okay, so i'm sitting in brit lit class, right? and the teacher is singing songs and telling us about william blake. then he's telling us about robert burns. maybe he was telling us about blake first. anyway. so he's singing "auld lang syne." and telling stories about the young generation letting minot slip silently away - because he tried to sing "auld lang syne" at the bar on new years and no one knew it or something. i thought, well - hell - maybe i'll start teaching the youth. beat back the decay!
my mind started wandering while i sat there. i started looking over my "to do" list. not wanting to be overwhelmed, i start daydreaming. of other things i need to do - things that are more "me" and less "pressing." i thought about adding some things to my "Get Better."
my Get Better is a list i've got up on the fridge. well, not a list as much as a tally-keeper. a scoreboard for personal achievement that i started this month. more because a new month had rolled over than that this was new years' month. i made a little calendar of january and put a "+" a "-" and an "x" for each day. sort of like a totem. then, there's a key on the side. the plus is cigarettes, the minus is drinking, and the 'x' is eating meat. i circle the symbol if i don't do it. if i "win" for the day. pretty simple concept. i can use it to evaluate my habits. i wrote "Get Better" across the top because that's what my friend Alex wrote on his drums so that while he was playing 'em his past self would be encouraging progress...
i've smoked eight days, drank 14, and ate meat maybe 12? these numbers are off 'cause i'm in the living room and lazy. anyway - you can see what a louse i am at all of this. back to class. well, i'm sitting there thinking, "if i can get through the rest of the month alright, i should add another symbol to fight against. maybe jogging - or writing everyday!" the teacher kept talking about poems and william blake and william blake's poems. blake's poems sometimes talk about god and beasts and spirits. i wrote this poem while i was listening to all of this. just 'cause i thought writing everyday could mean poems.
For Trials In the Grocery Line
today's a day like any day
my ups and downs you'll find
have more than once this morning
shone bright with light from the divine
you see, i'm at least part angel -
more than one-third, surely
but it seems i'm having trouble
making class - 'cause it's so early
and i wouldn't doubt if later
i couldn't get much done -
there's a lot of evil out there
and i've got to keep it on the run
i'll hunt down all the vampires
the monsters? kill 'em good, i will!
so if you'll just gimme a break
i'll be right back to watch the till
but for now i just need patrons
who understand and give me slack
'cause i got a lot of issues
and feathers sprouting from my back
i showed the poem to jake thomas, master of insight, who wrote at the bottom:
"For religion to have any hope, Angels must organize along the lines of the Mafia."
- Kurt Vonnegut
Wednesday, January 21, 2009
Monday, January 5, 2009
what lunch can tell you about a person
well, i've sacrificed ideals again. had a cheddar-dog for lunch. i'm drunk on a monday afternoon. the dog hasn't been walked and i've got homework i haven't done.
it wasn't a new years' resolution that brought me back around to ideals. it was the break. christmas break lasts a few weeks. i thought with the extra time i could think a bit more. and it fell over a "first-of-the-month." firsts are always good for new beginnings. instead, i've drank a bit more. i have a plan. we'll see if it ever gets implemented.
i don't want to eat flesh. i didn't for awhile. then things went awry. i deviated from the diet. i left the path. why?
hmm.
last year around this time - or was it two years ago? - i think it may have been two, actually, anyway - i had to leave minot for awhile. things were too rough for me. then i left and things were a little less rough in the abstract and a little more rough in the concrete. it was hard for me to face all of the talk - the rhetoric - when i didn't have a dime in my pocket and food was being given away and the food was meaty.
it was tough to deal with all of the questions. i was my biggest critic - and i've still got questions - how does a leftist reconcile his advocation for sentient beings with a workers' struggle that is at least partly composed of dealing with the meats industry? in the event that what you hold to be our only humane future - an absence of meat and animal byproducts - is to pass - where and what will have happened? nothing i've read maps out the future; it only criticizes our present. hypocrisies abound. i dunno.
i used to live by a sort of "platinum rule" - do unto others as you would wish they would do unto you. error on the side of good. and i think i may be gravitating back towards that. sure, the questions aren't answered for me, but does that mean i should participate apathetically in the slaughter of beings who, however speculatively, may share my emotions and dreams?
