fit and fitted

When you come to a person with a problem, most people’s initial reaction is to want to help. How can we solve this, what can we change to make this better? So they suggest modifications in behavior, in venues, in habits, and if you wholeheartedly want a problem solved, you make the changes and see what happens.

But what if nothing happens? What if the problem remains and you remain impacted by the problem? What happens if you keep trying to solve it by talking to those same people? Is there a limit to what people will listen to? Is there a point at which you have tried everything and are absolved of responsibility? Or is it always that you are not trying hard enough?

I used to think that everything could be overcome by strength of will and powering through. That you were the sum total of your ability to take care of yourself and forge your way. I didn’t give much consideration to the impact the people around you might have. Oh, to be part of a collective would be nice, of course, and it might even make things easier, but it wasn’t necessary. I didn’t give any thought to environment and place at all.

The lesson this year has been clear; not everything can be powered through. Not everything can be solved by you alone. Not everything can be changed by a mindset. Sometimes things just don’t fit.

It’s been a hard lesson to learn, and a harder one to internalize. It goes against my nature to think that things can’t be overcome by strength of will or by knowing when to let go at just the right time. It’s been harder still to come to the realization that you don’t have control over all aspects of your life. Especially when surrounded by people telling you that you do.

“You should worry less.” “You should relax.” “Try getting a different job.” “Don’t hang out in the same places all the time.” “If you were happier you’d get what you want.” “Why can’t you look on the positive side?” “You’re just hanging out with the wrong people.” The last one’s my favorite, I think; it’s been said to me by four different groups of people, and I wonder how much more I would have to diversify my friends to not be told that’s the solution to the problem.

Sometimes you have done all you can to get the things you need in life. You have worried less; you have accepted yourself and lived in the moment; you have gotten jobs to meet new people; you have focused on the positive and been grateful for what you have; you have tried to share your enthusiasm to get more back; you have gone to new bars and hangouts and events; you have accepted every offer from every potential new friend who could hold a basic conversation and some who couldn’t. And still, nothing has changed and the problem remains the same.

Take that strength of will before its spent, take that energy before its tapped out, take that knowledge of when to fight and when to let go, and let go. Open your hands and let it all go because maybe this time, it isn’t you after all. Not everything should be a fight, and nothing should be a struggle without an eventual reward.

checking off the list

Oh, the fourth of July. I’ve never been a big fan. Like Thanksgiving, it’s been an eating holiday for me—cookouts with some occasional fireworks thrown in—and I’m more of a fan of the gift and mischief holidays. But this city throws its weight behind the fourth pretty solidly, with fireworks the night before and the night of, street parties, and the end of Summerfest. I’ve seen the big fireworks display in past years but I hadn’t been to Summerfest at all yet, and I figured that was one Milwaukee thing I should check off the list before I leave.

fireworks as seen from Summerfest

Summerfest is billed as the largest music festival in the U.S., but it’s unclear what “largest” means. Most bands? Most days? Not most space, though the Summerfest grounds are huge. Luckily the two stages that held the bands I wanted to see were practically next to each other. There was a local stage with bands I’d seen before and liked well enough, bands pulled out of the dark confines of a smoky bar and put onto a small stage enclosed just enough to mimic the dark confines of a smoky bar. I watched a few songs from one band, a few from another, and then wandered off to soak in the surroundings before it was time to see The Roots’ set (or more accurately, hear, since the crowd was too large to see past. They sounded good, anyway).

I expected a madhouse of people sweating in the sun, spilling beer on one another, eating fried foods off plates and sticks. This is what summer festivals are about after all. There was some of that, but it was overall more low-key than I’d expected. It may have been that other bands were a bigger draw, other nights, or it might have been more people were out of the fairgrounds and off to higher vantage points to watch fireworks. Whatever the case, it made my night fun and non-stressful. I ate corn on the cob and fried zucchini strips with Amy and Julie and Olive. I walked up and down the marketplace aisle, checking out booths that offered bedazzled body art and ironic t-shirt slogans and handwriting analysis that predict your compatibility, romantic or platonic. I saw a man with a cardboard cup holder he’d turned into a hat, four full plastic cups in the holder on his head.

the analysis computer was called the Jeltron

I was on the phone with my friend Will when I saw this, and I described it to him. “Didn’t you tell me about seeing this last month, but with race cars?” He was joking, referring to when I called him from a road trip to Indy 500, but it was a pretty accurate joke. Music, cars, booze, the vibe’s the same.

The next day was cookout and fireworks time, with some street festival thrown in. The street festival had Stephen Malkmus, and the bbq had the most delicious food I’ve ever had at a cookout, and that was enough to make for a worthwhile Saturday, whether it was a holiday or not.

Stephen Malkmus at the Bayview PBR Street Fest

one small good thing

My childhood friend Alina is quite the inspiration for doing things. Not only is she a talented singer, songwriter, and world-traveler, but soon she will be a published author. I’m very excited for her, and while I wait for books and new albums and new tales, I can follow her recommendations on her new blog, One Small Good Thing.

