iPod = Life's Soundtrack

So last night as I was watching Grey's Anatomy (shut up) I was lamenting, once again, that life doesn't have a score playing constantly in the background. I would love dearly to hear a victorian-esque piano every time I see the boy I like. How awesome would that be?

But as I was walking through the park today, iPod being put to use, a breeze came up. It pushed me from behind, making my hair and long sweater go forward. It blew leaves across the ground and around my ankles. It was a mostly clear day, with lots of medium sized, fast moving clouds, so I was mostly in sunlight.

I don't know if it was the song, or the weather, or the increased heart rate from walking too fast (I was running late for an appointment) but I felt like a total badass. My life had a soundtrack. Even if it was just for three minutes, they were three perfect minutes. I felt like I was on top of the world.

Later, on my return trip home, I had another little moment with my iPod. There's a strange part of the park, where all of these huge pecan trees are lined up in perfect rows and columns. There's this strange grid of giant trees. (Seriously, these suckers are 30+ feet tall.) But right now they're grey and leaf-less. As I was walking on the little path parallel to it, a cloud passed over the sun, making it overcast, just as my song switched to a minor key. Seriously. It was amazing.

And another breeze came up behind me, and ruffled my hair and my long black sweater. I laughed, and for just a few seconds, I ruled the world.

The American Idol Drinking Game

Okay, to bring my father's brilliant idea to life, I have decided to post the rules for the American Idol Drinking Game (Audition Rounds):

1 Drink-
-Anytime Simon compares someone's audition to Karaoke, Lounge Singing, Cruise Ships, etc.
-Anytime Simon says he would rather inflict punishment on himself than hear them sing more.
-Anytime Paula drinks.
-Anytime Randy turns himself into a 1990's Black Sterotype.
-Anytime Ryan Seacrest looks uncomfortable with someone who thinks they're awesome, but just bombed their audition.
-When someone makes it to Hollywood.

2 Drinks-
-Anytime Paula and Randy vote opposite of Simon, just to vote opposite.
-Anytime someone wears a costume to their audition.
-When a back story is shown on a contestant, and it turns out they actually can sing.
-When a contestant asks for another chance after bombing their audtion.
-When someone auditions who has tried out for a past season... and still sucks.
-When someone makes it to Hollywood and starts crying.

3 Drinks-
-When a back story is shown on a contestant that CAN'T sing.
-When a contestant argues with the judges about going to Hollywood.
-When a montage of bad auditions is shown.
-When someone who has auditioned previously auditions again... and is actually good.
-When someone makes it to Hollywood and tackles Ryan Seacrest.

Finish Your Drink if-
-Paula kisses Simon
-Ryan kisses Simon

The one who has to tell it

I wanted to share a few of these golden little moments in my life with the handful of readers I have here, because I know you will appreciate them more than anyone else could.

Almost a year ago, I was sitting in the lobby of a Domino’s Pizza a little after two AM. An assistant manager at another store, I had made a few mistakes in my short career as a pizza slinger. The first was that I let my coworkers realize I was dependable and responsible. The second was that I then befriended some of them. I had just finished my closing shift at my store, and was waiting for the keys for this one. For reasons still unknown to me, I had become the reliable manager. I paid the price by frequently covering shifts for others. No one else would do it. And what would middle America do if they couldn’t order pizza?

“A woman, especially, if she have the misfortune of knowing anything, should conceal it as well as she can.” – Jane Austen

As I was waiting for one of the less responsible managers to finish his closing shift (I had completed mine quickly, he was behind schedule) I was working on one of my novels. I was scribbling the minute handwriting I use when I have to write long hand, in an effort to save paper. Really, it’s an effort to save my sanity. If I wrote larger, the same scene might take up a few pages. And I might just lose my mind if I ever lost a page of it. While I was writing away in the poorly lit lobby, one of the insiders (someone lesser than the manager, but not a driver) approached me. He asked what I was doing, then why I was doing it. The result was the following exchange-

"What are you doing?" he asked.
"Writing," I answered. I didn't even bother to look up.
"Is it hereditary?" he asked. He told me my brother (who works at his store) does that too.
"He does?" I asked. I knew he was often struck by flights of fancy, but I've never noticed him writing. Not like I write, anyway.
"Not that I’ve seen, but it seems like something he'd do," he said. I smiled, and went back to my page.
He would not be pleased. He continued, "So what are you writing?"
"A story," I answered.
"Why?" he asked. I shrugged, and my pen paused.
"It needs to be told."
"And you're the one that has to tell it?" he asked playfully.
I smiled up at him, "Yes."

