It’s a curious thing how a switch in the mind can suddenly be turned on after long lying dormant. This happened to me recently with regard to the television in the kitchen. We installed the thing when the kitchen was remodeled, eight years ago now; it perches on a black metal stand at the end of a jointed arm bolted to the wall, so that it takes up no counter space. It is a somewhat guilty pleasure, but a pleasure indeed: cook’s companion, weather guide, boon to dish-washing. Many the Phillies game I have checked on, the political debate I have sampled, the episode of Scrubs I have caught the end of. Without this television I would have no experience of either Everybody Loves Raymond or Deal or No Deal.
Placing a television in the kitchen has its hazards, however. Chief among them is food spillage, which, except on Superbowl Sunday, is not as much of a threat in the den. When a television set sits suspended above the coffeemaker, when a busy cook or a dishwasher is handling the remote control on a daily basis, problems are bound to ensue. In our case, the poor remote suffered so many wet thumbs and splashes of spaghetti sauce over the years that it gradually ceased to function. First the number keys, then the mute, and finally the on-off button became stubborn and unreliable. We were left with a crippled TV. To turn it on or change the channel required accessing the controls on the front of the set itself. In an age of fewer channels and less obnoxious commercials, this might not have posed a problem. But when you have to toggle 28 times to get from CNN to MSNBC, and 40 to get from PBS to Nickelodeon, it becomes a source of considerable frustration.
The point is we lived with this frustration for a very long time. From the first refusal of the “Previous channel” button, when I thought we needed new batteries, to the current state of all-but-total paralysis, where only the “5” key works, the remote had been in a state of advancing failure for at least two years. And for the length of that time, we had suffered with it, toggling those arrow buttons up and down every time there was a commercial or other lull.
Finally, yesterday, when Lori said she had some things to pick up at the store, it occurred to me to ask her to purchase a new remote, the kind they call a universal, that can be programmed to work for anything. The very concept is amazing.
Anyway, she brought home the device, I quickly got it programmed, and our troubles were over. After two years of struggle, we instantly had a television that was no longer crippled. What a relief!
But the question I’m asking myself now is: What the hell took me so long? Why on Earth did I keep muddling along with the damaged remote for two years, shaking my head, lamenting, cursing, before it finally occurred to me to just replace the damn thing? Why did it take so long for the Sun to break through the clouds?
I can identify the precipitating event. I had started to worry that the accumulation of all that rapid-fire toggling, that rough handling, was going to end up damaging the television itself. And the next thought was that if the set broke we were not going to replace it; we didn’t have the money, and anyway how would we manage to get one that would fit in as well as this one did? It was the fear of losing the source of pleasure that finally pierced through the inertia. When that fear became real, the idea took shape.
A trivial example, perhaps, but it shows how we fall into ruts in our daily living.
Showing posts with label bio. Show all posts
Showing posts with label bio. Show all posts
Saturday, February 23, 2008
Tuesday, February 05, 2008
Healthy perspective
This morning it was raining, a cold winter rain to melt the snow on the ground. I looked out the glass door and felt sorry for myself, knowing I’d have to walk in this. It’s fifteen minutes from the church parking lot where I leave the van to my office, I thought, and I don’t have a damn umbrella. What will I wear on my feet? I also lack a proper raincoat, I thought. My long topcoat lacks two of four buttons and a belt loop. My rainjacket is short for me, and the rain pours off it soaking my pants front and back at the upper thigh. Why does it have to be so wretched out, I groused? And why don’t I have the things I need? Because I don’t plan ahead. Because I don’t make enough money.
So things snowballed until I had myself good and miserable. There seemed no getting around a dismal start to the day. As we left the house I braced for the cold drops from the hemlock tree above the driveway that would no doubt find their way down the back of my collar. We got in the car and drove to the end of the street.
There, struggling to get out of his car, was the old retired guy who serves as our school crossing guard. A month ago he had a knee replaced, and now I could see him wincing as he tried to stand. By the time we reached him, though, and Lori rolled down her window, he had tottered over to his post, where he stood half-hidden under a red and white golf umbrella.
“Nice day, huh?” Lori said, sympathetically. The rain was beating on his umbrella.
“It is a nice day,” he shot back. “We’re alive, aren’t we?” He was grinning.
Lori and I both stood corrected. “We sure are,” she said. “Stay warm.”
