Showing posts with label Real Life. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Real Life. Show all posts
26 September 2007
Defenders of the Literal, Unite!
The problem with words is their unceasing and often misleading connotations. How many perfectly good words are ruined this way.
02 September 2007
Last weekend here: a modified email
I went to a concert at the Philharmonie with C last night, part of MusikFest Berlin - he had an extra ticket. The Concertgebouw Orchestra from Amsterdam played a program of Wagner and Debussy, some of my favorite music. Chromatic, hesitant, full of interesting orchestral colors and instrumentation. We also went to an exhibition at the Haus der Kulturen der Welt beforehand. Last night was also the "open door night" at the Staatsoper on Unter den Linden; the opera house was open to the public past midnight to watch rehearsals and small concerts of the Oper singers and instrumentalists, held at different venues and areas of the opera house and surrounding buildings. Amazing, such a great idea. We stopped by after the Philharmonie, since it's on the way (on bikes). We saw part of a rehearsal on the main stage (the most gorgeous hall, quite small but tiered with 5 balconies, straight up) of a big opera, some singers in the downstairs bar (a large hall, really a work of art), some clarinetists, and then 4 cellists playing their own arrangement of pop songs in the huge, warehouse-like storage magazine - that especially was great. Lots of people were there to hear all the music.
A good way to enjoy Berlin before I leave for the fall.
I had the typical Sunday Berlin brunch this morning with A at a decadent Russian restaurant. The weather was lovely, perfect brunch weather, and everyone sat outside; the food was even lovelier, and A and I stuffed ourselves for nearly 3 hours. A is British; she works here in translation but, ready to get out, is looking for new programs and other countries to live in. But it's hard because she's been here 10 years. C and D had a booth at the big flea market at Mauerpark today - I guess it's a yearly thing for them, getting rid of stuff they don't want anymore - so I went over and watched weird Berlin people looking through all sorts of junk and not-junk (a lot of East German communist memorabilia) and goofed around and had a nice afternoon. I don't know D as well, but she's nice; her English is ok but not great, heavy accent, and she speaks so fast that sometimes I only catch half of what she says.
I don't miss many people in general, which is kind of mean, I guess; I don't do it purposely. But I will miss C and A. And I miss R. Three of the best people I've ever met. Absolute gems.
A good way to enjoy Berlin before I leave for the fall.
I had the typical Sunday Berlin brunch this morning with A at a decadent Russian restaurant. The weather was lovely, perfect brunch weather, and everyone sat outside; the food was even lovelier, and A and I stuffed ourselves for nearly 3 hours. A is British; she works here in translation but, ready to get out, is looking for new programs and other countries to live in. But it's hard because she's been here 10 years. C and D had a booth at the big flea market at Mauerpark today - I guess it's a yearly thing for them, getting rid of stuff they don't want anymore - so I went over and watched weird Berlin people looking through all sorts of junk and not-junk (a lot of East German communist memorabilia) and goofed around and had a nice afternoon. I don't know D as well, but she's nice; her English is ok but not great, heavy accent, and she speaks so fast that sometimes I only catch half of what she says.
I don't miss many people in general, which is kind of mean, I guess; I don't do it purposely. But I will miss C and A. And I miss R. Three of the best people I've ever met. Absolute gems.
22 August 2007
Two Paragraphs
When I think of New York, I’m back at Lincoln Center surrounded by screeching yellow cabs hurdling around street corners and honking at pedestrians, dazed silhouettes against the gray slabs of sheetrock and metal, portrait-stills in the swirling vortex of necrotic fumes, gas, hotdogs, and roasted peanuts wafting across Broadway, almost poetic in this shaken snow-globe of cement. I can nearly glimpse the exploding chandeliers in the Metropolitan Opera beyond the square office buildings, promising something golden and spectacular to the ones lucky enough to escape the pelting rain or oppressive heat--opera or ballet, depending on the season, cool and velvet crimson, submerged in swells of sound, a place to go and dream. And dream I did.
