You Don't Have to Drink to Have a Happy New Year's Eve, but Sometimes It Helps

I secretly hate New Year's Eve celebrations.

I usually don't let people know this about me, as it might affect their appreciation of certain moments in our shared lives, but there it is. The drinking, paper horns, and butchering of Auld Lang Syne are all celebratory of a moment that feels oddly similar to closing a coffin lid for the last time at a long funeral. You're glad the process is over, but there's a bittersweet moment where the passage of time hurts more than you'd like to admit and all you want to do is fall out of reality and never let anything pass from your life ever again.

In spite all that morbid heaviness, I celebrate every year with all the expected pomp and circumstance. I happily don pointy hats, count backwards from ten with unmatched revelry, and occasionally pop champagne party poppers at the night sky to remind the universe that no happy moment deserves to pass silently. In my head, it sounds a bit like this video.

Here's to you little, wonderful reminders of existential defiance.

As 2013 winds down, I'll watch as my little family busily readies themselves to yell at the television, bashfully kiss cheeks, and bellow out "HAPPY NEW YEAR!" to the entire block, whether the block cares that we're celebrating or not. In between all the fun, I'll also catch myself thinking back to a few other New Year's Eves and try to recover them from the oblivion of the past by dusting them off and rearranging them on the shelf of my mind.

When I was little, New Year's Eve was always spent with my family, much in the same way that my daughters spend theirs with me. On New Year's Eve on 1989, I set up a pathetic little refreshment table for my family of three to enjoy as we celebrated the moment. My brother, who had just turned 16 a few weeks earlier, was out and about with his car and overdue to return home.

I used my mother's brown glass dishware to set the festive mood. Nothing says the party is about to be a thrilling, rip-roaring affair like orange-brown glass tea cups. In fact, nearly every other kid I knew had a set of these dishes somewhere in the house, incomplete and almost unusable because of their fragility and almost certainly toxic level of glass tinting.

Aww yisssss. It just got real. It's party time!

I remember anxiously waiting for his arrival, along with a group of his friends. When they finally pulled into the driveway like a rough gust of wind, I had long since abandoned my post at the spread. The ungrateful teenagers didn't even care to notice my elaborate snack table as they walked to to the kitchen to procure nacho cheese chips and soda. Knowing that my brother would soon graduate and move on to his own life, I realized that night that New Year's Eve, in addition to celebrating new beginnings, also sadly commemorated the inevitable passage of time. My little family, much like the universe itself, was in constant motion outwards away from its center.

Several more years passed in which New Year's Eves were passed by yelling at the television,  at chaperoned church lock-ins, or underwhelming get togethers where I had no particular quarry to catch by midnight. Going to college had yet to deliver a truly memorable New Year's Eve until 1999. The mass hysteria surrounding Y2K had driven people underground or into disarray at the terrifying anticipation of the moment when the twentieth century and human civilization might have passed into history, permanently.

Having absolutely no plans, I found myself tagging along with a friend to his half-sister's house on the outskirts of tiny Harrah, OK. I wasn't yet 21 and I hadn't really ever been three sheets to the wind drunk before, but it seemed like that night would be as good as any to test my limits. No one knew me, save my friend, and he was drinking as fast as I was. With the courage of anonymity and a total lack of shame, we poured the better hours of the night into glasses and down our throats.

Finally, the long-awaited moment of truth neared. I could barely stand without wobbling, but everyone got up from their seats, gathered their glasses for the toast, and as usual, started yelling at the television. As soon as midnight hit, one comedic genius in attendance flipped the circuit breakers in a back room, sending the house into total darkness.

In hindsight, that practical joke was a stroke of genius. At the moment, a room full of drunken twenty-somethings was suddenly plunged into a pitch black swirl of confusion. Bodies fell over bodies. Glass flutes dropped to the floor with shattering reports. A full-figured woman with big Aqua Net hair and a neon green blouse fell onto me and pinned me on the sofa, while another person fell back onto her. Madness descended and just for a moment, I thought the world was ending. I wondered if anyone would tell my mom that I had died heroically and not as collateral damage underneath the suffocating bulk of a back page model from the 1988 Lane Bryant clothing catalog.

I didn't die, thankfully. Power was restored quickly, bits of glass were picked up, and I ended up throwing up my night into a hedge on the backside of the house. New Year's Eve, despite my best efforts, had yet to be anything but an exercise in awkwardness. Every year, it's the same thing: trying to muster up excitement for midnight in the Central time zone when I had just watched a much bigger and better moment an hour earlier in Times Square, hosted by Zombie Dick Clark.

R.I.P., America's Oldest Teenager.

Better New Year's Eves were to come in future years, as I formed my own little family. We built gingerbread houses, blew paper horns, and yelled at the television at the duly appointed time. Yet, every succeeding year took on the same final, funereal quality. Another year gone by in which I missed a few opportunities, met a few new people, and kept moving closer towards death. Another year that will not seem that far in the past when future generations marvel at the fact that I was alive and aware of my surroundings in 1989.

I suppose I'll never really get the hang of New Year's Eve. I'm probably far too introspective and hypersensitive to let the moment pass any way but mournfully. I hate saying goodbye and I hate it even more when I see glittering, brightly lit reminders that time is marching forward without ceasing. I'm still holding out hope, though. Maybe this year will be different. Maybe not.

As 2013 passes into memory, we'll all probably spend the last few seconds like most Americans do: counting backwards from ten while yelling at the television. We'll mark off another year and another trip around the sun. Some people will be very proud of the year they've had and others will be glad such a long, difficult year is in the rear-view mirror.

In a moment like this, where the passage of time is beheld with more anticipation and reverence than at almost any other time, I'm reminded of one of my favorites lines from one of my favorite novels. In The Sound and the Fury, when given his grandfather's watch, Quentin's father tells him that "I give it to you not that you may remember time, but that you might forget it now and then for a moment and not spend all your breath trying to conquer it." Time catches us all in the end, even if we break the hands off the clock like the ill-fated Quentin Compson tried to do. There will be a New Year's Eve in the future that passes with one less familiar voice yelling at the television. This will continue on until all of tonight's festive voices eventually fall forever silent and a wholly new throng of voices are yelling happily in their place.

Perhaps this year will be different, though. Perhaps this year we could surrender more of our precious minutes in an effort to forget about time. Perhaps by falling out of time's endlessly clicking, mechanical grasp for a moment, we could stop trying to conquer the unconquerable. Perhaps, instead of yelling at the television, we could relish the unmeasured spaces without worry and yell joyously into the face of the indifferent universe that we not only lived, but lived well.

It's a nice thought, anyway. Happy New Year, everyone! Don't drive drunk if you've been drinking.

On Weighing More Than a Duck

If there was one particular attribute I possessed as a college student, it was a propensity to weigh in too often. I would have much rather been the best writer, the most insightful, or the most well-read, but those weren't my strengths. I'm a talker. I think quickly and I form conclusions with considerable speed, which inevitably led to sharing those conclusions if no one else wished to speak up. I couldn't really help it. After a professor asked a discussion question, most of my classmates would sit quietly, even in certain grad school seminars. The silence hanging in the air would electrify my mind into voicing a position.