I stopped feeling sorry for myself immediately. By the time I got to the church, the rain had pretty much stopped.
So things snowballed until I had myself good and miserable. There seemed no getting around a dismal start to the day. As we left the house I braced for the cold drops from the hemlock tree above the driveway that would no doubt find their way down the back of my collar. We got in the car and drove to the end of the street.
There, struggling to get out of his car, was the old retired guy who serves as our school crossing guard. A month ago he had a knee replaced, and now I could see him wincing as he tried to stand. By the time we reached him, though, and Lori rolled down her window, he had tottered over to his post, where he stood half-hidden under a red and white golf umbrella.
“Nice day, huh?” Lori said, sympathetically. The rain was beating on his umbrella.
“It is a nice day,” he shot back. “We’re alive, aren’t we?” He was grinning.
Lori and I both stood corrected. “We sure are,” she said. “Stay warm.”
I stopped feeling sorry for myself immediately. By the time I got to the church, the rain had pretty much stopped.
Saturday, January 19, 2008
Back to Cali
East Coast born and bred, I am always surprised by the friendliness of southern Californians. I react suspiciously, and then, ashamed of myself, I let my guard down probably too far.
The ringlet-headed Adonis who brings my bags to my motel room, the suntanned senior citizen who delivers my rental car: why are they smiling? Why are they happy? Why do they seem to be genuinely interested in what brings me to San Diego or La Jolla or Riverside?
Are they hustling for tips? I’d tip them anyway, just out of my overriding Eastern fear of doing something wrong—and I believe that they can smell this. Nor is there anything particular about me that would attract attention or stimulate sudden affection: I’m not a pretty girl, or a recognizable face. Why are they being so nice?
It seems to be just the norm out here, and probably I should know this—It’s no doubt a mark of my lack of sophistication that I don’t have a good handle on this thing called Western manners or California openness or whatever people call it—but still I wonder, where does it come from? What is the cause of it? When did it begin? Is it entirely a function of climate? Of geography? (Are people in Fresno and Indio as friendly as their counterparts in Laguna and Newport Beach?) Did it arrive with the gold rush? Is there some other cultural component at work?
Sometimes I think that these are the most American of Americans, suffused with optimism and tolerance, sun-kissed and feeling fortunate, living in paradise, suspended, not wanting the dream to ever end. Who can blame them? Open the motel-room door to go get breakfast and you’re blinded; you stand there blinking like an owl. As your eyes adjust, your spirit soars: Can the sky really be that blue? Can the breeze be that caressing? Is that sparkling swimming pool for me to use? How could this day not be sensational?
The stories were told of easterners (writers especially) being ruined out here, losing their bearings and their intensity among the Lotus Eaters. It’s easy to imagine. It’s easy to feel when you’re out here on assignment or vacation, and the sun warms your forearms, and you catch a whiff of eucalyptus as you cross the fresh-paved parking lot to an open-air cappucino bar where a blond-haired barista, suntanned and immaculate in her fifties, beams you a dazzling smile.
But at night in your room with the TV blaring, or sitting cramped on the plane ride back home, as you reflect on the traffic and the smog and the astronomical cost of living, don’t you wonder how people can relax out here at all?
How can they afford to be so mellow? Is the culture of the Sun so overwhelming?
The ringlet-headed Adonis who brings my bags to my motel room, the suntanned senior citizen who delivers my rental car: why are they smiling? Why are they happy? Why do they seem to be genuinely interested in what brings me to San Diego or La Jolla or Riverside?
Are they hustling for tips? I’d tip them anyway, just out of my overriding Eastern fear of doing something wrong—and I believe that they can smell this. Nor is there anything particular about me that would attract attention or stimulate sudden affection: I’m not a pretty girl, or a recognizable face. Why are they being so nice?
It seems to be just the norm out here, and probably I should know this—It’s no doubt a mark of my lack of sophistication that I don’t have a good handle on this thing called Western manners or California openness or whatever people call it—but still I wonder, where does it come from? What is the cause of it? When did it begin? Is it entirely a function of climate? Of geography? (Are people in Fresno and Indio as friendly as their counterparts in Laguna and Newport Beach?) Did it arrive with the gold rush? Is there some other cultural component at work?
