Where She Glows Like a Grain on the Flickering Pane

Here’s a story:

Friday, November 20 - 3:00 A.M.

Through various circumstances, I find myself alone, riding uptown on the subway, positively drunk as a skunk. I’m feeling woozy, sleepy, leaning against the shaky door as we slowly climb towards 137^th street. I’m thinking about the past evening, one of those very long, winding, multi-tiered nights with several cleanly deviated chapters (bound together only be the residual alcohol in my blood from one location to the next).

There is a young lady standing next to me. This is not to say that I noticed her while I was riding- I was too consumed with my own thoughts, as well as the ebb and flow of the train itself. However, at a certain point, she initiates a conversation. I don’t remember too much about it, but I believe she was from The Dominican Republic (with an accent to prove it), hoping to attend Columbia to get her masters in something (don’t ask me what), and lives up around 171^st and Broadway, a few stops past me. I do recall that her age was a bit of a mystery, even then. She could have been twenty-five or she could have been thirty-five, it was hard to tell. In any case, we talked on the train for awhile (for the most part, I believe, she talked; I nodded and tried my best to stay awake and disguise my slovenly state). Then, at the very end of the train ride, right as we were pulling into my station, I asked for her phone number. This ranks as just about the ballsiest thing I have ever done, and as I stumbled home I was exceedingly proud of myself.

I should try and clarify why this was such a momentous event for me. In all my life, every girl that I’ve ever dated (that vast, untold sum) has been someone who I knew, previously, as a friend. In fact, now that I’m thinking about it, I would say that this applies to not just any girl I’ve ever dated, but any girl that I’ve ever done anything with (besides, you know, sit next to on a couch and talk about Wes Anderson movies). For a time I was under the impression that this was just the way of the world, that a gestation period was a necessary component for me when it came to any kind of seduction (if seduction is the right term for this arduous process, defined more by perseverance and gamesmanship than anything resembling charm).

Lately I’ve started to reconsider this stance. This idea that I can’t be considered romantically until I’ve been accepted platonically is born out of the kind of crippling low self-esteem that plagued me for years. When I was younger, the idea that any girl would ever consider me attractive was completely absurd. I approached even the most meager gestures (walking side-by-side to the lunch tables, asking for a dance, etc) as though I was waging war against insurmountable odds. The idea that a girl I liked could feel the same way about me, could look at me and see any semblance of the same thing that I saw when I looked at her, was completely out of my frame of reference, as wholly unbelievable as any fairy tale. I’m exaggerating, but not by much.

Needless to say, this was not a particularly healthy way to live. I knew it then, and I certainly know it now. In recent years I’ve been making a concerted effort to obliterate every trace of this twisted self-image. I’d hardly call myself the most confident guy in town, but I’ve made a lot of progress.

I’m funny. I’m smart. I make a good first impression. Why can’t I just meet a girl and sweep her off her feet, straight away? And here we have the genuine article, a perfect New York moment, a meeting of like spirits on that soothing underground love boat, the Number 1 Train! Plus, I was a drunken mess, exhausted, rambling, coated with the sweat and grime of my night. If I can successfully seduce a woman then, perhaps even one that’s ten years older than me, then the sky is the limit!

So, that is why I was so excited about receiving this number. Here’s what happened next.

The Weekend

What I didn’t count on during that blissful, mildly nauseous stumble home was the next task at hand. I had to actually make the phone call.

Calling for a date in any capacity is always a nerve-wracking proposition for me. In this day and age of hypercommunication, a phone call remains the most daunting option. None of the reassurance and comfort that comes with being face-to-face, but none of the organized strategizing that’s afforded in front of a computer screen. It’s just you and that other voice, present yet obscured, suspended in the air.

On top of that, this call had several other uneasy factors at work. Our meeting on the subway had been so bizarre. Will she even remember giving me the number? Did she give it to me as a joke? Was she anywhere near as drunk as me? And beyond that, I knew absolutely nothing about her. Every aspect of our subway conversation, from her looks to her age to whatever the hell it was we talked about for twenty minutes, was pretty much lost in the haze. The image of her in my mind became stretched and contorted beyond recognition, to the point that I started to wonder if I would be able to identify her at a restaurant.

Maybe this wasn’t me. Maybe obtaining the number was the whole thin. In this case, the number was the goal. There was no point pushing my luck any further.

But no! That would be the same thing, the same cowardly behavior that traces back to those days on the Middle School playground. The times when every time a girl locked eyes with me my stomach started churning. I should call her! Take a risk! Be that guy! You know the kind I’m talking about. Those guys. The golden boys who can talk to anyone and anything, who spent their teenage years with a surplus of girlfriends and pool parties and riding in the backseat of jeeps with iced beers in their hands, rock music pouring out the open windows, feeling the wind against their face as they screamed to the sky in exultant cries of youth, beauty, freedom.

Monday night, I decided to call her.

Monday, November 23 - 7:30 P.M.

After pacing around my room for about twenty minutes, an experience horribly reminiscent of High School, I dialed the number.

It rang. Maybe it’ll go to voicemail, I thought. Rang again. If it went to voicemail, I could leave a message. Ring. Or even better, I could hang up and then text her! Ring. Yeah, that’s the ticket. Texting right off the bat seemed like the wrong move, especially if she’s older, but if I’ve already made a conscious attempt to call her and it goes to voicemail, then it would be completely appropriate for me to text! Ring. Oh man, that would be great, I wouldn’t have to pronounce her name!!

I heard the familiar click of a phone going to voicemail, and instantly felt waves of relief wash over me. Yes, I was feeling mighty good, for a whole two or three seconds. Then the actual voicemail came on. It was a man. A man with a very thick accent. I could barely understand what he was saying, but he sounded older. Definitely older. Certainly old enough to kick my ass, probably even old enough to kill me

I hang up. My heart is still beating pretty hard, and I’m confused and disappointed and relieved and, perhaps more than anything else, desperate to tell someone. Mike is home, so I let him know what happened. He asks, reasonably, what the message said. I tell him that I didn’t really pay attention. I ascertained that it was a male voice, and then hung up. But maybe this was a mistake. Mike assures me that it was definitely a mistake. Who knows what the voicemail actually said? It could have been anything!

Hi, this is Tony, you might not recognize my voice, but that’s because I’ve been through some sort of really awful tragedy and lost everything that matters to me, and now my really generous sister has allowed me to live with her and use her phone. She is also available and extremely attractive, even in the sober light of day. Leave a message.

