March 2002 (continued)

March 17

The city is closed off to me tonight, and I'm alone. It's not that I think the city is always my friend, or owes me beauty and happiness. It gives me those things sometimes, by being huge and beautiful. But from where I am, it's too far away, too late, too big to pick a place to go. Which is all a fancy way of saying I have no friends and no hangouts yet, and I'm bored, with too much time this weekend for doing nothing.

And now it's pretty late Sunday night, and I have to go in early tomorrow, and I have no life to distract me. No internet either. Man, I miss it so bad. I could easily pass the time if I had websites to read, journal entries to add. That's the one maddening thing about spending the next few months here...I'm so cut off. Not to mention that it probably limits my job hunting. I guess tomorrow, I'll talk to Anna after work, see what's coming up. I don't know if the phone lines she has would allow me to use the Internet either, but it's worth asking. I mean, do I want to reconsider on the room share thing? I only need it for....3 mos at most. Most shares want someone longer than that. That's a lot of upheaval for 90 days.

I am hoping, any way, that I can find my job by another route. I just feel a little stymied, shut out of the loop on this. Normally this would drive me to rage and despair, but I'm not giving up just yet. God didn't bring me this far to drop me. Something will turn up, if I'm patient and persistent. It's surprising, or maybe not, that my journal has taken such a religious bent. But it is part of who I am, so it belongs here. And the thing is, anything big in my life, plus most small stuff, involves me talking to God about it, praying for help, guidance, wisdom, encouragement, whatever I need. I don't feel weird or naive doing that, because--well, I guess my faith is just there, and that makes it a natural thing.

I *would* feel weird if I prayed to a God I wasn't sure was there, or that I thought probably didn't care about me and what I needed. I think some people do that, which seems so pointless. I would rather be an honest atheist than a hypocritical believer any day. I think God prefers people to believe what their consciences and brains tell them to believe, even if it means they're atheists. There's a verse in the New Testament about that, where Jesus mentions, that God will accept the hot or the cold, but spits out the lukewarm.

But all that's about other people and God, really, and I don't feel that I can safely say much in that arena. It's something I've noticed, that when I do express my faith (always careful to say it's mine, never in "recruiting" mode, mind you), some people always feel compelled to debate me. To make me nail down all the truths of the universe, and prove them wrong or right in whatever they believe. I can only assume they are struggling themselves, and want some sort of reassurance or condemnation from *me* of all people. And that's just not my job.

It continuously astonishes me that people want me to give them answers on something so individual, anyway. I mean, who the heck am I to tell people what to believe? But so many people are hungry for some sort of concrete proof, I guess? I don't know. I think that early Church indocrination is responsible, on some level...kids are dragged to church and told never to question what they're taught there. Later, even if they reject that, they still keep that mindset, that someone else is supposed to tell them what the truth is about God. And that's just so dangerous...the road to jihad and crusades and purges.

So, if you're reading, and you email me wanting a debate on religion...you won't get an answer from me. I'm one person, with a life different from yours, different experiences, different thoughts. If you want to know something about God, well...think. Listen to your conscience. Read religious texts, if they call to you. Go to church if you like. Pray if you feel you can. If God's not there, none of that will make any difference. If God is, then maybe you'll learn something.

Later. Feh. Can't sleep. Still coughing from this crappy cold I hope is getting weaker...I don't want to shell out for a doctor. I really hate the lack of national health care in this country, have I mentioned that? Otherwise, being a temp would be much more enjoyable. Maybe I *should* move to Canada, as I keep threatening to do. At least I could go to a doctor if I needed it. Listening to the Magnolia soundtrack. Aimee Mann, my god...she's so great. The best lyricist, such wonderful melodies.

I find that overall, I seem to listen to female artists much more than male. I think it's mainly to do with lyrics, which are what usually attract me to a song. At the moment, most guys don't write about stuff that interests me as much. A lot of women artists that I like say things that just haven't been said in music up till now, whereas guys have had years to talk about their...uh...stuff.

