homeland security January 31, 2008

on my way to work this morning, I passed about 10 cops within a 5 mile vicinity. everyone was pumping their brakes and moving quickly out of lanes to avoid the authorities on their heels. I couldn’t figure out what the hell was going on and then I remembered that 1) I work very close the the airport, 2) the last time I saw this many cops and helicopters (yep, saw one of those, too) was when I was sent to report on Bush coming to speak at Gaston College, and 3) the radio said Cheney was coming to a private fundraiser lunch in town today. Which means don’t even BOTHER to try to leave the office for lunch or the bank or anything today because all of Charlotte will be on shut-down and halted to a standstill as the po-boys will block any street on the VP’s path to million dollar hamburgers. (this happened once before, when I worked at Starbucks, and our store was filled with angry customers for TWO HOURS because all the streets were closed because the Bush crew was having a late fundraising brunch and just might need to be whisked to the airport once their pockets were full.)

the exciting underbelly of the corporate workplace January 30, 2008

I have to go over something very important to my daily life although I’m sure all of you will judge me to be not so ladylike for saying it.

There are 12 stalls in the restroom on my floor of my office building. They are split into two, separated by a wall with sinks and a mirror in the middle of the room. It is an understood rule that if you have to do a number 2, you use the stalls in the BACK of the restroom – farthest from the entrance. I am a person who finds no shame in doing No. 2 at work, since I already spend 8.5 hours a day here, 5 times a week, and if I think that gives me every right to get my bodily business done while I’m here. However, that does not mean I wish to flaunt it for everyone to enjoy. I do have some common courtesy, despite what you may read in this blog. Therefore, I choose to use the stalls in the back of the room like a decent human being.

Now, since everyone (or most everyone) knows you should try to do No. 2 in the stalls on the other side of the restroom, I think that would also imply giving people some space. I mean, who wants to sit down right next to someone in the back of the restroom who’s likely to drop a stink bomb? Common sense, right? Human nature, perhaps? It would be like asking to share toenail collections. This is why, even if I have to just pee, I usually leave an empty stall in between me and another occupied stall. No reason to get all cozy. We do have 12 stalls after all, and AT MOST there are 5 people in the restroom at once, so really no one needs to be sitting next to each other unless they want to pass secret notes or something.

But oh no! I tell you there are at least 3 times out of every week where I go to drop a load, and I am the only person in the restroom, using one of the stalls in the back – away from the entrance – and some Miss Doh-Doh comes tumbling in and decides to walk allll the way past all the empty stalls (that’s at least 6 before you turn the corner to head to the back of the room) and come sit in the stall directly adjacent to me, even as they hear me juggling the toilet paper dispenser, coughing or even downright bumping my elbows into the walls to inform them that YES I AM HERE TRYING TO TAKE A CRAP AND DON’T COME SIT NEXT TO ME.

Sometimes I even let out a complete SIGH as if to say “You are an idiot” once they close the stall door – and this has sometimes worked to scare them away to the other side of the room. But most of the time they just plop down and start peeing like a cow standing over a rock. The WORST is when they sit down…and nothing comes out. So you just sit there in silence, playing a secret game to see if the other person will get up first. I NEVER get up first. It’s my little way of rubbing it in. You: idiot. Plus, I don’t want to leave and allow them to get a peek of me through the cracks in the door. I want to watch THEM leave – and feel the humiliation. And this is where I could also interject my plan for world domination, but somewhere in my brain I am reminded that oh, yeah, I’m sitting in a bathroom stall inside a corporate office building hoarding so much emotion for something so stupid.

the waiting period begins January 29, 2008

So, I am officially done with sending out grad school applications. (Well, there may still be some mailing to be done as inevitably things I mailed or requested to be mailed by others have disappeared into the ether or been intercepted by pterodactyls or what have you.) Other than feeling like I lost a kidney in this process, I’m a relieved that I now have 3-6 months to do other things with my late nights and weekend afternoons than remain scrunched over inarticulate essays trying to explain why and how I came to write poetry while I am actually not writing poetry because I am stressing too much over how to explain how I write poetry in order to get into a program that will give me more time to write and study poetry. SIGH.