well, the cheddar dog. jaz bought 'em - i'd said i wanted to be vegan for a month. she still brought the shit around, trying to help. i think she'd thought i meant just no dairy (it gives me, and about 30-50 million other americans the badness) - but i still don't get the purchase. maybe she thought it was minimal cheese? it is one of my favorites. anyway, i just eat it. and a month is nothing. i should be able to do this. i used to do this shit for a long time. in fact, when i asked josh plogue about it all and he'd said, "i've been vegan three times." i didn't know what he was talking about. really? he'd fallen off?
at the time i was new to it and a would-be martyr for it. how could he have changed?
well, now i think i get it. some convictions can't hold and while you're busy dealing with the realistic the idealistic takes backseat. my real problems are family and friends and insecure-chips-on-the-shoulder - what can i do?
i'm also trying not to drink (strike against me right now) and smoke (if i could break this without buying a pack, i would).
but none of it's working much. i'm tired and lazy and things are hard. not harder than other people have it - far from - so fuck you and your guilt-giving. i understand where i'm at. it's not a hard life, but i don't deal well regardless of this evidence of leisure.
what to do? i cannot justify my diet. i cannot justify my vices. in fact, i know better. i know that for the fight a clear-headedness is important. i'm an avid fan of proactive living. i'm an activist of sorts.
but goddamn does it feel nice to just lay around and drink and smoke and eat some pizza.
how to reverse the cycle?
it wasn't a new years' resolution that brought me back around to ideals. it was the break. christmas break lasts a few weeks. i thought with the extra time i could think a bit more. and it fell over a "first-of-the-month." firsts are always good for new beginnings. instead, i've drank a bit more. i have a plan. we'll see if it ever gets implemented.
i don't want to eat flesh. i didn't for awhile. then things went awry. i deviated from the diet. i left the path. why?
hmm.
last year around this time - or was it two years ago? - i think it may have been two, actually, anyway - i had to leave minot for awhile. things were too rough for me. then i left and things were a little less rough in the abstract and a little more rough in the concrete. it was hard for me to face all of the talk - the rhetoric - when i didn't have a dime in my pocket and food was being given away and the food was meaty.
it was tough to deal with all of the questions. i was my biggest critic - and i've still got questions - how does a leftist reconcile his advocation for sentient beings with a workers' struggle that is at least partly composed of dealing with the meats industry? in the event that what you hold to be our only humane future - an absence of meat and animal byproducts - is to pass - where and what will have happened? nothing i've read maps out the future; it only criticizes our present. hypocrisies abound. i dunno.
i used to live by a sort of "platinum rule" - do unto others as you would wish they would do unto you. error on the side of good. and i think i may be gravitating back towards that. sure, the questions aren't answered for me, but does that mean i should participate apathetically in the slaughter of beings who, however speculatively, may share my emotions and dreams?
well, the cheddar dog. jaz bought 'em - i'd said i wanted to be vegan for a month. she still brought the shit around, trying to help. i think she'd thought i meant just no dairy (it gives me, and about 30-50 million other americans the badness) - but i still don't get the purchase. maybe she thought it was minimal cheese? it is one of my favorites. anyway, i just eat it. and a month is nothing. i should be able to do this. i used to do this shit for a long time. in fact, when i asked josh plogue about it all and he'd said, "i've been vegan three times." i didn't know what he was talking about. really? he'd fallen off?
at the time i was new to it and a would-be martyr for it. how could he have changed?
well, now i think i get it. some convictions can't hold and while you're busy dealing with the realistic the idealistic takes backseat. my real problems are family and friends and insecure-chips-on-the-shoulder - what can i do?
i'm also trying not to drink (strike against me right now) and smoke (if i could break this without buying a pack, i would).
but none of it's working much. i'm tired and lazy and things are hard. not harder than other people have it - far from - so fuck you and your guilt-giving. i understand where i'm at. it's not a hard life, but i don't deal well regardless of this evidence of leisure.
what to do? i cannot justify my diet. i cannot justify my vices. in fact, i know better. i know that for the fight a clear-headedness is important. i'm an avid fan of proactive living. i'm an activist of sorts.
but goddamn does it feel nice to just lay around and drink and smoke and eat some pizza.
how to reverse the cycle?
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