Musically, my attention to lyrics is what keeps me away from most of the harder stuff, the Linkin Parks etc. and about all of grunge, punk, nu-or-old metal. I just can't care about them, and a beat will only hold my attention so long. Anyway. I once told Matt that if I could sing worth a darn, and was still 17, I'd probably start an Aimee Mann cover band, just so I could sing "Deathly" in front of an audience. She gave me the daydream I'd never understood in boys, of becoming a rock star, standing behind a mike, working that guitar, making the audience sway with me. Being the source of the power that is in music. Maybe out there, somewhere, some 17 year old girl is dreaming of doing that right now. I hope she does.

March 18

Only a few minutes, Matt's supposed to call me back. Not much to report today, event-wise. I went out in the cold misty air to buy some odds and ends at the little market up on 5th Avenue. Many shops were closed, but the 99 cent places were open, which was what I mostly needed. I spotted an electronics place and stopped in to get a tape player so I could hear Matt's stuff. There were two guys, one the owner, in the rather nice shop. They looked like brothers, Middle Eastern or perhaps Greek or Armenian. The owner rang me up, and asked me "Do you think we'll have peace?" I didn't know which peace he meant...Afghanistan? Israel? So I said only "I hope so." He looked sad...I wonder if he's Palestinian and has family in Israel, or maybe Afghani or Pakistani. There's so many wars that could apply. Which is undoubtedly why he's here.

On the way back, the cold droplets cooled my face, and made me feel awake, alive. Glad to be both. Glad to be here, and blessed with the knowledge that no one I love is fighting in wars far away.

March 19

Listening to Ella Fitzgerald. I am reminded of the civilization New York is supposed to embody, and that I'm not inside that charmed circle just yet...I can see, I can travel to it, but I don't live in it. My neighborhood is a frontier town; at night, everyone withdraws behind their locked doors, keeping safe. There is no warm, welcoming nightlife of restaurants and coffeeshops anywhere within easy distance of me...that's the other side of the tracks. So I feel stuck, not part of this place really.

Which is a good rationale for not moving to the suburbs very soon either...they are safer, but have the same isolation that left me so bored and disconnected in Texas. At night, I'd like to be...out. Walking the streets, getting a cup of tea, reading a local paper, nodding to the people I pass every day. And really, I'm kidding myself; even New York's best neighborhoods don't work that way much of the time. Which is a pity. It would be nice to feel a little closer to it, though. Maybe Park Slope or Williamsburg or somewhere in Brooklyn is enough of a neighborhood to feel that way sometimes. And maybe not, and I'll have to deal with my alienation and lonliness like everyone else for safety's sake. I wonder if there will ever be a time in human history when we have no reason at all to fear the dark, the person you can't see waiting in ambush around the next corner. They caught the rapist that's been making the headlines, but there's still plenty to be afraid of.

Of course, that was never news to Ella.

Matt is definitely coming out for our anniversary. It's a month away, but already I can't wait. I thought we might have to cancel that trip for finances, but I think it would be too expensive emotionally..not being able to see him until June would be something I'd pay to avoid. He'll hate this neighborhood, but there's not much I can do about that...it looks worse than it is. And he's lived in worse places...so have I. I probably take fewer risks living here than I did in west Fort Worth, with drug dealers on every other corner.

I'm afraid to be too cocky, of course. I don't want to court disaster or say nothing can happen to me, no matter where I live. But that's the fear everyone faces, women especially. We know we are subject to a special risk every time we walk out the door, just by being women. There are days when I think Florence King is right; if we want to lower the rape statistics, issue every women a gun at age 13 and teach her how to use it. I'd shoot a rapist, no doubt. No one deserves it more. I'm no pacifist when it comes to defending my safety or any innocent person's.