Sometimes, I wouldn't even actually support the position I presented. Being a competent devil's advocate was as exciting as being the voice of insight. When a free exchange of ideas occurs, I'm irresistibly inclined to join in the discussion. I used to become embroiled in facebook discussions, laced with bluster and ignorant fallacy. I've learned my lesson there and now most of mpackaged but fierce exchanges take place with strangers on Reddit. Now that I lead a great many discussions with unwilling, captive participants, I've learned to better obscure and mute my own personal position of a topic when necessary.

I've been reticent to weigh in on the fracas surrounding Duck Dynasty patriarch Phil Robertson and his candid comments in an interview with GQ. Over the last week, I've watched unproductive arguments unfold between politically-opposed friends and passive-aggressive status updates appear about knowing who to unfriend or unfollow because of the controversy. I enjoy listening to a vibrant debate as much as I used to enjoy classroom discussions as a student,  yet there's something troubling about this controversy and, by extension, these contemporary conceptions of free speech.

Before I go any further, I'm going to take a page from the book of an earlier incarnation of myself and explicitly state my position on the issue. I simultaneously support both gay equality and Phil Robertson's right to consider homosexuality immoral. In fact, I support a strong set of protections for freedom of thought, speech, and association. I believe that a secular, democratically-oriented republic should have a permissive and inclusive attitude towards individual freedom and the free exchange of ideas. I believe the same constitutional protections for the free practice of religion are philosophically analogous to the same proposed protections for sexual orientation.

I also believe that Phil Robertson's inability to delicately articulate his point of view is more indicative of passive bigotry on his part than it is a lack of polish and refinement. That being said, accusations of hate speech should be saved for the egregious offenders, not those who are simply unvarnished or unaware of the effect of their words on others. 

The new Pope's overtures towards relatively progressive political perspectives is a clever masking of the fact that, all other things being equal, the Pope still believes that atheists and gay folks are in desperate need of spiritual rehabilitation. He's better at covering his iron-fisted morality with a velvet glove than Phil Robertson, but they live on the same planet in the solar system of ideologies.

It's an unresolved problem for modern Christians to consider that love, but with ulterior motives, isn't an inherently insincere point of view. Proclaiming to love everyone while demanding rehabilitation is a recipe for isolation, whether it is from others or imposed on others. Conditional, contingent expressions of love aren't ethically acceptable simply because they're packaged with a big red heart on the envelope. There's still an explicit assertion that goes something like this: "I love you because I'm obligated to do so by religious authority. You're broken and I won't respect or accept you unless you admit that you're not only broken, but that I also know what's better for your life than you do. If you do both of those things and then conduct yourself according to my standards, I'll consider seeing you as someone worth sincerely loving."

That's not "loving the sinner but hating the sin." That's christofascism with a valentine, desperately trying to not be exposed for what it truly is.

On the other hand, Phil Robertson's world view and unrecognized white privilege inform his morality in such a profound way that there's no perceived tension between loving the sinner and hating the sin. From another perspective, expecting the people we love to continually improve themselves isn't insincere. A parent wants their child to be better, do better, and eventually fulfill all the promise that parent believes they hold. That parent's love isn't insincere simply by virtue of it being partially composed of expectations.

It isn't unreasonable to believe that a meth addict can't flourish without admitting their dependence and then working to purge its poisonous influence from their life. There's no ethical inconsistency to demanding that one's relationship partner be sexually and romantically exclusive to you. A partner's tendency to be unfaithful isn't a lifestyle one should be forced to accept if one believes that the only valid relationship to have is one where fidelity and respect are expected. So it goes that if an individual's moral precepts foundationally predispose them to see a certain set of behaviors as unacceptable, that individual is free to not engage in those acts.

Phil Robertson's views on homosexual inequality and harmonious, prelapsarian racial coexistence emerge from a cultural specificity that shouldn't be excluded from any evaluation of his personal moral principles. A&E knows exactly who Phil Robertson is and to claim that his personal intolerances are somehow suddenly unacceptable is flatly disingenuous, at best. This is the same network that willingly edited, approved, and aired the following segment earlier this year.

I'm not going to make any inferences beyond what the obvious dry humor attempts to exhibit, other than to say that A&E knows exactly who they're dealing with. They have from day one, as well. Having grown up around socially conservative backwoods-folks, there's nothing surprising about Robertson's views. In fact, I'm surprised they haven't been more of an issue or have been more crudely presented. There's something fishy about this whole fiasco. It's likely as not that this whole thing is a clever method for A&E and the Robertsons to part ways and boost the value of the syndication rights to the show.

That being said, his suspension isn't a free speech issue in any constitutional sense. There's very clearly no state or government pressure to censor Robertson's speech. In fact, his state's own governor, Bobby Jindal, defended Robertson's right to speak his mind. Jindal's defense was a faulty resemblance argument, but the underlying principle of tolerating uncomfortable content isn't unreasonable. A&E isn't even prohibiting Robertson from speaking his mind as often as he likes, to whoever will listen. They're simply not allowing him to use their show, which is a private business entity, as a platform upon which to air his beliefs.

Philip Nel wrote a blog explaining how academics should expect more protections for unpopular speech than Phil Robertson, due to the unique nature of their occupation. The argument could explain itself to a greater degree, but it's a blog post and it does a suitable job of explaining the difference in public pressures and production expectations between a reality TV show star and a college professor in a politically hostile state. It's the same protection of unpopular academic speech that guides part of my teaching.

I have ongoing arguments with colleagues about allowing students to make certain arguments on sensitive issues. I know several colleagues who have chosen to disallow essays on certain topics like abortion or gay marriage. That's their pedagogical choice and they're free to choose what they wish, but I allow students to write essays from their own cultural specificity. I receive essays attacking the practice of abortion, promoting gay marriage, comparing taxation to enslavement, and asserting that Obama is a villain.

I allow these topics, not because I find common ground with their premise, but due to the fact that my primary goal is to help a student articulate their own political views to a greater degree. More often than not, this directly involves an uncomfortable recognition that one's personal beliefs are hard to defend, inherently bigoted, misinformed, or are based on logical fallacies.That's not the stated purpose, though. It does happen and I'm happy to guide a student through the process of the scales falling off their eyes.

I believe that the solar system of ideologies needs socially conservative and socially progressive voices. I believe these voices need to learn to evaluate and use evidence effectively. I believe that a rich field of perspectives creates a more thriving, representative democracy. I not only want a socially conservative student to explore their views against gay marriage in an essay, I also want them to engage with another student's views in favor of abandoning the institution of marriage altogether.

