Gossip

So, a couple nights ago, I was passing the time (or wasting time, depending on your world view) by listening to a friend tell a juicy story about how someone had deeply offended her. She was in full on gossip mode, giving it her all, doing the voices of each character and hitting the intonations of the person-in-question perfectly. I was hooked. The drama between her and this person involved me, but only in a very peripheral way, and I was succumbing to the utterly human temptation to gawk at a car accident.

[That's a gross truth, isn't it? How human beings tend to be fascinated by the tragedy of others? I mean, if you've ever been stuck in traffic outside of normal rush hour time, you can almost be sure it's because there's some wreck a mile or two up the highway. And 50% of the time, the wreck is on the other side of the road, and the only reason cars are backed up is because people are slowing down to gawk.]

Anyway, I was gawking. My story-telling friend (let's call her X) had me hooked. I was on her side all the way, rooting for her, looking down my nose at the other person (let's call him Y). She gave me a specific example of Y's insolence, and i almost snorted. "Figures," I thought. "Sounds just like something Y would do." Satisfied with my reaction, X brought her story to a close and walked away.

Just then, another friend, who had been floating in and out of the conversation (let's call her Z), turned my world upside down in one sentence. She had been there for the entirety of the aforementioned car accident, had watched it happen in real time, and she said, "The only reason Y did what he did was because X did this to him first."

Oh. Um, wow. Oops.

My feelings of superiority and smugness that had been directed at Y mere moments ago just melted away, and I was left feeling like a complete fool. If Z hadn't chimed in and told me what actually happened, from an unbiased outsider's perspective, I would have left that evening believing Y to be the enemy when in fact, neither X nor Y are the enemy. For that matter, neither is Z - her version of what happened that night probably differs slightly from any other outsider. Each version is crafted by an intricate mind, and each brain works in different ways and is encased in different packaging.

And maybe sometimes these minds, that work so differently and perceive the world in such different ways, maybe sometimes these minds don't quite see eye to eye.

Anyway, whatever. My point? The number of sides to a story is equal to the number of people involved.

A Masterpiece of Epic Proportions

My bag has been so much lighter since I finished this book.



I finished reading it almost two months ago, after lugging the damn thing around for a good five weeks. I took it with me everywhere and read it every chance I got. Still it took me over a month to fully absorb its brilliance, and twice as long to compose my tribute to it.

And so here it is. My paltry attempt to pay homage to a work of art that changed my life.

I will not go into details about the storyline or the characters. I believe that everyone needs to read this book for themselves, and what fun is there in reading a story when you know what happens next? I will say that Atlas Shrugged is a mystery, it is an adventure, and it is a championing of capitalism. It is full of crime and greed and those basest of human conditions. It is a record of what happens when people are overcome by aforementioned conditions. But ultimately and above all, it is a story of love, and the discovering of oneself.

Rand's position on love is a unique one. In loving someone, she believes, you are offering up your own mind, body, and spirit. In effect, your lover acts as a mirror, reflecting what you offer and showing it back to you. In this way she sets forth the idea that love is not necessarily about the worshipping or even the adoration of a partner. Love is not "to choose a person as the constant center of one's concern," but rather "...love is a celebration of one's self and existence." Also, she writes that love is not "some static gift which, once granted, need no longer be deserved." Love must be constantly earned, over and over again. This notion is lost on so very many people, and I believe it is the downfall of so very many real-life love stories.

More than anything else, though, the book helped me to understand that

my life is my own.

If I'm happy, it's because of something I've done, the people I've chosen to associate with or the goals I've decided to pursue. If I'm unhappy, it's my own fault and no one else's, because I am the only person who has the power to change it. Rand says, "Man exists for the achievement of his desires." So, then, what better way to live your life than to strive towards achieving your desires, whatever they may be? Strive, strive for yourself and for no one else. Your true love will join you on that path rather than block it.

SOME PEOPLE ARE TOXIC AVOID THEM.

This advice, from Milton Glaser's "Ten Things I have Learned," is something we all intuitively know. He just puts it into explicit words. It's gold... Read on:

SOME PEOPLE ARE TOXIC AVOID THEM.
There was in the sixties a man named Fritz Perls who was a gestalt therapist... Perls proposed that in all relationships people could be either toxic or nourishing towards one another. It is not necessarily true that the same person will be toxic or nourishing in every relationship, but the combination of any two people in a relationship produces toxic or nourishing consequences. And the important thing that I can tell you is that there is a test to determine whether someone is toxic or nourishing in your relationship with them. Here is the test: You have spent some time with this person, either you have a drink or go for dinner or you go to a ball game. It doesn’t matter very much but at the end of that time you observe whether you are more energised or less energised. Whether you are tired or whether you are exhilarated. If you are more tired then you have been poisoned. If you have more energy you have been nourished. The test is almost infallible and I suggest that you use it for the rest of your life.

Cold Spring

I was an Indian princess for Halloween. I wore a feathered headdress and sat at a table collapsing under the weight of a feast. I ate Stacy's truffle mashed potatoes and apple butter salmon and magic bars that were meant to take me to a place called Fairy Land, and even though Astrid was the only one who was supposed to get there, I think I got there too. I laughed, and drank, and tried to fall backwards into the Hudson River, except that Daniel and the wind were so strong they held me up.

When I fell asleep on the couch, Kalen and Dee covered me up with sweaters and scarves and animal pelts, but only after failing to coerce me into the community sleeping pile. In the morning, Justin brought me coffee with soy milk in it because that's what I wanted even though soy isn't good for you. I don't care, I like the way it tastes like caramel candy. Chris' pancakes were so fluffy, they were like eating flat, golden-brown clouds. I figured I don't eat clouds very often, so I had three.

We got to the woods and Jeff and Tim took over. Their determination to conquer the forest almost made me cry, but only once, because I was wearing shoes meant for subways and not for rocks and leaves. I pretended we were a tribe and the boys were leading us on a hunt. At first I didn't know what we were hunting for, but it seemed pressing, so I continued on. Then they led us to the top of a mountain, and I looked around, and I understood.

I was an Indian princess for Halloween.

This little video from Justin Kay may not cause the same welling of emotion for someone who wasn't there, but it almost made my chest burst. The weekend was almost perfect.

Family Band

The moon was round and full and bursting with cold light. I could see the change of season in it, the thousand years of bounty that it stood for, the pay off at the end of a hot summer.

The harvest moon.

I got to a building, floating, and called and called to be let in. Walked to the top of the stairs, closer, out onto the roof, closer, if I raised my arm I could touch it.

Close.

And then I went inside the moon. Just crawled right in through a little hole at the bottom. All I brought with me was a bottle of wine. Inside, it looked like I expected it to look, all white and safe, with blankets on the ground and moon-people milling around in jackets and boots.

The walls of the moon were waves, rolling with the wind, and the band started to play. She sang, and he sang, and the drums and the guitars and everything made noise and the inside of my head was like the inside of the moon, warm and safe and with blankets on the ground.

Little Pleasure of Life #1

When you come back from the bathroom at dinner and someone has (unexpectedly) picked up the tab.

Foreverever?

I asked him what forever meant.

He said forever is till the end that you can't even see. Forever is 24 hours, but it restarts every 24 hours.

I pulled him close and kissed his eyes.