I've always been divided on gun control; the NRA is full of loonies, no doubt. Teens buying guns at unregulated gun shows is a monumentally bad idea. Kids shooting each other with their parents' guns is a horrible tragedy. But. If I had to live in a worse neighborhood than this one, and feared for my safety every day...I'd want a gun, and I'd want to carry it and know how to use it. Because the police can't be everywhere, and attackers can be. I'd have wanted a gun if I'd been harassed by those thugs at the Puerto Rican parade a few years back. I'd have wanted a gun if somebody was stalking me, and I couldn't get them put in prison, and I didn't know when they'd try to get violent. And I wouldn't want anyone to give me any trouble about it.

The big question is, does all these people carrying guns make the world more violent? Or was the world always this way, and it's just more visible...more combatants, fewer straight-out victims? Should I be asked to sacrifice my safety, be at bigger risk for rape and murder, to make the world "less violent"? Or should society allow me to have that gun until it can prove that there is no longer as much risk for me? Can we prove that having more guns around is the cause of violence, or caused by it? I don't think anybody really knows. And how can I tell others what to do in the meantime?

March 21

I think I am deeply superstitious. I blame it on a lifetime of reading, where every minor event is a foreshadowing of something. So every time I miss my train, discover the grocery store is closed, or have chance interfere with my plans in any way, I suspect a conspiracy, I try to interpret what it means.Which can be harmful, because sometimes, things that happen are bad, and my natural tendency is to see bad things as signs that I'm doing something wrong.

Which, in the context of the universe and all its complexity, is a vast oversimplification. Not to mention supremely egoistic of me...every chance event is meant to guide me in some way? Isn't anything just random? Of course, a lifetime of also being a somewhat religious person doesn't help either, because then you do suspect that the universe is trying to boss you around, only you can't quite make out what it's saying, and that causes stress and confusion and guilt and frustration. And athiesm, if you get mad enough about it.

Anyway.... Much bizarreness, and some strangeness and sadness today. On the bizarre side, for the second time in a week I saw a guy taking a wooden cross along 34th Ave. Not the same guy as earlier, who was ragged and had a homemade, small cross covered with painted ranting verses. This guy looked like a football coach, khakis and golf shirt, tall, white-haired, potbelly. His cross was nicer, too, larger, with wheels at the bottom of the long end so he could move easily with just the cross pieces over his shoulder. Neither of these guys said anything to anyone; I guess they figured the crosses did it for them.

Then later, as I waited to cross the street, suddenly several black limos with flags and police escorts, full of...little Jewish children in yamulkes, smiling and waving? Huh? Then like 50 RV's full of kids and adults, all with the mysterious slogan "Mitzvah Tank". A Jewish convoy! I'm guessing this is all related to the approach of Passover. What it means otherwise, other than New York will always attract oddness, I don't have a clue.

On the strange and sad note...The guy who sits behind me at work, one of the real employees, is about 50-something. Today we heard that his daughter died suddenly of brain cancer at the age of 32. She only knew about it six months ahead of time...the doctors told her nothing could be done, so she and her family simply had to wait. A terrible thing. So why, I started asking myself, is he here at work? He stayed the whole day, kept a normal demeanor, mentioned he was coming back tomorrow. And I kept thinking...what's wrong with you? Your kid just died. Go home and be with your family! How can you work ( I don't think he really did, just sat at his desk)? How can you be alone at this time?

When my dad died...I mean, I was devastated, I wasn't fit to go back to school for weeks (and barely then). I couldn't possibly concentrate on my studies, and didn't even try. It was too big and disrupting for that.I needed my family as I never had, before or since. And losing a kid...how could that not be worse? At least my Dad had had most of his life to live. So of course, being me, I couldn't help wondering if there was a terrible story, a rift somewhere that made him so removed from his grief. Maybe she had done something he hated her for (become a lesbian, or something) that made him cut her out of his heart. Still, though, doesn't seem like that would work...like you would be able to do that. But maybe he could. Maybe he could refuse to forgive her even in death. People can be stupid that way. I hope that's not the story, that there's some more acceptable reason. I just can't think what it might be..I keep thinking of his wife, if she's alive, grieving over her daughter...he mentioned several other children he had...didn't they need him then?