I want their writing to become more articulate and thoughtful and I want them to see that there is validity in other perspectives across a wide spectrum of ethical positions. In fact, I want them to forget that ethical positions exist on a spectrum at all. They're in constant, multidimensional movement in relation to all other perspectives, just as celestial bodies are both constantly in motion and constantly affected by their proximity to other celestial bodies.

So, while I think that Phil Robertson's views are unsurprisingly conservative, I don't think that he shouldn't be allowed to express them. I do think that anyone with similar views should look at Robertson's statements as an example of inarticulate expression and I also believe that Robertson's critics shouldn't forget  that his inability to acceptably articulate his point of view is rooted in his cultural specificity. 

When we discuss historical revision and idealizing the past, I want to point to Robertson's views on Louisiana race relations as an example of how different people might not even possess the same foundational, seemingly elementary view of history. The awareness of such a perspective ideally makes us all more acutely aware of the limitations of our own perspectives.

Free speech is best wielded skillfully. Those who wield it like a crude club or a misused semiautomatic assault rifle risk undoing the protections that we're fortunate to have. Yet, the answer is not to enforce inoffensiveness through a panopticon, where everyone is afraid to truly speak their mind. We want weighty, substantive arguments that can be comprehended by a wide swath of the populace.

The way to acquire that is not by overreacting to folks like Phil Robertson. We acquire those sought-after perspectives by helping others refine their ability to articulate their own point of view, so that civil discourse is elevated enough to rise above the influence of political demagogues,  reality television personalities, and sensationalist magazine writers.

Confessions of an Unhandy Man

It’s quickly becoming the time of year when people begin thinking of elaborate, meaningful, expensive gifts that they can give another person. The spirit of love, generosity, and gratitude guides us towards video game systems, cheeky coffee mugs, early editions of favorite books, or Cosby sweaters given ironically to humorless, unappreciative recipients. Some gifts are simple and provide endless joy, like a pair of yellow Spiderman saucer sleds given to two little boys. Some are more elaborate and involve weekends away with people we love.

When I was a boy, my mother bought a junior carpenter’s workbench for me as a gift. It came with adorably kid-sized tools that, while nominally functional, were not meant for serious work. I set the workbench up in my bedroom, eagerly planning the wondrous items I’d produce with its limitless capacity. The arrhythmic, staccato tapping of my tiny hammer, coupled with the ineffective and interminable sawing generated by the miniature, plastic-handled saw thwarted my efforts. Toolboxes became unbalanced, miniature footstools. Birdhouses became horrifying lessons in the fragility of life. Thumbs were smashed and sawdust covered my low-pile bedroom carpeting in a dusting of frustration.

It was at that point, well before I had even been on this Earth for a decade, that I knew I wasn't much of a handyman. That recognition didn't stop me from trying to build new and more unsafe creations.

In high school, I went on a mission trip to Matamoros, where part of my service involved helping to frame and sheet-rock the walls of an interior room. Between the uneven cuts of wood and hammer dents in the gypsum, it was determined that I was better suited to paint the walls of the entryway. It didn't take long for my joyful carelessness to allow thick, grey enamel paint to stick in my hair and on the floor. I didn't care. I was productive and handy. I was doing the Lord's work. I was Michelangelo, by way of Tarzan, and this was my Sistine Chapel. 

Faced with the task of painting the ceiling without a ladder, I carefully arranged a set of folding chairs in just such a way that I could use them as scaffolding to reach the high corners, so long as I kept one hand on the trusses above. Eventually, It got to the point where I couldn’t safely reach all parts of the ceiling, so I devised a plan to dangle from a nearby truss, paint the remaining spots quickly while I had paint in the bristles, and drop to the ground in the knowledge that I had outsmarted my limitations. At least that’s the way it was supposed to go in my head.

My cunning plan didn’t take into account the amount of brushstrokes it would take to cover the bare spot, nor how long I could keep my hand gripped on the rough, steel truss supports. As the weight of my body transferred squarely into my left palm, I felt each burr and splinter of steel grind themselves in deeply, no doubt causing a horrifying infection. Frantically, I slashed the brush against the ceiling. Hasty strokes forced the brush to drip more of the paint down to my hand, instead of onto the ceiling and I lost my grip on its handle. As I dropped to the ground, the director of the mission came around the corner to see the mess I had made of the scene. Tiny, grey globs of paint were all over the floor, my face, and a nearby window. As his face exhibited a colossal battle between explosive anger and cultivated patience, he politely asked if I'd rather sweep the floors in a different part of the building.

My technical skill was on display once again in college, when my truck’s battery seemed to be on the verge of failure. One friend told me to pour a can of coke over the corroded terminals, which I thought sounded patently idiotic. Another friend suggested simply buying a new battery, but I knew I could revivify the old one. My brother, who had come up to visit for the day, suggested I clean the terminals with a steel brush. There are specialized tools for that task, but I discovered a much cheaper alternative in a long lump of steel wool. 

Chandler took to the task of cleaning one terminal and I thought it would be efficient and helpful to grab the other end of the steel wool and clean the other terminal simultaneously. A few seconds later, his girlfriend alerted us that smoke was rising from front of the battery. I looked down, saw glowing, burning steel, and suddenly remembered everything I knew about electrical conductivity. Thankfully, that task only took a few seconds and I intelligently removed my end from the terminal as my brother began to justifiably panic in a storm of profanity and swatting at sparks on his jeans.

In my adult years, the evidence against me continues to pile up. A cat condo emerged from a former bunk bed frame, so overbuilt and unnecessarily heavy that it was more functional as monument to my ineptitude than it was a functional piece of pet furniture. Decks were installed, but somehow tilted and creaked if one's weight was transferred to a precise spot. A laptop computer was rendered useless by futzing around with it in the process of trying to clean it. Pool leaks were patched with enough silicone sealant to make Pamela Anderson jealous and zip ties were lasting, proud solutions to problems better solved by spending $15 at the hardware store. Sometimes, I am able to outsmart my limitations, sometimes not.

Today is my mother's 61st birthday and I love her very much, even if she loves Barry Manilow and radishes. Even if my personal decision making abilities are vexing and I don't see her as often as she'd like, I'm sure she loves me too. She was about the age I am now when she bought that junior carpenter’s workbench for me. While it's hard to wrap my head around that chronological fact, it's even harder to remember all the gifts she bought me over the years and if any of them were as educational and character building as that one.

The workbench, ignoring its role as the scene of my earliest mechanical failings, was a fine gift and I am grateful to my mother for purchasing it, even a quarter of a century later. The gift itself wasn't what was important, though. It was a chunky, ugly contraption made of particle board that warped and cracked when shifted around. What was important were the traits that the gift awakened and nurtured in me.

In spite of a hundred sliced thumbs, scuffed knuckles, and defeated trips to the hardware store, I still believe that I'm capable of building and repairing items. In spite of mountainous evidence to the contrary, I still believe that I can succeed if I try to solve the problem in a different and more inventive way. That sense of curiosity and optimism, given by my mother through a junior carpenter’s workbench, is the kind of gift we should all look to give to our loved ones this holiday season.