Sometimes I think that these are the most American of Americans, suffused with optimism and tolerance, sun-kissed and feeling fortunate, living in paradise, suspended, not wanting the dream to ever end. Who can blame them? Open the motel-room door to go get breakfast and you’re blinded; you stand there blinking like an owl. As your eyes adjust, your spirit soars: Can the sky really be that blue? Can the breeze be that caressing? Is that sparkling swimming pool for me to use? How could this day not be sensational?
The stories were told of easterners (writers especially) being ruined out here, losing their bearings and their intensity among the Lotus Eaters. It’s easy to imagine. It’s easy to feel when you’re out here on assignment or vacation, and the sun warms your forearms, and you catch a whiff of eucalyptus as you cross the fresh-paved parking lot to an open-air cappucino bar where a blond-haired barista, suntanned and immaculate in her fifties, beams you a dazzling smile.
But at night in your room with the TV blaring, or sitting cramped on the plane ride back home, as you reflect on the traffic and the smog and the astronomical cost of living, don’t you wonder how people can relax out here at all?
How can they afford to be so mellow? Is the culture of the Sun so overwhelming?
Wednesday, November 21, 2007
Counterfeit
We were both heading to Spokane for a conference. This fellow Ron, who by chance had the seat next to me on the plane, hails from Boston, works in media relations. He’s a self-assured, opinionated presence, youngish, a bit of a hipster. He had a David Foster Wallace poking out of his knapsack, like a ship’s prow, and was passing the time by going over with a pencil a short-story draft from a fiction workshop he was taking. He paused now and then to chortle at the inadequacies of his absent classmate.
“Read this,” he said giggling, pointing at one particular howler. After I nodded and smiled appreciatively, we conversed for a while. It was October, playoff time, and he—amiably slumming—professed to be part of Red Sox nation, a diehard fan. He told of cruising through Cambridge after the last out in ’04, the year the Curse was lifted. What it was like to be in the streets, how he high-fived an overexuberant drunk leaning out of a taxi and almost had his arm taken off. What a scene!
Pretty soon, though, his story started to unravel. He couldn’t remember the name of Josh Beckett, Boston’s towering, soul-patched ace—“the big guy, the pitcher” was the best he could muster. And the awkward way he spoke about Fenway—“It’s one of the oldest ballparks in the country”—suggested he’d been there once, recently, and had known nothing of the hallowed grounds before that. I threw him a look, but we moved on to another topic.
It was not until an evening reception a couple days later that my suspicions were irrevocably confirmed. It was the day of Game 6, the pivotal win against Cleveland. Ron, craving attention, piped up about having watched the first few innings in the hotel bar. Boston had jumped out early when J.D. Drew, the underachieving right fielder, uncoiled on a 3-1 fastball with the bases loaded. “It was incredible!” Ron gushed. “The Red Sox made a grand slam!”
Made a grand slam? They made one? There was a moment’s pause. The guys within earshot eyed each other uncomfortably. No one challenged Ron directly on his faux pas: This was a meeting of science writers, after all, some of whom were on firmer ground talking about neutrinos. But from that moment on, everyone knew—I knew, at any rate—that this fellow Ron was not to be trusted.
“Read this,” he said giggling, pointing at one particular howler. After I nodded and smiled appreciatively, we conversed for a while. It was October, playoff time, and he—amiably slumming—professed to be part of Red Sox nation, a diehard fan. He told of cruising through Cambridge after the last out in ’04, the year the Curse was lifted. What it was like to be in the streets, how he high-fived an overexuberant drunk leaning out of a taxi and almost had his arm taken off. What a scene!
Pretty soon, though, his story started to unravel. He couldn’t remember the name of Josh Beckett, Boston’s towering, soul-patched ace—“the big guy, the pitcher” was the best he could muster. And the awkward way he spoke about Fenway—“It’s one of the oldest ballparks in the country”—suggested he’d been there once, recently, and had known nothing of the hallowed grounds before that. I threw him a look, but we moved on to another topic.
It was not until an evening reception a couple days later that my suspicions were irrevocably confirmed. It was the day of Game 6, the pivotal win against Cleveland. Ron, craving attention, piped up about having watched the first few innings in the hotel bar. Boston had jumped out early when J.D. Drew, the underachieving right fielder, uncoiled on a 3-1 fastball with the bases loaded. “It was incredible!” Ron gushed. “The Red Sox made a grand slam!”