I am now in that dreaded waiting period, where I wake up in the middle of the night heart-pounding over potential typos or blank lines on forms or writing sample wrong moves. And Lord help the person who keeps me from checking my mail six days a week. For some reason – I checked all 5 calendars in my possession for noted holidays, and there were NONE – my pothead mailman did not pick up my bills yesterday so I had to leave a mean note “MAIL NOT PICKED UP OR DELIVERED ON MONDAY JAN. 28″ on this post-it my mother gave me that also reads “NO OUTFIT IS COMPLETE WITHOUT CAT HAIR” so I’m sure he’ll peg me as crazy cat lady and add some extra grease to my Real Simple magazine when it arrives. (Sometimes just flipping through Real Simple makes me think my life is Real Simple.)

I’ll also be checking here on a 100 x a day basis, and using this as a back-up.

But anyway, to keep my mind off all this nonsense and to use my time wisely, I have formulated a mental and now written list of things to accomplish without guilt in the coming weeks, months, days. They are:

• Write/read more poetry, yada yada yada
• Clean out guest room and host more out of town guests (you know who you are!)
• Vacuum every living/nonliving surface in my apartment with my new vacuum cleaner (I must say this is very therapeutic)
• Tear up gardening bed that has now turned into a litter box for the feral outdoor cats
• Plant new seeds in pots ONLY
• Watch more movies
• Sell some CDs/buy more LPs
• Yard sale
• Start new drawings and/or paintings project (it would be really nice to sell some work on etsy or perhaps have a gallery show but right now that sounds a little too ambitious)
• Write more letters to out of town folks
• Keep up with my 4x a week gym thing
• Spend more one-on-one time with my broads
• Learn how to make bread (and do it)
• Take at least one extravagant trip out of town to somewhere I’ve never been (we’ll see.)
• Not take life too seriously

In the mail January 22, 2008

(some a few weeks old)

• Indiana University application
• The futile Sarah Lawrence application
• Univ. of Missouri – St. Louis application
• UNCW application
• Univ. of Oregon application
• Kakalak Poetry Anthology submission
• Southern Poetry Review submission
• Yet another transcript request form (@#$Y*I%&)
• My dignity

Coverage of women in poetry (and poetry in general) January 22, 2008

Jilly @ Poetry Hut brought up an important conversation the other day:

So what’s the deal? Why do the mainstream media hardly ever do articles or reviews about women poets? It is often hard to find ANY article to link to.

Are there more men poets than women poets? (When I got my MFA, the poetry students were mostly women.) Are men poets simply better poets than women poets? More interesting? Better at self-promotion maybe? Do articles in which the subject has a penis make for increased sales or something? Are men poets more likely to get published by a large press? What? Is? The? Deal? Here?

and again today.

My response:

As someone who used to work for the MSM, I must say that in some ways, yes, they are responsible for our lack of information. But at the same time, a lot of reporters (I’m talking about your average newspaper reporter here, not the books editor, which we all know is a dying position) just don’t always have the time to go & seek out the news and profile stories. (They’re put on breaking news and PR releases instead.) Often are not in the know about who they SHOULD be covering. The best thing we can do as people in the poetry/writing community is to send word about local poets (especially women!) who win prizes/have interesting lives/work with local organizations/publish books/run local presses, etc. to the media and tell them we’d like to see them written about. So much of what goes into the news comes from tips from readers. I hope this adds some perspective to the debate. However, I do agree that there is an overall lack of women in the media (as makers of media and subjects in media), and that this is a problem.

