A sad state of neglect

My life right now has been reduced to bullet points. I'm no longer afforded the luxurious time of paragraphs, of sentences that link to one another - only harsh, ugly bullets.

I am moving in one month and 10 days.

I am starting school, and borrowing a lot of money to do so.

I haven't been to school in 2 full years. In fact, I am unsure whether I've engaged my brain in 2 full years.


I am leaving this job in 6 days. I fear my desk will never be clean.



I have to pack all my things. I have to part with clothes that I don't wear, but that my brain still thinks I need. I have to weed out my books, my most comforting possessions.

And finally, I am going to be poor forever. Chicago looms, with open arms of fun, and I will have to pass up on All Fun because I have no money. Literally, all fun. I'm sure I won't have one bit of fun.

Now, a story: last night, I went to the 3&2 Baseball Park to watch my youngest brother (12) play in the championship game for his league. The weather, despite the humidity, turned out to be beautiful as I sat with my dad and my aunt and ate peanuts. We watched my brother play only one inning - the first - as his team struggled to keep up with a far better one. The rest of the time, he sat on the bench. Dad and I would look over and see him, in the corner of the dugout closest to the fans, talking to a group of the girls in his class who came to cheer the team. Did he miss the baseball? We couldn't tell.

I learned a few things last night:
1. Never pass up an opportunity for free baseball on a beautiful night with family to accompany you.
2. There is nothing I miss less than being a junior high girl.
3. Sometimes, warming the bench is enough for someone, if they get to be part of the team.
4. Maybe, if you know you're going to be sitting on a bench for 2-3 hours, you should bring a cushion. Who cares if it's an old lady thing - benches hurt butts.

I think she said "feck"

Saturday night, I came home about an hour before bar close to relieve my stomach of the Kelly's/Joe's pizza that I'd just eaten. I crawled into bed feeling vaguely unsettled, with a beer/pizza/taco/thai curry combo that was rather unpleasant.



I turned on the TV (my nighttime boyfriend) only to hear... Alvin and the Chipmunks! "Christmas Time is Here" is one of my favorite carols, and I knew that it could only mean one thing: Almost Famous was on TV.



Being tired, I tuned in for about the first twenty minutes. I realized how fantastic that set-up was, despite any flaws in the rest of the film (and by flaws, I mean Kate Hudson. Kate Hudson is not good on an unsettled stomach). Crowe took Frances McDormand (always amazing) and paired her with Zooey Deschanel (spelling?) - what a duo. Then, he pairs Philip Seymour Hoffman (maybe my favorite working actor) with the fictional Lester Bangs character. Delicious. And he manages to play nearly all of Simon and Garfunkel's "America," as well as "Sparks" by the Who, some Iggy Pop, and, of course, Alvin and the Chipmunks.

"The only true currency we have in this bankrupt world are the things we say to each other when we're being uncool." Not bad for 3am on a Saturday.

I Feel it All

Well, I knew when my friend ercwttmn had lapped me that it had been too long since I'd posted a blog. The last couple of weeks, being high stress and high activity, have left me a bit cranky. And you know, if you don't have anything nice to say...

So let's talk about Leslie Feist and Laura Veirs, as a little warm-up. Thanks to a dear friend of mine, an envelope from STL arrived with burned copies of these two lovely ladies' latest discs. I'd been chomping at the bit for Veirs' "Saltbreakers" after sampling a few tracks on my internet radio station, and it was as good as I expected. Pair it with the Shins' "Wincing the Night Away," and you've got yourself a nice little nautical adventure. Enchantment under the sea.

Feist, whom I love to see live, didn't disappoint either. I think her latest disc is much, much better than "Let it Die," which I bought excitedly after seeing her at Lollapalooza last year and abandoned after a few months. I read a review in the NYTimes of her latest NY show, and the writer said something about how Feist is the word "chanteuse" embodied. I couldn't agree more; what IS it about her voice? "I Feel it All" is my favorite track so far.

I turned 24 last Friday, and celebrated with many of my dear friends. I spent a lot of the old "birthday week" discussing how 24 seems much, much older than 23. Maybe I'm really letting myself settle into 24, knowing that the year ahead is more on track with the me that I think I am. On the other hand, there's this, summed up beautifully in an email sent by my fellow future student: do you ever worry that the heads will figure us out? like, we'll show up and they'll take one look and say, "wait, we thought you were someone else!"

