I'll be very good at figuring stories out. For all the ones I read and watch, I'm sometimes still surprised by conventional plot twists and while I can often figure out which character is going to live or die in a plot, there's a whole lot that's still new to me each time. But I'll read your essays and listen to you talk about those things we all randomly think about during the day but rarely speak aloud. I won't be the best at science or be a remarkable med student or make any great discoveries or really create social justice, but I'll collect the stories. I know it's not that great of a thing if I don't do anything with them, but I'm still working at it.
Everyone has this dilemma, I think, of pinpointing one thing; except it's harder for some than others. I am passionate about words, but I'm not spectacular at making them. Like, I could never do it for people who don't already know me in some form. Not good at poetry or fiction, because I think straight reality's hard enough for me to digest. On the other hand, I liked journalism but I couldn't commit to reality to that extent. I can write a decent English essay, but I would never survive in grad school and I'm not good at articulating my arguments aloud. I relish in the detail of words but much of it goes unnoticed by me unless I'm pushed to examine it. So there it is, I can't be a writer or a critic or scholar. I don't mean that I won't seek ways to write and read in the future, only that it's not "my thing."
I love music, but I'm mediocre at making it and I don't have the ear for technique or the nuances. No amount of practice would have made me great at the piano, because I dislike counting beats and even if I did get good at playing, I would never be able to distinguish keys or catch a melody well enough to play it without sheet music. I barely understand acoustics which is why I never know how to describe a band to someone who hasn't heard them.
A lot of the things I was passionate about in college--Project Health/SPI, thesis, my editing job, ASK--I never threw myself fully into. I still feel guilty about how much more I could have done for ASK, how few families really got anything from me because I always had something to study for. I hate that what was supposed to be the culmination of my English studies in college was nowhere near my best writing because I had to take the MCAT (which I didn't even do well on). I regret never getting into the specifics of the Summer Policy Institute--not learning more about the speakers and what they did, how I could incorporate their ideas in future work--because I was so entrenched in summer physics. I'm not always even that good at balance, because the sacrifices I make to have two things can make neither one really worth it.
There are other things, some of which don't seem like anything but that I find indicative. I like some of the photographs I've taken, but that's a result of taking so many that a few inevitably come out okay, and being in beautiful environments rather than anything I give to them. I'm not Victo, who has art as her thing. I'm pretty neat and organized, but I also spent five hours locating my Coachella tickets the night before leaving for it and I am no Melkis who knows how to use office supplies like no other and has a togetherness as her thing. I do my job well and I work hard, but I'm not meticulous and quick-thinking enough to be really excellent at it. Though since I've been training a new person, it's been easier for me to see how much I've learned this year, but still, it's not my thing.
I know it doesn't really matter if you have one "thing" or what it is, but it matters to yourself a little bit. So I was thinking about how I value stories, and how that underlies everything that I love. I'm not good at making them or telling them, but I can be good at finding and listening to them. Sorry, this is the only thing I could think of. If you want to tell me something, I'll listen and I'll remember, likely a good deal of it including how and where you said it. I'll try to understand the thread of your story and it will most always interest me. This is not to say that I'll be very good at figuring stories out. For all the ones I read and watch, I'm sometimes still surprised by conventional plot twists and while I can often figure out which character is going to live or die in a plot, there's a whole lot that's still new to me each time. But I'll read your essays and listen to you talk about those things we all randomly think about during the day but rarely speak aloud. I won't be the best at science or be a remarkable med student or make any great discoveries or really create social justice, but I'll collect the stories. I know it's not that great of a thing if I don't do anything with them, but I'm still working at it.
Monday, June 11, 2007
comfortable
How did it happen that I have two weeks left to wrap up a year's worth of work, to soak up my beloved apartment, to pack for travel and to prepare for school so that I'm not swamped when I get back in August? No matter how I try, I can't finish all the little things I thought I could do with my "free time." I've put a whole lot of photos in albums, but then I accumulated new ones this year. I've read a few books that make me want to get more. I've amassed much new music that I'd like to put in exactly the right playlists, but the minutes elude me. My email drafts folder grows by the day. I haven't written in my paper journal in ages; this past year, when I did write in it, it was when I was moody, not so much a thoughtful mood, just a moody mood. It's full of the same stuff. I regret that, because this year was so full of new, nuance.