In between the Scylla and Charybdis of shallow consumerism and thoughtless obligation, perhaps we might stop and contemplate what traits our gifts might nurture in the minds of their intended recipients. There's nothing wrong with a shiny toy that inspires flights of imagination. There's nothing wrong with a sweet stocking stuffer that imbues a temporary sense of satisfaction and well-being. Somewhere amongst those items, there's also room for a gift, like a junior carpenter's workbench, that might awaken something grand and lasting.

Happy Birthday, Mom. Thanks for all the gifts and kindness over the years. Happy Thanksgiving and safe travels to the rest of you out there.

Veterans, Prairies, and Much Needed Vacations

Here in my home office, I have a series of random items hanging on the wall. They're collected from experiences I've had or items I've been given over the years. I have a heavy, wooden tennis racket from the 70's that was purchased at a garage sale to satisfy the room's required kitsch factor. I have a few of my youngest daughter's drawings posted to give her confidence and pride in her abilities.

My M.A.diploma, which sits in a plain black frame, simultaneously reminds me of both personal successes and bittersweet missteps. There's also a framed group photo of my maternal grandfather's Army company before they shipped off to fight in World War II. Near it is a frame displaying his medals and patches from his time as a paratrooper in the 82nd Airborne. He's been gone for well over a decade now, but echoes remain in my mind and in the world around me.

My recollections of my grandfather aren't well-suited to the kinds of proud, lionizing rhetoric I'll read or hear about today. He was a retired, confused man by the time I knew him and most of his days were spent drinking, reflecting, shooting gophers from his back porch, or underlining certain phrases in copies of National Geographic and the Reader's Digest.

It's hard to imagine him as a young man dropping from the sky, heralding the death of Axis soldiers in Italy and the Netherlands. In a box in my office, I have his war-time Gideon Bible. It's beaten, aged, and has the names and apartment numbers of women he knew, in the biblical sense, while fighting in Italy. He lived a long and complicated life, filled with contradictions, defeats, and victories.

Yet, his medals rest in their display case on my wall, reminding me that he overcame a struggle that required far more bravery than I've ever had to muster for anything. So, on a day like today where we're meant to honor all who served our country in the military, I think of his service and how his extraordinarily fortunate survival is directly responsible for my existence, not only as a free American, but also as a human being.

As is usual, I try spend a bit of time before most holidays to reflect upon what the holiday means to society, what it means to me, and how divergent those meanings might be. I don't know if most people do this, but I suspect that they don't. I try to believe the best about the people around me, so I'd like to believe that  we're all constantly trying to align our perceptions of the present with our interpretations of the past. It just so happens that a holiday provides a more definite window of opportunity through which we can defenestrate our ponderings.

My ponderings took me to the internet, to find out the history of the holiday. As it happens, the Congressional Representative responsible for the bill that created our modern version of Veterans Day hailed from Emporia, Kansas. I say this because I drove through Emporia twice this weekend on my way to an Iron & Wine concert in Kansas City. Aside from being the home of a few famous people like R. Lee Ermey and Coach Dean Smith, as well as a small college, Emporia also calls itself the "Front Porch to the Flint Hills."

 The Flint Hills of Kansas. I don't see a front porch. Or much of anything.

As I drove through the Flint Hills, both coming and going from Kansas City, I was stunned by the starkness of the landscape. The absence of trees or traces of humanity made the land seem otherworldly, as if it were some sort of moonscape image transmitted by a NASA rover, ten million miles away from home. I've seen this landscape before, in the Tallgrass Prairie Preserve in Osage County, just west of my hometown. I'm sure I was more focused on the bison or whomever was with me in the car at the time to see the beauty of this part of the country.

Yet here it was, still and silent outside the window of my fleeting automobile, appearing to have been unspoiled by the avaricious persistence of certain kinds of pioneers. When I returned to my house, I read more about the Flint Hills. Geologically, they're beyond ancient. They're largely unspoiled because the land is unsuitable for farming, though some small patches of agriculture were present as I drove through. 

More importantly, the Flint Hills and the Tallgrass Prairie Preserve are worth beholding because they've survived. Most of the Great Plains looked this way when settlers arrived here with their plows. Natural grassfires would scorch the landscape, burning nearly a third of it every year. More than that, the massive fires also gave the land the possibility to grow and flourish. In that austere beauty, a survivor's narrative appeared. Despite the fact that an abysmal interstate bisects the land, it persists and resists. It would seem that destruction, survival, and revivification were literally infused into the grass and soil.

It is a veteran of its own great war and it bears its own scars to prove its courage. So little of it remains, much like the ever-decreasing number of beings that are veterans of my grandfather's war. We take time to memorialize their service in eternal granite, knowing that it was a brave and stunning decision to put themselves in harm's way. We've taken efforts to set aside tracts of land as memorials or open-air cathedrals celebrating the survival and resurrection of a threatened place. We honor the inimitable beauty of their service and their survival.

Time will carry us into the future and subsequent generations will undoubtedly lose any sort of personal connection to veterans of certain wars. Their struggles, if not properly remembered and protected, will evaporate into the nebulous haze of our collective forgetting. That's what today's holiday is meant to struggle against. In my last post , I was thankful for the ability to forget. Today, I'm thankful that other people have worked diligently to ensure that I remember.

And in the spirit of that, I'll leave you with Iron & Wine's cover of New Order's "Love Vigilantes." Its spare, unadorned arrangement creates in my mind a nexus between the Flint Hills' survivor's narrative, my grandfather's heedless bravery, and the wondrous, delicate magic that allows me to never forget why both of those matter. So there, on my wall, his medals will remain, as commonplace tributes to uncommon courage. Have safe travels out there. If you happen upon scenery that triggers reflection, be sure to keep the car between the lines.

On Being Thankful for Dungeons at Halloween

When I was a younger person, I had more time for inane conversations about favorite movies, great restaurants, and other personal preferences. I'd stay up on the phone, talking to a girl whose interest in me was already fading, trying to convince her that I was unassailably cool because I was a night owl. In my estimation at the time, that kind of preference was what could accurately predict personal compatibility.

To be sure, those likes and dislikes can tip the scales when one's mind is torn. They're not nearly so important as I once thought, though. I say all this because my daughters are both in that age range now. Technology has provided me with previously unimagined insight into their conversations, as their texts, tweets, and messages bounce around the cloud at home. Checking those communiques are part of my parenting regimen.

Just like when I was young, their conversations are sodden with feelings they're ill-equipped to articulate. Instead of being able to express genuine interest in another person, a complicated dance routine emerges in which superficial flirting or silly non sequiturs become required steps in an elaborate pairing ritual. Wearing the right clothes and knowing the right lingo isn't enough. One has to be fluent in an array of discourses to navigate the shallow, muddy waters of teenage relationships.