Made a grand slam? They made one? There was a moment’s pause. The guys within earshot eyed each other uncomfortably. No one challenged Ron directly on his faux pas: This was a meeting of science writers, after all, some of whom were on firmer ground talking about neutrinos. But from that moment on, everyone knew—I knew, at any rate—that this fellow Ron was not to be trusted.
Tuesday, October 30, 2007
New specs
Two months ago I finally went to the eye doctor and got new glasses. It had been seven or eight years, or longer, since I’d had a new pair. My prescription hadn’t changed dramatically in all that time, but I had long noticed blurriness at the edges of my vision, near and far, and lately it had started to bother me.
When I got checked out, I found that I was in an in-between place as far as my vision was concerned. As I had noticed before the machines confirmed it, I needed some help at both ends of the spectrum: reading and stargazing. To really sharpen both ends, however, would require bifocals, and getting bifocals would entail a significant sacrifice at the mid-range, where I actually do most of my seeing: from computer work to driving.
I could opt for trifocals, the optometrist told me, but even he didn’t seem too keen on that idea. The amount of lens area you have for each range is very narrow, he admitted, and that can be hard to get used to.
After some futzing around, I let him talk me into a compromise. I would get basically the same prescription—“We’ll sharpen it up a little,” he said helpfully—in a different frame. I guess the frame was what I wanted all along.
It’s surprising how quickly a pair of frames can look out-of-date after eight or ten years of seeming fine. I was wearing a gold-rimmed frame with full-size rounded lenses, and had been perfectly content with that, but as soon as I had given myself the go-ahead to start pulling new frames off the shelf and trying them on, the old glasses became anathema. How old and fusty they made me look! How had I stood them so long?
I tried on at least 20 pairs, and quickly narrowed down to five, all similar in style, and very different, updated, from what I’d had. Finally, with Lori’s help, I cut it down to two variants of the exact same style: smallish rectangular lenses with top-only frames. One frame was black, the other gun-metal gray.
The black were stylish. I actually thought they made me look kind of cool. Lori seconded the notion. The gray were, well, gray. They were perfectly serviceable, neat, up-to-date, but they didn’t flatter me as much. They didn’t make me look dashing. They did come, however, with a pair of magnetic clip-on sunglasses that were exceedingly handy. The cool pair offered no such option.
I’m ashamed of how much I agonized over the final decision. It was a clear-cut choice between practicality and cool. I tried as hard as I could to manuever myself into opting for cool, and then I wrestled myself out of it. I made and remade the decision a dozen times, wasting an awful lot of energy. In the end, with my family waiting and he store closing, I went for the safe choice—and as soon as the ink was dry on my signature I was kicking myself. How typical of me! I sneered. What a dull gray little man I am, never having the courage to follow my heart’s desire! It was only the saleswoman’s repeated assurances that I had a full 60 days to change my mind that enabled me to leave the store at all. I was miserable for a week.
Now, with the 60-day deadline just passed, I am reasonably content that I made the right choice after all. The gun-metal frames seem to suit me just fine, and I find myself snapping on the sunglasses all the time. Every time I do I’m glad I didn’t opt for the Maserati. (But then I usually think, these sunglasses don’t really help that much.)
Here’s the kicker: Frames aside, I’m still frustrated with my vision. From about two feet to six feet I’m all right. Closer, I just take my glasses off. But farther than six or seven feet I’m squinting as miserably as before.
So what the hell does all this mean? What have I learned?
That I am still a slave to vanity, for one thing. Despite wanting, or professing to want, the opposite, I am as much as ever prone to get caught up and make a foolish decision based on appearances. My prayers for release from this damnable condition are conducted with fingers crossed behind my back.
This half-heartedness is the other thorn that tears me. Even now, when the tide of second-guessing has gone out, I find myself unable to let go, to be completely sure that I made the right choice. What a continuing torment it is to me, what a wasteful drain, to never to be able to be whole-hearted! And to waste such energy on something so trivial! To always worry, in matters great and maddeningly small, about whether I’ve done the right thing!
When I got checked out, I found that I was in an in-between place as far as my vision was concerned. As I had noticed before the machines confirmed it, I needed some help at both ends of the spectrum: reading and stargazing. To really sharpen both ends, however, would require bifocals, and getting bifocals would entail a significant sacrifice at the mid-range, where I actually do most of my seeing: from computer work to driving.