This past Saturday I went to a graduation party for a girl who just graduated from my high school. We played together as kids, but I haven't spoken to her in years. She was salutatorian and is going to UCLA, and wants to major in environmental science. How odd to think of that time, so long ago. Notre Dame is very much the same and different too. We talked about teachers who were still around, Spirit Week, college applications. I sometimes missed high school while I was in college, but I haven't missed it in a long time (especially now that I miss college). As I told her how much she had to look forward to in college, I remembered how nice that summer before college was--so much possibility, so much excitement, so little anxiety, because my scope of the future back then ended with college. I didn't think past that, and it was great. At the same time that I grew nostalgic for that phase, I realized that I didn't want to be back there. I'm incredibly happy to be where I am right now, and I've liked--am grateful for--growing up a little. I love how much fuller life has gotten through experience and story. Like kids going into college, us kids going out have so many choices and opportunities ahead. We're in a scarier place than we were back then and somehow that's becoming less something to lament and more something we've gained privilege to.
The carefreeness of my weekends this past year in a very small way recalls a little of that stress-free summer before college (I doubt anything will ever be as completely thought-free and that's okay), but I've appreciated it differently. This past weekend was a lotta Steph & San Francisco. I saw her classmates perform classical music at the Alumni House and it was a nice excuse to dress up. Her friends are a warm, talented group of people. We went on another inNout & Krispy Kreme run afterwards, and spent quite a bit of time watching the donuts being made on the conveyer belt. I think I felt actual pain when they threw away a deformed donut that we'd been watching from its inception through its development. Such sugar coated goodness, never to be eaten! On Sunday I met up with Steph and Albert (silly kids!) again to go to the Haight-Ashbury Street Fair, which was quite the packed event. We were basically a herd marching slowly down the few blocks of Haight, and it was lively as outdoor affairs usually are. People peered at us from their balconies on the apartments lining the street, and we ate overpriced mediocre Chinese food while sitting on steps. There were bands at both ends of the fair, and various troupes moving from one end to the other. Everything was funky and hippie and colorful. It was a sunny cold day but warm within the cocoon of crowd.
Walking back, we somehow decided that we should build a fire in my fireplace and make s'mores. So we stopped at Steph's apartment so she could change and Albert could rest on her futon, then to Albert's apartment so he could get books and let me borrow his awesome backpack for my Asia trip, then finally to mine. We hesitated for a bit, unsure if the chimney was "open." When we finally went for it our fire went out pretty quickly, but we persevered and soon it was glowing. Christmas in June! The sunlight pours through the windows through the white curtains in my living room, so the room was awash in yellow sun and orange fire and the three of us were mesmerized. Then we skewered our marshmallows on fondue sticks and melted them atop le petit ecoliers. There was also dark chocolate with almonds. All the while my "comfortable" playlist provided a musical backdrop. I packed a little, they read a little; mostly we lolled and lazed around. An old friend, a new one; a city from my past where I've made my home of the present.
These things make me want to write because I want to both bottle it up and keep it in me, and to pass it around and make it tangible and living around me. There's much more I've wanted to write and more I will want to, and more photo albums I'll want to make, and more little things to do and make, but nothing can really capture everything. So you might as well carry it around with you.
This past Saturday I went to a graduation party for a girl who just graduated from my high school. We played together as kids, but I haven't spoken to her in years. She was salutatorian and is going to UCLA, and wants to major in environmental science. How odd to think of that time, so long ago. Notre Dame is very much the same and different too. We talked about teachers who were still around, Spirit Week, college applications. I sometimes missed high school while I was in college, but I haven't missed it in a long time (especially now that I miss college). As I told her how much she had to look forward to in college, I remembered how nice that summer before college was--so much possibility, so much excitement, so little anxiety, because my scope of the future back then ended with college. I didn't think past that, and it was great. At the same time that I grew nostalgic for that phase, I realized that I didn't want to be back there. I'm incredibly happy to be where I am right now, and I've liked--am grateful for--growing up a little. I love how much fuller life has gotten through experience and story. Like kids going into college, us kids going out have so many choices and opportunities ahead. We're in a scarier place than we were back then and somehow that's becoming less something to lament and more something we've gained privilege to.
The carefreeness of my weekends this past year in a very small way recalls a little of that stress-free summer before college (I doubt anything will ever be as completely thought-free and that's okay), but I've appreciated it differently. This past weekend was a lotta Steph & San Francisco. I saw her classmates perform classical music at the Alumni House and it was a nice excuse to dress up. Her friends are a warm, talented group of people. We went on another inNout & Krispy Kreme run afterwards, and spent quite a bit of time watching the donuts being made on the conveyer belt. I think I felt actual pain when they threw away a deformed donut that we'd been watching from its inception through its development. Such sugar coated goodness, never to be eaten! On Sunday I met up with Steph and Albert (silly kids!) again to go to the Haight-Ashbury Street Fair, which was quite the packed event. We were basically a herd marching slowly down the few blocks of Haight, and it was lively as outdoor affairs usually are. People peered at us from their balconies on the apartments lining the street, and we ate overpriced mediocre Chinese food while sitting on steps. There were bands at both ends of the fair, and various troupes moving from one end to the other. Everything was funky and hippie and colorful. It was a sunny cold day but warm within the cocoon of crowd.