In that same effort, I had developed a series of monologues that staked the limits of my particular personality. One of my favorites was a conversation about one's favorite time of day. Like anything created by a human, the monologue was graceless and awkward in its early stages. Periodic refinement and adjustment led to sentences that were loaded with more pathos and innuendo. You probably think I'm crazy, but you're probably guilty of the same thing.

At the core of that shameless performance was a bit of truth. I do have a favorite time of day: It's night. When I was little, I'd lie in bed for hours, staring out my bedroom window at the street light on the corner of Waverly and State. I loved the soft glow of the light and the way that it streamed in through my curtains. I loved lying in bed and listening to the radio, drowning my brain in terrible late 80's pop music until I drifted off. The older I was, the more baroque my thoughts became.

I dreamt up scenarios where I'd win some poor girl's heart or where I'd outsmart some meathead bent on humiliating me. I concocted lushly detailed scenarios in which I was the protagonist in a gritty action film and only my determination and incorruptible sense of ethics would win the day. The more the years passed, the more visceral and vivid these moments became. Somewhere along the way, women and a misguided attempt at fiction writing became involved. Still later, low paying jobs at odd hours of the night forced me to enjoy the still, calm hours to an even greater degree.

Each night's ending has its own unyielding weight, forever flattening out the carelessly unfolded day. The effervescent, insistent demands of our electrical souls soften, resolving themselves to wait for a more opportune moment upon which to seize our attention. Even when awake and ostensibly working, the absence of the garish sun gives liberty to relax one's anxieties.

Light scattered faintly, around corners and through windows, illuminates only because no other lights outshine its subtle, momentary addition. Street lights are a wonderful example of this. In the daytime, they're virtually useless and unhelpful. Yet the sparing amber light guards against the veil of nothingness that makes nighttime mysterious and even terrifying. There's a certain reassuring safety in that cone of light, even if it cannot hold back the dark veil that has descended over everything else.

The moon is an even better example. It glides through the heavens, unnoticed in the day, while casting silver dust in concert with the veil of night. It's light causes what was once dark and uncertain to once again have a detectable form and shape. At the low-paying, overnight job, I spent hours sitting on a massive roof, in the open air, watching the moon slowly sail across the sky. On nights with a full moon, the sight was nothing short of hypnotic. An hour would pass between calls for my presence and in that hour, I'd intimately study the moon's face and be spellbound in awe of its ancient magnificence.

At this time of year, when the night air has a pleasant chill, the gloom of Halloween turns every unattributed footstep into a prelude to a grisly murder. Yet, it is the same night as what appears after sunset in April and its sweet embrace promises the death of one moment in exchange for the birth of another. It is a deal I'm compelled to make by the most irresistible natural forces. More than anything else, the best part of the night is the chance for our minds to discard the burdens of the day.

Of course, not all thoughts should be laid down and forgotten. Important engagements, tender instances of affection, and the collected grains of wisdom that might fall into our laps all need to be stored and retained. Those are the moments that collectively become a life and those are the thoughts that populate the undetectable space in our minds we call a consciousness.

I'm also thankful for the moments that wash away from my present awareness. Human brains absorb an impressive amount of information in a single day. Much of it is petty, instinctual, or ephemeral. If our minds couldn't lay some of it down, we'd careen into insanity in no time at all. I'm given to metaphorical flights of fancy and I'm tempted to think of these thoughts as footprints in the sand as a wave is rolling in, but I know those thoughts don't always disappear.

Deep in the recesses of our consciousness, there is a place to keep these thoughts. Though it isn't something we actively consider, our minds have a deep basement into which these thoughts and experiences are herded. An oubliette awaits, with a secret door and no means of escape, silently receiving the white noise of our already cacophonous days. It's a dungeon of sorts and a place of forgetting or letting go to never see again. It's morbid, dark, and absolutely effective.

I still have a series of personal preferences that differentiate me from all other people, but I no longer trot them out as evidence of my inherent value as a person. My daughters are forming their own monologues, which will be refined and improved until they're finally seen as inferior to the actual business of knowing someone. I still love the night and I'm still thankful for the ability to forget. I know one day I'll wish that wasn't the case. For now, it's a welcome reprieve.

Have a happy Halloween out there! Don't eat unwrapped candy and make time, at the end of the night, to appreciate your mind. Marvel at the fact that it ushers your consciousness into the next day by allowing it to forget, to move forward, and to prepare for another day of collecting thoughts and discarding them once again.

Requiem for a Friend

Each of us inhabit our own small world and all of our worlds are constantly overlapping. It's as much a miracle of metaphysics to walk amongst each other's worlds as it is to lose oneself, at the exclusion of all others, in the solipsistic solitude of one's horizons. I've written about how individuals interact with others more than once and I'm equally guilty of navel gazing reflections doubling as posts. This week's post lies somewhere in between, overlapping common experiences while undoubtedly floating on a stream of contemplation.

It's been a long week, overloaded with pressing responsibilities and unnecessary burdens. I'm glad it's over. Everyone has these sorts of weeks, where a person is always just a step behind or a few paces off the beaten trail. It's comforting, in a way, to know that this week's feelings of sturm und drang aren't unique to me. Someone else will undeservedly inherit the burden that I hope I've successfully cast off.

When in this sort of funk, some people reassure themselves with joyful thoughts of a better tomorrow. Others share saccharine-sweet pictures of otters, koalas, pugs, or other adorable critters. Some settle into the sofa and watch comedies to lighten the mood. In any case, it's the sense of well-being that follows such activities that allows a person to feel better.

At other times, wallowing in the funk isn't as bad as it sounds. When a fog of melancholy descends, erasing perspective and social instinct, lingering in the haze can be beautiful. Aimlessly driving at night, which used to be a favorite activity of mine, became less of a means of transporting myself from point A to B and more of a means of transporting myself from one confused state of mind to another, less worried one.

Being lost in melancholy can, of course, be very destructive. Anyone who has lingered too long can attest to its proclivity to act as a quagmire. Anyone who has lingered there can also tell you that at certain times, one's mind needs to be as lost in heaviness as it can be in the lightness of being alive.

There's no music I know that sounds better in one of these heavy hazes than the music of Elliott Smith. If you're already a fan, you know that his music isn't just good for sadbastard moments, but it does take on an entirely different tone when one's soul is leaden. Other music is too hopeful to allow one to pause and reflect, while some music is too depressing to bear for any appreciable amount of time. More importantly, the intimate, highly personal lyrics and the ethereal nature of his voice lend themselves well to being still and silent in the face of one's own storm.

Today also happens to be the ten year anniversary of his death. I'm not interested in debating the particulars of his passing, as it was a sad event punctuating the struggle-filled life of a person I didn't truly know. What I am interested in thinking about is how, a decade after his death, I'm still so deeply moved by his music. If you haven't listened to any of the links above, click play below and see why I'm making such a fuss about him.

I'm certain that only my closest friends care about why certain musicians or songs resonate so deeply for me and explaining that isn't even the point. Being lost in my own melancholy-fogged world is inscrutable to any other soul, as it should be. But I do have more than a few friends whose appreciation of Elliott Smith converges with mine, often for the same reasons.