It’s one of my favorite little moments of my life, because it felt good to be recognized as a story teller. A few weeks ago, I was discussing my desire to be a writer with my mother, and how wonderful it would be if my only responsibility were to write. No day job, no nine to five. A sharp mind and a wounded heart have made me view the world with a more critical, cynical eye than I used to. I said the following to my mother –

“It just seems like we live in a world where we are all just numbers. Just statistics. We use our social security number to identify ourselves on every important piece of paper. We might as well have barcodes on the back of our necks. That’s all we are in the grand scheme of things. When the people who knew us are dead, too, we are just numbers. Maybe that’s why I like writing. I may not ever be more to history than a pop culture question in Trivial Pursuit, but at least I will have a voice. I will have words in a world where only numbers matter. It gives me a little bit of control over how the world will remember me.”

She got kind of teary eyed and chuckled, that sort of mom-ish gesture I’m sure you’ve all seen or done yourself, and told me it was beautiful and that I should write it down. So I did.

No More Frontier

This had a bit of success on my myspace blog, but considering that is only available to friends, I thought I might be able to reach more people here. Someday. It's not like it's a blog that will change the world, but it might make a few people stop to think. Then they'll think about other things. And thoughts change the world.

With that logic, blogs do change the world.

I've been becoming more and more dissatisfied with the government, and maybe it's that I reread Atlas Shrugged at the worst time, but I'm very scared for the economical state of the world right now. A few days ago, Arizona officially announced that they are in a recession. No shit, really? 46,000 government employees laid off in the capital seat in January? Nah, I never would have guessed. What that really means when you interpret what's being released to the news (freedom of the press, my ass) it means Arizona is in a depression.

And without further ado...

The ever declining state of the world has brought about a sad realization for me. There's no more frontier. There's nowhere left to run to when you get tired of the government, get tired of the world. The American Pioneers got tired of everything, and went west. They provided for themselves, took care of themselves, with little or no interruption from the world outside their little bubble. A few centuries before that, Europeans left for America. We've used up every corner of the world, and there's nowhere left to go now. We can't get away. We've all become a prisoner of our neighbors.

Here in America, we're just now starting to hear about a 'commodity shortage' that is going to become a global crisis if it's not seriously addressed. The rest of the world has known about it for a while. Half of me is fed up with the so-called freedom of the press in America that informs us of absolutely nothing, while the other half is glad to be ignorant of the ugly going on outside my immediate realm. I could go on and on about the troubles in America, but that's another blog.

Since World War I, global communication has been revolutionizing every culture in every country. A lot of amazing things have happened because of this, but a lot of terrible things have as well. The saddest effect this has had is Western civilization feeling it must thrust its modern ways on third world countries. There has been so much wrong done on our part (our = 'civilized' nations) to contaminate every corner of the world. Corners that weren't ready. By messing with the natural evolution of societies that are so far behind ours, we're crippling them. And in turn, crippling ourselves. We are making these countries dependent on us, making us incapable of caring for ourselves as well as we should.

I heard a story once about tractors delivered to rural Africa. Five years after they were delivered, the more advanced country went back to see the progress, and was surprised to see that most of the tractors had weeds growing on them. The few being used were being pulled by farm animals. In our infinite wisdom, we gave them tractors, but not the knowledge to use them, or the fuel to keep them running. Powerful symbolism, or what?

As a by product of mass communication, countries that would still be centuries behind our own have been forced to jump ahead. The result of which is a population shaped like a pyramid. Each generation is reproducing faster and faster, with more and more offspring. While in 'civilized' countries our population pyramid is upside down. With medical advancements we're living longer. But the result of mass communication on our end is an underlying hatred of ourselves. We see all the ugliness that we have put into the world, instead of all of the beauty that there is; that there could be. People are having fewer children and, generation by generation, we are shrinking. All the while we are watching people starve in the corners of the world or meet untimely ends after a natural disaster. We feel like we must pull the splinter from our crippled country's eye, while not removing the plank from our own.

The population in Africa, the Middle and Far East are soaring. A third of the planet's population live in India and China. All those mouths to feed is draining the entire world of its money.

The higher price of oil and gasoline is raising the cost of basic grain sources, like wheat, corn and rice. The recent push to save our planet has lead to a good deal of the world's corn being turned into fuel. However, this has caused a shortage all over the planet. So the prices go up and the poor starve. But if we stopped using corn as a fuel source, the price of oil would rise. Which, in turn, would raise the price of grains anyway. What a vicious circle.