After a very short deliberation, I decide to call again, this time putting it on speakerphone. That way, Mike and I can both listen to the message (after all, four ears and two brains are better than two and one, especially if the latter combination belongs to me). I call again. Put it on speakerphone. It rings a few times.

Then she answers.

Hello? I turn to Mike with a look of sheer horror. Hello? Answer it, Mike mouths to me, his arms in the air. Hello? I look to the phone as though it’s a ticking bomb, then back to Mike. His eyes are big and white and he looks ready to burst. Hello?

Hi, is this Katarina? I turn off speakerphone and yank the device to my ear. I throw out one possible pronunciation of her name, caution already in the wind. Hi this is Joel, we met the other night on the subway. It sounds so trite when I say it. But at the same time, my breathing has suddenly steadied itself. I’m talking calmly, confidently. Something has changed. In the old days, I would be shaking like a goose in preparation for calling a girl, but then it was the actual phone call that really tortured me. Pacing around the room, sweating, regretting everything I said the moment after I said it. I had been nervous as hell right before making the call, nervous in a way that really felt like High School, but now I was doing fine, hell, better than fine!

Oh Joel yes how are you? She laughs as she says it, clearly surprised that I called. Her accent is also a lot thicker than I remembered it. No wonder the details of our conversation on Friday night had been so foggy. She’s hard enough to understand without any alcohol. Images of us our dinner flood into my mind; every sentence she utters punctuated by a sharp “WHAT?” from me as I lean forward, cup my ear, and perform every other stupid perfunctory gesture to try and make it seem like the issue at hand is volume and not, in reality…

Well Katarina, I don’t usually do this, but I was wondering if you’d like to have dinner with me sometime? Not bad, not bad. I shouldn’t have said “I don’t usually do this.” That’s such a cliché, makes me seem unsure and weak. But other than that, I kept my voice steady, I didn’t garble any words or stutter or go up into a creaky falsetto on accident. I said it, the band aid was off.

Ok! She says. Why not?

There it is. Why not. She says this, and I pump my fist, because that’s what you’re supposed to do in these kinds of situations. But in reality, inside, I don’t feel especially happy. I feel uneasy. All that nervous energy and anxiety I had right before the phone call starts to come back. I still won’t be able to recognize her, I think to myself. And now I know for a fact I won’t be able to understand her. And there was a man at the end of her voicemail. And for God’s sake, she’s probably forty-five years old and married with a big family!

We talk for another thirty-forty seconds. She tells me that she’s at a bar with friends from the Dominican Republic, information that I didn’t ask for, so for a moment I’m terrified that she’s inviting me to meet her there. I try to set a night for the date (because at this point I am committed, the sweat caked my forehead notwithstanding). She says she'll call me tomorrow. I hang up the phone. That’s that.

The Rest

I wish I could tell you that this story goes on and culminates, as it would if my life had any kind of solid dramatic construction, with the actual date. But this mysterious young- slash-old lady did not call me the next day, or the day after. And say what you will, but at this point I wasn't going to reach out again.

I’m surprised that I wrung this much out of what, really, doesn’t amount to much of a story. Thinking back on it, though, it was definitely a memorable experience for me, at least psychologically speaking. I guess this is the closest thing to time travel that we have today, feeling like yourself eight years ago and yourself in an idyllic future and yourself today all in the span of a weekend. Sort of. Don’t think about that analogy too much, it starts to fall apart almost instantly.

What can I say? Maybe a good conclusion was just too much to hope for.

The Job Will Not Save You

I didn’t go home for Thanksgiving. I did this because I’m just about to start a new job, and I thought that I would have too much to do this week. Going home, it seemed to me, would complicate things needlessly. In retrospect, I could have gotten my work done very early in the week and easily gone home. In fact, it would have been a pretty ideal time. And if I had really wanted to find a way to go, if I had made any kind of concerted effort, then this would have been clear. But I never did. In this time in my life, when so many disparate bits are rotating around and I’m trying so hard to piece them together into something solid, finding a time to return to the nest registered at the very bottom of my list of priorities. I definitely understand why. Back in school, I never cared much about going home for thanksgiving- I did it every year, sure, but it always felt like an inconvenience more than anything else, a forced removal from Northwestern right in the midst of finals (and, often, a show) when in just another two weeks I would be home for a real vacation.

In case you can't tell, I wish I had gone home. My time in New York City is reaching a breaking point, the moment when all the excitement of living here temporarily dissipates and I find myself feeling homesick and tired and wishing for nothing else but an escape. New York is an impossible place to get sick of, because for everything you see there are a hundred things you haven’t, but it’s certainly possible to get sick of my day-to-day life here.

I’ve always had a tough time adjusting to change. This is one of the few constants of my life. When my family moved across the country in eighth grade, I spent months and months in the same miserable routine: I would wake up, cry, go to school, hate my life, leave school, cry, and then spend the rest of my afternoon watching Food Network, often crying. During my first year at Northwestern, I considered transferring to another school about five thousand times. The primary reason I never pursued this option was sheer laziness (after applying to about sixteen schools during my senior year of High School, going through that heinous process again was truly a final, do-or-die scenario). And now here I am, somewhere new once again. The adjustment has not been nearly as painful as those in the past, but it’s still new, and it’s still scary, and lord knows it’s still exhausting. Going home would have been a good thing for me. I wish I had realized this earlier.

But then, maybe I’m just being sentimental. I think about an alternate reality, one where I spent the last week back in sunny Oak Park, CA, and (as alternate realities are prone to be), it is incredible. I see a bunch of old friends from High School, and they are so taken by my new sociability and confidence that they barely even recognize me (I’ve lost a bit of weight since High School as well). I passionately reconnect with everyone I’ve ever known, and all the different versions of myself, the current and the past, somehow come together in a magical confluence. I, for perhaps the first time in my life, know exactly who I am, and my destiny appears before me in perfect, startling clarity.

Maybe, in my wildest dreams, I would find a romantic connection with one of those miscellaneous pretty girls from my High School. Some girl who considered me only in vague, platonic terms (if she even considered me at all), but who, when confronted with this new, vibrant manifestation of myself, wouldn’t be able to control herself. We would spend every night of break ravaging each other, staining all my old hangouts with new, charged memories, and I would leave Oak Park with a freshly formed legend trailing in my wake. At the same time, I would have a fantastic weekend with my parents, their pure, unadulterated love reaffirming everything I’ve ever loved about myself. All of the doubts that have plagued me the last few months would be wiped away, disappearing like smoke in the wind, and I would return to New York re-energized, brimming with passion, seeing this great, sprawling city as if for the very first time.

