Teapot of Wisdom

It turns out that the loudest place on the planet is a major intersection that:
a) serves as the detour for an interstate highway
b) is a commuting route for a major university, state capital, and the largest city in the state
c) has a gas station
d) is a major construction site for a collapsed bridge
e) includes a bridge over the largest river in the U.S.

Stick yourself in the attic room in the corner facing this intersection, and your stress level might go up just a bit.  When I talk on the phone, I have to close the windows.  People ask me, "Are you outside?"  The volume on my computer (for the radio, music, DVDs, etc.) is pretty much turned up all the way all the time. 

A few quotes from a Washington Post article about the effects of noise pollution:
"In a study of students attending an elementary school near noisy train tracks in New York, for example, researchers showed that by the time the students reached sixth grade, those whose classrooms faced the train were a year behind those whose classrooms were on the quiet side of the building. After noise reduction materials were installed in the classrooms and around the tracks, reading scores in the two groups equalized, strengthening the case that noise was the culprit."

"Children near the working airports had significantly higher levels of adrenaline and cortisol -- the body's so-called stress hormones"--resulting in higher blood pressure and greater risk of heart disease.

"Studies have shown that chronic night noise not only leaves you shrouded in a fog of fatigue, irritability and poor concentration, but also activates the stress response as you sleep."

I wear earplugs at night and can still hear the trucks backing up--because, of course, they do construction all night long.  (Which is good.  The bridge needs to be fixed.  At some point I might write on the experience of being so near the site of a tragedy, but for now, the stressor I can identify is the relentless beeping, knocking, revving, pounding, rumbling.)

On top of this, the old owners stole the air conditioners out of the storage space before the closing last week, despite having promised a/c to us and despite, according to the new owner, having included them in the purchase agreement.  So by about 2pm until about 4am, my room is a sweltering box of noise.

I think I'm going to have to start lugging my stuff down to the coffee shop down the road to study.  Sigh. 

Okay, I'm done bitching.

On a positive note, I've started doing a short yoga routine most mornings, sparked by a class offered Saturday mornings at a meditation center about 2 miles down the road.

I've only one final leg of my journey to go, and just the idea of sweet little Minneapolis (I've been assured countless times I'm "going to love it there") fills me with anxiety.  So, here's a brief summary of my travels to keep my hands steady for the road ahead:

Niagara falls was weird, almost disturbingly touristy (with its wax museums and casino) but sad and creepy, as I walked by the house with two apparently functioning satellite dishes (the door was open, and the TV was loud) and piles of dusty restaurant equipment on the porch.  The falls were breathtaking, however, except at night, when they light them in neon colors.  I got a $5 t-shirt that says in an oval, "Niagara Falls, Canada."  In the center of the oval it also says, "World Famous."  Gets the prize for most obvious.

Toronto, well, the jury's still out.  I'd need to have a friend who knows the city take me around, I think.  I went to the places I was instructed by a native (Queen Street, Chinatown), although I missed the Danforth--except in my car several times--and the most I got out of it was some cheap cotton clothing in Chinatown.  Unfortunately, the most memorable aspects of Toronto for me are the irritating driving and European family I shared a bathroom with, who had a 6-year-old boy with terrible aim.  Oh, and I sat for tea with a Kashmiri shopkeeper and heard his life story.  But that's kind of what I do, no?

Here's a tip: when passing into the U.S. from Canada, do the following: 1) bring an item of produce--say, a bag of grapes; 2) nervously claim such bag of grapes to the immigration official and admit that you did indeed buy them in the market in Toronto; 3) turn bag of grapes over to immigration official.  If you appear 1) white, 2) female, and 3) have a Standard American English accent, you will be let through with a stern warning and no further search of your car.

Chicago was not at all what I expected.  I guess I've read too much Alex Kotlowitz and Sara Paretsky and haven't listened to Amy enough.  It was a beautiful day (although a bit hot and windy), and I wished I'd had more time to explore this really lovely city.  But alas, the hotel was three times as much as the next most expensive one (did I mention my accommodations have been quite cheap?--oh, you might have guessed, on account of the seat-peer), and I had to move on to my cheapest yet--$30 a night!  I was in a kind of wide-eyed art-loving mood that day, and so the Art Institute veritably made me glow.  Of course, it's just an all-around fantastic museum, but I also want to point out that, with a focus on American art, they do a better job of showing works by women and African American artists of the 19th century than any other museum of its kind.