Seriously, the only way I would go back to being a staff writer for a newspaper again is if I could cover books, authors, artists, films, and/or musicians ONLY. Every once in a while, I got to squeeze in a cool Q&A with a local poet, or an art review of a big gallery show (that the other arts reporters were not already covering.) But most of the time it was what church has had another fire and where should we direct traffic for NASCAR week and what new homeowners association was popping up, etc., etc. The true reason I left my job was not just the crappy pay, but the realization that it would take another 30 years of crappy reporting to ever get to cover what I really wanted to do full-time. This is why freelancing is so much better – if you can balance it with your other work life. But then again, I think I have put myself in a corner as far as that goes, too. Maybe when I move I will tackle the magazine article ideas floating in my head and stop settling for the absolute least amount of creative energy (although it is informative) for my pay.

FREAKING OUT! January 22, 2008

Ooooooooh no.

I have three final MFA applications that are going in the mail tomorrow (they would have gone today, but of course, it’s MLK holiday.) And everything was cool as a cucumber as I have been mailing all my applications ahead of deadline by about a week (sometimes two), and stressing very little about them once they were out the door, BUT OH NO I just checked Sarah Lawrence’s website to read their reading series dates and noticed that, LO, they changed their application deadline from the last time I looked there! -That’s from the deadline that came with the application packet they mailed me over the summer! An adjustment from Feb. 1 to Jan. 15. !!!

D;

I am going to mail my packet tomorrow anyway because of all 10 applications, this is the one I have worked on the most. (I had to write a 1,000 word autobiography for goodness sakes.) And although I absolutely do not want to be one of those needy people who messages the program director and begs for mercy, what else can I do besides just that or act like nothing wrong happened with getting the envelope in the mail 8 days late?

This is very embarrassing to me as an objective observant because throughout this whole process I have considered myself obsessive and overly organized. I even have two very extensive Excel sheet checklists!

But why, oh why, is it always something like this that trips me up?

Perhaps I should throw my hands in the air and leave it up to Fate and God … because after all New York would be the biggest transition to my lifestyle (read: a future of being cramped and destitute) and Sarah Lawrence is the most expensive school on my list without funding … but part of me toward the end there started really believing that maybe this is where I will end up … maybe where I should end up … and I was getting happy about that idea, despite all odds.

I checked the fridge and there is no alcohol. I checked the drawer and there are no cigarettes. I checked the fridge again and I found cheese.

Greensboro Reading Series January 21, 2008

Sometimes I’m a little too quick to complain about Charlotte not getting any good visiting writers, with the exception of those who come through Queens’ MFA program and the CPCC Literary Festival (and the latter is harder to go to now that I don’t have student hours, since most of their readings are at 11 a.m.)

But that doesn’t mean that the state of North Carolina is lacking in literary history or celebrity.

UNC-Greensboro has announced their 2008 Spring reading calendar, and it’s quite impressive this year. I was stoked to read that two of my favorite poets – Dean Young and Natasha Tretheway – are both reading at UNCG this spring! The readings are at 8 & 7 p.m., so perhaps I could manage leaving work a little early on those days and hauling butt to Greensboro to see them.

I’ve never roadtripped for poetry, but I think it’s about time that I did. After all, I’ve driven the 4 hours roundtrip to Greensboro to see Joanna Newsom and other musicians play live on a weeknight. So it can be done, and poetry is certainly deserving. (And those concerts cost admission – these readings, I believe, are free!)

So if anyone wants to join me, I’m going to try to make it to these readings in April. We can split the cost of gas and pick up some BBQ along the way!

Private Eyes January 17, 2008

Hello fellow humans, I have been absent because earlier this week I was transported to Philadelphia (Carin, I waved out the window!) and Bridgewater, NJ, for two days as part of my exciting day job. The main purpose a handful of execs decided to pay to fly my ass up there and for my subsequent meals of airplane pizza and hotel eggs was so that I could make an appearance and lay the smack down at our annual review meeting, which I must say I accomplished swimmingly. Or what I imagined was mesmerized eyes looking at me across the business table was actually just intense concentration on something stuck in my teeth. We’ll never know. And after all this was coming from a dude with ponytail, feather earring and pentagram necklace (have I mentioned I work in the music industry? haha.)