And that's a story I will probably never know the outcome of, or the reason. People are so mysterious in grief...there's always so much you don't know about what they go through, and they always come out changed. I hope good things for him and his family. That's all a non-acquaintance can really do.

March 21

Matt made me a mix CD...he has such a poetic touch with these things. His letters are not nearly as eloquent sometimes as the musical mix tapes and CD's he sends me...he finds songs with exactly the right lyrics and puts them all together. It's alarming to think how many lyrics he must know by heart to be able to pick out the songs he wants. It's not something I can reciprocate to him...my music collection is so limited, and he's heard it all already...and I don't have his skill at putting songs in groups that way.

So I send him long love letters full of my philosophizing, and whatever poetic things I can think of to say, the thoughts I have of him, the things I miss, the hopes I have for us. Standard love-letter stuff. Since words are the only medium I wield with any ability at all, it's the only thing I can use to create something for him.

Much like a They Might Be Giants song, which is almost always one of the songs in his collections. This one's got Whistling in the Dark, hee. I wish we had enough cash to justify a hotel room for April 19 and 20...it's going to be a tight, non-luxurious fit in my little hovel. I know he won't care, but it would be nice to have our own room with a little more luxury. It'd probably be 200 bucks or so though...I don't know, too much when we're saving up for our place. Which I don't want to jeopardize. I'm torn. If I were rich, I'd spend all my money on him without a second thought. He's just that wonderful. He deserves whatever I can give him, and a lot more. Now I'm a little teary. Dang you, romantic Dido song.

Sigh. How can I choose between pampering my sweetie and saving for our mutual future? I wish I didn't have to. I keep hoping I'll find a magical money solution to that one, but it doesn't look likely. We owe so many people as it is. I hate to keep adding to that. But he will be here, and I know as soon as I can see his face, I won't give a darn about anything else. I don't talk about our relationship much here; it's hard to put into words, and it tends to bore/repulse people when every entry's drippy with love.

But if you wanted to really know much about me, the fact that I am one of the most-happily married people I know is something important in my life. Matt is as perfect a match to me as any man could possibly be; he knows what I'm thinking, feeling, and I know him. We are friends, and in love, and love each other to an impossible degree. There are very few things I've ever known for certain in my life. That Matt and I truly love each other is one of those things. We fight very occasionally, but it's painful to us both to disagree for long. Not that something couldn't really come between us, but up to now, one or both of us will try to make up and resolve things as soon as possible. Neither one of us wants to become used to resenting the other. That would be hell.

I hope we have a long time together. But as long as we have, there will be this amazing love in our lives, that has...well, transformed us both. Made us into better people than we would have been alone. Not everybody needs this kind of thing, but I guess we did. Neither one of us will ever be the same for it. Sweetie, so far away from me tonight, I am thinking of you. I love you. Keep safe.

March 26

Man, had the most disturbing dream this morning right before I woke up. I don't know if it was because I was PMS-ing...sometimes I think that affects my dreams, or maybe just makes me wake up more and remember them. It was so unusually vivid for me, though. And I'm not sure I want to know what it means.

I dreamed I was part of a country that had been overthrown. Myself and all my family were arrested and scheduled to be executed. I felt absolutely no hope of escape, and had decided to make my peace with dying. Yet, my captors didn't seem to be able to kill me. They tried to kill me by driving a nail into my skull from behind (yes, gruesome), but couldn't seem to manage it...they only scratched me. I felt a sort of desperate tortured fear, a desire to get it over with, but they couldn't seem to decide on or be able to find a way to execute me. I ran away, not to escape completely, but, and this is the creepy part, to find a way to be killed that would be quick and final. I just couldn't believe I would be able to escape the country and my death sentence. I knew my family was probably already dead. I was afraid they would mess around, torture me with their inefficiency and not actually kill me.