Why my mind conjures up the colliding streets at 66th and Broadway is unclear. I didn’t live or study there, save for one summer of Fordham University classes, nor did I attend as many concerts as a New York musician should. Tourists imagine Times Square with its massive commercial impact, a slap in the face of one’s sensibilities, shoppers fantasize about 5th Avenue’s sleek glass windows and smooth facades, hipsters mourn the high rents of the Village and lost days of soul-brother boozing in the Bowery, but I think of Lincoln Center for no particular reason, maybe just to slight my nameless uptown college and my closet apartment as if they had feelings and could be offended by my trying not to remember them. Few things in Manhattan have feelings; the skyscrapers and turbulent crowds of passersby effectively smother any inner life, a little love-fern starved to death in the desert, strangled by a thorny briar which takes root in the soul and emits, from time to time, a high-pitched scream of rage.
Why my mind conjures up the colliding streets at 66th and Broadway is unclear. I didn’t live or study there, save for one summer of Fordham University classes, nor did I attend as many concerts as a New York musician should. Tourists imagine Times Square with its massive commercial impact, a slap in the face of one’s sensibilities, shoppers fantasize about 5th Avenue’s sleek glass windows and smooth facades, hipsters mourn the high rents of the Village and lost days of soul-brother boozing in the Bowery, but I think of Lincoln Center for no particular reason, maybe just to slight my nameless uptown college and my closet apartment as if they had feelings and could be offended by my trying not to remember them. Few things in Manhattan have feelings; the skyscrapers and turbulent crowds of passersby effectively smother any inner life, a little love-fern starved to death in the desert, strangled by a thorny briar which takes root in the soul and emits, from time to time, a high-pitched scream of rage.
19 August 2007
08 August 2007
Life is hard.
Yep, that just about sums it up.
I've read a few books lately, though, which shall be mentioned now:
Herzog - Saul Bellow
an academic work of great philosophic proportions (ok, sort of) - my friend - Cornell University Press, to be published 2008
Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows
Never Let Me Go - Kazuo Ishiguro (incredible novel)
One must find an escape somewhere. Frankly, though, it doesn't work very well.
I've read a few books lately, though, which shall be mentioned now:
Herzog - Saul Bellow
an academic work of great philosophic proportions (ok, sort of) - my friend - Cornell University Press, to be published 2008
Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows
Never Let Me Go - Kazuo Ishiguro (incredible novel)
One must find an escape somewhere. Frankly, though, it doesn't work very well.
27 July 2007
Quoting a world traveler
I just read this on somebody else's blog. He gets it and says it exactly right.
"I'm sick of saying goodbye. It's beginning to jade me. You have the best times with the most fascinating world travelers and then you must always say goodbye. goodbye. goodbye. goodbye. I need more hellos, which end in tomorrows."
"I'm sick of saying goodbye. It's beginning to jade me. You have the best times with the most fascinating world travelers and then you must always say goodbye. goodbye. goodbye. goodbye. I need more hellos, which end in tomorrows."
11 July 2007
05 July 2007
A Rainy 4th
The wintry weather in Berlin did not make 4th of July very festive for any Americans seeking sunny summer fun. I got rather drenched in a few downpours and ate dinner at a Spanish tapas restaurant. Star-Spangled Banner indeed!
In sad news: 3 of my (um, like 8?) friends in Berlin moved away this week, two to London, one to Chile. :(
In sad news: 3 of my (um, like 8?) friends in Berlin moved away this week, two to London, one to Chile. :(
28 June 2007
Assaying Religion, People, Metal
A very brave woman on Al-Jazeera, "discussing" Islam. Watch this before the link is disabled.
http://switch3.castup.net/cunet/gm.asp?ai=214&ar=1050wmv&ak=null
---
From Die Tageszeitung 28.06.2007, as posted on signandsight.com:
Filmmaker Werner Herzog, to whom the Munich Film Festival is currently dedicating a retrospective, talks in an interview about the quality he looks for an actor: "It's really only when someone is under extreme pressure, because for example they have to fight for their life, that you recognise what they're made of. It's similar with materials that physicists analyse. You have to expose a metal alloy to extreme pressure and extreme heat to find out about its composition. The same's true of people who're put to the test. Just like an ore that's assayed and refined in the forge."