But I did enjoy the trip, although the lack of sleep was enormous. I don’t know what it is with my body that it thinks it’s OK to watch Harry Potter on HBO until 11:30 p.m. when I’ve been awake since 4 a.m. And despite my comfortable surroundings in a very swank suite, I was still too afraid to fall asleep. I’ve always been this way when traveling. On one of my childhood vacations to a random beach resort, I woke my family up because I thought someone was opening our sliding glass door to the pool area. I kept seeing this shadow moving back and forth across the wall. I must be very convincing, because I had my sister chattering her teeth and my mother frozen and Dad even got his gun out…only for us to discover that it was the sprinkler system going back and forth across the lawn. And then Scott and I took a trip to Charleston this summer and did our usual ghost tour requisite. The tour guide told us a story about a haunted hotel room where people would wake in their beds to find a Confederate soldier floating above them, face to face. I clung to my man that whole night, and every time the AC kicked on, I’d say “WHAT’S THAT??” To which I usually got “snore.”

So on this trip, which was also my first time staying in a hotel room alone, I could have sworn that the ice machine (yes, I had a full kitchen!) was actually a man scraping his fingers onto my window. Then I remembered how the desk clerk, “Brendon,” had called me 5 minutes after I checked into my room to make sure I found it “satisfactory.” I immediately assumed there was a body in the ironing closet, but shrugged it off. Later, I had asked my boss if he received the same phone call from the front desk and he said no. Oh god, I thought, in the middle of the night. Brendon is going to murder me because I am blonde and that’s what all the serial killers like. In order to keep my heart beat down to something slower than a hummingbird, I came up with the Parent Trap solution of sticking a million things in between the front door and the door to the bedroom (yes, it had separate rooms!) so that if any intruder dared to enter, he would undoubtedly break a toe and awake me and I’d scream bloody murder.

My plan must have worked because I’m alive and here today. I also did not die driving in the 1.5 inches of snow (!) on the ground this morning. And by snow, I mean wintry slush.

next to last person on earth to own an iPod January 11, 2008

 Despite the fact that I work in the music industry, freelance music articles for a national newspaper, date a musician, can hold my own weight in most conversations about music (which I tend to avoid), and own waaay too many CD’s, I only just recently got an iPod. And already, I feel like such a tool.

I let it sit in the box for about 3 weeks before finally setting some time aside to turn it on and get the thing started and upload some of my CDs into my computer. I was glad the actual set up of the iPod was very easy, and I was already familiar with iTunes from my job so that wasn’t threatening, either. But the time involvement of uploading music is quite annoying, especially since I don’t have wi-fi at home so this is just one more thing to keep me stuck to my desk with the laptop hooked up to the cable Internet connection (without the Internet connection, iTunes doesn’t recognize the song titles, album titles, and artist names when you pull music from a CD). So far, I’ve spent about 3 hours uploading 30 albums. If I were to upload everything I own…then I have at least 133 more hours ahead of me.

And I’m no where near becoming someone who downloads singles from the Internet. For one, I love tangible music. I like to dust my CDs and flip through liner notes and see colors and names wrapped in plastic sitting on my shelves. I seriously need to purge from my CD collection, but it’s so hard for me to throw out even embarrassing titles such as my 79 cent copy of “Deluxe” by Better Than Ezra, which is perfect for impromptu 90s dance parties with my girlfriends (and secretly, I’ve always really wanted someone, one day, to sing “It was good a livin’ with her waaa unnh uh huah” and mean it about ME, which will probably never happen because I keep bad music piled around the house). And whereas I love smart compilations, rarely do I seek out just one song by an artist. You have to listen to the whole album, people. Or at least most of it. You can skip songs like I skip chapters about cooking supplies in “Kitchen Confidential,” but I still think albums are the way to buy and listen to music.

I’m also trying to find the right time to pull my iPod out. I can use it a little bit at work, but it’s much easier to just use iTunes and not plug my headphones in – that way I can hear people creep up on me (which is very important, since my computer screen faces coming traffic) – and I still need to answer and make calls now and then. I don’t take public transportation to and from work, so I’m more likely to listen to XM radio or CDs in the car. When at home, I can just put a CD in the stereo, turn the radio on, or (eventually) listen to LPs on my new record player.