You see, it doesn't matter how deeply lost in our own funk we think we might be. Our worlds are always overlapping. It isn't just that by reading this, part of me has spilled over into you. It's that by hearing these songs that have been enjoyed by a million other people before, we realize that we're constantly being filled with the same substances as every other person. The mixtures and blends might vary wildly, but the same streams that poured themselves into you also poured into me and everyone else that you know.

Though the particulars of our own storms and stresses might have never emerged before, there is nothing new under the sun. There is nothing you're burdened by that hasn't been borne by another before you. I say that, not to flatten out the distinctiveness of our experiences, but to put them in concert with one another. Around us, every day, a symphony of diverse emotional states harmonizes into the grand, tragic song of humanity. We do our best to ignore its persistent presence in the air. We feel driven to inflate the importance of our own struggles, above all others, to drown out the sounds of difference drifting through.

Yet, there it is. The songs of a chronically depressed singer/songwriter echo in the ears of a million listeners a decade after his death, reminding us all that we're highly distinct beings, paradoxically constituted by the same fountain of shared experiences. If, during this week, you see the person who has been forced to undeservedly shoulder a heaviness like that which I cast off, lend a hand. Their troubles might not look quite the same as yours, but they're made of the same substances and they'll weigh on your shoulders in due time. Perhaps the same friend you help today will be the friend to put a shoulder under another's burden next week. In time, a shoulder will appear alongside yours, to help bear what burdens you must.

And if you like what you heard above, I promise you won't be disappointed by searching for more of his music.

It's Time to Say Bon Voyage to Columbus Day

In the year 2013, the United States of America will celebrate ten federal holidays. Most of these holidays commemorate an important value or idea, such as paying respect to veterans and fallen soldiers, our nation's independence, or the contributions laborers have made in building our society. You can read my thoughts on Labor Day here. I'm not intentionally trying to establish a series of blog posts motivated by a holiday induced reflection, but an internet meme encountered earlier this week gave me pause to think about the holiday we observe today.

The Oatmeal is a humor site that has given the hoi polloi such memorable articles like How to Use a Semicolon , My Dog, the Paradox, and my personal favorite, 10 Words You Need to Stop Misspelling. Earlier this week, the individuals behind those posts also shared a comical tirade against Christopher Columbus. Feel free to read it if you like, but anyone with more than a passing interest in history probably knows most of what the post contains.

Columbus is presented as a bumbling, greed-fueled, genocidal madman. There's some historical basis for such a claim and the post's point about rejecting Columbus's achievement is insightful, if not a bit too tongue-in-cheek for such a heavy topic. Ultimately, the idea is offered that we shouldn't celebrate Columbus Day if it's to honor the dead mariner.

Growing up, the need for such a holiday was tied to the presentation of Columbus as a courageous hero of human exploration. Even if it's true that intelligent people thought the world was round or that Columbus wasn't the first European to land in the Americas, the boldness of such a gambit evokes thoughts of humanity's propensity to abandon fear in search of answers from the unknown.

Every semester when teaching a certain essay unit, I ask students to describe what exploration means. Some point to Mars and our efforts there as a reasonable definition, while others point to psychonauts exploring the innerspace of human consciousness, where they arrive at new truths and thus see the world anew. Exploration motivates people to seek out new medicine to fight diseases, while also motivating others to break social barriers and unjust laws. Columbus Day could celebrate all of those human characteristics, but it seems like a stretch to say that.

Like it does most things, new knowledge disabused me of lionizing Columbus. Even if we give Columbus credit for the brave journey, there's simply far too much evidence that his ethics were questionable, at best. Even if we somehow discount the evidence against him as the jealousy of rivals, Columbus's arrival heralded a new era of conquest, exploitation, greed, and genocide. European kingdoms became bloated transoceanic empires by gorging themselves on gold, raw materials, and the labor of slaves cruelly ripped from West Africa and the Americas. Columbus's arrival opened the door to a global imbalance of power that still threatens the future of humanity.

Simply put, the effects of Columbus's discovery are too tragic and destructive to warrant celebration. Now, the folks over at The Oatmeal proposed using a contemporary of Columbus as the new central figure of the holiday. While Las Casas is a better figure to promote, I wonder why we need to even elevate a benevolent, White European at all in this context.

The discovery and subjugation of the New World is a chapter in Western Civilization that is an excellent lesson in our industry and cruelty. Neither can be separated from the other and though I'm a fortunate inheritor of certain advantages derived from the settlement of the New World, any holiday that ignores the death and suffering of millions, just to honor their conquerors, seems unworthy of remembrance.

If the holiday is meant to celebrate humanity's burning desire to explore, then why attach it to any one specific individual? Why not attach it to an achievement that hasn't yet been sullied by genocide or cultural extermination? I've wondered this for quite some time and the solution I've come up with, at least for Americans, is extraordinarily obvious.

We should celebrate Lunar Landing Day instead of Columbus Day.

 There's still a few kinks to work out with the memory rhyme.

If Congress ever returns to work, it seems simple enough to promote a bill than swaps one federal holiday for another. Every year in the United States, on July 21st, we could celebrate humanity's first steps onto another celestial body. It possesses all the same characteristics as Columbus's voyage, but to an even greater degree.

The holiday could be used as a celebration of STEM-based subject matter or humanity's ever-widening body of knowledge of the physical universe. Beyond that, it's one American achievement not explicitly tainted by war, suffering, or assassination. It's an achievement that no other nation can claim, so why not celebrate something positive our technology has accomplished?

Even more, Lunar Landing Day celebrates the limitless potential of humanity. Our competitiveness might have driven the moonshot, but the holiday's focus would be on how we can motivate each other to achieve greater things, to believe in a greater future, and to ponder what only a select few humans have been able to behold: that our world is bound together as a whole, not as an assemblage of distinct parts.

 One family photo that wasn't ruined by your obnoxious, blond little brother.

Our fate, as a species, is tied to our understanding of our rarity and diversity. There aren't any other known intelligent civilizations to compare ourselves against. There's only us and we only have this small, water-covered planet to share amongst ourselves.

Petty differences and politically-motivated military conflicts tell a large part of humanity's story to this point, but we're also a species that strives towards greater ideas. We're incredibly slow at enacting such ideas, but our vision of a better, more harmonious world is only limited by the pessimism of those clinging to the power structures of the past. Our imagination and capacity to courageously explore know no boundaries.

Columbus Day is burdened by the effects of the conquest of the New World. It's a holiday whose time has passed and whose namesake is increasingly unworthy of lionization. It's also a holiday that overlooks the suffering of millions to honor the achievements of the few. It's time to celebrate a new holiday.

Lunar Landing Day isn't specifically designed to celebrate Neil Armstrong, NASA, or the American empire. It's designed to celebrate the bravery of human exploration, the courage of seeking knowledge from the unknown, and the grand possibilities that our shared future contains. It's a time to ponder what we're doing to make our world better, more unified, and more aware of our shared destiny.