Wait, we thought you were someone else! On days like yesterday, where I ping-pong between feeling like I'm running a 70 person training and feeling like I'm running a 70 person training into the ground, I wonder what the university will make of me upon my return to academia. Either way, I can't imagine a Beth not going back to school, so I must be doing something right.

Stories from a Sober Weekend

Indulge me in a scene: It's a sunny Saturday afternoon at the lake. 5 beautiful ladies in kids' sunglasses (all the extras they had at the lakehouse) take off for a boat ride with two young gentlemen. Jeanie's cousin, antsy for some outside stimulus, steers the boat in the direction of what he's heard is "a good dive bar." "This should be interesting," thinks the girl who can't drink.

Their boat pulls into a cove. A crowded, crowded cove. There are two oversized yacht-boats parked at the edge of a cram-full dock. A girl, caucasian in descent but brown in color, waves a skinny arm to signal an open spot behind one of the yacht-boats. Her cash tips are tucked into the waistband of her rolled up cotton shorts, because her bikini top doesn't afford any pockets. Billy, aforementioned cousin, steers the boat into a small spot next to a loooong, long fast boat. A glorified cigarette boat, if you will. The heroines mill about their own boat, applying sunscreen and taking in the sights.

In the long boat next to these lovely ladies, there are young men. Skeezy, skeezy young men. In the boat across from the ladies? More skeeze balls. Our protagonist has the distinct feeling of being ogled. She ignores the feeling to look out on the general chaos around her.

Inland from the crowded dock is a small swimming beach, with its own, bused-in sand. The beach is littered with children, and sits in front of the establishment. The protagonist, expecting a dive bar, was surprised to find the lake's version of an outdoor (privately owned) Applebee's. This wonder was called Louie and Dave's or something equally lake-y.

After everyone finishes their road sodas, our heroes leave the boat and walk down the long (ogling) dock to approach the restaurant. They find a table and plop into the plastic deck chairs, inspecting menus of fried goodness and pizzas. Frozen drink machines swirl sweet daiquiris behind the free-standing bar. These confectionery drinks are over-priced, but adequately liquored, or so they tell our protagonist. She orders a glass of water and pizza.

As the food is served, they notice the true ambiance of the place. A trip to the women's bathroom displays two toilets, separated not by stalls but by a single partition. A friend asks the protagonist if this is, in fact, a converted men's room with toilets where urinals should be. They wind their way back from the bathroom through crowds of bleach-blonde hair and fake Coach purses.

A one-man band is playing Jimmy Buffet covers and bad country music. There are three, maybe four women dancing and hooting on the large dance floor in front of this troubadour. Occasionally, the young children of these women join them for a dance. They wear the kind of two-pieces where the bottom piece is a ruffled skirt, and dance with drinks in hand. At a table near the dance floor, a man is holding a tiny dog. The dog is wearing a life jacket.

After eating, the group of our interest orders a drink for the road and retreats to their boat. So much for stimulus: our heroine is inundated with bad cover music, dancing ladies, dogs in life jackets, and sunshine. They motor the boat over to a deserted cove, and spend the rest of the afternoon floating on fun noodles, boat anchored safely in quiet waters.


And in other news: I stole the following link from my friend Tom Drew. Read it and you'll understand why this "gay bomb" was too good to pass up.

The Space Arranger

Debbie Debee entered our Foundation on Aging lives last month. A board member dragged her in to find ways to freshen up our office. Our office (four rooms and a "kitchen"), would need... well, it would need a lot to become fresh again. It lives in building that, ironically enough, smells like old people. The walls are covered in a scratchy-textured wallpaper that is cream? dirty white? thatched with the exhaled dreams of tired accountants? I don't know, but it's ugly.

Debbie Debee's main objective, her killer idea to make the office more inhabitable, is "softening" the light with sheers, "just a sheer, to soften that up." For example, a sheer on the glass that sits next to the door, and affords me a beautiful view of the wood-panel wallpaper in the hall. She wants to put sheer curtains up on a window that looks out into a hallway.

Here are some phrases overheard when this space arranger was in our office yesterday: "As much as I'd love to be able to put some throw rugs down..." or "That was obviously NOT designed by a woman" followed by knowing laugh. "We need what I call a 'mama drama piece,' something to draw the eye up here." What?!?