And, on top of all this, I would have a great big thanksgiving dinner as well as several other good meals. I would also go shopping with my parents one day and have lots of things purchased for me, including several new pairs of pants, which would be greatly appreciated.

It’s a nice thought. But in reality, none of that would happen (except the pants). It would have been a pleasant, uneventful trip, just like pretty much every other Thanksgiving for the past four years. None of these grandiose ideas about would have even crossed my mind. It’s the fact that I didn't go, the deviation from the norm, that has made the whole “Thanksgiving at Home” register in my mind as such a hallowed, rejuvenating tradition, and has, in turn, made me feel these waves of self-pity about missing it.

In any case, whatever the circumstance, whatever the ratio of reality to fantasy, intuition to imagination, I’ve been pretty depressed the last few days. Which is too bad, really, because I was on a pretty good streak for awhile there, last weekend being an especially pleasant combination of productivity and fun. There’s just a sort of emptiness I feel inside. Not all the time, certainly, but often enough that it merits attention. Of course I think about all the things that would help, that could fill this void- a trip home is the flavor of the moment, but just as often I think that I would feel better if I did more stand up, or if I exercised all the time, or if I had a clear schedule each day, or if I had a girl to wake up next to, or, barring that, a girl to call after the sun sets and smile through a conversation But the reality is, none of those things can change me. They all of these things pass through my mind, and then they all disappear. And I'm left, as always, with myself.

I don’t know what I want. Sometimes I think I just want to be back in school, to have some sort of structure grounding my life, some clear goals to work towards. Then I think I want to drop everything and do something crazy, live in Korea, ride a bike across America, something where I have absolutely nothing holding me to the earth. But see, even that life, with its complete lack of definition, is more clearly defined than the one I’m in now. Maybe that’s why I wanted to go home. Not because of some half-baked romantic ideas about carousing through Oak Park in the backseat of a Jeep with the guys I took AP Euro with or sitting down to dinner with my family and feeling warm inside, but because it would give my life, at least briefly, some real definition. Visiting my hometown feels nothing like it used to, but when I’m there at least I have a clear picture of who I am, where I am, what I’m doing. In that context, it makes sense. When I look at myself here, in New York, does it make any sense? But then, what am I even talking about? How can I make sense in one place and not make sense in another? Why do I always feel like I need to attach these labels, these fucking definitions to everything I do? That the only way I can ever be satisfied within is if I’m able to step back and cleanly analyze my life from afar?

Happy Thanksgiving, friends. I’ll feel better in a day or two. I always do.

The Life of the Mind

The other day I had an unfortunate experience. I was getting ready to go out for the night, and I put on my nice pair of jeans (a.k.a. the only pair I own that doesn't have a huge tear at one of the knees). But they didn’t fit. Or rather, they fit, but were uncomfortably tight. I bought these jeans for a stand-up show back in February and they fit great then. What could possibly have happened in the last few months? Did they undergo some sort of shrinking process?

Then it hit me like a ton of bricks. The truth was right there in the mirror, starring back at me, a sickening grin on its face: I’ve gained some weight. Not much, mind you, but definitely a few pounds. This came as a terrible shock to me. Because these last few months I have been living the life of an unemployed, twenty-two year old male, a lifestyle I always figured would be akin to having the Flu: it’s not very pleasant, but at least you’ll lose some weight. Seriously, aren’t poor people supposed to be skinny? Isn’t that just one of the things that goes with being poor?

This kind of thinking, I have realized, is deeply flawed. My traditional ideas about the poor (scrawny, long-haired men with newspapers for pants and a wild glint in their eyes) is based on outdated, romanticized notions, and really has no place in today’s world. And after much deliberation, I have realized that my weight gain has not occurred in spite of my unemployment, but rather as a result of. Allow me to explain:

THE LIFESTYLE CHOICES AND LONG TERM GOALS OF THE UNEMPLOYED (NOT INCLUDING GETTING A JOB)

The primary goal of the Unemployed Male (the UM, if you will) is to not spend any money. This is tantamount. Obviously there are the other, more ambitious goals (ex: getting a job*), but when you've sent out your hundredth email in a week without a single response, or maybe when you've been informed by the sour manager of a candy store in Times Square that you aren't qualified to sell chocolates, you reach a breaking point. These other goals seem a bit too lofty, and we must settle for something less.

This new goal, in turn, makes one's day-to-day priorities very different. For instance, there was once a time when spending an entire weekday playing Nintendo 64 would be deemed uneventful. But, for our intrepid UM, this is an exceedingly fruitful use of time. Because there is one defining principle that can still guide you through these hard times, one truth that remains absolute: when you sit in your apartment all day, you will not spend any money. On the other hand, when you are out there in New York City, no matter how frugal you plan on being, you are probably going to spend something. Doesn't matter what you're doing, doesn't matter if you're just going for a crisp stroll. You will spend money. At a certain point you’ll walk past so many pizza shops and cafes and guys selling books on the sidewalk that you just can't help but succumb. It is the curse of this city.

Now I'm not saying that spending entire days sitting around your apartment, your unwashed skin wrapped up in an unwashed robe, is an especially romantic way to live. Nor is it especially healthy. But when you go to bed at the end of the day having not spent a single cent, having managed to keep your rapidly diminishing bank account in a precious moment of stasis, then I’ll be damned if you don’t go sleep with a smile on your face.

THE ARGUMENT FOR BREAD AND CHEESE

New York City is not a difficult place in which to find something to eat. You could be anywhere in the city, and there's a very good chance that you can find food within a block. The problem is, almost anything that’s cheap enough for the UM to eat is also, inevitably, very bad for you. For example, right across the street from my apartment there is a Burger King. It is there every day when I wake up, taunting me, laughing at me, every bit my old nemesis. I frequently complained about Burger King being the only fast food restaurant back in Evanston, but let me say, I gave in and had some the other day (an angry chicken tendercrisp, thank you very much) and, well... it tasted like home. A disgusting, gloppy, fattening home, but home nonetheless. Seriously, though. I bash BK sometimes, but they actually have some extraordinary deals there. For under six dollars you can get a full meal that not only fills you up, but, at least briefly, makes you feel like you never want to eat again. What a bargain!

