where in the world is carmen sandiego?

when i was a kid, i used to get heckled a lot.

it wasn’t because i was funny lookin, or because i spoke with a lisp, or even because my dad had a big ears, it happened because i couldn’t answer a simple question.

a simple but very common question.

in fact, dare i say the second most common question that a child will be asked while growing up: ‘boy, where’r you from?’

(the most common question asked is: ‘whats’ur name?’).

because i didn’t have a simple answer to what most people considered a simple question, i was constantly picked on.

‘dontchya know where yur frum?’

‘are you soo stoopid thatchya momma and daddy don’t wanna tell ya?’

‘nobody wants ya, so yur not from anywhere!’

the simpletons hassling me hadn’t been anywhere, and they hadn’t done anything. so they mistakenly thought that every simple question has a simple answer.

unfortunately my life has never been that simple.

*so let me try explain: i am a us citizen who was born overseas, and ive spent the majority of my life living outside of the united states.

in fact, by the time i was eighteen years old, i had already lived in five countries, and six different cities.

and by the time i was twenty two years old, the number of cities had grown by three, to a total of nine cities.

which doesn’t include the number of states that ive ‘resided in’ for work (a total of nine states).

nor does it count my stint working abroad (which brings the work total upto nine states, and two countries).

hell! i won’t even bother factoring in all of the places that ive merely visited (because there are simply too many to count).

i think you get the picture.

nothing is ever THAT simple.

and when you’ve traveled as much as i have, and you’ve moved as many times as i did, you can understand why i sometimes wax philosophical with these types of questions…

what do you mean when you say ‘from’?

where am i now?

where am i going next?

when am i leaving?

when will i get there?

who will i meet?

who am i going with?

who can i depend on?

ive asked myself these questions many a time.

and they’re all good questions to ask - but lately ive found myself concentrating more on the questions related to ‘who’ and less on any of the others.

throughout my childhood, i never knew who i would meet at any given time. but i always knew who i would be with - my family.

and whenever we moved (wherever we moved), i knew that i could ONLY depend myself and my family to be around. which is not to say that my friends were unreliable, rather its to say that most of my friends (and their families) were just like me – traveling vagabonds.

i never knew who would be pulled out of school because their dad had to manage his company’s far east manufacturing operations out of guangzhou. or i never knew if my best friend would be coming back after summer vacation, because MAYBE his father would be sent to hamburg to become the european president of esprit de corp.

shit like that was always happening to me.

which is oh-so-very-boo-effin-hoo. (ha!)

and i dont mean for this to be a sob story, rather i want to explain that from an early age i learned to be VERY self reliant. my family was a bedrock of support, but i always knew that when it came down to it, it was all on me.

ESP when it comes to moving from one place to the next…

which is an especially interesting statement to make, consider that im moving further into the bowels of lincoln park this weekend.

which is not a big move by any means, but its a move nonetheless.

and if you’ve ever had to do it, you know that moving ten blocks or ten states is practically the same thing. you still gotta box shit your up. you still gotta contact a gazillion people about your address change. and you still gotta physically move everything on and off of a moving truck.

and therein lies the rub.

because most of these activities i can (will do) on my own. BUT short of hiring movers (a bit silly for the seven pieces of big furniture that i have), i have to ask friends for help.

and i don’t ask friends for help. EVER.

but this time i have to ask. and its been a GREAT social barometer – because moving makes me think about who im close enough with to ask for help. it also makes me realize who is a good enough friend to offer. and when people actually show up to help me move, it will make me realize how many true friends i really have.

they say that choosing who is invited to your wedding is not (necessarily) about who you are friends with now, its about who you want to be friends with in the future.

and on a smaller scale, moving can provide similar insight into the same types of questions – and the results can be either a relief, or a letdown.

either way, ill soon know the answer to the question: ‘who can i depend on?

at least for a little while.

*im not trying to brag (hmph DFK!) ha!

~ if i could put her (or her writing) in my pocket, and carry her (it) around all day, i would ~
~ so you're sayin' theres a chance! ~

(all lollapollala pics are copyright the nytimes and (or) the AP)

brush ya shoulders off...

nobody gets up in the morning and automatically thinks to themselves – ‘i am going to dress like shit today.’

but inevitably shit happens.

and im not saying that it happens to everyone, or that it even happens that often, but it DOES happen.

it even happens to me.

sometimes my outfit debacle is worth a good chuckle when i get home.

other times i want to burn my clothes and drive to work nekkid.