My reaction to this woman and her behavior is strong: I think she's a fool, and I resent her for wasting the time of my boss and myself. This may not be fair - she's here to help, she's working as a volunteer - but it's hard to accommodate oneself to unrequested help. We know our office is a dump; what's to be done about it? She refers to the office as stark, but I want to let her know that this is a not-for-profit that we're running, not a brothel. We're allowed to be stark.

The Like and The Dislike/The Sound of Settling

Let's be clear: I do hate the Eagles. I have always hated the Eagles. Unlike my (more musically savvy) friend Tom, I didn't realize that it was trendy to hate the Eagles. On the contrary, I hated the Eagles for a pretty basic reason at first.

My mother hates the Eagles. Hates them. My mother is a vocal woman (anyone surprised?), and soon I realized, hey, she's right, it's a bunch of whiny crap without the balls to go full-out country. Thus, I hate the Eagles. For much the same reason, the following bands are lumped into a "why do they still play them on the radio" category - Foreigner, ELO, BTO, Boston, etc etc ad nasuem. Many people love these bands. "More Than a Feeling" stirs the souls of men, and I must admit that I can sing along with it. But thanks to my mother, I derive no pleasure in these sing-a-longs. To tell the truth, it really is thanks that are due to my mother. These are throwaway bands, and I'm well occupied spending my musical time elsewhere.

But what about the delicate balance between letting someone else's likes and dislikes dictate your own? Generally, when kids are at the formative age where they really notice what's on the radio (junior high for myself), aren't they also at the age where their parents are the very last place they'd look for cool music tips? One would think that I'd have learned to love the Eagles, just because my mom hated them. I've always wondered about this; the only thing I can come up with is that their music is so obnoxious, I had no choice but to agree with my mom.

On to the spark for the blog - This morning, here at work, I connected to the radio station out of Seattle that I listen to on the internet, KEXP. They played a great new song by Softlights, a band I hadn't heard of but will now look for, and followed it up with "The Sound of Settling" by Death Cab. I think, in most musically avante garde circles, that "The Sound of Settling" is that song that made it big on the radio that true fans aren't supposed to really like anymore. (Actually, I think many of those avante garde circles would have me leave Death Cab behind altogether, buried with the textbooks of my college days. Oh well.) But I love "The Sound of Settling." I like the catchy beat, and I think the lyrics are terribly clever. I mean, the man is talking about what settling sounds like. Give him some credit.

It's funny, though, because were I still DJing, "The Sound of Settling" isn't the song I'd pick from Transatlanticism to play. I wouldn't want people to think I wasn't a true fan, etc etc. I'd certainly let the dislikes of the minority (automatically the likes of the majority) decide what I played (probably "Tiny Vessels" or "Title and Registration"). Reverse snobbery has always driven me crazy, but I perpetuate it often. I think my mom (and the Eagles) would disapprove. Maybe settling actually sounds like obscure Scottish groups when all you really want to hear is "The Pretender" by Jackson Browne.

Existence Validated - Yessss

Because it had the word story in it, I read it. Because I was at work, I read it in pieces. I love to read the NYTimes each day at my desk: I feel like it's healthy for my vocabulary (yet to see that payout) and good to stay connected, even if it is a slanted connection. Today, "This is Your Life (and How You Tell It)" was the fourth-most emailed article on the online version of their paper. Obviously, the title intrigued me as a nonfiction writer.

When I read the following, I rushed to the blog, eager to show my 6 readers the importance of memoir:
When we first started studying life stories, people thought it was just idle curiosity — stories, isn’t that cool?” said Dan P. McAdams, a professor of psychology at Northwestern and author of the 2006 book, “The Redemptive Self.” “Well, we find that these narratives guide behavior in every moment, and frame not only how we see the past but how we see ourselves in the future."

Maybe it isn't so strange that I find myself waking up and narrating the details of my surroundings in my head, generally in third person (meta-writing, eat your heart out). However, the article turned out to be mostly about the use of stories in psychoanalysis. Interesting enough. Everyone loves to tell their life stories, but it turns out that the manners in which we tell these stories are patterned enough to show similarities between healing habits of subjects. Your stories and your health: on the next 20/20.


In music news, my opinion that the Eagles are the most over-rated band ever is validated by Wilco. Check it out on Spinner.