---
Quote of the day:
Sarah: I'll be an old maid before you.
Me: How is that possible? I'm 6 months older.
http://switch3.castup.net/cunet/gm.asp?ai=214&ar=1050wmv&ak=null
---
From Die Tageszeitung 28.06.2007, as posted on signandsight.com:
Filmmaker Werner Herzog, to whom the Munich Film Festival is currently dedicating a retrospective, talks in an interview about the quality he looks for an actor: "It's really only when someone is under extreme pressure, because for example they have to fight for their life, that you recognise what they're made of. It's similar with materials that physicists analyse. You have to expose a metal alloy to extreme pressure and extreme heat to find out about its composition. The same's true of people who're put to the test. Just like an ore that's assayed and refined in the forge."
---
Quote of the day:
Sarah: I'll be an old maid before you.
Me: How is that possible? I'm 6 months older.
26 June 2007
Dear...
I hope you enjoy the:
1. sunshine while it lasts
2. bike riding
3. brown-bagged lunch
4. library browsing
5. frantic reading
because life could be a whole lot worse, and someday you might look back and think "Those FU Berlin days weren't really so bad - kind of relaxing, idyllic" in the split second before your pregnant 15-year-old daughter starts screaming about the empty refrigerator, your 7-year-old boy throws the remote control at the TV, missing and smashing a hole through the living room window, and your second ex-wife's new boyfriend, who is over to collect the 3-year-old, crashes, in his drunken stupor, into the glass case containing your mother's precious porcelain dishes handed down four generations, and just as the shelves start tipping, a cascade of painted white bone china like a mountain avalanche, your 3-year-old, momentarily dropped by the startled ex-wife's boyfriend, projectile vomits all over the newly polished hardwood floors, and as this cacophony is turning you into a Moses Herzog figure, a cocktail of paralyzing self-pity and enraged insanity, you glance out the window to see your ex-wife impatiently glaring at you from the passenger seat of the shiny blue Mustang parked in your shabby driveway, and you jolt into action, run to the door, and shout, "How dare you let this RAVING DRUNK MADMAN drive with little Bobby in the back seat!"
This is why all of you, dear readers, would be lucky to maintain email communication with me: I'm known to send wishes, possible predictions, and very long sentences at 10 in the morning, to unsuspecting homo sapiens.
1. sunshine while it lasts
2. bike riding
3. brown-bagged lunch
4. library browsing
5. frantic reading
because life could be a whole lot worse, and someday you might look back and think "Those FU Berlin days weren't really so bad - kind of relaxing, idyllic" in the split second before your pregnant 15-year-old daughter starts screaming about the empty refrigerator, your 7-year-old boy throws the remote control at the TV, missing and smashing a hole through the living room window, and your second ex-wife's new boyfriend, who is over to collect the 3-year-old, crashes, in his drunken stupor, into the glass case containing your mother's precious porcelain dishes handed down four generations, and just as the shelves start tipping, a cascade of painted white bone china like a mountain avalanche, your 3-year-old, momentarily dropped by the startled ex-wife's boyfriend, projectile vomits all over the newly polished hardwood floors, and as this cacophony is turning you into a Moses Herzog figure, a cocktail of paralyzing self-pity and enraged insanity, you glance out the window to see your ex-wife impatiently glaring at you from the passenger seat of the shiny blue Mustang parked in your shabby driveway, and you jolt into action, run to the door, and shout, "How dare you let this RAVING DRUNK MADMAN drive with little Bobby in the back seat!"
This is why all of you, dear readers, would be lucky to maintain email communication with me: I'm known to send wishes, possible predictions, and very long sentences at 10 in the morning, to unsuspecting homo sapiens.
22 June 2007
Moments That Expose My Apathy and Laziness
This man utterly puts me and my aspirations to shame. Some people are unbelievable.
3quarksdaily.blogs.com/3quarksdaily/2007/06/getting-better-.html
www.gawande.com/bio.htm
Writes a friend in response: "Yes, you should be utterly ashamed of your pathetic, inactive, lethargic, useless, careless, spiritless existence."