So today, when someone sarcastically wishes you a happy Columbus Day or lays claim to your coffee in the spirit of Columbus Day, laugh off their bad sense of humor and tell them it's time to stick Columbus Day's flag right up their... Better yet, just tell them that it's time to swap in a new federal holiday.

Maybe next year, on July 21st, we'll be able to look up at the moon on a sultry July evening and see a reminder of humanity's potential, shining down on us and inspiring greatness. Maybe we'll have a few beers and try to fire a bottle rocket at it. Either way, it sounds a hell of a lot better than feigning interest in an unworthy, depressing holiday in the middle of October.

Admitting You Have a Problem Is the First Step

They say it takes all sorts to make a world and surely the vast gamut of human personalities testifies to this. In any given day, you're likely to encounter a dizzying array of different people. Whether its the shy, introverted bookworm in the office next door, the high-spirited pixie who never seems to miss a beat, or the lumbering, moody, malcontented neckbeard in front of you in line, the parade of personalities keeps life varied and interesting. Over time, we come to appreciate the strange mosaic of odd people surrounding us at all times because of the infinite diversity they represent.

With infinite diversity also comes the potential for encounters with personality types that are a bit harder to handle than others. This article, in a semi-serious way, highlights a study that partially explains why certain test subjects expressed dislike for environmentalists and feminists. To be fair, I think the takeaway from that article isn't that environmentalists and feminists are unlikable. The article's primary claim is that people shy away from the politically passionate, regardless of their particular stripe or creed. Most people are simply uncomfortable with aggressive activists for change because of our herd mentality.

There's one personality type we run into far too often that can ruin our day faster than a smug environmentalist or send us off in a huff of offended recognition of misogyny quicker than a feminist: The asshole.

We all know this type of person, but what specifically defines an asshole? Is it the self-assured arrogant opining that marks this nuisance? Is it the crude, often nasty sense of humor rooted in deep self-loathing? Are assholes just myopically-focused on a goal and could care less about who they have to step on to reach that goal? To find out, let's put on our junior investigator fedora and go to Google.

Urban Dictionary defines the term as "your current boss", "someone being arrogant, rude, obnoxious, or just a total dickhead", and "The worst kind of person. You cannot fully construct a meaning that fully encompasses what this vicious insult means. If you're an asshole, you are disgusting, loathsome, vile, distasteful, wrathful, belligerent, agoraphobic, and more. Assholes are human fecal matter. They are the lowest of the low. They transcend all forms of immorality." Nice, enthusiastic start, especially with the thoroughness of the last entry. I'm a big fan of flaunting impressive vocabulary, but there's surely a more stable, sensible definition out there.

There's an oddly instructive song by Denis Leary, detailing a variety of scenarios in which one can observe the asshole in the wild. He points out so many scenarios, actions, and instances that it can be applied to almost anyone. Well, anyone not fondling a saline implant while smoking a cigar. That's crossing into new, uncharted territory. Still, we search on for more elucidation.

Ah, wikipedia, the last desperate bastion of frantic, essay writing college students. To be totally honest, this is as much information as I'd ever need to fully understand the etymology, usage, and contexts of the word. It's truly educational. Be that as it may, wikipedia's definition describes people who are "viewed as stupid, incompetent, unpleasant, or detestable," which seemingly covers the term well enough.

If there's one thing Google does well, it's overload. So, I found myself drowning in a thousand variations on the theme of "asshole." There have been attempts through academic research to quantify and study the traits that seem to typically occur in people we deem to be assholes. Linguist Geoffrey Nunberg even wrote an entire book tracing the origins and the implications of the word itself. It isn't simply a socially constructed pejorative for people we don't like. It's apparently a type and it is one that possesses traits that often lead to success, from certain points of view.

So, how does one know if one is an asshole? Surely, we all want to know, right? It's no fun being the designated arch-asshole of your particular cast of Friends, is it? Surely, knowledge is power and power, in this case, is the opportunity to steer one's ship in a new, less detestable direction. With that in mind, here are several traits that seem to be coterminous with being an asshole. I'll kindly leave Nickelback fans and owners of Hummer H2s off the list.

1. Assholes are terrible listeners and excellent liars.

Is your mind always somewhere else when others are talking to you? Assholes don't mind engaging in conversations, but they aren't really listening. They're simply waiting for their turn to speak, plotting and contemplating their next brilliant or hilarious statement. Assholes are the kind of people that callously minimize your concerns or downplay your perspective in a discussion. They reduce your carefully thought out positions to oversimplified straw-man arguments. They're less concerned with reaching consensus on an issue, focusing instead on how to convince everyone to go along with their own personal wishes. Because of these self-serving, egocentric tendencies, assholes also concoct highly persuasive lies to mask their true intentions or hide their unethical behavior, which leads us to the second trait.

2. Assholes think only of their own happiness.

If there's one seemingly universal characteristic that I encountered in this search, it's this one. Assholes do whatever makes them feel best, all the time, regardless of the consequences. Instead of finishing a project, they nap or fool around with a diversion. When asked to complete a task, they won't unless they see some sort of personal benefit. When given a tremendous head start in life, they fritter it away capriciously. If that weren't enough, assholes seem to acquire a greater number of sexual partners over their lifetime, due to this impulsive, egocentric mentality. There's a sense in which someone with an opportunistic devil may care attitude embodies the id in all of us, which can seem superficially attractive. It's why Lester from American Beauty suddenly became so attractive right before he was killed. Don't be confused, however. An asshole is only concerned about their own feelings and desires. You're a means to an end. The lying and secret-keeping are just part of it. They want what they want and your feelings mean precisely nothing to them.

3. Assholes are convinced of their own rightness and that they're surrounded by morons.

We've all known that person, motivated by narcissism and political hackery, who firmly  and defensively believes that they've stumbled across the precise formula to set this country on the right course. Complicated problems, such as illegal immigration or conflict in the Middle East, can be solved by "building an alligator-filled moat" or "turning Iran into a sheet of glass." Their rants usually begin with "The thing no one understands is..." and they fervently, legitimately believe that their colleagues and peers are incompetent, mentally deficient morons. This point of view of others makes it easy to bully or intellectually bludgeon other human beings, often baselessly, but never without exceptional confidence. Whatever the situation, assholes always know the right course of action and must tell you how you've been doing it wrong all this time. Feminists call this "mansplaining," but it's annoying no matter what appellation it bears.

4. Assholes are relentlessly rude to others, on purpose, often for humor's sake.

There's a big difference between having a few crude laughs or good-natured ribbing with friends and habitually and hurtfully mocking others. Assholes detect another person's greatest weakness, often with astounding rapidity and accuracy, only to exploit it for laughs. They make fun of everyone they know, even their best friends and significant others, if only to trigger a few laughs over lunch with a different friend. Assholes aren't just sarcastic. They're serially and sociopathically sarcastic. Internet trolls, the Westboro Baptist Church, and the cast of Jackass all fit right in with this trait.