But see, those brief forays into hard fast food are not a normal occurence. They are regretful benders, most likely fueled by marijuana smoke and sado-masochism. They are not my day-to-day. For the day-to-day, there is something else: pizza. The single most omnipresent food in NYC and, in a cruel twist of fate, also the most consistently satisfying. No matter where you are, there will be a pizza place down the street that provides you with a meal that’s several dollars cheaper and several degrees more delicious than any of the alternatives. There are exceptions to this rule, obviously, but for the young diner with both a light wallet and a discerning palette, New York pizza is really where it’s at.

Now, from the very start, that’s a large amount of bread and cheese in your diet (note: I will be referring to “bread and cheese” collectively as if it was it's own autonomous food group which, given the state of things these days, it pretty much is). But that isn’t even the half of it. Sure, pizza is a cheap thing to eat out, but by far the cheapest way to eat is cooking at home. Assuming that you’re buying your groceries from that super-cheap Supermercado down the street (smiling at the pounds of chicken thighs for a buck fifty, grimacing at the plastic-wrapped chicken feet mere inches away from them), it’s possible to eat at home for something like fifty cents a meal. And while yes, sometimes you do enjoy experimenting in the kitchen, sometimes cooking can be therapeutic and rejuvenating and a perfect stress-killer. But cooking takes time and effort, and those are both precious commodities indeed.

So even for those (like me) who like to cook, there are plenty of nights when the prospect of slaving over a hot stove, of chopping and peeling and smashing and smelling, of eating your entire meal with the dire knowledge that there’s a huge mess in the kitchen waiting to be cleaned as soon as you're done... there are times when that whole shabang just doesn't seem all that appealing. So all the dishes that require actual cooking, all the salads and soups and risottos and roast meats and grilled fish and puttenesca/arrabiatta/chimichurri sauces and pastas that you were thinking about making, all of those go out the window. But we’ve already covered how financially gainful it is to cook something at home, so even though you don't want to be makin’ anything too fancy, you can still make something, can’t you? You can still whip up something that's satisfying and filling and won't mess up the whole kitchen or give you a migraine, right? Are you that inept?

Well, let’s see. You’ve got all that super cheap chicken, which you probably cooked all at once right after you bought it. And you have tortillas, or if you don’t have tortillas then you probably have some bread, and if you don’t have either of those then I’m sure one of your roommates has some, and will they really notice if a couple fucking slices of bread are missing, really? I mean, I’m not saying that you should go all communist in your kitchen, but a little sharing never hurt anyone.

Okay. Some type of sandwich. But do you have lettuce? Tomatoes? Onions? Anything like that? No, you don’t (see: The Argument Against Vegetables). And you don’t just want a piece of cold chicken in between bread, do you? You may be experiencing some financial difficulties these days, but you don’t have to live like a fucking animal. But wait, wait… you have cheese! You always have cheese, that’s one of the essentials. So why don’t you just lay some chicken and cheese on top of your tortilla/bread, pop it in the microwave, and presto! Not only is that easy, and cheap, but your mouth even begins to salivate at the prospect (because no matter what they might say about cheese and bread based concotions, they are undoubtedly delicious). And not only is this delicious, but it takes less than a minute to prepare, and your prep work ranges from incredibly minimal to (if your cheese is pre-shredded) absolutely nothing.

And there you have it. More bread and cheese. And so gradually, without you even noticing, bread and cheese takes over your life. It becomes your primary source of nutrition. Your body becomes accustomed to it, and so does your mind; you begin to inadvertently order quesidillas and tuna melts at restaurants, choosing to indulge in cheese and bread even when you have a wealth of other possibilities, finding a hateful comfort in that soft, gooey taste that fills your mouth and expands your waist. The constipation comes later.

THE ARGUMENT AGAINST VEGETABLES

There are many arguments that can be made against vegetables. A lot of people just plain don’t like the taste of them, so their argument is easy. But lets say you are one of the proud few who do enjoy the taste of vegetables, who find them peppery and savory and exciting and fresh, a spa treatment for the inside of your mouth. However, there is a harsh truth that you can’t escape: vegetables need to be cleaned. Whether you are buying them at a boutqiue grocery, an outdoor farmer’s market, or a gas station, the vegetables need to be cleaned. And this cleaning process is, more often than not, a categorical “pain-in-the-ass.” And it doesn’t matter how you’re planning on preparing them. If you’re eating the vegetables raw, adorned with nothing more than table salt and the sweat of your palm, they certainly need to be washed. And if you’re cooking them, it's also a real good idea. You can delude yourself into thinking that by putting broccoli florets over heat all their dirt andgrime will evaporate into thin air, but the reality is it will just become darker and grittier, a more concentrated, pungent form of its' already disgusting self. Still hungry?

Now, here's another misconception about the life of the UM: it may seem like you have a lot of spare time these days, like you have literally nothing but spare time. In fact, your time right now is more precious and regimented than ever before. For instance, any amount of time that you might spend washing vegetables could just as easily be spent applying for jobs, which is the single most important thing that you can be doing and which should take up a sizeable portion of your day, every day (if for no other reason than to the assuage the throbbing guilt that eats away at you any time you think about that incredibly expensive education that you spent the last four years of your life accruing, and that nowadays is getting about as much use as that Bowflex in your parent's closet).

This is not to say, obviously, that your entire day should be spent applying to jobs. No sir. No man can live like that. And it doesn’t matter whether you’re bent over a shining computer screen in your underwear or peddling your resume door-to-door, spending too much time only applying for jobs will begin to eat away at the very fabric of your soul. You’ll know when you’ve reached your breaking point for the day, because the same job-hunting that was working to feed your guilt (and, thus, marginally improve your rapidly diminishing psychological health) has now begun to demoralize and depress you. All of the sudden, you’re five times worse than when you started: you’re crouched in the corner of your room, shivering in a blanket, wishing that you lived three hundred years ago and had been forced to learn a proper skill or trade at a young age. Wishing that you now had the facilities to perform an honest day’s work for an honest day’s pay, and would never have to think about cover letters or resumes or informational meetings or cold calling or interviews ever, ever again.