I know, I know.
3quarksdaily.blogs.com/3quarksdaily/2007/06/getting-better-.html
www.gawande.com/bio.htm
Writes a friend in response: "Yes, you should be utterly ashamed of your pathetic, inactive, lethargic, useless, careless, spiritless existence."
I know, I know.
21 June 2007
One of the Worst
Today was a really bad day.
A really really bad day.
I want to go home. Where is home?
A really really bad day.
I want to go home. Where is home?
16 June 2007
Father's Day
TWO POEMS AND A REFLECTION**
I. "HE SPEAKS IN YOUR VOICE, AMERICAN"
I understand
my father
more
after reading DeLillo's account
of Bobby Thomson's 1951 homer
than I ever did
living in the same house
for 18 years
How could I have been
so blind?
II. "AND THERE'S A SHINE IN HIS EYE THAT'S HALFWAY HOPEFUL"
At my age,
23,
my father had already survived
the bug-infested
snake-swarmed
lonely
damp
dangerous
jungles
of Vietnam
What right have I
to give up?
--
**In the cool pallid summer dusk,
I saw my dad weep over his dad
and realized that someday
I'll be the one in the twilight,
weeping
(posted also on medusaskitchen.blogspot.com, June 16)
I. "HE SPEAKS IN YOUR VOICE, AMERICAN"
I understand
my father
more
after reading DeLillo's account
of Bobby Thomson's 1951 homer
than I ever did
living in the same house
for 18 years
How could I have been
so blind?
II. "AND THERE'S A SHINE IN HIS EYE THAT'S HALFWAY HOPEFUL"
At my age,
23,
my father had already survived
the bug-infested
snake-swarmed
lonely
damp
dangerous
jungles
of Vietnam
What right have I
to give up?
--
**In the cool pallid summer dusk,
I saw my dad weep over his dad
and realized that someday
I'll be the one in the twilight,
weeping
(posted also on medusaskitchen.blogspot.com, June 16)
12 June 2007
"He was thinking continually, but nothing clear resulted."
I don't know what to do. I can't concentrate on anything, not even my book when I was trying to read at a cafe this morning. I'm completely immobilized. What am I going to do?
"Readiness to answer all questions is the infallible sign of stupidity." - from Herzog
--
What they really think. From Dutch magazine Trouw, as posted on signandsight.com, European Feuilletons:
Trouw dedicates its culture section to "The power of the image." There's a excerpt from Al Gore's new book, "Assault on Reason" as well as a pointed critique of it by Henri Beunders, a history professor from Rotterdam. "An American book must naturally have an alarming beginning and an optimistic end, otherwise it won't sell. His understanding of 'the old media' is just as narrow as his grasp of the Internet is naive. He writes, 'Web democracy is arming itself. You can feel it. We, the people, are still the key to the survival of democracy in America.' What naivety! As if 'the people' always want what's best. In 1914, 1982 (the Falklands War) and 1991 (the Gulf War) 'the people' marched joyfully into war. In the thirties the Germans begged Hitler: 'Free us from freedom.'"
"Readiness to answer all questions is the infallible sign of stupidity." - from Herzog
--
What they really think. From Dutch magazine Trouw, as posted on signandsight.com, European Feuilletons:
Trouw dedicates its culture section to "The power of the image." There's a excerpt from Al Gore's new book, "Assault on Reason" as well as a pointed critique of it by Henri Beunders, a history professor from Rotterdam. "An American book must naturally have an alarming beginning and an optimistic end, otherwise it won't sell. His understanding of 'the old media' is just as narrow as his grasp of the Internet is naive. He writes, 'Web democracy is arming itself. You can feel it. We, the people, are still the key to the survival of democracy in America.' What naivety! As if 'the people' always want what's best. In 1914, 1982 (the Falklands War) and 1991 (the Gulf War) 'the people' marched joyfully into war. In the thirties the Germans begged Hitler: 'Free us from freedom.'"