5. Assholes usually have a long list of enemies and a small circle of friends.

Assholes have a body count. By that, I don't literally mean they kill folks. Instead, there's a long line of people who have had enough of the asshole or who have been royally and exquisitely screwed over by the asshole. Assholes have exes that absolutely hate them and assholes tend to categorically hate their own exes. Because of these tendencies, assholes don't fare well in maintaining friendships. Whether it's impulsive, self-gratifying behavior that wrecks a relationship or just too  much thinly veiled verbal abuse, assholes are simply people that aren't well-liked.

So, what do you do if these traits apply to you? Admitting you have a problem is the first step. Most assholes would rather drown in a sea of cognitive dissonance rather than face up to the problem, so knowing you're an asshole is half the battle. Now, I could drone on into boredom, reciting self-help manuals and pithy internet aphorisms about being more sensitive to others.

I'm not going to do that. Not yet anyway. Consider yourself lucky. For now.

What I'm stuck on is how many of those actually apply to me. You see, the genesis of this particular post was that both my spouse and one of my best friends declared last week to me that I can be a real asshole. I laughed it off at first, but my omphaloskeptical self continued coming back to the question of whether I'm really an asshole or not.

In a last ditch effort to rescue my self-worth from the sulfurous fires of assholery, I stumbled upon a silly internet quiz.You can click Here to take a self-test to determine just how much of an asshole you might be. I'm not going to vouch for the scientific metrics used to build the test, but the questions generally seem designed to force you to choose between a two very clear options. Your experience with the test might vary.

I scored a "14", which means I'm a "borderline certified asshole." So that's it. Time to wear the scarlet letter.

I'm an asshole.

I'm a terrible listener, at times. I can be very good at fibbing and misleading folks. I have an impulsive streak that motivates me to stupid things like blog at 2:00 a.m. when I should be sleeping or working. My Facebook timeline, especially right now in the midst of the government shutdown, does inspire a sense of intellectual superiority over a particular meme slinging sector of friends. I'm famously, frequently rude for humor's sake, even if I'm the only guy in the room laughing. This might even be the most clear, compelling evidence. Ask any of my dear friends who tolerate me and they'll all attest to being deeply offended by my humor at some point or another. Ask former friends as well. There's certainly a long line of ex-girlfriends, lost friends, and family members that just don't engage with me anymore, for whatever reason.

But once again, it suddenly occurs to me that many of us are guilty of the same transgressions. We've all paid less than our best attention, told a lie, and taken advantage of another while not caring about the consequences. There's not one of us that doesn't feel superior to a particular group of people and we all have a list, some longer than others, of people who don't desire contact with us in the future.

Sure, admitting you have a problem is the first step, but perhaps maybe the second and only other step is to strive to be a little less of an asshole every day. Be a better listener or be less dishonest. Think of the happiness of others once in a while, instead of your own or try to imagine that you're not categorically better than everyone else. Perhaps find a way to tell your closest friends how much you appreciate their tolerance and maybe, just maybe, try to reel back in that sarcasm-soaked zinger you've been perfecting since last Thursday.

Nope. Too far. One day at a time. My daughters are only going to live with me for just a few more years. I can't miss this golden opportunity to lovingly mock their use of the word "SWAGGGG!" in polite conversation. I am what I am. I'm an asshole.

Have a great week out there!

Underemployed and Inarticulate

Earlier this week, an academic acquaintance of mine made a passing joke about a plot for a new television drama, parodying Breaking Bad, that follows "the story of an uninsured English adjunct who gets a terminal diagnosis and then starts cranking out really bad free verse that no one will publish. He'll die in the first season, underemployed and inarticulate." It takes being within the adjunct ranks to appreciate the subtle, stinging humor behind such lampooning. Such a boring, repetitive plot would be abysmally terrible viewing for anyone not suffering from some sort of long-term memory disorder. But I'm also a tremendous aficionado of scathing, self-deprecating humor. It's the primary reason why I love Woody Allen films and it's the most consistent critique of myself that my closest friends vocalize to my face.

While trying to justify my lot in life through comically bad poetry would make for absurd black comedy (think Louie without the reprieve of occasional stand-up sequences), the universe also delivered a much darker plot to my virtual doorstep this week. Margaret Mary Vojtko, an 83 year-old adjunct in French at Duquesne University, died on September 1st after a 25-year university teaching career. Normally, such a story wouldn't be cause for much notice, but Vojtko's story is different because of the conditions of her life just before death. Despite her long service to her university employer, she died penniless, trying to recover from cancer while on the verge of being turned over to social services. With no benefits and no retirement, she was virtually homeless while still serving as a college professor. You can read more about her story here. It's a sad affair, filled with a stunning lack of gratitude or an abundance of pointless hand-wringing, depending on one's personal perspective. It also reminds me of one possible fate, were I to stay the current course and sail onward into the sunset.

Her story motivates parts of my soul to rise up with the other lumpenprofessoriat and demand more gratitude from our employers. It also motivates another part of me to pull up the tent stakes I've carefully hammered in place and move on to more fertile tracts of land. Aside from those large scale, life-altering contemplations, such a story gives me pause for reflection. Our lives, which we spend so much time carefully and meticulously constructing, look very different to outside observers. Some might see the potential for self-referential laughter, where we all chuckle nervously when the humor hits a little too close to home. Some might see the unfolding struggle of a lonely soul, impossibly disadvantaged by decisions that didn't work out, against the cold, monumental indifference of reality. Some might see nothing of value whatsoever, while others might settle into earnest fandom. Whatever the audience's response is to the performance of our lives, it's almost certainly not quite what we're hoping the play will engender.

That statement, depressing though it may seem, is a subtle reminder of the folly of trying to live to make the audience fall in love with you. They will or they won't. You cannot control their reaction to or interest in your life any more than they can yours. The true answer is to play the scene you're in as well as you can, in the best way you know how. In the spirit of that, and in the spirit of cranking out really bad free verse that no one will publish, I think I'll share something I've kicked around lately. I make no claims to its relative quality and I don't expect anyone to like it or critique it. With my spouse's birthday coming and going this weekend, I feel like it's appropriate to share something about the best gifts we've ever given each other. Judge all you like and feel free to make snide, clever remarks to your heart's content. I'll be here, playing the scene I'm in the best way I know how. Here's hoping this isn't a herald of my impending doom.



BEHOLDEN

I cannot imagine loving more
Any other souls, ancient or potential,
In a more pure, unspoiled way
Than I love both of you.

Yet I know, undoubtedly,
Your ever-flowing streams and

Your delicate blackbird wings

Will carry you to places I cannot conceive.

So I enjoy the momentary respite
When you babble and run past my tree and
When you bring bright blue ribbons
To my dull, grey nest.

Stay longer, sing longer, be not so quick
To devour my admiration so fully and
To flee, fat-bellied and pleased,
Without kissing me goodbye.