I could opt for trifocals, the optometrist told me, but even he didn’t seem too keen on that idea. The amount of lens area you have for each range is very narrow, he admitted, and that can be hard to get used to.
After some futzing around, I let him talk me into a compromise. I would get basically the same prescription—“We’ll sharpen it up a little,” he said helpfully—in a different frame. I guess the frame was what I wanted all along.
It’s surprising how quickly a pair of frames can look out-of-date after eight or ten years of seeming fine. I was wearing a gold-rimmed frame with full-size rounded lenses, and had been perfectly content with that, but as soon as I had given myself the go-ahead to start pulling new frames off the shelf and trying them on, the old glasses became anathema. How old and fusty they made me look! How had I stood them so long?
I tried on at least 20 pairs, and quickly narrowed down to five, all similar in style, and very different, updated, from what I’d had. Finally, with Lori’s help, I cut it down to two variants of the exact same style: smallish rectangular lenses with top-only frames. One frame was black, the other gun-metal gray.
The black were stylish. I actually thought they made me look kind of cool. Lori seconded the notion. The gray were, well, gray. They were perfectly serviceable, neat, up-to-date, but they didn’t flatter me as much. They didn’t make me look dashing. They did come, however, with a pair of magnetic clip-on sunglasses that were exceedingly handy. The cool pair offered no such option.
I’m ashamed of how much I agonized over the final decision. It was a clear-cut choice between practicality and cool. I tried as hard as I could to manuever myself into opting for cool, and then I wrestled myself out of it. I made and remade the decision a dozen times, wasting an awful lot of energy. In the end, with my family waiting and he store closing, I went for the safe choice—and as soon as the ink was dry on my signature I was kicking myself. How typical of me! I sneered. What a dull gray little man I am, never having the courage to follow my heart’s desire! It was only the saleswoman’s repeated assurances that I had a full 60 days to change my mind that enabled me to leave the store at all. I was miserable for a week.
Now, with the 60-day deadline just passed, I am reasonably content that I made the right choice after all. The gun-metal frames seem to suit me just fine, and I find myself snapping on the sunglasses all the time. Every time I do I’m glad I didn’t opt for the Maserati. (But then I usually think, these sunglasses don’t really help that much.)
Here’s the kicker: Frames aside, I’m still frustrated with my vision. From about two feet to six feet I’m all right. Closer, I just take my glasses off. But farther than six or seven feet I’m squinting as miserably as before.
So what the hell does all this mean? What have I learned?
That I am still a slave to vanity, for one thing. Despite wanting, or professing to want, the opposite, I am as much as ever prone to get caught up and make a foolish decision based on appearances. My prayers for release from this damnable condition are conducted with fingers crossed behind my back.
This half-heartedness is the other thorn that tears me. Even now, when the tide of second-guessing has gone out, I find myself unable to let go, to be completely sure that I made the right choice. What a continuing torment it is to me, what a wasteful drain, to never to be able to be whole-hearted! And to waste such energy on something so trivial! To always worry, in matters great and maddeningly small, about whether I’ve done the right thing!
Monday, July 23, 2007
A good priest
June 16
There was mention of Joe H. at mass on Sunday. Father Joe. A good man and a good priest, of compassion and courage. He ran afoul of diocesan authorities for his attempts to minister to homosexuals.
What actually happened was he caught the attention of a handful of truly rabid homophobes, who then, as guardians of orthodoxy, took as their blood mission to run him out of the priesthood. The bishop was not strong enough to stand up to them, was in fact enraged at having been put in the position of having to do so. Joe was to him a problem priest, and was soon disappeared. He has now surfaced in New Jersey, where one presumes that there are other voices in addition to the homophobic. He is still, thank God for the rest of us, a priest.
I wish I had been close enough with him that we could’ve remained friends. That would’ve been some kind of break for me, a break from reticence. Those are my second and third responses to hearing his name; pangs of regret. (My first response was to remember him fondly.)
I tend to blame myself, but in truth, I tried to start a relationship with Joe. Invited him over for dinner, more than once. Engaged him in email correspondence. Approached him on the running trail. We became friendly, but not friends. He had too many sheep to tend, and was in some ways more guarded than I was.
