deontology & wonder woman

I'm beginning to think that maybe it's not just how much you love someone. Maybe what matters is who you are when you're with them. (Anne Tyler, The Accidental Tourist)

Love isn't a feeling, it's a policy. (Cookie's Fortune)

*****

Lately, I don't quite know whether the things I want in life - and, indirectly, from the people in my life - are reasonable expectations or unfair (and possibly impossible) impositions. Even worse, I'm not sure whether the disappointments I feel are a result of setting my sights too high or other people setting theirs too low. And so I find myself mired in thinking that I deserve better from the men in my life, yet settling for less because not settling makes me feel like a heartless bitch who can't sustain a relationship under even the best of circumstances. So what's a gal to do?

Despite self-identifying as an virtue ethicist (what matters are intentions, affects, and moral ambitiousness rather than rules or ethical laws per se), I have an innate tendency toward Kant, which I blame on (1) being raised Catholic by (2) concrete- and rule-bound dysfunctional parents (3) in Texas. So combine my intrinsic love for rules with my intellectual fondness for contextual thinking, and we've got a problem.

On the one hand, my more intellectual side says love can be thought of as a series of rules of interaction, a romantic version of Grice's Speech Acts with its own set of maxims. In this sense, our traditional notion of love fades away and a set of appropriate policies falls into place, a set of "if you love someone..." antecedents ripe for the conditional picking. Okay, good enough. [But you still need to come to some sort of understanding with the lover-in-question about how to write those conditional statements, which is an undertaking of the most difficult sort...]

Then comes along Anne Tyler, who says even THAT isn't sufficient, and we need to consider that maybe it's not even love in any current sense of the word - duty, rules, a feeling - and it's who we become when we're around that person with whom love has ceased to be a relevant concept. So forget rules or "love": what matters is the identity we create when around particular people. I suppose by extension this means that men who make me feel like Wonder Woman are ones I should keep around the longest, or at least the ones who should matter the most to me.

But here's the catch: what if the person who makes me feel like Wonder Woman fails to live up to the notion of love as a policy? Or what if someone rises to the occasion of following all the "if you love someone..." rules but can't even make me feel like American Maid? It isn't a question of which quotation is more accurate; they each articulate very real expectations we have for sincere and long-lasting love. But where do we draw the line? Are these like the scales of justice, appropriate within moderation on all ends of the spectrum but having an excess of one and lack of another becoming - as Aristotle might say - a moral weakness, if not a vice?

The question, then, becomes whether I'll find a man who thinks policy in all things romantic is on par with passion and who just happens to also make me feel like an Amazon princess with kick-ass thighs. I'll keep you posted. This is, after all, The Year of the Hip Mama.

some kind of hoo-hah

In his Sex, Drugs, and Cocoa Puffs: A Low Culture Manifesto, Chuck Klosterman claims that because "countless women born between the years of 1965 and 1978 are in love with John Cusak" he is unable to have a productive long-term relationship. This is, of course, because women of a certain generation have fallen for Cusak-as-Lloyd Dobler and wish someone could fall for them just as he did with Ione Skye-as-Diane Court in Say Anything (1989). And when you're in love with fairytale characters under the guise that THESE THINGS COULD ACTUALLY HAPPEN TO YOU, TOO!, you've got a problem.

I'm not going to deny harboring fantasies of John Cusack standing under my window brandishing a boom box and playing Peter Gabriel songs while my heart leaps at the fact that someone has seen my inner soul. I am, after all, born into the age range of those "countless women" of whom Klosterman speaks and, c'mon, have you SEEN John Cusack? Of course any woman would fall for him, the same way we know George Clooney has a small dick because no one can be 100% fabulous and that's the only thing we haven't seen. But I digress.

I don't doubt that our generation has been completely fucked over by the media in ways we don't even realize. Thank you, Mr. Klosterman, for pointing this out with such gusto and aplomb. But what you don't realize is that there's an entirely different subsection of women born into Generation X who - perhaps in addition to, but often instead of, pining for a Dobler-esque man to come serenading - desperately fall into the category of playing Mary Stuart Masterson's Watts to Eric Stolz's Keith Nelson in Some Kind of Wonderful (1987). We carry the banner of unrequited love in the face of the perfect Lea Thompsons of the world, and we do so in the apparently stupid and idiotic hope that, one day, something will click in our objets d'affection and we will get an insanely expensive pair of diamond earrings or, at least, become owners of a not-so-lonely heart.

The truth is that while guys actually buy into the Lloyd Dobler myth because it's cool to be a man filled with unrequited love for The Pretty Girl, no one wants to be Keith Nelson. No one pushes away the pretty girl for the cool one who's handy with a wrench unless he already has a propensity for that type of gal, and there wouldn't be any movie if that were the case. It is true that men often wish the Pretty Girls were a little less, well, pretty in the name of practicality, and it's also true that almost everyone would rather be with someone who Gets Them rather than Trivializes Them, but that doesn't translate into guys regularly choosing tomboys over princesses.