Those are the bad days. They are inevitable. But as the barren winter approaches, how can we try and guarantee ourselves just a few more good days? The answer is simple: the times that are not spent applying for jobs should be spent, in effect, recooperating yourself. This recooperation can take the form of activities that are entirely mindless (playing videogames, watching the Glenn Beck Show) or therapeutic and rejuvenating (reading, writing, watching Barton Fink on Instant Netflix). Peeling and cleaning vegetables, unfortunately, does not fall into either of these categories. To do it properly you need a big sink (bigger than we have), and lots of clean dishrags (psshaw) or paper towels (the environment!). And, when it comes down to it, you’re just washing and scrubbing crusted old dirt off of ragged shit that comes from the ground. It isn’t a fun thing to do, and the inclusion of this kind of non-fun / non-productive activity into your schedule could really wreak havoc on your extremely frail psyche. And maybe it won’t really make that much of a difference, but honestly. Things haven't been going so well. You’re in a tender place right now. Why risk it?

THE EXERCISE ENIGMA

Of course, some people would say that it doesn’t really matter what you eat, especially for a strapping young man such as yourself. These people will say that you can eat pretty much anything you want, provided that you exercise. And there have been times in the past where you exercised on a semi-regular basis, and despite the mundane pain of the whole thing, you found that every time you left the gym you felt refreshed and powerful and just goddamn good about yourself. And now, with no job, no hope, no future, that kind of refreshed/renewed feeling could do a whole lot of good for you. But it isn’t that simple, is it?

Gyms cost money. Lots of money. Even the one that’s a few blocks away, one room, no showers, no locker rooms, a hole in the wall with treadmills, even that one costs lots of money to join. Perhaps it all seems like lots of money because you are more financially aware right now than you have ever been before, because you understand the value of the dollar in a visceral way that no amount of civic class theorizing or folksy talks with your father would ever approximate. But still, whatever the case, it’s a lot of money, and this is a time where money just can’t be spent on nonessentials (and as a member of the male sex who does not flex in front of the mirror every night and feel comfortable slapping strange girls in the ass when they pass you at the club, a gym membership does not quite register as “essential’).

But that’s fine, isn’t it? Who says you need a fancy-schmancy gym membership to get in shape? You can just go running outside, do push-ups in your room, create the perfect sculpted physique and do it by utilizing your own muscles and the sweet power of gravity. Problem is, you live in Harlem, and since you already feel a bit self-conscious just walking around outside, you can only imagine how miserable you’ll feel dressed in your gay little running outfit, running these hilly streets as you sweat and pant like a bitch (which is precisely what you’ll be doing the first time you run after four months of perpetual sitting-on-your-ass). You could still do push ups in your room, sure, but as the lack of running packs on the pounds, push ups will become more and more difficult, and the lack of forward momentum in your exercise regime (a perfect parallel to the lack of forward momentum in every other part of your godforsaken life) will be very, very frusterating.

Perhaps it’s better to just accept your physical decline and know that in order to be fit, you might just have to wait til you’re rich. And maybe that will also coincide with becoming well-adjusted and popular and joyful and you’ll start to dress better too. It’s an all or nothing world, friend. Grit your teeth and accept it.

______

So there you have it. Circumstantial evidence that my weight gain is an (almost) inevitable result of my current unemployment, just a part of the natural order of the universe. Granted, there are ways to work around these issues; for instance, the gym membership quagmire can be temporarily solved by making use of all the free trial memberships that are offered at just about every health club in the city. This works great, so long as you don’t mind lying to the face of friendly people. But those strategies are for another day. For now, I have some sitting around to do.

*Note: For those of you who are curious, I am actually hot on the trail right now for a really, really, stupidly great job, but I don’t want to jinx anything by talking about it. All I can say is it would be a real trip if I got it, after spending several months unsuccessfully applying for the type of jobs that I was trying to get in fucking High School. Either sweet irony, or positive proof that success in this life is based entirely on blatant, vacillating chance. I'll take either.

Everything in its Right Place

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Warming Up

My moods jump around a lot these days. I wish I could say that I wake up every morning calm and centered, that I feel in complete possession of myself and am confident in my ability to take anything the world throws at me because, in my heart, in my soul, I know who I am and I’m proud of who I am and that energy guides me in everything I do. But that would be bullshit. When I wake up in the morning, I usually have no idea what kind of day it’s going to be, what kind of person I am, whether I should feel satisfied or miserable or sick or carefree, etc. Maybe this is because in the course of any given day (hell, any given hour), I feel like my disposition runs the gamut, from preening cockiness to shivering fear, as well as lots of little subsets in between (these include, but are not limited to: optimistic trepidation, jaded ambition, desperate happiness, and lack of abject confidence in my abilities that presents itself as self-deprecating modesty and, in turn, makes me feel rather charming).

Lots of things have happened in the last week and a half, good things too, but my feelings often seem to operate on their own crazed frequency, separate from circumstance. Maybe it’s because my life is so loose and free-wheeling right now, with ups and downs arriving in such a rapid, random succession: after weeks of abject rejection and rising depression, on the exact same day I got a tutoring job and a play I wrote was accepted by an off-off-Broadway theater (I don’t actually know what the correct terminology is here- accepted seems too informal, but I can’t say the play was commissioned since I won’t be getting any money). A few days ago, after a week of not really looking for another job and feeling ceaselessly guilty about it, I got an email telling me that I’ve been called in for an interview at a place I applied to about two weeks ago and had completely forgotten about. But that interview isn't for a few more days, and I don't want to worry about or jinx it, so...

Let’s talk more about my play. I got an email from the Artistic Director of this place, and just as soon as my exhiliration began to wane (I would say a couple hours after the news), the stark reality that I have to cobble together a full-scale production of a rather challenging play in about three weeks hit me like a buffalo stampede, a bloodied bash in the head that I’m still reeling from. Since then I’ve made a lot of choices about the play and this production, all of them under a self-imposed hard deadline. And, of course, the time that I haven’t spent making these decisions, I’ve spent up late at night in a cold sweat overanalyzing and regretting them.

What this means, what any of my life here in NYC means, is another thing that’s constantly fluctuating: maybe this production is a break. I hope it is. But it just as easily (actually, far more easily) could be a little thing that comes and goes, a blip on the screen of my life. What if I don’t end up being a playwright? What if I end up as a fiction writer, or my stand up comedy career takes off, or in another year I’m in China teaching English, or I go back to graduate school and decide to be a professor, or something else happens that I can't even begin to envision right now? My life could go in a million different directions, and even though I’m technically in control, I really have no clue what’s going to happen. There are a hundred different futures in which this production doesn’t matter, in which nothing I do during these wandering days in Gotham City matters in any real capacity. In that case, all I’m doing here, really, is just building up valuable life experience, that strange commodity that’s impossible to define, yet that people covet nearly as much as money and power.