So, this leaves only one important time for me to use my iPod, and why I asked Santa for one in the first place – time at the gym. That’s at the gym I just recently joined where it is completely normal to zone out and workout without having to talk to or listen to anyone. I lacked this at my last gym, which is why I hated it, and why I eventually quit. The idea of having to have chatty conversation with women who wanted to coach me on “power! power!” or listen to women who had nothing more interesting to talk about than their new strollers really wore on me. And don’t even get me started on the music they played in that gym. But now – now! – I can listen to my own music while sweating like a goon. I just need to get one of those iPod arm straps and I’m good to go.

And last night I had my biggest revelation about this new technical gadget. I always figured that podcasts were something you had to pay for, and came in the variety of boring. And I’m one cheap person when it comes to buying crap you can get for free. But I discovered that all my favorite NPR programs – and ones that don’t come to my local radio station – are out there for grabs for free. I know, this is like a senior moment. And I can guarantee you if I did not already have the bowel muscles of a 25-year-old, I would have shit my pants over this.

So, move over shuttle button. I’ve got podcasts lined up for my hour of iPod time each day (OK, by each day, I mean 4 days a week). I can listen to recipe tips from Lynne Rossetto Kasper, or comedic quizzes from Michael Feldman, or literary history from Garrison Kieler, or twisted turns in American sociology from Ira Glass! And the guy running on the treadmill next to me will have no idea. (Except for when I start snort laughing.)

I’d also like to know what other cool, and most importantly FREE, podcasts are out there for we nerdy/writer types. Dear reader, please let me know since it will probably take me another 5 years to find out about any of it on my own! And eventually, I can also graduate to video content, but I’m still not sure when I will ever use that.

poetry reading – Steve Gehrke…and me January 10, 2008

Last night I attended the MFA readings at Queens, which featured poet Steve Gehrke, the author of Michelangelo’s Seizure, winner of the National Poetry Series and quite possibly one of the coolest poetry book titles ever, in my personal opinion.

Steve was one of those poets who in person reads his poems like he’s in a marathon – fast and barely taking breaths from beginning to end. At first, this was distracting. I took a big breath for him to ease the pressure and nervously looked around at other people who were leaning forward and squinting as if someone had sucked the air right out of them. But after a little bit, it was kind of like sitting in the passenger seat of a fast moving car, with your head out the window and your hair smacking you in the face, catching glimpses of signs and other landmarks on the road as you zoom by. He had some phrases and images in there that just really hit me with a “pow!” that may have been more like a tap if it were just read silently while reclined on the couch. But I’m yet to know that for sure, since as soon as I got home I had to bury my head in some freelance paper work, while Scott selfishly broke in my brand new copy of Michelangelo’s Seizure for me. Jerk

I’m a little (ok a lot) jealous about Gehrke and this book. You see, that title should belong to my first manuscript. Not because I’ve already written a poem with that title (because I haven’t), but because it’s the kind of poem I imagine myself writing, or that I hope to write one day. If the personal must weave its way into everything I write, then it would seem only natural that I would write a poem with this subject matter because 1) I’ve had minor seizures on and off since I was five years old, 2) I have been a visual artist most of my life (longer than I’ve been a poet, that’s for sure), 3) Michelangelo is one of my favorite painters, 4) I’ve stated in MFA application essays and in other mediums that if I were to tackle a “research project,” it would be “to read the biographies of visual artists to write dramatic narratives or tie their own narratives into my own.” Lame, lame, lame, I know. But I’ll read this book anyway and hope for the best and that my subconcious doesn’t try to steal everything. And I’m a firm believer that just becaues someone else has written about something, doesn’t mean that you can’t. It just makes it harder.

I am a couple steps ahead (or is it behind?). I do already have a few poems that separately deal with art and seizures, although I’m sure that I’ll erase them from all memory down the road.

(This is where I take a big gulp and consider coming back here later to delete all of this)

two poems by me…

(Oops you’re too late… she did indeed delete these!)