During those dinners here, he opened up. Literally took off his collar and lounged on the sofa, his thick gray hunting socks and huge pale calves protruding from his too-short black pant legs: the image of a New Jersey farm boy. Plied with a bit of Scotch, he dished the dirt, compared being called before the bishop to “getting into a pissing match with a skunk,” and also spoke sanely and sensitively and with conviction about important things. He especially liked Lola, in part, I think, because she is not Catholic. She liked him too, always favored him with a warm hug after mass. But when those dinners were over, the veil went back up.
We knew nothing, really, of his troubles—except what appeared in the newspaper: scathing letters to the editor written by his enemies and the tepid responses from the chancery. Knew that he was unhappy as a diocesan priest, heard that he had tried to join the Maryknolls and was rejected. In preparation for that application, he had gone to South America to study Spanish, and picked up an intestinal bug, and lost a lot of weight. (He was pleased afterward, said he’d been trying to lose.)
And then he disappeared. Eventually I discovered by googling him a couple of snippets indicating that he had gone back to New Jersey, but there was nothing definitive until this past Sunday, when our deacon mentioned that he had come for a visit. I was sorry that I had missed him.
There was mention of Joe H. at mass on Sunday. Father Joe. A good man and a good priest, of compassion and courage. He ran afoul of diocesan authorities for his attempts to minister to homosexuals.
What actually happened was he caught the attention of a handful of truly rabid homophobes, who then, as guardians of orthodoxy, took as their blood mission to run him out of the priesthood. The bishop was not strong enough to stand up to them, was in fact enraged at having been put in the position of having to do so. Joe was to him a problem priest, and was soon disappeared. He has now surfaced in New Jersey, where one presumes that there are other voices in addition to the homophobic. He is still, thank God for the rest of us, a priest.
I wish I had been close enough with him that we could’ve remained friends. That would’ve been some kind of break for me, a break from reticence. Those are my second and third responses to hearing his name; pangs of regret. (My first response was to remember him fondly.)
I tend to blame myself, but in truth, I tried to start a relationship with Joe. Invited him over for dinner, more than once. Engaged him in email correspondence. Approached him on the running trail. We became friendly, but not friends. He had too many sheep to tend, and was in some ways more guarded than I was.
During those dinners here, he opened up. Literally took off his collar and lounged on the sofa, his thick gray hunting socks and huge pale calves protruding from his too-short black pant legs: the image of a New Jersey farm boy. Plied with a bit of Scotch, he dished the dirt, compared being called before the bishop to “getting into a pissing match with a skunk,” and also spoke sanely and sensitively and with conviction about important things. He especially liked Lola, in part, I think, because she is not Catholic. She liked him too, always favored him with a warm hug after mass. But when those dinners were over, the veil went back up.
We knew nothing, really, of his troubles—except what appeared in the newspaper: scathing letters to the editor written by his enemies and the tepid responses from the chancery. Knew that he was unhappy as a diocesan priest, heard that he had tried to join the Maryknolls and was rejected. In preparation for that application, he had gone to South America to study Spanish, and picked up an intestinal bug, and lost a lot of weight. (He was pleased afterward, said he’d been trying to lose.)
And then he disappeared. Eventually I discovered by googling him a couple of snippets indicating that he had gone back to New Jersey, but there was nothing definitive until this past Sunday, when our deacon mentioned that he had come for a visit. I was sorry that I had missed him.
Why I hate golf
May 29
My good friend I-man keeps trying to get me interested in playing golf. Now he’s trying to get my son, his godson, to play. I don’t have the heart to tell him how much I hate the sport.
Let me count the ways:
Because it is a Republican sport, a rich man’s sport, a wasteful sport, the sport of someone who would heedlessly impose himself on the environment. I hate it for moral reasons, as some people hate eating meat. I grew up across from a golf course, so I knew it sort of innocently. A nice course but not exclusive—not at that time. By now it has no doubt become so, a gated community. But then it was open for the neighborhood kids to crawl. Nobody chased us, or cared that we were there. Try cutting across a golf course today, to get here or there. Or sneaking there at night to have sex. They’ll sic the dogs on you.
It takes so much water, so many chemicals, so much money, to tame a place for golf. It’s an obscenity. Yet I met a man who designs courses, a nice and down-to-earth guy, a Bizup.
I hate it for the same reason I hate ice-skating. You’ve got to pay every time you do it, for God’s sake!