Why don't you take, say, a 3-4 hour break in bumper-to-bumper traffic right now?  Because that's what I did, driving the mere 90 miles from Chicago to Milwaukee at 2:00 in the afternoon.  That was fun.

The Milwaukee Art Museum is conveniently open late on Thursdays.  Still in a wide-eyed art-loving mood, well, you can guess how I felt about this museum.  It's actually quite spectacular.  I will have photos of this and other stuff later, once I did my adapter out of my trunk.  I had dinner in an old restaurant on the lake with an ex-coworker, my first real conversation all week, which was really nice.

Here, have another break, as you imagine me driving in a one-lane bottleneck at midnight from Milwaukee to Madison?  What should be ninety minutes turns to another three hours, and I don't arrive until 12:30.  Pulled over in the truck lane at a rest stop, a state trooper takes pity on me, gives me directions, and puts on his flashers to get me safely into the proper car parking lot. 

Madison.  Well, yes, everyone was right about Madison--at least the parts I saw.  I started off at the Botanical Gardens, which are free, and beautiful, and of course early June is a wonderful time to go.  The conservatory ($1) was like a hodgepodge of every tropical country I've every been too, and indeed there were plants from all over the world, beautifully arranged.  I headed into town and parked near State Street, where I spent my day wandering in and out of shops and continually marveling at how friendly Midwesterners are.  At the end of the day, I went to the Museum of Contemporary Art for a concert on the rooftop sculpture garden, where I met interesting people (all lawyers--apparently Madison has too many professionals per square foot) and had dinner with one of them.  I'd planned on going out and seeing the same band later that night at a club, but I was so tired that I came back to my motel and was asleep by 10:30.

I'd better get to breakfast so that I'm fortified for the drive to Minneapolis.  I hope you enjoyed this little 7-day jaunt as much as I did.  I do promise photos, which take much less time commitment (although if you've gotten this far, you've either skipped to the bottom, or, well congratulations--you should win something).

I had a wonderful day, and I've finally given myself permission to enjoy it.  After sending off my academic-year summary to my department administrator and replying to a student's email about her final paper, I headed off to meet prosicated and take a long walk in the sunshine, stopping for shopping and a falafel lunch, and ending up in Central Square, about 4 miles away.  I left her for some mental floss and then went to Pearl Arts & Crafts for some supplies for our project tomorrow. 

I had tea and a scone and read the preface to a book about Somali Islam.  Then I walked back to Harvard Square and wandered around a bit, bought Mistrusting Refugees and a pair of swirl stud earrings, and then took the T back to Davis, and tried on clothes at a couple of boutiques.  Heading home, I felt somehow not quite finished with my day.

Fortunately, there was a small gathering on the corner at Hodgkin's Spa, and I only hesitated for a moment when I was offered a margarita.  Apparently, a guy known as "PK" has an annual Cinco de Mayo party at that corner with his childhood buddies, neighbors, and random passersby.  I nursed a strong margarita for an hour or so, chatted about the neighborhood, and then walked home with a mild buzz and a smile on my face.

It is a nice day.

I am not taking my comps May 1st, as originally planned.  It's largely because of a scheduling/logistical glitch--and my own inattention to detail (not to mention that of my entire committee).  It's not the end of the world, although it's a little frustrating and disappointing, and it requires an about-face of state of mind.  Fortunately, at least at the moment, the current state of mind is now, whew, ahhh....look how pretty it is outside.

I did, however, finish the paper for last semester's incomplete--in the strange limbo days where I hadn't made the final decision yet.  My advisor thinks I should use my energy to start writing grant proposal drafts, but now I don't know if that's worth it, as labetsy points out that the department (or school?) may not suppor my grant proposals until I have a dissertation proposal.  (BTW, the department chair, who's on my committee, was in on a discussion, back in February, of me writing grants in the fall, knowing full well that I wouldn't have my dissertation proposal written at that point.)

Meanwhile, I'm enjoying labetsy's visit and the sunshine.

I really like to dance.

Just saying.