‘damn! my coworkers let me walk around all day looking like THAT!!?!?’

it happens, but not that often.

in fact its been such a long time since my last ‘episode’, that i must have been lulled into complacency.

because i actually thought that i was looking fairly decent today – thomas pink button down, plain white undershirt, kenneth cole flat front black pants, black belt, black socks, black johnston & murphy split toes…

i was well dressed in my straight - man - i - refuse - to - wear - striped - shirts - fashionably - oblivious - while - at - work kinda way.

which is GREAT if you’re at work… and you only plan to see the trolls that you work with.

unfortunately when i got dressed this morning, i hadnt anticipated seeing S (a cute girl i play ultimate with) at lunch.

myohmyohmy, she cleans up well.

hell! she looks REALLY good once you rub off the pitch dust and grime (not that she doesn’t look good out on the field… just a different good).

suddenly im six checking myself seven ways to sunday…. my shirts creased, my pants are too tight, my shoes are scratched to shit, my hair looks like a porcupine humped my head, and i havent shaved so i look like a thirteen year old boy (ya know, those kiddos who grow a faux mustache and a T to make them look older…).

hot damn im hot.

these are the thoughts ping ponging around my skull as i stand in line for my sandwich.

and as i place my order to the underpaid teen behind the counter, i am faced with a dilemma – to care, or not to care.

that is the question.

because there are two types of people in this world – (duh…) those who care and those who don’t.

those who care – overthink shit. they fumble. they second guess. they stare at an opportunity, and they tilt their head from one side to another like a chipmunk mulling over an odd looking acorn. they stare at opportunity, and they wonder if the other person remembers who they are. they wonder if they will make a fool of themselves. they wonder if the earth will swallow them whole if they squander this opportunity… because it feels like the entire planet is riding on the decision that they make – should they initiate contact? what should they say? how should they say it? what will the other person say in return? what will they say in return to what the other person said?

we’ve ALL had these thoughts (even if you were only ten at the time).

sometimes im still ten.

and other times i realize that im closer to being ten plus sixteen (an entirely more successful age for me), so i really shouldn’t care anymore.

which is a hell of a lot easier because those who don’t care – could give a flying fuck what happens next.

THEY.JUST.DON’T.CARE.

talk. don’t talk. earth swallows. earth doesn’t swallow. it doesn’t really matter.

they do what they want – they say what they want. and more often than not, they go straight upto someone and start yammering like a caffeinated high school cheerleader on her first trip to a regional competition (an event that i actually bore witness to last week). they don’t care how they look. they don’t care what people think. they just do – and let the chips fall where they may.

and as much as i didnt want to care, i did.

i cared about how things went down. i cared about how i looked, and more importantly i cared about what S would think of how i looked.

the funny thing is that im not even interested in her.

i just think she’s really sweet.

which is a great thought to wax philosophical about, but doesn’t really help me much with the situation at hand – considering that by this time ive already paid for my meal and im practically shuffling past her table out the door.

for a second i consider simply continuing past her.

do not say hello, do not collect two hundred dollars.

and for a second i consider it a GREAT idea. she’ll never even know that we almost bumped into each other – a plausible solution considering that i look dramatically different off the field (people are SHOCKED when they see me out and about).

BESIDES she’s sitting with her friends, she probably hasnt even noticed me.

don’t tell me that you’ve never been in this situation – because you have. and don’t tell me that you’ve NEVER thought about doing this (done it) – because you did.

and since you have (as i have too), you know that the other person may have noticed, or they may not have noticed. it doesn’t really matter.

because you did.

and you SHOULD know better than to pull that shit.

so i said fuck it. and i stopped caring.

and it’s a good thing i did, because when i tapped her on the shoulder, she turned around, smiled, looked me straight in the eyes, and said hi __________!

im glad that i was wearing clean underwear. ha!

‘the fear of which they thought was not the normal kind; not a response to a tangible danger, but the chronic, unconfessed fear in which they all lived. they remembered the misery of the moments when, in loneliness, a man thinks of the bright words he would have said, but had not found, and hates those who robbed him of his courage. the misery of knowing how strong and able one is in one's own mind, the radient picture never to be made real. dreams? self delusions? or a murdered reality, unborn, killed by that corroding emotion without name - fear - need - dependence - hatred?’ -the fountainhead (my absolute favorite)

~ do you have a secret? ~ the sneeze never fails to amuse ~ googlebomb do not date this boy ~

im with stupid.

love it love it love it.

not only am i oblivious, but im stupid too.

apparently languid isnt the ONLY one suffering from pms... (ha!)