I can appreciate the skill required, the thrill of hitting well, the addictive nature of it. The whole being outdoors bit. But the expense!
My good friend I-man keeps trying to get me interested in playing golf. Now he’s trying to get my son, his godson, to play. I don’t have the heart to tell him how much I hate the sport.
Let me count the ways:
Because it is a Republican sport, a rich man’s sport, a wasteful sport, the sport of someone who would heedlessly impose himself on the environment. I hate it for moral reasons, as some people hate eating meat. I grew up across from a golf course, so I knew it sort of innocently. A nice course but not exclusive—not at that time. By now it has no doubt become so, a gated community. But then it was open for the neighborhood kids to crawl. Nobody chased us, or cared that we were there. Try cutting across a golf course today, to get here or there. Or sneaking there at night to have sex. They’ll sic the dogs on you.
It takes so much water, so many chemicals, so much money, to tame a place for golf. It’s an obscenity. Yet I met a man who designs courses, a nice and down-to-earth guy, a Bizup.
I hate it for the same reason I hate ice-skating. You’ve got to pay every time you do it, for God’s sake!
I can appreciate the skill required, the thrill of hitting well, the addictive nature of it. The whole being outdoors bit. But the expense!
Memories of graduate school
May 22
I was a shit in graduate school. On the first day, I taped a sheet of paper over the 8x10 glossy of Steve Martin with an arrow through his head that my office-mate had fixed to the painted cinder-block wall behind our shared cubicle. “I can’t stand him looking at me!” I scribbled on the paper in blue ink. My office-mate was rightly incensed; I have a memory of her tossing her hair and harrumphing indignantly at the edge of my vision. But she said nothing to me, and neither did any of the dozen other first-year grad students who shared the remaining cubicles. I was left to slowly recognize on my own what an ass I’d been. It took about a week, and I was much too shy to apologize.
This had been, and to some extent remains, the pattern of my interactions with people. Long bouts of vacuum-packed silence punctuated by eruptions of inappropriate boldness or ferocity. A kind of Jekyll and Hyde thing. My parents used to call me Vesuvio.
The result was that after that first day no one talked to me—no one except Howard, a shaggy, gangly 6-foot-6 inch Thoreauvian from south of Pittsburgh who happened to be a born-again Christian. Howard was drawn to me by his intuition that, unlike the others, I did not reflexively condemn his religion. He took a big brotherly interest in me, often talked to me about his church, but was never pushy. “Don’t you like people?” he once asked me after I expressed a distaste for crowded suburbs. It made me think. Howard would die of melanoma within a month of getting his Ph.D., leaving a wife and infant daughter.
Silent as I was, I spent a lot of time listening to conversations from behind my smoked-glass cubicle walls, quietly admiring the self-conscious repartee. Are there any souls more pretentious than graduate students in English literature?
I was a shit in graduate school. On the first day, I taped a sheet of paper over the 8x10 glossy of Steve Martin with an arrow through his head that my office-mate had fixed to the painted cinder-block wall behind our shared cubicle. “I can’t stand him looking at me!” I scribbled on the paper in blue ink. My office-mate was rightly incensed; I have a memory of her tossing her hair and harrumphing indignantly at the edge of my vision. But she said nothing to me, and neither did any of the dozen other first-year grad students who shared the remaining cubicles. I was left to slowly recognize on my own what an ass I’d been. It took about a week, and I was much too shy to apologize.
This had been, and to some extent remains, the pattern of my interactions with people. Long bouts of vacuum-packed silence punctuated by eruptions of inappropriate boldness or ferocity. A kind of Jekyll and Hyde thing. My parents used to call me Vesuvio.
The result was that after that first day no one talked to me—no one except Howard, a shaggy, gangly 6-foot-6 inch Thoreauvian from south of Pittsburgh who happened to be a born-again Christian. Howard was drawn to me by his intuition that, unlike the others, I did not reflexively condemn his religion. He took a big brotherly interest in me, often talked to me about his church, but was never pushy. “Don’t you like people?” he once asked me after I expressed a distaste for crowded suburbs. It made me think. Howard would die of melanoma within a month of getting his Ph.D., leaving a wife and infant daughter.
Silent as I was, I spent a lot of time listening to conversations from behind my smoked-glass cubicle walls, quietly admiring the self-conscious repartee. Are there any souls more pretentious than graduate students in English literature?
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