I certainly have had already some interesting life experiences in relation to this show. For instance, two nights ago when I went to a public showing of the theater. The twist is, I wasn’t able to attend the showing for the new play festival that I’m in, so instead I attended the showing for the same theater’s Gay and Lesbian Theaterfest in November. It wasn’t an especially strange experience, all things considered, but the Artistic Director (who had a glass of wine in one hand and a tiny dog in the other) was definitely in his element with that crowd.

In any case, whenever I start to feel overwhelmed or stressed, I have a fairly successful tactic: placing things into context. The slow understanding that even though it feels like a huge part of my life is over, the real stuff has actually just begun, and I have no clue whatsoever where I’m going to end up, so in all likelihood everything that I’m stressing about is just complete bullshit and in ten years I’ll be somewhere I never expected. When this happens, I imagine I’ll think back fondly on my lost years in the city, remembering all the good times and wiping away all the loneliness and fear and existential dread that managed to coexist, happily, with all the fun stuff.

Still, I want the show to be good. That’s just a matter of pride. I feel that pressure, because no matter (and no matter the lack of money), this is the first professional-type thing that I’m doing as a writer. The insane, fast, throw-it-all-together mentality makes it seem like something superfluous, but it’s not. It’s me trying to do some version of what I want to do for a living, and I need to treat it super seriously (I guess you could say that the Sandman workshop/reading in Chicago was my actual first professional engagement, but the process-orientated causality of the whole thing, as well as the fact that nearly the entire audience was composed of current and former Northwestern students, makes me think otherwise).

In any case, we start actual rehearsals on Monday. So there’s no use talking or thinking about it too much.

I will say one thing: New York City is a hell of a nice place to feel lost in (it's also a nice place to get lost in, which is a slightly different thing, though they're related). I’ve been here for one month (just had the anniversary yesterday, marked unceremoniously by an expired MetroCard). And it’s true, over this month, there have been more than a few times where I’ve quite suddenly felt overwhelmed and dead inside and like I was getting swallowed in an a sinking vortex. During these times, I’ve looked around and wondered to myself, often in angered tones, why the fuck I ever wanted to live in a place so jam-packed-saturated with people. There is so much space in the world, and here I am in this one dinky island that has built upwards, stacking people on top of people on top of people until it becomes a sweaty, clogged mess. There’s the obvious crowdedness, but there’s also a real sense of isolation that comes with such an overabundance of strangers. Every day that I walk around New York I see hundreds and hundreds of people, very few of whom I make eye contact with, none of whom I will ever see again. And even if two weeks later by some chance I see that same short Asian businessman from Central Park knocking one back at a West Village Bar, I will never, ever recognize him. Because there are so many people in this city, the value of human life becomes far less important. Everyone is clearly, truly out for themselves. It can be a pretty damaging place, and this is coming from a guy who likes to be alone. When I saw a pretty girl walking around at school and didn’t talk to her, I could always imagine that she would turn up in a class or at a party or I would just see her walking around again, I could always tell myself that I’ll have another chance. I was always surrounded by people that were part of my same community, that I had some implicit bond with. And even if I only ever became friends with a handful of them, it was a reassuring thing. Now, I see a pretty girl on the subway, I don’t talk to her, and when she walks away into the swarms and I know that I will never see her again. So many people, and so few connections.

Luckily, whenever I get too deep into my head wondering about this, I rediscover why New York is such an incredible place to live. New York, more than anywhere I have ever been, has the ability to make someone feel, at any given moment , like they can completely reinvent themselves, change their lives for the better. New York as a place is so inspiring and exciting, and every part of it is so radically different: you get on the subway, and then ten or twenty minutes later you get out and suddenly you’re in what seems like a brand new city, a whole different world. This, from what I’ve seen, is unique to NYC. No matter where you are in Los Angeles, it still always, undeniably, feels like Los Angeles. Same thing with Chicago. There’s something about those places, that’s hard to pin down: an energy, a feeling, a vibe that translates across all their area codes and neighborhood barriers. Not so in New York, which really is like ten great cities (and about forty decent ones) all crammed together into one jumbled, crazy, invigorating mess. It’s a tiring, tirelessly expensive place to live, yes, but there’s also something really inspiring about it.

Of course, I’ve only lived here a month. I may have a working knowledge of most of the trains and a vague understanding of where Gramercy Park ends and Chelsea begins (very vague), but I am still very green in this place. These observations, I’m sure, are all very naive. But then, come to think of it, I’m also pretty green to this whole adulthood thing, to not having my schedule planned out and having very clear goals at any given moment of the day. I’m new to not being allowed to throw around that wonderful, always respectable moniker of “student" whenever it's convenient. I actually have no idea what to say to people now when they ask me what I do, but that’s something I’ve thought a great deal about and is, likely, the subject of a separate entry.

So, I’m doing good, right? I feel like I’m doing good. I’ve been here a month and I’ve got a job (part-time, and not making nearly enough money to live off of, and I haven’t even started training yet and have no idea when the deuce I will, but still). In another month I’ll be a produced playwright. I live in a good apartment with great roommates (all of whom are struggling with their own versions of this real world, sink-or-swim hysteria, but all struggling pretty admirably). There are times when I feel a sharp pain in my stomach or my heart rate rises without warning or I wake up at in the middle of the night shivering uncontrollably (all of these are my body’s struggling attempts, I’m convinced, to cope with the mental pressures breathing down on me). But then there are also days where I stroll through one of those gorgeous, idyllic blocks of the city (and there are plenty of ‘em) with Jay-Z pumping in my headphones, and I feel like maybe, just maybe, I’m king of this whole fucking world.

Fact is, I’m going to make mistakes, and I’m going to wish I could go back and make things better. But then, things could always be better. If this show in a month is, by some chance, a smash hit and, by some even crazier chance, seen by some people who matter, then what happens? My theatrical career will be off and running, but I’ll still want more. I’ll want to have plays on Broadway, I’ll want to be making enough money as a writer that I don’t have to do anything else. And if that happens, then I’ll want to find a way to transfer to TV and Film. And if that happens, then I’ll want to be on a better show, and have more power, and get more acclaim, and if by some chance I become the Creator/Producer of a huge hit series and win a dozen Emmys, I’ll probably look back on a life consumed by work and wonder what the hell it all meant, and why I never just dropped everything and went backpacking through the Himalayas.