but im getting ahead of myself...

several times this week i asked the girl who is hiding her relationship from me (i.e. my 'friend') if she had any plans for friday night.

i expected that she would - not a completely out control assumption considering that she's just beginning a new relationship.

much to my surprise, she had no plans (which is kinda sad).

so i waited to see if plans would materialize.

eventually i decided to broach the subject of the two of us potentially hanging out. she was less than enthused (obviously she was hoping for hotter friday night plans), BUT at least seemed open to the idea.

awesome.

so i started having second doubts - is this REALLY how i want to spend my friday night? i may not be interested in anyone right now, but i CERTAINLY could be trying a little bit harder to find somebody... anybody. hell i should start looking for a new friend!

but once again i digress...

a day passes.

so i called up the girl who is hiding her relationship from me this afternoon and asked her what she was in the mood for. she said a movie sounded good, but was up for whatever. i confessed that i was torn between going to a movie, getting completely hammered, hitting a patio bar etc. etc. (not necessarily in that order)

in other words i was having second thoughts, and i couldnt decide what i wanted to do.

which brightened up her side of the conversation immediately, because according to her, 'someone' had mentioned hanging out on a patio bar tonight. (with a vast majority of mutual friends, her playing the pronoun game is what gave this whole farce away in the first place).

''someone' eh?'

i deliberately chose not to make her elaborate.

i told her that i was going for a run, but that it was upto her to make a decision about what we would do.

because of course we ALL know what she wants to do on a friday night.

and who can blame her? its FRIDAY fucking night.

but having said that, what really riles me about this is that she STILL refuses to have this discussion with me. she still refuses to admit that A) anything is going on B) that she's deliberately avoided telling me about it .

eh?!? two can play at this game.

six miles later, i come back and find out that we're going to a movie.

which (personally) i was quite surprised about.

until i realized that she mentioned a 'we', which FORCED me to ask who else would be going.

'oh, a couple of randoms doods... and of course him.'***

hmmm didn't see that one coming.

thanks, but i think ill politely bow out of this charade.

to which her response was' oh, i feel bad. i told you we were going to hang out, and now we're not.'

love it love it love it. ha!

*** i have to admit, i would have considered going if there was even a remote chance that someone cool would be there to meet. but the idea of me, her, him, and some guys REALLY didn't strike me as an optimal friday night experience.

chicago is a blackhole ~ congratulations to zuleika

rebellion (lies)

i wasn’t a particularly bad kid growing up.

i didn’t burn down any houses... i didnt get any girls pregnant... and i didnt fail out of school…

‘you know the worst thing about niggas? niggas always want some credit for some shit they supposed to do. for some shit they just supposed to do: a nigga will brag about some shit a normal man just does.

a nigga will say some shit like, "i take care of my kids.’

you're supposed to, you dumb mothafucka! what are you talkin' about? what are you braggin' about? what kind of ignorant shit is that?

‘i ain't never been to jail.’

what do you want, a cookie?

you're not supposed to go to jail you low expectation having mothafucka!!!’

(source: rock, chris. Rock This! new york: little, brown & company, 1998.)

don’t get me wrong, i wasn’t a saint, i just wasn’t a terrible child.

of course i regret the time i ‘accidentally’ shot my sister in the chest with a bb gun (even tho she deserved it).***

i also probably could have done without playing rock wars in the construction yards behind my elementary school (fortunately, i wasnt the one who beaned a friend with a rock on the crown of his head... i was just there throwing 'supporting' fire).

and it probably wasn’t the brightest idea to drop a handful of slingshot ball bearings from the roof of my twenty nine story apartment building… onto the cars below (eh?!? a couple mercedes, a porche or two, and maybe even a rolls royce limo). doH!

stupid, dangerous, and maybe even downright criminal, most of my actions really weren’t that different from your average boy growing up.

and like most boys, i was punished (when caught) for the deeds that id done.

aside from the usual spankings, groundings, curfews, chores etc. my parents were particularly inventive when it came to punishments.

one year i only got coal and onions for christmas.

another year i wasn’t allowed to participate in halloween.

and at one point my mother decided that i needed to pay dearly for the ‘abuse’ that i rained down upon my little sister, and made me make incremental monetary payments to her [my sister] for every deed, bad name, insult etc. that i committed.

in retrospect they weren’t the most HORRIBLE punishments ever, but it certainly seemed that way at the time.

and at the time i was usually pissed!

so to make a long story short, i know a thing or two about punishments.