On Tuesday she asked if she could interview me about my job as a proofreader and copy editor for sometimes naughty books. Really, I edit all kinds of books, but it is the tales of romance novels and erotica anthologies that people are most interested in. Yesterday I did the interview and today it is posted at One Small Good Thing. It was a funny thing to do, and hopefully a good and funny thing to read on an almost-holiday Friday afternoon.

The interview is here. Enjoy.

leisure time

I’m proofreading a book right now about the Enlightenment and science and one of the author’s main themes is that a key to the development of ideas is leisure time. Time to ponder and consider and let thoughts simmer, let the brain make connections, however long it takes. Two days, twenty years, it’s not for us to force these things forward, to put them on our schedule of progress, the author argues.

I am not a patient person, though I recognize how important this concept of leisure time is and how much merit it has. I’m a creature of schedules and structure and a strangely omnipresent feeling of time constantly winding away, as if time is something that can be lost. If I don’t seize these moments to work, I think, I will run out of time. I will see life move along without those things I want or wish for ever coming to fruition. It’s true that action must be taken in life at some point if you ever want to progress (with goals for family or work or money or home or travel or anything), but it’s become something more than that for me lately. A feeling that if action isn’t  constantly being taken, then opportunities are wasted and failure is around the corner.

No one and nothing can move forward constantly without respite. Even fields need to lie fallow before they can be planted again. Leisure time is a necessity, but it’s also a scary proposition for someone who’s worried about achieving their goals and working hard enough to build the life they want. When does leisure become laziness? When does downtime become stagnation? If you have faith (in your abilities, in some higher power, in the order of the universe, in hard work, in luck), you can close your eyes and follow the ebbs and flows of life, a natural pulling towards and pushing away from interests, and work ethics and effort. But that faith is a hard thing to come by and maintain if you’re a Type A personality or raised in the American ethos of self-determination or surrounded by go-getters or slackers. The balance is hard to find and harder to maintain, but if you can get yourself into the stream and go with it, you’re golden.

book, blanket, beach

Today was beach day, a handful of people who had the day off taking advantage of the gorgeous, balmy 80 degrees.  As I was packing my bag for the afternoon in the sun, the perfect beach song came on the radio: “When They Fight, They Fight” by The Generationals. (You can listen to the song at their site here; the lyrics have nothing to do with the sun, but the melody is summer all the way).

I’ve never been a fan of the sun or the beach—not since I was a tiny little person, anyway—but relocating has expanded my boundaries. I generally prefer rainy days over sunny ones, but today I said yes to the heat and happily went to bake in the sand. I wasn’t a camping person before moving either, and now I own multiple sleeping bags and a tent. I wasn’t a nature person, and in the last two years I’ve willingly spent hours on rivers, in woods, on beaches, on trails. Between the city and the country (or the town) I will still always pick the city, hands down (concrete! steel! automation! action!) but the non-city experiences have been more fun and more interesting than I’d have thought a few years ago, amongst all that concrete.

It may have as much to do with continuing maturity as it does with relocation; when we’re younger, we hold tight to the things that we want to define us, and we build those definitions on opposition. I am this thing because I am not that thing. I am urban, not suburban. I am blue state, not red. I am cosmopolitan, not camping. Even if we know that’s an overly simplistic way to live life, we still find ourselves succumbing to that kind of thinking in small ways if we’re not paying attention. It’s easier, after all, to see the world in either/ors.

I didn’t expect I would ever enjoy camping or hiking or baking in the sun, but in the right circumstances I do. It won’t ever make me into a camper or hiker or beach bunny, or any kind of outdoors person. But those are all just definitions, and really, it doesn’t need to make me into anything at all, except someone enjoying the experience.

your bright future

I spent the last week on the East Coast, New York first, then Massachusetts. It’s where I’m from and where I grew up, respectively. Or vice versa. I’ve learned a lot about homecomings over the last two years away, how the quality and texture of them changes depending on where you’re coming from, how long you’ve been away, how things are going in your current home. Whether it is a current home at all. On its own or in comparison.

Things have not been going well in Milwaukee, the place I’ve been working to call home over the last two years. Or rather, they have, but it somehow hasn’t been enough. The first year was full of new and shiny things, which is always a good distraction. Novelty alone often equals adventure. But the last year has been odd. I’ve felt a pretty constant disconnect with the city, not ever quite synched up with the people around me. Wanting the right things at the wrong times, putting in more effort when I should be letting go, each experience creating a feedback loop that exacerbates the situation. It’s been alienating and frustrating. Am I a negative person so I’m looking at my experiences negatively, or have negative experiences made me a negative person?