And that’s just professional stuff. There’s also that whole friendship/love/sex/family component of life, and there’s also just how I feel about myself, deep down, separate from all these extraneous factors. There is a lot of stuff. Which is why it might be best to just take things one day at a time.

You know, I like this blog because it gives me a chance to put into words all of my personal philosophies. Now if only I knew what the fuck I was talking about.

Corporations are Persons

A few nights ago, after an arduous day of preparing my application materials for The Next Food Network Star (I'm serious), I decided to watch the Video Music Awards for the first time in about three years. The first time I've watched it live in I don't know how long. It seemed like a good lineup of performers this year (Beyonce and Jay-Z at the least), and I figured if it was too boring or too mind-numbingly stupid I could easily switch stations or turn off the TV. But Good Lord, what a show to see live. I was able to see Kanye West’s insane freakout in all of its unedited, unadulterated glory, complete with jerky camera work and the sudden slam to a ten-minute long commercial break. I wonder sometimes why so many of the huge cultural moments of generations past still reverberate today, while our generation’s are mostly composed of celebrities making idiots out of themselves. But that’s neither here nor there. It’s also funny that I saw this, though, because two days before I actually got into a debate about Mel Gibson, a filmmaker whose artistic merit often gets ignored due to the mounting evidence that he is a spy for the Neo-Nazi's.

In addition, just over the weekend I was linked to an article about Megan Fox’s on-set antics during the Transformers movies (written by three anonymous crew members). Whatever you might think of Megan Fox, this is pretty scathing stuff: http://www.deadline.com/hollywood/transformers-crew-talk-back-to-megan-fox/

I’m not really going to address that article any further, as it’s pretty self explanatory, and I don’t consider Megan Fox nearly enough of an artist to relate her to my query. Which is: should the way celebrities/artists act in real life be of any consequence when it comes to how we appreciate their work?

I’ve been thinking about this for a few days, and it’s a surprisingly complex question. Let’s start with our two knights in armor, Kanye West and Mel Gibson. Despite their myriad of differences, these two men have a great deal in common. They are both widely respected, extremely influential statesmen in their respective fields. They have each garnered both prestigious awards and enormous mainstream popularity, the holy grail of the entertainment industry. There has also been fairly conclusive evidence that both of these men are, in a matter of speaking, raging assholes. Now, if you’re one to indgule in all that trendy Hollywood gossip, you would have reason to believe that everyone in that city who stands in front of a camera (and a good many who stand behind) are similarly dickish. But with these two, I think we’re dealing with the genuine article.

Kanye is a dipshit. That's always been known. South Park even did an episode about it (if you look at a list of their episode topics, it's a fairly comprehensive catalogue of eveything that has pervaded popular culture in the last ten years). His actions at the VMA's hit a new low, to my mind. That being said, I’ll still listen to whatever new music Kanye comes out with. I’m a big fan of the new Jay-Z album, and Kanye produced more than half the tracks on it and guests on two of my favorites. In some ways Kanye's insane antics actually make me want to listen to his music more. That night, after watching him storm the stage and stomp the shit out of a traumatized little girl, I immediately wanted to listen to some of his music, wanted to hear his voice in my ears and think more in depth about this truly bizarre man. Which, of course, is exactly what he wants. I'm playing right into his hand, who am I to judge him? Still, we’re dealing here with hip hop, a form in which the particular artist’s public persona is inextricably linked with their artistic content. I will say, with this particular stunt, Kanye has cemented himself in the wild, unpredictible “Kramer” role of hip hop’s royalty, with Jay-Z and Beyonce as Jerry and Elaine, and P.Diddy rounding things off as George (when I stated this thesis, Chris replied that there are lots of fat rappers that would make a better George. I concur, but I was trying my best to stick with Jerry/Jay-Z’s actual social circle).

Kanye’s bizarre personality has always been such an integral part of his success (his incredible producing talent and decently above-average rap skills composing the rest), and he has, in turn, reached such insane platitudes of success, that I feel like at this point he can do anything. Short of actually killing someone, the crazier Kanye acts, the more people will want to watch him. In fact, his celebrity often mirrors all of those faux-celebs, like Paris Hilton or one of the strangely named Kardashian sisters; they all act worse and worse, and in turn watch their popularity rise. The only difference is, Kanye is also an extremely talented artist, and thus is far more impenetrable to public opinion than any of those flash-in-the-pan heiresses. Kanye became a celebrity because of his music. Those girls filmed themselves having sex, and they're desperately milking the attention until the next younger, hotter, richer woman films herself having sex in even more compromising, submissive positions.

Oddly enough, Kanye’s music itself is pretty damn unthreatening. He rhymes about blood diamonds in Africa and how much he loves his mother. Any attempts at real gangster "hardness" are always treated with a degree of irony. Makes you wonder, if he didn’t have such a crazy “real life” persona, would he even be as popular?

Movie stars, however, have rather different social obligations than bizarre, egomaniacal hip hop stars. I can think of several examples of massive celebrities who have had their careers legitimately hampered by the overriding belief that they are assholes/weirdos/nutcases/etc.

Mel Gibson is, I think it’s safe to say, a huge dick. Lots of really talented people are, lots of extremely powerful people are, and he happens to be both. But as with Kanye, if Mel makes a movie that I really like, then, frankly, I don’t give a shit. I remember when Apocalypto came out, Gibson’s big, gaping bomb after the twin phenomenons The Passion of The Christ and his drunken rant to a police officer on the PCH. Very few people saw Apocalypto, but I did, and I thought it was awesome. There was so much buzz about how the movie was unneccessarily violent, and that is insane. There is nothing thematically controversial about the movie; it was a pretty straightforward chase movie, except all the chases were on feet through the jungle. The whole thing was just one long, unbelievable action sequence, and I couldn’t believe how much negative press it was getting. It’s an action movie! That's it!

You see, the movie was released at a time when the public opinion of Mel Gibson was at such a resounding low, that people (mass media included) were just looking for a way to attack him. And, when confronted with this movie, the best they could come up with was that it’s “too violent.” Also that the dialogue is in Ancient Mayan, and that's, y'know, sort of weird. Are you kidding me? There was nothing, I mean nothing, in the movie that was remotely worse than what you’d see in oh, say, Braveheart? Or Gladiator? Both exceptionally violent action movies, both critical darlings and huge hits and eventual oscar winners.