I've had myself a wee bit of a vacation, and now I need to kick myself in the ass and get back to work.  I did manage to get my comps list whittled down to exactly 200 readings (which includes specific chapters of edited and single-authored volumes alike), and I got a paper topic approved for a class I took last semester.  I didn't actually write that paper, which I'd hoped to do.

I did, however, have a fantastic, fun-filled day with the girls-- prosicated and our young Canadian friend--getting my ear pierced and shopping for clothes and other necessities.  I spent the weekend in Maine skiing with bunches of grad students--well, technically, I was mostly skiing by myself, to the point that I developed a slight reputation as a loner.  But, hell, I ended early on Saturday, drove back to the house, and had the hot tub all to myself for a full hour.  I was rested and limber enough for a full day of skiing on Sunday after that.  Antisocial be damned.  Add a couple of dates into the week, and it really was a vacation.

But it's 11:20 on Monday, and I've yet to do anything but compile my final comps list into a single Word file.  (Almost, almost final--I still need to substitute one reading, but I'm waiting to hear from my advisor, who is giving a talk in Chicago and unavailable.)  I guess I'd better stop blogging.

Boing Boing posted an entry today about a new book, Not Quite What I Was Planning: Six-Word Memoirs, and challenged its readers to post their own. 

Mine was: Two careers so far, still time.

California results aren't in yet, and even when they are, the Democratic primary could still be a toss-up.  I voted for Obama, but it would be cool to have a woman in the White House.  Particularly if her name is Allison Taylor, like the new President on season 7 of 24.  I may just have to start watching it again.

I was eating a particularly crunchy bowl of cereal this morning, and I heard Hillary Clinton say on the radio, “The next president will walk into the Oval Office and waiting there will be a stack of puppies.” 

What she actually said in the debate last night was that there would be a stack of problems, but somehow the image of a tower of tiny dogs on that big desk delights me.  If my abdominal muscles didn't hurt so much from the "Energizer" aerobics class the other night, I'd be unable to control my giggles.  As it is, it goes more like, "hee-he--ow!...sigh...puppies...hee-hee-hee--oww!"  Repeat.  Tears streaming down my face.

And let's be honest, who's going to deal better with those puppies?  I hate to say it, but somehow I see Clinton transforming into Cruella deVil, while Obama happily sits with a puppy in his lap while he signs some bill.

On the way home from Spamalot the other night, a grad school friend and I somehow got on the subject of SCA* and our feelings about it (the group makes me mildly uncomfortable).  I found myself dancing around the subject, since I'd like to think I'm the last person to condemn a (sub)culture or way of living.  It's not what the group or its members do per se--throwing swords around and play acting sounds fun (although carrying an entire character in an elaborate fantasy life is not for me).  It's not the sexual side of the group--polyamory seems as good a way to do it as any.  It may partly be that the members seem to cultivate a particular interpersonal style that I've actively avoided adopting--despite (or because of) my inherent geekiness, my leanings towards nerdiness, and--let's be honest--my fear of ultimate dorkdom.  Brashly embracing the thing I was taught to fear?  That's part of it, surely.  But there's something else.

I'm lying in bed this morning in random thought zone, and I come to the realization that, above anything else, it's the groupness of it that I don't connect with.  It's the same thing I find creepy about improv troupes, the cool kids, cults, and the Junior League.  I was never really part of a clique, never a member of a religious group, and never had a single identity in high school (jock, nerd, theatre kid--I was all of the above)--to my constant misery as a kid.  I realize that today I'm a member of several social, political, and professional groups, but none of them wholly define me, and I have friends and acquaintances from many parts of my life.  I'm such a solitary person, and as an adult I like being the hub to many social spokes, even if that means not being a part of something.  The idea of having a single group take over so much of my social, recreational, sexual, and fantasy life makes me nervous.  And yet, when I come close to groups like that, I always feel a familiar sense of exclusion, just as the people within them feel inclusion.  That's just as it should be--it wouldn't be a group otherwise--but it just makes me uncomfortable.



*Society for Creative Anachronism.  If you don't know, just Google it.

I think I must be an Obama supporter.  I had been leaning towards just voting for Kucinich, to show him my appreciation for what he adds to the debate.  I doubted my vote would make much difference by the time of the Massachusetts primary in March.  Well, our primary has been moved up to "Super Tuesday," which is less than a month away.  Sorry, Kucinich.