05 June 2007
Baby Steps
Setting: Cafe in East Berlin, 10:30am, morning after the bombshell
Me: drawing; Friend: writing
[Silence; ambient cafe noises]
Me: (turning suddenly to friend in outburst of despair) OH F#&%! What am I going to do?!?
Friend: (ponders for a moment) Well, in a little while you'll eat lunch. It's not much, and beyond that I don't know. But it's something.
---
Epiphany: What is any relationship - be it friendship, marriage, or anything in between - if not a promise, spoken or unspoken, to catch you when you fall?
Me: drawing; Friend: writing
[Silence; ambient cafe noises]
Me: (turning suddenly to friend in outburst of despair) OH F#&%! What am I going to do?!?
Friend: (ponders for a moment) Well, in a little while you'll eat lunch. It's not much, and beyond that I don't know. But it's something.
---
Epiphany: What is any relationship - be it friendship, marriage, or anything in between - if not a promise, spoken or unspoken, to catch you when you fall?
A Day I'd Like to Erase
Today I practiced 7 hours straight. Then I had a not-lesson. Afterwards, I learned how to do a headstand, had a discussion about Snow White, and pondered my very vague future.
Basically, I'm f***ed. Totally, totally f***ed.
At least medusaskitchen.blogspot.com posted more poetry of mine today (along with a photo) - June 4.
Basically, I'm f***ed. Totally, totally f***ed.
At least medusaskitchen.blogspot.com posted more poetry of mine today (along with a photo) - June 4.
03 June 2007
Stress
You know something's wrong when:
- your jaw is so tight from clenching that you can barely open it
- your knuckles are sore, creaky even
- you feel shooting pain in your back as each new knot begins to form
- you pop pain killers in vain hopes they'll relax you
- your friend, out of pity and alarm, starts demonstrating stretching exercises in the middle of a restaurant, over brunch
- in spite of all your efforts, 8 hours just isn't enough
- your jaw is so tight from clenching that you can barely open it
- your knuckles are sore, creaky even
- you feel shooting pain in your back as each new knot begins to form
- you pop pain killers in vain hopes they'll relax you
- your friend, out of pity and alarm, starts demonstrating stretching exercises in the middle of a restaurant, over brunch
- in spite of all your efforts, 8 hours just isn't enough
27 May 2007
Online Dating Tag Line
While flipping through my journal, and I came upon this bit of nonsense written last June (I think I should be
embarassed, but it's just too funny...). It would make an excellent online dating profile sentence, no?
"I'm fat, ugly, anti-social, and enjoy being repulsed by close relationships."
Ah, the weird days of yore.
I've also decided that the word "dragoon" is one of the English language's hidden gems. Dragoon. Don't you dragoon me into that, you greasy skank. In my previous life, I galloped on horseback across the moors, musket at my side, war in my blood, courage binding me to my fellow infantrymen, my hearty regiment, my faithful dragoons. This here, children, is a dragoon - unlike his cunning, fiery cousin, the dragon, our little dragoon enjoys his evening pub crawl far too much to challenge any knights in battle.
embarassed, but it's just too funny...). It would make an excellent online dating profile sentence, no?
"I'm fat, ugly, anti-social, and enjoy being repulsed by close relationships."
Ah, the weird days of yore.
I've also decided that the word "dragoon" is one of the English language's hidden gems. Dragoon. Don't you dragoon me into that, you greasy skank. In my previous life, I galloped on horseback across the moors, musket at my side, war in my blood, courage binding me to my fellow infantrymen, my hearty regiment, my faithful dragoons. This here, children, is a dragoon - unlike his cunning, fiery cousin, the dragon, our little dragoon enjoys his evening pub crawl far too much to challenge any knights in battle.
25 May 2007
A First Time for Everything
On Wednesday, my friend Flora (M's mother) invited me performance of something German and musical tonight (Friday). Naturally I agreed to go.
It's now Friday at 5:30pm, and since last night, I've been asked by FOUR other people to get together tonight. Four blond men, no less! Four blond men who don't know each other, all asking me to do different things tonight, wishing so desperately for my company.