No, I don’t like Mel Gibson as a person, I don’t like the things he says, but it’s not like he’s a massive corporation that’s actively exploiting or harming the Jewish people. He’s just one guy with a loud mouth and a big wallet. If we start to judge the entertainers of our time by their personal conduct, then who knows how much great art we could miss out on? T.S. Eliot, one of the greatest poets of all time (many would say the greatest, period, end of story), was an open Nazi sympathizer. John Cheever lived a double life, lying to and humiliating anyone who tried to get close to him. There are countless accounts of Hemingway being a drunken assbag. But who cares?? You read their writing, and you just don’t care, because it makes no difference now, and because quite probably these men needed all that darkness inside of them in order to create the beautiful work that they did. I'm not saying that Mel Gibson is on the same level as Hemingway, but he's made a lot of movies, some of them really good. And if he was a perfectly nice, normal guy with no anger festering inside of him, then who knows if we would have gotten the chance to see any of them?

But then there’s the issue of when a person’s toxic beliefs begins to show up in their art. And when this art becomes enormously, insanely popular, then the ol' pot really starts to boil. This was the case with The Passion of the Christ, which might be either be a brilliant, visceral, uncompromising recreation of Jesus’ final days or a thinly veiled creed against Jews masquerading as a pious drama. I personally never saw the movie, because no matter what it always sounded to me like a piece of high-class torture porn, so I won’t comment too in-depth. It just seems to me: he created something that spoke to a huge number of people in a really profound way. Nobody mentions that when they talk about that movie. Shouldn't that count for something?

Rather, let’s go back to the world of hip hop and look at another one of the most controversial rappers of all time, Eminem. Now, let me say off the bat, I love Eminem. He is without a doubt one of my favorite recording artists. I loved The Marhsall Mathers LP, his insanely successful, insanely controversial breakthrough album that won a bunch of grammys and provoked massive, organized protests. I love his most recent album, Relapse, which is deeply dark and demented and clearly the product of several years in a drug-addled seclusion (which did happen, and which is chronicled in wry, painful detail in several of that album's tracks). I love them all, because no matter what he’s rapping about, Eminem’s skills are mind-blowing. When it comes to intricate, complex rhymes and visual storytelling, he’s among the very top tier of the hip hop world. Yet, he is also one of the most technically impressive rappers, his flow is simultaneously precise and unpredictible, melodic and razor sharp.

That being said, Eminem does not rap about nice things. Remember when I said Kanye has a rap about how much he loves his mom? Eminem has several about his mother as well, yet they are more likely to be violent, murderous fantasies, often laced with bits of Freudian incest and a healthy dose of rape (another one of Em’s favorite topics). There are lots of ways to explain Eminem’s brutal subject matter: his own life, as he’s apt to let us know, has not been a picnic, those pesky mother issues compounded with gang violence, paranoia, and an extremely tumultuous relationship with his ex-wife Kim. Not only that, but if you look at Eminem’s discography from a critical perspective, you can see what he’s doing. Eminem’s personality, what he’s really like, is shrouded in mystery. Even after all these years in the spotlight, nobody really has any idea who Marshall Mathers is. And that's no accident: throughout all of his albums, the singular theme of Eminem's storytelling has always been a shifting, endlessly mutable conception of self. It’s no accident that he has three different names that he goes by in near-equal amounts: Slim Shady (the hyperviolent, sadistic Id), Marhsall Mathers (his birth name, and often the gentle Superego), with the two converging in his central alias, Eminem. In nearly every song he writes, Eminem is playing with this fragile concept of identity, freely intercutting his own life experience with crazed fantasy. What’s real? What’s imaginary? It’s always so hard to tell, and that’s half the fun.

In case you can’t tell, I think that Eminem can write about any damn thing he wants, in no small part because I think he’s a genius and it would be criminal to curtail his artistic output in any way. But, unfortunately, the issue isn’t that simple. The big problem that people had with The Marshall Mathers LP (and the impetus behind so much of the organized protest against him) is because the album was super popular amongst middle and high school kids. Suburban kids. White kids. I was in middle school when the album came out, and while I wasn’t into hip hop at all back then, I remember that a lot of people I knew loved Eminem. He reached audiences that most rappers don’t touch (in no small part due to the color of his skin), and as a result, his words can have repercussions that most don’t. A lot of Eminem’s audience (at least back then when he was at the height of his popularity) is very young, and not nearly sophisticated enough to see the layers of reality that he’s playing with in each song. They just hear Eminem, this really cool, really famous music star, talking about how he wants to rape women and kill faggots and, hey now, maybe that’s a good way to think!

Like I said, it’s a complex issue. And there are countless other examples like this. Someone who, in my mind, is a greater talent than Mel Gibson, and has had his career even more compromised by his personal hinjinks, is Mr. Tom Cruise (a.k.a. the biggest movie star in the world turned the biggest crazy hyperactive weirdo scientologist in the world, who also happens to act in and produce movies). This one really saddens me. I think Tom Cruise is a terrific actor. Anyone who doesn’t think so, I would instruct immediately to watch Magnolia (which is a fantastic movie in every respect, but also features an incredible performance by Cruise in a supporting role). But even beyond that, he’s at least good in every movie he does, and often he’s great (Jerry Maguire is my Dad’s favorite movie, and I agree it’s no slouch). Still, it’s at the point now that whenever you mention Tom Cruise in any conversation, someone immediately starts ranting about how crazy he is. About how they can’t respect him as an actor, they can't really see anything else about him, because gosh, he’s just so darned CRAZY.

This always gives me a headache. Here’s a twist: most actors are crazy. The good ones are really crazy. And Tom Cruise, from what I’ve seen, isn’t even a bad guy. He doesn’t seem like a jerk. He’s just a kook. Who gives a shit? Why must his religious beliefs and the way he acts on talk shows be the first thing people talk about when they talk about Tom Cruise? Why is that his relegated place in the parthenon of pop culture? I don’t know. But I like Tom Cruise, and I hope he comes out with a big, successful, quality movie so people on all the Entertainment shows can rant and rave about his incredible comeback, when the only thing he’s really come back from is their misplaced scorn.

Jesus Christ this was a long entry. And rather dry too. Those of you who reads blogs to get juicy gossip into other people's lives are probably slitting your wrists right about now. I would actually love to know if anyone read this whole thing. Congratulations if you did. Maybe you should try reading a book now.