Walking back, we somehow decided that we should build a fire in my fireplace and make s'mores. So we stopped at Steph's apartment so she could change and Albert could rest on her futon, then to Albert's apartment so he could get books and let me borrow his awesome backpack for my Asia trip, then finally to mine. We hesitated for a bit, unsure if the chimney was "open." When we finally went for it our fire went out pretty quickly, but we persevered and soon it was glowing. Christmas in June! The sunlight pours through the windows through the white curtains in my living room, so the room was awash in yellow sun and orange fire and the three of us were mesmerized. Then we skewered our marshmallows on fondue sticks and melted them atop le petit ecoliers. There was also dark chocolate with almonds. All the while my "comfortable" playlist provided a musical backdrop. I packed a little, they read a little; mostly we lolled and lazed around. An old friend, a new one; a city from my past where I've made my home of the present.
These things make me want to write because I want to both bottle it up and keep it in me, and to pass it around and make it tangible and living around me. There's much more I've wanted to write and more I will want to, and more photo albums I'll want to make, and more little things to do and make, but nothing can really capture everything. So you might as well carry it around with you.
Monday, June 4, 2007
hate/love
In one day as I was flying to Cleveland I rediscovered intense hate for one thing and intense love for another. They're not related.
I freaking hate flying and almost everything associated with it. I fly a lot, and I HATE airports. I've had practically every bad experience possible and those I haven't had, I'm sure I will. I've been in two-hour security lines (pre-9/11) that make you miss your flight so that you're stuck in the airport for six hours. I've been sent back home from the airport. I've lost luggage, I've sat in a plane waiting an hour for a storm to pass so that we could move up a hundred feet to the gate (thus missing a connecting flight), I've been given a boarding pass to Austin instead of Boston (and once I cleared that up I had to retrieve my luggage that was also routed to Austin), I've spent 15 hours at the airport/on planes for a 5 hour flight, I've switched planes due to malfunctions. Like everyone else, I've had the crying babies and obnoxious kids and vocally grumpy passengers and seat-kickers and lean-backers-even-while-you're-eating. I hate the recycled air and the loud, fast flush in the bathrooms and the prevalence of incompetence. I feel like such a horrible person when I am easily annoyed at someone for being incompetent, but I can't stand it. I've lost expensive things on airplanes, like my retainer and iPod. And though this is of course my fault, it contributes to my bitterness.
One of the things I hate most is how airports desensitize people. The staff rarely cares about the passengers, because to them everyone is just another cranky customer with the same problems as everyone else. They can no longer see why some hours at an airport versus some hours with someone you haven't seen and won't see for a long time is a reason for some pain. Over time the urge to place blame on them for your woes snuffs their natural empathy. I do know there's nothing they can do, but I do think that if the woman behind the counter was actually sympathetic when she tells me my flight that I paid for months in advance is overbooked and I'm not getting on this plane even as I can see it outside the window, I wouldn't feel so defeated. Instead, I'm just another, and to the woman behind the counter, why risk sympathy when you'll likely just get anger in return? I've tried combatting this with politeness and the kind of empathy I'd like, because I think people do respond, but honestly I'm just not always that patient and it's hard to be nice first if someone else isn't all that nice to you.
My hatred of airports/planes is so pure that it overcomes my natural urge to romanticize such imperfections with their counterparts, like the beautiful views and how you're covering all kinds of distance without feeling any motion and how you have long stretches of time for music and books and the conversations you have with strangers and how I actually liked the food back when they gave it to you and that one time I acidentally went to the international terminal to pick someone up and saw people standing around with signs and flowers and so visibly eager to see loved ones from afar. I like these latter things about flying, but for me they are distinct from the experience of flying. I like them as individual things, and I hate flying as a whole. It's the difference between a good thing with imperfections, which is how I see most things, and a bad thing with some saving graces.
Enough about that.