i know that a punishment is only successful if its enforced. i also know that a successful punishment requires a greater than equal response to the bad deed performed (otherwise the perpetrator might start thinking its almost an equal trade).

finally, i also know that the most effective punishment is not only a forfeiture (of rights, of material things, of privileges), it is a forfeiture with the spoils being provided to another recipient (usually the victim).

this last ‘rule of thumb’ is key; punishment is most painful in the form of contrast – because without the contrast, the punishment is merely looking at life from a different point of view (a different albeit shitty one).

for example: when you break up with someone, and you’re miserable, it makes you doubly miserable to think that your ex is slutting around having a fantastic time meeting new people… who aren’t you.

or how about when you have work on a friday / saturday night? it makes it ten million times worse when you get drunken phone calls / texts from friends who are having a great time (without you around).

the pain inherent in punishment is in the contrast, not in the punishment itself. because sometimes the contrast can be absolutely BRUTAL.

lately i feel like im being punished… punished for something that im not even sure i did.

my life is by no means shitty – its just not where i hoped to be at.

and when you KNOW where you should be, and you KNOW where you are currently… well then the contrast is certainly a punishment in itself.

wah!!

*** now that we're all grownst up, my sister and i are very close.

007 and the truth

in my opinion, conflict is a natural occurrence in anyone’s life. without it, we would never learn, never evolve, never grow as a human being.

in my opinion, conflict is inevitable.

some might say that i like conflict a little too much (i.e. my ex girlfriends), but that’s not really the case. i simply don’t shirk away from it if that’s the only option remaining. i don’t need to be in a fight every single moment of every single day, but i don’t need to avoid it if i feel that my feelings are justified.

which i think is a healthy attitude to assume.

unfortunately not everyone feels the same way. in fact im sure many of you either know of, or are the type of person that im talking about - people who live their life to avoid all forms of conflict.

those types of people absolutely drives me bonkers.

this weekend has hammered this point home like a thirty man crash in the middle of the peloton.

because i keep meeting girls who absolutely abhor conflict.

take for example, my roommate situation. ive been looking for a place. i found a place. i like the place. i like the roommates in the place. i tell them that im interested in the place, and tell them to take a week for deliberation and let me know if id be a good fit in their place. after a week of meeting other potentials, and ‘talking’ it over, they still cant decide.

im beginning to think that ‘cant decide’ is code for ‘we didn’t like you’, but we don’t want to tell you that, so we’ll avoid the conflict by forcing you to take yourself out of the running.’

which is the only LOGICAL option that i have – afterall, if they're having trouble deciding, what does that say even IF they do choose me? eventually i was the chosen one, BUT… it could have just as easily gone to the other person too. or even worse… you were the second choice, BUT.. the other person opted out (which is what you should have done) and subsequently we got stuck with you.

not a great start to our roommate synergy by any means.

the shitty part is that i want to take myself out of the game, BUT… i really really like the place. it seems stupid to make their job easier, by giving up on a place that im really interested in.

perhaps taking myself out of the game is the right thing to do...

unfortunately the irony is that i put myself in the second situation by actually taking myself out of the game in the first place. (damned if you do…)

in the second case, things were slightly more complicated. about a year ago, a close friend of mine expressed some initial interest in me – a concept that i was not immune to, but skeptical of our potential for success. i gave it some thought, but ultimately decided that it would be better if we didn’t date. we’re still good friends, and occasionally sometimes even a little bit more. which is probably where it gets complicated. im still adamant that we shouldn’t date, and yet we do have our occasional slip ups. i was happy to have a close friend that i could depend on – the hook ups were mostly an extension of being in close proximity, not as a direct result of any genuine interest on either of either of our parts.

everything was where i expected it until she started acting erratic. last weekend i asked her what she had been upto - she mentioned dinner with a friend. i asked about which friend (not an entirely unusual or particularly nosey question to ask) – she said just a ‘friend’. i asked her if this was her way of saying that she wasn’t going to tell me – and she said yes.

so i dropped it.

it set off a couple of alarms (im not stupid, i know that two and two is five and a half), but it wasn’t a big deal for me.

fast forward to this weekend, and i finally figure out who the mystery man is – and i have to admit that im very impressed. if she can pull a guy like that, she definitely deserves it. but what really started to bug me was the fact that she had deliberately gone out of her way to hide it from me. i will admit that i felt slightly weird about finding the two of them so enamored with one another – but i realized it had less to do with any feelings that i had for her, than it did with the fact that she didn’t think i could handle the truth. its even worse, when you find out that everyone knew, and you (i.e. one of her close friends) didn’t.

i can rationalize WHY she did what she did – she didn’t want to mess things up, she didn’t want to cause any drama, she didn’t want to hurt my feelings, she didn’t want me sticking my nose in things etc. etc.