I took the WBUR/NewsHour Vote by Issue Quiz, and Obama, Kucinich, and Richardson (who knew?) tied for first at 8/10 issue agreement.  I disagreed with Obama on Energy and National Security. 

I disagreed with Mitt Romney* on all ten issues--no big surprise there.  But I fear that the Iowa and NH results, in aggregate, show Romney as the rational, national choice.  One woman interviewed in NH summed it up perfectly: "He looks like a president.  He sounds like a president.  He acts like a president."  As far as I'm concerned, this is code for: he's a rich white guy that looks more than a little bit like Superman.

At the same time, the Democrats' results show division--between two people who look like less powerful superheroes.  No matter that they're both more qualified, have more reasoned stances on the issues, etc.

At any rate, this entry started out with my apparent support for Obama.  Remember that Vote by Issue Quiz?  I agreed with Clinton on 5/10 issues--fewer than any other Democrat.  I even agreed with Huckabee on three!  I never really liked her, but I'm now totally convinced that she's not nearly progressive enough for me.**

I'd like to get excited about Obama, like I was way back in 2004 at his DNC speech.  But there are so many factors working against it. 

( Why I'm so cynical this time )

Any suggestions about getting me engaged in this political process, or should I just wallow in my cynicism?


*Completely random trivia moment from Wikipedia: Apparently, Mitt is his middle name.  "He was named 'Willard' after hotel magnate J. Willard Marriott, his father's best friend." J.Willard Marriott--that's Uncle Bill to me--my grandmother's big brother.
**Completely random moment #2: Doesn't the music from this ad sound just a little bit like the opening credits to the West Wing?

I feel I need to start this like a confession: It's been months since my last post.  It seems that a blog post after such a long hiatus should be momentous in some way, or revelatory, and brilliant.  Of course, the irony of my bizarre self expectations is that I have a readership of roughly three, give or take.  And, let's be honest, this is LJ--it's more about me and my own self expression, anyway, right?

I sit right now in a chain coffee shop in Lexington with free wifi.  It's 9:40 on a Tuesday, which means I'm missing class.  I'm dressed, I'm relatively well, I've probably done more of the readings than anyone else.  So why am I sipping a "chai latte" and typing my musings on a laptop from a leather sofa rather than sitting at a small plastic desk in Brown 124?

I was creeping along the right lane towards the ramp from Rte 2 to 95, having decided to take the highway to school rather than local roads after checking the traffic report.  I have an especially extreme mixture of envy and rage towards the people who cut the line on this particular stretch of road, even more so when (as this morning) I was surely going to be late.  I sat, thinking, "I am going to practice loving kindness towards all the people around me" (for those not familiar, a concept from Buddhist practice).  That lasted about thirty seconds.

A grey-haired man in an enormous Buick pulls up beside me--no glance, no wave--and noses his way in, in front of my little Audi.  I lose it.  I wail on my horn.  I scream at him: "NO, THAT IS NOT OKAY. THAT. IS. NOT. OKAY."  I wail on my horn again.  I flail my arms in the air, point at him, and yell, somehow hoping he'll read my lips, "YOU ARE A BAD MAN!  YOU ARE A VERY BAD MAN!"  Without a glance in the rear view mirror, he puts a cell phone to his ear.

That's it, I thought.  Well, actually, I said that out loud.  I also said, "I can't do this.  I can't sit here yelling at old men.  I'm getting the fuck out of here.  Fuck it."  So, I managed to get off the highway, and ended up here--so as to avoid another half hour of rush-hour traffic.

With a twinge of guilt, I recounted the story to the sympathetic guy behind the counter.  "It's just--I just can't.  You know?"  Serge nodded and said, "I know.  I don't know, but I know."

I've never skipped a class because of road rage, but it seems as good a reason as any.  Now in my third year, I've rarely missed because of illness--in fact, I've attended too many classes in pain or discomfort or full of germs, and felt far too much guilt for staying in California through Thanksgiving after the anthropology conference last year.

For all the (relative) suffering I've endured this semester, I'd like to think I have gained a bit of perspective.  It's not that I'm abandoning my work, it's just that I'm tired of doing things that are less than useful to me.  Or sacrificing my (mental) health for, well, anything.  It's all about priorities.