When I am an old woman, God willing, my grandchildren will ask me what it was like to live through this time period, like my father asked his grandmother about the Great Depression. The next few decades are going to be dismal. The first tier to go will be the very poor in the third world countries. Starvation, disease and a rise in violence will take them out. Maybe even the plague. Nothing screams plague like over population and poor living conditions. Once this completes (because it has already started) it will be like pulling the plug from the bathtub drain. The next to fall will be the middle class of the countries struggling to catch up. About this time, the lowest class of western civilization will start to disappear. Not having enough money for proper nutrition or medical care, Americans and Europeans will lose their working class. Who will the rich rely on once the lower classes are too poor to live? Who will do the grunt work that makes them money? Next will be the upper class of poorer markets as the world market crashes spectacularly. Ayn Rand saw this coming half a century ago.

I think the scariest thing is that it is going to get worse, before it can get better. That's what is so frightening. When you look at the past, when countries and kingdoms and empires have gotten too overcrowded, too poorly governed, there has been an outbreak of disease, or a natural disaster wipes them out. Cities throughout Europe were devastated by the bubonic plague in the dark ages. 350 years ago, London had been experiencing a population boom for decades, and the city had been built with very poor planning. A fire spread throughout most of the city and killed thousands. We're going to be seeing things like the disasters in Myanmar and China more often. It's not just the rest of the world, there are problems reacting here at home, too. Look at how poorly we handled Hurricane Katrina.

I read Atlas Shrugged at the wrong time. While I'm grateful for it's enlightenment, ignorance did hold a kind of bliss. It was kind of nice to think that only my little family unit was having struggles. To know it's on a country wide - world wide, even - scale, is TERRIFYING. What we're experiencing right now is the ugly side of capitalism. It's the result of kids fresh out of college getting into positions of power. Our failing economy is the by product of America's need for instant gratification. Big business is no longer looking at the big picture. Oil companies are thinking of the profit they can make right now on fuel, not realizing that in two or three years, they will have killed their market. I just hope it's not literal.

Isn't the point of history supposed to be learning from our past mistakes? Now, by closing our eyes and plugging our ears, we are making bigger ones. There is a giant display of dominoes set up, and the first have fallen. We are watching the rest fall. The most terrifying part of seeing these dominoes set up, and knowing our past too well, is knowing the only way we can come out of this slump. What brought us up from the Great Depression, kiddies? No, not Big Band music, not Coca Cola or Hershey bars. World War II. The entire world rallied together. That's not going to happen again. There is a very famous Albert Einstein quote that is dear to my heart, and it rings eerily true – "I know not with what weapons World War III will be fought, but World War IV will be fought with sticks and stones."

I don't know what's going to happen over the next decade or two, I can only guess. I will be a witness to a very interesting historical period. And honestly, I don't want to think about it too much. It's very, very depressing. I just wanted to go on the record, so that when everything turns to shit, I can do the "Told You So" dance. A great deal of my sadness on the subject comes from the fact that there is nowhere left to run to. I can't get away from the rest of the world, from governments and regulations and laws and taxes. I can't have a dozen acres and freedom. I am caged.

Duality?

It's so weird working on this book.

Right after everything went to hell, working on it was impossible. Even a month or two afterwards, whenever I tried to go work on it, it would be slow and hard to come. When I would have to cyber stalk him for dates and phrases, I was surprised at how ugly and unattractive he appeared to me then.

Now, more than a year after the fact, it's like looking at an entirely different person. I can see that he is a pretty decent looking fellow, but it's not the guy I remember looking at. WEIRD.

I want closure with this guy. And the only way that is going to happen completely, is to close the book on him. I have to finish writing this damn book.

Trudge, trudge, trudge

At Nikki's insistence (ok, it was more like a scolding - completely earned on my part, I might add) I have busted out the uber personal, and uber marketable, novel I've been placing on a shelf for a while.

The problem with a memoir type of book is that while writing it, you feel all of those emotions again. Not with the intensity they were initially felt with, of course, but with all that's passed between then and now, a mixture of sadness and regret has filled the area between. Not true regret, per se, but an odd sense of mourning not only what's been lost, but the potential that was squandered.

I've meant to work on it, I really have, but other projects have sprung up. Nudged themselves to the front of the line. And real life, that whore, has had her fair share of my time. So I've dusted it off, and I'm working on it right now, trying to finish up an important portion. However, I keep forgetting exactly where I am in the structure of things. It's one thing to live day to day and look at a calender, it's another entirely to map out the story of your life in something that resembles a plot, and put push pins on the dates. So I get lost, "Did that happen then? No, that was Christmas."

But I am trudging through. Finishing the portion that has held me back for a few months, pushing through it. Checking back and reading bits and pieces, remembering how good the book actually is.

Man, books that are entirely fiction are soooo much easier.

Conformity? No!

Ok, maybe a little. My cousin and co-conspirator, Jinx aka, NL Gervasio, told me it might be strategic to have a blog on an actual blogging website. So, as soon as the sudafed and ibuprofen wear off (sometime tomorrow) I'll actually put some effort into this place. Spiff it up a little.

-Jesse