BUT who’s to say that any of that would happen – im a rational person. i TOLD her that things wouldn’t work out between us. who am i to stand in the way of her finding someone who it WOULD work out with. i would have taken a moment, thought things through, and then been really happy for her.

just like i did when i found out the truth.

unfortunately she didn’t think that i could handle it. or perhaps more accurately, she didn’t want to deal with the conflict IF i couldn’t handle it.

which is complete and utter bollocks.

what ultimately saddens me about this weekend is that i not only lost a great apt, but i lost a great friend.

what kind of true friend keeps secrets because they think you’re incapable of doing the right thing.

if she has so little faith in my character – well then perhaps its good that we’re not going to be friends anymore.

'you should always tell the truth. because if you tell the truth you make it the other persons problem.' – sean connery

a post about cheating by the cheatingist cheater around ~

old school

i found this quote in an old sketchbook of mine: ‘one comes to a decision based on what one wants, not based on what one doesn’t want.’ it came from the movie ‘beautiful girls’, and i originally wrote it down because it related to a period of drama during my second year of uni.

seven years later, and i still find a lot of truth in this statement.

when i was a wee lad (relatively speakin’) i chickenscratched this quote into my sketchbook to remind myself of the importance of necessity. in its purest form, necessity is an unequivocal need for something to be in your life. its more than just wanting someone or something to be present; it is an absolute life requirement.

shouldn’t we have someone in our life that is an absolute necessity? shouldn’t that person be someone that we absolutely want in our life?

i would like to hope so.

unfortunately life is never that simple. afterall, its easy to conceptualize a person that we wholeheartedly want, but it is an entirely different effort to achieve this understanding.

more often than not, we are as likely to have someone in our lives because they are what we want, as we are to have someone in our life because they are a better than what we don’t want.

and sometimes its hard to discern who is what, when we’re trying to figure out why they’re in our life. (ha!)

case in point – if you’re lonely, its very easy to date someone (anyone) and accept them into your life. in this particular case you are making a conscious decision not based on what you want (you want a quality person to be a part of your life), but based what you don’t want (you don’t want to be alone).

its laughable how often this situation can occur. have you ever used this logic?

i haven’t… but obviously ive been tempted (which is probably why i wrote this quote down in the first place).

the chief cause of unhappiness is trading what we want for what we can get right now. and sometimes its tough to see the forest through the tree’s when we’re smack dab in the middle of nottingham forest.

i used to experience a lot of situations that validated this quote, but lately ive realized that appearances can be deceiving. as ive gotten older, ive begun to make more and more decisions based not only on what i want, but also based on what i don’t want.

which seems like quite a paradox, but its not nearly as confusing as it seems.

the majority of my decisions continue to be based on what i want – i want to date someone that is an absolute necessity in my life. BUT ive also begun to use the converse logic to validate my feelings as well.

which is a great way to perform an emotional gut check.

in the heat of the moment, its easy to understand and conceptualize the experience of wanting someone through ‘love’, ‘attraction’ and ‘need’. these emotions/feelings can be extremely strong amidst the throes of a relationship.

however an even stronger set of emotions exists – those emotions associated with what we don’t want (i.e. jealousy, anger, regret etc.). and it is these emotions that ive learned to use as the true barometer for decisions that ive made regarding my relationships.

the perfect example is an ex girlfriend of mine – after we broke up, she was approached by her previous ex boyfriend about the possibility of rekindling their relationship. she asked me for my advice (perhaps to evaluate my openness to us getting back together) and i told her that she should date him. and i didn’t feel an ounce of remorse. i didn’t (necessarily) want her dating someone (who the hell EVER wants their ex to be dating somebody else?) BUT i really didn’t want to get back together either. the presence (or lack thereof) of converse emotions, validated that i had made the right decision about breaking up. in fact it fortified my resolve to adhere to my decision – afterall, if i wanted to get back together with her… shouldn’t i feel a torrent of jealousy or regret?

when we began dating, i had very strong feelings for my ex. and when we broke up, i was worried that we had made the wrong decision. unfortunately i was unable to discern whether my lingering doubts were a result of my continuing interest in her –or- my fear of letting a wonderful person slip away.

maybe it was (is) a little bit of both. but at least i made the right decision - taking into account what i wanted and what i didnt want to have in my life.