OF A GOLDEN AGE

in this month’s marie claire there is an interesting story about six women and a feature of their bodies that each of them particularly values. these aren’t traits like “MY TREMENDOUS TITS!” or anything like that — a ballerina talks about her feet, a violinist talks about her hands, a belly dancer talks about her healthy belly. my favorite, though, was a big beautiful swimmer with the most incredible back. she said she sees women in swimsuits and thinks they look so unhealthy compared to the athletes she is used to being around, let alone the normal people of the world.

college is full of silly little paradoxes. maybe that’s why everyone always says it’s the first step toward the real world when you can easily argue that it is a big leap back toward childhood. students at beloit pay exorbitant amounts of money to the college but relish the opportunity to get tiny things for free. earlier i was thrilled to find a can of pears in a give-and-take box, but someone else didn’t care enough about the dollar he or she spent on the can of pears to even fucking carry it to their new place. intriguing!

kissing apparently started as a gesture between mother and child to transfer food, which we won’t get into because it is sort of gross to think about, but this history does make it more interesting that kissing has become a form of distinctly nonfamilial affection. i see scenes in movies and tv shows where people play spin the bottle, which i’ve never done — my friends were more into truth or dare, and i NEVER choose dare — and all i can think is how germy it is to kiss all those people in such a short time. what a romantic thought!

this american life this week is a rerun about dying words. all of this makes me wonder, if i died today and people looked in on what my life is, what would they think? what would seem consistent with the way i am, and what might come as a total surprise? we rely on our intuition to give us a real sense of what people are, because otherwise, my existence could be boiled down to a messy, colorful room and the half-formed resume of a twenty year old. thank god for intuition. and thank god for messy, colorful rooms.

the other night i dreamt that i was walking toward some unnamed big-box warehouse store when someone outside, who was protesting something, shot me right in the gut. my stomach started to hemorrhage and i could feel blood boiling in reverse order through my digestive system. the sensation of the blood in my throat was vivid enough that i can still remember it, coughing up clotted blood but staying en route to the store. i walked in and an employee approached me, wearing a helpful face, holding an enormous band-aid. “can i offer you some assistance?” comic relief.

lately i’ve been thinking about
stitches,
scars,
codeine,
acid reducers,
postcards,
friendship,
casual romantic encounters,
long hair on boys,
whether i should think more about “important things,”
cherry sprite,
the blues brothers,
freaks and geeks,
how much better men’s dress clothes and shoes are than women’s,
water,
exercise,
laundry,
moving next week,
stripes,
honey,
harry potter,
my irresponsible and inconsistent cell phone,
breakfast with my parents,
the library,
house of leaves,
some sunglasses i found,
the round table,
math,
graduate school,
busyness,
the incoming first-year class,
people with whom i would like to be better friends, and
strange dreams.

c-rr-ll electric’s center of operations used to be in what’s called the gateway business park near i-90 in beloit. the company moved its offices to their present location several miles away on prairie avenue, but returned in late 2005 to start work on the staples distribution center project.

the gateway business park is located in one of beloit’s most economically-thriving areas: at the junction of i-90 and i-43, near retailers like wal-mart and the existing staples store, a number of restaurants and gas stations, and other miscellaneous businesses.

in the eyes of many residents, this part of beloit is critical to the future economic well-being of the entire city. beloit daily news features editor debra jensen-dehart described this feeling in an editorial on july 29, 2006:

“it’s true these developments might seem minor in other, more prosperous communities, but even small steps are reasons to celebrate in a city that has been rocked by economic hard times.”

however, the gateway business park is certainly no small step. the greater beloit economic development corporation said in its 2005 annual report that there was $70,000,000 in committed investments in the gateway business park at that time, including the staples distribution center.

the internet offers people a variety of ways to define themselves in terms of the things they enjoy — a livejournal interests list, a facebook or myspace profile, a music-tracking website like last.fm. obviously none of these things really get to the heart of anything, but they bring into our lives an entirely new concept: explaining yourself to people you don’t know. i don’t have to meet people to see the way they illuminate themselves. sometimes in traffic i wish i had a screen in my window that could bring to light my motivations and fuck-ups and apologies.

today i had lunch with one of my favorite people ever. we’ve known each other for eight years, crossing paths as is wont to happen in small towns. it’s funny because he’s only a year younger than me, and obviously always has been, but i feel like i’ve watched him grow up. certainly there are people who felt the same way about me for a while, but i can’t think of who they might be — there are only the scantest handful of people i’ve known for more than the last three or four years, let alone who follow my life.

watching an a&e miniseries of tess of the d’urbervilles reminds me how much i loved this book; how progressive it was for its time; and how completely frustrating the story is. tess is raped and later has a baby, which dies. she spends the rest of her life punishing herself for something that was not her fault at all but that nonetheless ruined her life. i realize life is unfair and that’s one of the lessons drilled into us early and often, but it is the ultimate injustice that a western world built on individual drive works that way.