The day I got into New York I felt clicked back into place. I talked to my friend Alina about it all, how I’d approached things and how I was approached in turn. About what I’d left the East Coast for in the first place, and what I might still be looking for. Alina had just finished moving back to Brooklyn from Chapel Hill NC, and was in a uniquely perfect position for giving advice.

“Two cities are not a significant statistical sampling,” she said. “Go find another one. Think of it as an adventure.”

An adventure was one of the reasons I’d left the city in the first place. To see what other places and lives looked like, to see how much you’re shaped by your environment, and what kind of life you can build for yourself in a new one.

“Start visiting places again,” she told me. “And keep a record of it,  so you can track the process and see the possibilities.”

I’d been thinking about what I should be doing with YBF on the subway ride to her amazing new apartment. I’d been thinking about how to keep my newly returned positive attitude in place. I’d been thinking about how to get inspired again.

She’s right. It’s time to start again.
Welcome to your bright future.

other lists, other lives

My house is on a busy street, and it’s not unusual that bits of trash and the detritus of other people’s lives occassionally ends up on the lawn. Today’s trash wasn’t candy wrappers or grocery receipts, but something much better: Someone’s to-do list. Here’s how it read:

Sat or Friday = Try on pants
Buy stamps
Aldies—> Buy yougart + milk = 2 gallons
Clean up ustang and check all fluids
Buy ICE car wax and do Mustang
Do laundry
Maybe cut grass
Clean room
Buy stinkens for Mustang

Priorities, priorities. Someone loves his mustang…

robot/people art

I used to work for NYU years and years ago. One of the newest departments at the school was the Interactive Telecommunications Department. Because my office didn’t do any programs with ITP, I was never quite sure what the department did. I knew it involved art combined with technology, but I couldn’t imagine how they came together.

This is how, with an amazing project by Kacie Kinzer. In the artist’s words: In New York, we are very occupied with getting from one place to another. I wondered: could a human-like object traverse sidewalks and streets along with us, and in so doing, create a narrative about our relationship to space and our willingness to interact with what we find in it? More importantly, how could our actions be seen within a larger context of human connection that emerges from the complexity of the city itself? To answer these questions, I built robots.

They are Tweenbots and they are adorable. Watch the video on her site at Tweenbots.com; it’s an excellent social experiment and also super-cute. My favorite part is how protective people get with the bot once they’ve made the choice to interact with it. Well, why wouldn’t you? Look at them!

willful abandon

I have a brand new story up on the art and lit website my friend Michael S and I started, Showed & Told. The story’s called “Willful Abandon” and I wrote it last night from 11:30 pm to 1:30 am. And then this morning I took out all the typos. I hope you enjoy it.

Oh, it has been quite a week! Or two. It seems most everyone I know has been watching some part of their life fall to pieces since the month started. For me, it was a double barrel attack of an insane tax bill (which I knew was coming, but just wasn’t sure how many thousands it would end up being) and my newly renovated computer blowing up again. It’s stunning how much of your life is affected by not being able to get online. For instance, it is now April 14th and I’m doing tax research that could’ve been finished last week. At least I was not my friend who got his car impounded. Or the one who got fired.

But I figure if we all hang in there long enough, things will turn around. That might not be true, I have my doubts that the universe works on a quid pro quo, everything balances out basis, but if you’ve got to subscribe to a belief system, why not that. So I am holding tight. Grab on too.

while headed down to New Orleans

I never traveled when I was in my twenties. I was all about settling down and getting rooted at that point in my life, and had no interest in places other than where I was (New York). I stockpiled vacation days into weeks into months, taking them here and there and doing nothing with them but wandering around my neighborhood, or maybe going back to Massachusetts for a visit. No place new. I couldn’t tell you now why I felt I needed to do that then. It’s all part of the strange backward trajectory of my life, I think, doing things and making decisions in the reverse order from most people. When I was young and people said I should be exploring, I aimed for stability and routine. As I get older and people say I should be settling in, I cut ties and leave in pursuit of irresponsibility. Further. Faster. Forever.

I love traveling now, and I wonder if it’s just that no one told me the secret about it before. That traveling is all about possibility and simplicity. Whatever strategy and prep work you need to do to go on your trip – planning for time off from work and hunting down the cheapest fare and making sure your pets and children are cared for – once it’s the day of, your responsibilities are few and your mission clear and simple. Get to the airport or train station or bus station on time. Get in the conveyance. Settle in with a book or a newspaper or a trashy celeb magazine. Put the headphones on. Relax. Go.

Go. Oh, that’s the best part of traveling, for sure! You are in motion, you are pursuing, you are action. Something is waiting on the other side of the road and you are moving to it and what’s the possibility waiting for you there? Why, it could be anything! It could be the best time of your life, an amazing adventure, magic. It could be nothing like you envisioned and plagued with difficulties and everything that could go wrong does. But then you get to go back home, to your day to day life! That is the key about traveling; you always get to go, and you always get to leave.