I didn't bring enough to read during my delays last weekend, but I had a pocketbook Chagall and I was too tired to read much anyway so I just looked at his pictures. I freaking love Chagall. I don't know much about art, so it's not like I have a whole lot to choose from when I say he's my favorite, but for what it's worth, he is. I love how he captures such real emotion with such dreamlike images, and how his vibrant colors make you think that's what life really looks like. I like how people are often upside-down or at odd angles and how he gives them unnatural curves that seem natural. One of the things I love best is how he makes people fit together--how they float, intertwine, connect in some way. One of my favorites is The Birthday, where a woman is leaning forward on one foot, like she's drifting upwards, and a man is floating above her, kissing her. They're back to back, so he has to stretch his head 180 degrees (impossible) so that he can be face to face with her. I also love his windows and the views into other worlds, how these views also happen when there are no windows. I like his art because you could think hard about it if you want to and there are deeper things that I probably don't get, but you don't have to think too hard. It's strange and beautiful and you can just look at it to get that. You can see that it's not exactly simple because it's different and odd and there must be some reason and technique for how he gets you to feel this way--it's not just a pretty scene but something he does to it--but still, it is simple.
I freaking hate flying and almost everything associated with it. I fly a lot, and I HATE airports. I've had practically every bad experience possible and those I haven't had, I'm sure I will. I've been in two-hour security lines (pre-9/11) that make you miss your flight so that you're stuck in the airport for six hours. I've been sent back home from the airport. I've lost luggage, I've sat in a plane waiting an hour for a storm to pass so that we could move up a hundred feet to the gate (thus missing a connecting flight), I've been given a boarding pass to Austin instead of Boston (and once I cleared that up I had to retrieve my luggage that was also routed to Austin), I've spent 15 hours at the airport/on planes for a 5 hour flight, I've switched planes due to malfunctions. Like everyone else, I've had the crying babies and obnoxious kids and vocally grumpy passengers and seat-kickers and lean-backers-even-while-you're-eating. I hate the recycled air and the loud, fast flush in the bathrooms and the prevalence of incompetence. I feel like such a horrible person when I am easily annoyed at someone for being incompetent, but I can't stand it. I've lost expensive things on airplanes, like my retainer and iPod. And though this is of course my fault, it contributes to my bitterness.
One of the things I hate most is how airports desensitize people. The staff rarely cares about the passengers, because to them everyone is just another cranky customer with the same problems as everyone else. They can no longer see why some hours at an airport versus some hours with someone you haven't seen and won't see for a long time is a reason for some pain. Over time the urge to place blame on them for your woes snuffs their natural empathy. I do know there's nothing they can do, but I do think that if the woman behind the counter was actually sympathetic when she tells me my flight that I paid for months in advance is overbooked and I'm not getting on this plane even as I can see it outside the window, I wouldn't feel so defeated. Instead, I'm just another, and to the woman behind the counter, why risk sympathy when you'll likely just get anger in return? I've tried combatting this with politeness and the kind of empathy I'd like, because I think people do respond, but honestly I'm just not always that patient and it's hard to be nice first if someone else isn't all that nice to you.
My hatred of airports/planes is so pure that it overcomes my natural urge to romanticize such imperfections with their counterparts, like the beautiful views and how you're covering all kinds of distance without feeling any motion and how you have long stretches of time for music and books and the conversations you have with strangers and how I actually liked the food back when they gave it to you and that one time I acidentally went to the international terminal to pick someone up and saw people standing around with signs and flowers and so visibly eager to see loved ones from afar. I like these latter things about flying, but for me they are distinct from the experience of flying. I like them as individual things, and I hate flying as a whole. It's the difference between a good thing with imperfections, which is how I see most things, and a bad thing with some saving graces.
Enough about that.
I didn't bring enough to read during my delays last weekend, but I had a pocketbook Chagall and I was too tired to read much anyway so I just looked at his pictures. I freaking love Chagall. I don't know much about art, so it's not like I have a whole lot to choose from when I say he's my favorite, but for what it's worth, he is. I love how he captures such real emotion with such dreamlike images, and how his vibrant colors make you think that's what life really looks like. I like how people are often upside-down or at odd angles and how he gives them unnatural curves that seem natural. One of the things I love best is how he makes people fit together--how they float, intertwine, connect in some way. One of my favorites is The Birthday, where a woman is leaning forward on one foot, like she's drifting upwards, and a man is floating above her, kissing her. They're back to back, so he has to stretch his head 180 degrees (impossible) so that he can be face to face with her. I also love his windows and the views into other worlds, how these views also happen when there are no windows. I like his art because you could think hard about it if you want to and there are deeper things that I probably don't get, but you don't have to think too hard. It's strange and beautiful and you can just look at it to get that. You can see that it's not exactly simple because it's different and odd and there must be some reason and technique for how he gets you to feel this way--it's not just a pretty scene but something he does to it--but still, it is simple.
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