The idea that we can get someone to notice us and fall in love just by being ourselves is wonderful, but the supposition that we can get ANYONE WE WANT to notice us simply by virtue of being authentic - even if we are absolutely not what they're looking for - borders on pure nonsense. The truth is that quite a few guys don't want their version of Watts, no matter how hard a woman might try or how great of a catch she seems to a dozen other guys. Even worse - and particularly frustrating for women of my generation - there isn't any way to tell which guys are worth fighting for and which ones will brand you a fool for acting like a romantically impaired idiot trying to garner their attention. Welcome to the 21st Century.

varieties of musical experience

Like many people, I enjoy listening to music while I work. Not only does it serve as background noise, the right album can get me in a productive mood and subtly shift the feel of my workspace. If I'm feeling particularly unmotivated, I know listening to a live Dave Matthews Band album will put me in the zone, and if I'm too stressed or upset to even get started, a little Rage Against the Machine or taste of The Pixies acts as an emotional leech, cleansing me of inner angst and festering emotions.

Today, I heard Death Cab for Cutie's "I Will Follow You Into the Dark" during the much-heralded mid-day music express with Terri Hemmert on WXRT, and I realized it had been months since I'd listened to the band. Since I'd spent much of my summer in South Carolina practically memorizing Plans - one of the dozen albums I actually had on hand - I was a little surprised it had been so long. So I dug it out of my yet-to-be-organized stacks of CDs on top of the entertainment center, popped it in my CD player, and commenced listening, only to find myself now - an hour later - filled more than ever with longing and despair, with a touch of melancholy thrown in for good measure.

I've always been the sort of person who internalizes certain sensory information, particularly smells: my first lover's t-shirts fresh out of the dryer, warm rain in Texas in the spring, my fourth grade English teacher's perfume, my children when they were infants and had just come out of the bath and I'd nuzzle their chipmunk cheeks. There are times I'll be walking down the street, and a smell will hit me, and for an instant I'm back in that moment, left reeling for some time. For the most part, though, this is limited to smells: I'm not so great with the other four senses, particularly touch, but it's only today I've realized how much hearing something can completely recreate a mood and place.

It isn't that my summer in South Carolina was filled with longing and despair, or that my time there was even remotely unrewarding; on the contrary, it was one of the best summers I've ever had. Beyond meeting some incredible people, I learned quite a bit about myself, including realizing the depth of some negative aspects of my personality and forcing myself to make changes in the way I view the world. I don't think I could have moved out, strengthened friendships, or survived the last semester had I not spent those nine weeks in South Carolina. Still... when I put on Plans what is conjured up wasn't a reminder that, over the summer, I became a better person; instead, it transported me to my tiny condo overlooking Colonial Lake, where I spent hours crying, recovering from hangovers, avoiding work (especially writing), and generally retreating and withdrawing from all the complications of my life in Chicago.

And so now I realize: this album - and, likely, the other eleven to which I listened in almost constant rotation - is a reminder of the pain I felt, the dark times that paved the way for the (relatively) light ones to come, the deep sadness and loneliness that I tried to hide through late nights filled with live music; incessant bad movies; bike rides all over the peninsula; drinking with poets and thieves alike; befriending Deadhead cab drivers; relishing my meals of trois legumes, bourbon butterscotch cake, thick slices of bread, red wine, and French press coffee.

The question, now, is whether I should move past this visceral reminder, listen to Plans - and Cat Power, and Beth Orton - enough so that the memories fade away, or put the music away, keep it in a special place I can visit when I need a different kind of reminder: that the stories I tell myself aren't always so simple, there's a dark spot in my soul that needs release, and (more often than not) I need to remember how far I've traveled on my journey.

lessons for a new year

I've been in the new apartment full-time since A. came back from Florida, so it's been about two weeks of living alone (well, me and the new-to-me cat). I bought a retro couch from an antique store in Andersonville (that almost looks like John Cusack's sofa in High Fidelity), went to Ikea last Monday for an entertainment center and bookshelves, and splurged on a new flat-panel HDTV. Cable, internet, and phone were installed Thursday. I finally feel as though I've entered the 21st Century. And, for the first time in my adult life, I have my own apartment that doesn't consist of a futon and bookshelves made from cinder blocks and particle board.

I know it's odd to feel as though I'm coming into my own as I'm a third of the way through my fourth decade of life, and it's even stranger to feel simultaneously liberated and horribly depressed by the end of a relationship (and, to some extent, the death of my hope), but ultimately I think this is a stage of life I need to go through, a process I've been needing and wanting for so long. I don't quite know how to be alone, and while it sure feels difficult at times (cf., my sobbing in the car for five minutes after coming home from going out because the walk to the apartment seemed almost interminable, even though I'd parked right in front of my building), it's the same kind of difficult felt when working toward anything worth achieving.

