the voices dying with a dying fall

Song of the Hour: "American English" Idlewild

           So,
circumstances have contrived to leave me at my favorite bar of all time, masterfully
named “WB Yeats” in Chapel Hill, with a few spare moments alone to contemplate
what I’m sure you all already realize, is my 29^th birthday.

I told my “Literature
in the Media Age” group how old I was today, and they just sort of stared
disbelieving. From that, and other similar experiences being carded, I suspect that
I really don’t look my age… yet. I have laugh lines curling up around my eyes
and the corners of my mouth, but they’re subtle. I can still pass for undergrad-age,
which keeps things easier and teenagers from asking me to buy them beer. Which
is good.

Part of me
wants to take inventory, see where I am. The rest of me is too fucking tired,
and it feels like intellectual masturbation anyway. So I’m not gonna do that. I
do remember the video notes I left myself on my 23^rd birthday,
huddled alone  in my and andy’s Greensboro bathroom after
rolling around naked in the snow. I think I was hiding from the other drunken
party-comers as well, but it’s mostly all a “oh-my-god-are-they-all-still-naked”
blur. Six years ago. Christ. Joss was only two. Was he ever really 2? Anyway.

I think
Joss more than anything else makes me feel my age. No, not like that sounds.
Like realizing I’m playing chess with him, and how surreal that is. [He mostly
understands how to play chess, thanks to Brian, not I]. He calls me like a
dozen times a day. He fixes the VCR DVD playstation nightmare by himself. I’m
old, I tell you, old. The more capable he grows, the older I feel. I guess I
associate youth with confusion; and having a newborn and not having a clue what
to do with him was definitively the most confusing era of my life. I’m not
confused like that anymore, so I don’t feel young. I’m confused about other
things- about mortality and morality and meaning and  responsibility. What was it, Andy? Giri? I’m
confused about little-old-european man things. Descartes things. Kierkegaard things.
Not Trent Reznor or Kerouac things. I don’t know. I’m not sure what I’m saying
anymore.         

    My embarrassing confession of the year. When I was in my Soloman stage, roughly 6th-8th grade, every morning when I got drees for school I’d draw a teardrop in red and black ink around that bump on the inside of my wrist. (look at yours, it’s kinda shaped like a tear. tilt your wrist back, there.) Anway, and I’d write on my arm… brace yourself:
                            My life is filled with sorrow,
                                Because I comprehend
                            The vastness of man’s ignorance,
                                And my own, my friend.
Yup, that’s a Jenny Bridgers age 11 original. For years I did that, writing, drawing over my veins. Reminding myself of man’s depravity, and how every sin is a slap in god’s face and how much he must be hurting with the amount of sin man commits. 11 years old, people. I knew something back then, whew howdy.
    Not long after, came the spiritual revolution. Thanks to the open minded liberals I met in high school (Hi, and thank you). High School really became  "high" schooling  and I’m sure I don’t need to recap the self-destructive ball of erratic  "passion" that eventually ensued. And that girl burned out by 22.
    So here.  I’m the fermenting fruition dripping from the blossom of youth [talk about mellodrama :)].  I don’t hate myself, don’t entirely like myself, but have a clear idea of what I want to change and some rough idea of how to go about it. That’s not too bad for 29. I’m in a decent school, I’m learning, which is something I enjoy no matter the atmosphere; I have fantastic friends who’ve seen me through a lifetime of self-induced crisises, scattered over the globe as they may be; and a healthy angel of a 4′8" baby bit who for whatever reason still worships the ground I walk on, not to mention a pretty decent pop.  what I’m realizing in this inventory that I said I wouldn’t take, is that I need to stop  bitching and get on with things. I’ve got it pretty damn good; let’s be honest, we all do.
     My only wish, (ok, besides winning some lottery and losing about 50 pounds), is that this time next year I have a clearer idea of where I’m headed. I’m waiting out a few classes to see what I’m really good at, what I can get paid to do that I enjoy. I dream of a MFA writing, but heavily suspect a masters/phd in clinical psychology in my future. Either way, I have nothing to complain about.

Battery dying. Thanks for the b-day mails. To warn you, I probably won’t answer my phone tonight, so leave me funny messages. Sadly, I have homework to do.

Love you guys. Thanks for sharing this intellectually mastabatory moment with me. I feel much closer to you now…
later,
love.