So I stole a light blue pickup truck and drove into the woods. I found a farmhouse early in the morning and woke the farmer and his wife. I explained, in eloquent words that I felt but can't remember, how I was doomed to die but needed someone to kill me mercifully. The wife was horrified...she did not want to be part of it. The husband was reluctant but finally agreed. There were guests staying with them , a black family, that looked out from the kitchen and then went back in. The husband took me out to the barn with his rifle and had me sit on the ground, my legs stretched in front of me. I woke up just as he put the rifle to the back of my head. And all through it, I and everyone else was speaking partly in German.

I don't know what it means...a warning against martyrdom? Because in my dream, I knew that I was refusing to think about true escape, that I wanted to go on accepting my fate and was afraid to try escaping, afraid to break from the path (or maybe too stubborn to) that I'd accepted for myself. A warning against inflexibility, maybe not listening to myself. Definitely a warning.

March 28

The other day, I saw a Chinese (?) guy playing a lute-like instrument just like the one on Matt's dad's fireplace. He held it in his lap with the neck going up, like a bass or cello. He fingered with his left hand and strummed very fast with his right, using a pick. I have to remember to tell Matt and his Dad about it.

Good news/Bad news: Matt may be coming up early/because we owe even more on the car than we thought we did (about $300 more). Possible good news: (maybe): my brother's offered to help fix/sell the car so no-one's stuck with the note. I told Mom (who holds the title) that we had no intention of dumping it on her, and I mean that. But it'd be nice not to have to keep paying on a car we don't even own or use.

So, I am suspicious of God once again. If the fix/sell thing works, I'll definitely know something is up...there's some big reason we both need to be in NY right now. Maddening part being, I may never know what it is...it may be something really obscure and un-obvious but crucial in some way.

It will be interesting...I've just been getting used to the free-falling feeling of this lifestyle (is that the word)?...but it was only for myself. Having both of us doing this...wow. I wonder what's going to happen? It's kind of nice that I feel such a low amount of fear, at least today, around that question.

Oh, nearly forgot. Today I went to a "Bach's Lunch" (oh, cute) at the Marble Collegiate Church. A nicely modest little cathedral-type church. And I suddenly understood for the very first time, why churches were traditionally so very gaudy, yet also dark and somewhat dull. It always mystified me...I could never see the reason for all the decor (and I still think the altar at St. Peter's in London is way over the top). It didn't seem in line with the poverty, chastity, humility message.

But today, I came in to this dark, quiet, warm building, with the soft glimmer here and there of gold on the walls and pillars...the muted stained-glass light, the rich contrast of reds and blues in dark tones. And I felt such peace, and relief, that was much more aesthetic than religious. Because outside, it was all hurry, rush, bustle, and gray stone going up and up and gray sidewalks and light glaring at you and noise. And inside, just the opposite, like a jewel hidden.

This must be what attracted people in the middle ages; though the outside was different, it was equally dreary. Work, fatigue, worry, pain. Bad weather, little shelter, no lights but rushes or candles, no colors but green and brown and the occasional wildflower you didn't have time to gaze at. No music at all, unless it was a fair. Very little that was pretty or bright. Of course, the church would attract you. If you were the kind of person affected most by such things, wouldn't you try to go and live in such a place, look at gilt and lovely carved wood and stone and majesty? To be in even a modestly decorated church and looking at such things must have been like being fed when you were starved for beauty.

I think if I lived then, I would have seriously considered being a nun, provided I had the choice, just to be around beauty and knowledge. And organ music has always bored me...but what if I seldom if ever heard any kind of instrument play...wouldn't I be in awe of it? And maybe that's why it took the more austere sects longer to get going...you needed more people in a middle class who could get beauty any time they wanted it by buying silks or looking at tapestries. It's a theory that's undoubtedly been discussed, because it seems so obvious. But it never struck me before. Of course the saddest part is, that the Church kept all that beauty to itself for the most part. Closed in to dark cathedrals, instead of being part of the people's every day lives. The people loved the Church because it was beautiful, and contained a great deal of truth...but why was music and beauty and truth missing for so long from their everyday lives? Why did their circumstances have to be so harsh and miserable in the first place? It's a worthwhile question.