We'll see how it all goes.

oh...

...just screw it all. I'm Sisyphus And yeah, Camus can pontificate all he wants about how Sisyphus wasn't nearly as downtrodden as conventional wisdom would have you believe, but fuck Camus. I hated Caligula and The Stranger wasn't War and Peace by far. I was always more of a Sartre gal myself anyhow. And Rollo May. Now that's an existentialist who had a thing or two of substance to say.

Can I just drown in a warm bath now? Though that wouldn't be a very existentialist thing to do, would it? That would entail prolonged suffering, unrequited love (at which I'm becoming an expert!), and intense angst. So I guess I better get to making my life even more frustrating and unacceptably depressing. Though I doubt I need help on that count... [Insert inspiring background music and a theme song that indicates "hip mamas to the rescue of one of their own!' Dun-dun-da-da...]

a question of balance

I need a nap, a massage, a bubble bath, a glass of wine, and vegan ice cream. Instead, I'm working with five hours of sleep, a stiff back, a shower with no water pressure, Gatorade, and an old vegan chocolate bar I found in the bottom of my bag when I was looking for a pencil.

So, then, perhaps you see the appeal in the lyrics to Question, which I sang at the top of my lungs while zipping along the drive on my way home from school today (followed by Golden Earring's Twilight Zone). Yes, I am a child of the 70s.

why can't i just shoot someone?

It's a complete waste of a perfectly good evening to spend almost two hours chatting online with a Dell representative (who's probably sitting in India somewhere) to figure out why the sound on my computer mysteriously stopped working only to learn that a nebulously described technician will be calling in 3-4 business days to replace my motherboard and sound card.

And I even had not one, not two, but three invitations to go out tonight.

Thank goodness I have exciting plans for the weekend or else I'd want to throw my laptop through the window.

friends with money...

I can't help but think how much my thirtysomething experience is like Friends With Money. When did I move from identifying with Singles to this?

random information

I've spent my entire adult life wondering what was so special about bubble baths. And then I moved into my current apartment, which boasts a deep clawfoot tub... and I've now had a taste of heaven. Some nights, I don't even want to get out to go to bed....

I am now sporting Tattoo No. 6 on my left wrist -- a modified Sailor Jerry design with the word "sisu" featured -- and plans are in the works for the sleeve I'm hoping to start within the next two or three weeks. (FYI: The inside of the wrist is a damn painful place to get a tattoo.)

The Saps were great last night. Three Stellas helped me overcome throbbing pain from the tattoo, and partially helped me control my urge to pummel asshole tourists from St. Louis in the crowd. ("Hey, Mabel! Let's go up to Shee-caw-go and see ourselves a rock'n'roll show. I hear them mosh pits are mighty exciting this time of year...")

back to the grindstone

Why is it that even though I get four months off every year, I'm so reluctant to go back after every break? It is as though the entire four months of Mondays I miss are piled into the first day of each semester... which means I'm exhausted and completely overwhelmed by the amount of work I've got to get through this week.

I am hopeful things will have stabilized by the weekend, so I can continue with my plans to see The Saps on Friday and get another tattoo at some point before Sunday comes around... in the meantime, I'm back to learning how to get by on five hours of sleep each night...

the dialectic of jack black & mr. big, revisited

For the moment, I've done away with ideas about Mr. Big. I have, you see, decided Jack Black is where it's at. And, yes, this is one of those blogs that you'll either know what I'm talking about or you won't. Happy fuckin' Monday.

the big bash is all bashed out

Much love and many thanks to everyone who came out last night and helped make my Saturday night an excellent one. Between the wine, beer, vegan donut holes, cappucino truffles, Taboo using a maraca for a timer, and PlayStation karaoke, there was something for everyone, and I think there might have even been some romance blossoming here and there... though I confess I was much too distracted myself to keep track...

So, then, on my current schedule, the next party will be in 2012 -- save the date! [Seriously, I'll be having an open house in my new place once I've got all my furniture moved over...]

happy fuckin' new year

Strep throat threw a monkey wrench into last week, but I'm now fully recovered and have been so since New Years Eve, when I went to Lincoln Square Lanes with Mehgun and her new beau (and a guy from school who was stoned). Met some interesting people, had a good time bowling, and experienced for the first time what it's like to smoke and eat pizza hand-in-hand. Was a very good girl; only had two beers and home, sleeping by 3am. Who woulda thunk I'd be so well behaved on the most debaucherous evening of the year?

Reminder: The Big Bash of 2007 is on Saturday... drop me a line if you haven't seen the evite and wanna come. Should be a fun time. Hey! We can even play Scrabble... um, not.