Ok maybe that's an exaggeration. And maybe two of these guys are spoken for, and maybe one of them might be gay, and maybe the other one is, well, his own version of complicated.
But still. Who knew I'd become so popular!?!
(Post Script at 9:12pm: a sudden, violent thunder storm ruined all my potential evening plans! Rats)
It's now Friday at 5:30pm, and since last night, I've been asked by FOUR other people to get together tonight. Four blond men, no less! Four blond men who don't know each other, all asking me to do different things tonight, wishing so desperately for my company.
Ok maybe that's an exaggeration. And maybe two of these guys are spoken for, and maybe one of them might be gay, and maybe the other one is, well, his own version of complicated.
But still. Who knew I'd become so popular!?!
(Post Script at 9:12pm: a sudden, violent thunder storm ruined all my potential evening plans! Rats)
22 May 2007
Skinny Girls
Setting: Tiergarten, Berlin
Time: 6pm, Sunday
Scene: Sitting on a picnic blanket with Boy M, Girl M, and Boy H after two hours of boys playing frisbee with some other young Germans.
Girl M: Ok guys, we're going to flip through this People Magazine, and you tell me which girls you'd date just by their picture.
Boys M&H: Ok!
Girl M: [points at everyone from Penelope Cruz to Jessica Simpson to Angelina Jolie to Katie Holmes]
Boy M: Yes, yes, yes, no, no, yes, no, yes, no, no, no, no, yes....(in other words, a mixture)
Boy H: No, no, no, no, no, no, maybe, no, no, no, yes, no, no, no, no, no...(hard to please)
Girl M: [opening to swimsuit page] [to me] Look at her [someone famous and gorgeous] - she has fat thighs! Yay! Don't you feel better?
Me: Yes! I need to see these kinds of pictures....
Boy M: Yeah, she doesn't look so hot.
Boy H: Her shape is funny (Girl M: [interrupting] pear shaped?) but I don't like any of these other girls. They're too skinny. They all need a layer of fat. I don't like skinny girls.
I DON'T LIKE SKINNY GIRLS.
Me: [thinking: What? Really? Is this serious? Can it be true?]
This comment, coming from a 27-year-old guy, world-travelling, highly-educated, and very hot, someone I pegged at first sight to be rather arrogant, somewhat elitist, and out of my league....
For the first time in my life, I felt comfortable being me. Being normal. Being a size 6. Not being skinny.
The feeling was fleeting. But then I remember this conversation, and I feel good being real.
Time: 6pm, Sunday
Scene: Sitting on a picnic blanket with Boy M, Girl M, and Boy H after two hours of boys playing frisbee with some other young Germans.
Girl M: Ok guys, we're going to flip through this People Magazine, and you tell me which girls you'd date just by their picture.
Boys M&H: Ok!
Girl M: [points at everyone from Penelope Cruz to Jessica Simpson to Angelina Jolie to Katie Holmes]
Boy M: Yes, yes, yes, no, no, yes, no, yes, no, no, no, no, yes....(in other words, a mixture)
Boy H: No, no, no, no, no, no, maybe, no, no, no, yes, no, no, no, no, no...(hard to please)
Girl M: [opening to swimsuit page] [to me] Look at her [someone famous and gorgeous] - she has fat thighs! Yay! Don't you feel better?
Me: Yes! I need to see these kinds of pictures....
Boy M: Yeah, she doesn't look so hot.
Boy H: Her shape is funny (Girl M: [interrupting] pear shaped?) but I don't like any of these other girls. They're too skinny. They all need a layer of fat. I don't like skinny girls.
I DON'T LIKE SKINNY GIRLS.
Me: [thinking: What? Really? Is this serious? Can it be true?]
This comment, coming from a 27-year-old guy, world-travelling, highly-educated, and very hot, someone I pegged at first sight to be rather arrogant, somewhat elitist, and out of my league....
For the first time in my life, I felt comfortable being me. Being normal. Being a size 6. Not being skinny.
The feeling was fleeting. But then I remember this conversation, and I feel good being real.
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