Can't sleep.

I just saw this bumper sticker on a minivan in the Trader Joe's parking lot:

This is perhaps not the best way to return from a two-month blog hiatus, but, well, there it is.  Made me laugh.

I've been in Kenya for over six weeks.  The newness has waned, but I am frustrated at my limited skills in both Somali and Swahili.  It feels like my familiarity with the city should be matched by a facility with the languages I’m learning.  I can put together rudimentary sentences in each language, but slowly and not well.  I also find it hard to understand when people speak to me—particularly when they speak quickly.  But in the past few days, people have started to give me more fine-tuned feedback.  If I convey the thought, but not quite properly, people (those who know me, at least) will correct me.  It’s a new frustration but incredibly helpful, and I think it shows that I’ve reached another level in my learning. 

*Kiswahili: I speak a little Kiswahili
**Somali: I can speak a little Somali
At least, I think that's what it says.

I'm in a fancy cyber cafe in a Mombasa suburb, with only a couple of emails to answer and time to kill before the bowling alley opens (if it does), and so I thought I'd give LiveJournal a try.  For some reason, it's the German version--I'm now writing a Neuer Eintrag.  I came up here with some American college students who are doing a summer archaeology program, run out of the house where I'm staying.

Gosh, what to say at this point?  I've been writing updates--or I did, for the first three weeks--and sending them out as emails.  I've been here in Kenya for almost 6 weeks now, and I have mixed feelings about fieldwork on a daily basis.  I'll have a wonderful interaction with a Somali friend, followed by a crappy one where I'm asked (again!) for a visa, then eat a delicious cup of saffron ice cream, then get hit on constantly on my walk home, and then make macaroni and cheese and share it with a friend.  

I'm learning so much.  I can carry on very basic conversations in both Somali and Kiswahili, and I'm starting to feel as if I could manage to speak both if I keep working on it.  And then I'll go to an event, where no one's really talking to me, and I exhaust myself trying to follow (read: pick out words I recognize) the Somali.  

But besides the languages and getting to know the layout of the city, how to take the maddening matatus, navigate the streets of Old Town, and properly wear a headscarf, I must be learning about how people live their lives here.  I think I have some understanding of the complexities (if not the specificities) of how Somalis relate to each other and to their neighbors.  At least I understand that it's complex.  There are probably mounds and mounds of other things I can't properly synthesize, not until I'm back home.  

I marvel at anthropologists who go to the field for a year, right off, and still find a way to figure out what the heck is going on.  Preliminary trips should be mandatory, really.

What else?  Well, I'm safe.  I went back and read some of prosicated's entries since I left for Kenya.  Ironically, she worried about the wrong friends, since labetsyand I are perfectly safe (knock wood), and aquaholderis watching violent demonstrations on the streets of Peru.  We'll all get home safely, Insha'allah.*

See you all soon-ish!


*No, I haven't adopted a religion; it's just a good phrase.

I was a little mean to the Earthlink Chat person.  I'm on edge, okay?  I'm leaving for Kenya in 3 days, and I wanted to import my Outlook address book into my earthlink webmail, so that I can actually email people while I'm there.  With all the time I've dealt with this, I could have manually entered all the contacts I actually want. 



Oh, and if you're curious, I was able to import my contacts into Yahoo! just fine, but when I exported my Yahoo address book as a .csv file, I got the same "corrupt" message when I tried to upload it to Earthlink.  Grrrrr. 

Maybe I'll just use Yahoo while I'm away.

Goddamned IRB!  Grrrr...

Just needed to get that out.

Almost totally.  I still have a short ungraded but useful writing exercise for my readings course, but otherwise, done!  After a bleary-eyed drive back to Cambridge with my friend R, we celebrated with several tiny cups of Turkish coffee and some baba ganoush, which revived me enough for a lovely evening at the ballet with prosicated.  Whew.

I actually got a second  "woo-hoo!" from my professor when I handed in my paper today.

The title song on this album is freaking me out.  Listen to it at your own peril.

Of course, the primary cause of the current insanity is the fact that a) it is 2am, b) I'm only 11 pages into a 20-30 page paper due--well, today, and c) the antihistamines and caffeine are waging a battle in my brain.