2015

2015 was holding my breath. I lived so much this year.

Time passed with a moon dipped in venom, so many friends visiting - Adrienne, Hannah, Will, Sorrel, a Bernie rally attended. I smoked my first cigar and felt sick - stuck with the habit of holding the smoke in my lungs. I got hit by a car while biking, and had too much to think anything of it. I went to a lecture on John Weiners at Harvard at Kelsey's urging, hundreds of miles away in Columbus, Ohio. I got sick. I spent a few days in NH with my coworkers and three dogs. I got told that I was looking exceedingly bird-like. My flatmates and I threw a party and named it "Crunksgiving". I climbed Mt. Lincoln and Lafayette with my father.

each of those is a story, a vignette.  maybe I'll have time to tell them this year.

I read a few books - Cat's Cradle in a burst of "oh! reading in English, I've forgotten!". On Adrian's advice (and my parents as well)  How to Win Friends and Influence People. When I felt lonely with R, I would read his favorite book; 100 Years of Solitude - it went by quick, so did he, the irony not lost on me. House of Leaves, which I had gifted myself for my birthday. Matt then lent me City of Glass. A project started by Hannah and Sorrel led me to read chunks of A Short History of Wine, I Drink Therefore I am; A Philosopher's Guide to Wine, and A History of the World in Six Glasses.

I'm ready to breath out.

Christmas

My life as fiction:

There was a party on a boat for the hospital. A cruise called Spirit of Boston, meaning that twenty minutes in comes the realization that exchanging pleasantries isn't that pleasant, and that to escape into drinking is not an option with a morning shift looming, and that one has to smile and try to enjoy oneself.

By which I mean to say, maybe not-me learned some things about some people that she didn't need to know, and maybe some of that they learned later, but that's okay. There were no cheating wives. There was no man who slept with three women from his workplace. There was no higher-up who did worse than either. After the ship and the dancing there may have been pool (which I was brilliant at!) at a bar everyone was invited to by a heart-broken nurse, but there I wasn't complimented on my lipstick as he lamented all the girls scattering when he came around.

Similarly, Christmas Eve was not spent in West Bridgewater. I didn't walk barefoot through the misty neighborhood. Nobody said a single racist thing. Not a single person made a fool of themselves! Nobody got angry, everyone was happy with their gifts, and I definitely, undeniably got a full nights' rest, most likely in my own bed and not on a fold-out couch at Emily's. Incredible, right?

And Christmas day dinner was not four Jews and a Catholic-raised Atheist talking about mind-control for the good of the masses. That's ludicrous! Dinner couldn't have been served on the porch; after all, it's the end of December. There was no tilapia and certainly no pumpkin cupcakes with cream cheese frosting or warm hugs. 


cheers to the most Christmas I've ever had in my life.

no hurries

I told Adrian that the heat makes me feel horrid and groggy. He says he likes it, that he feels like the world is giving him a warm blanket-hug.
I thought that was very sweet, and that all I can do is envy him.

On the forth of July weekend I stayed in Cambridge, and saw the fireworks for the first time in a while. We live on the fourth floor in an area surrounded by three story buildings, so we have a clear view of Boston from the balcony, and the light show was lovely and so was this strange and delightful blimp with a whale on it and a name of a gin across on a banner, which kept circling around and around.  Elyse came over and a few of us ate nachos and eventually it devolved into hide-and-seek and watching scary music videos with masks. (Pitbull Terrier by Die Antwoord, Alles Neu, Ramstein's Du Hast)

In the morning I woke up and Elyse was still asleep on the couch, and together we decided we have no hurries.

Hurries are like worries mixed with harpies, suburban mothers clucking I have to pick up cake for Sally's birthday party, and make it to yoga class, and finish 50 Shades of Gray for book club this Wednesday, and Paul asked me to pick up the dry cleaning, and I should make sure Ronda did her English hw this time and...

So with no hurries we wandered over to her place in Quincy, stopping by a beach filled with dead jelly fish, reading in the sand, eating drippy ice-cream and meeting up with Sam for dinner. No hurries is great.

Spontaneity

One thing I've learned from online dating is that everyone wants someone spontaneous and 'willing to try new things' as well as some standard rotating set of 'has a good sense of humor' or 'can have an interesting conversations'. I on the other hand like humorless boring people.

Regardless, I wouldn't call myself a spontaneous person. Paras and I took a trip to Target a couple weeks ago. He has a theory that older siblings date people who are younger siblings, and that older siblings are less spontaneous, generally smarter and less athletic. I told him that I sometimes set goals for myself to be more spontaneous - and was relieved and surprised when he said he has done the same thing. Not only that, but written down moments of increased impulsiveness, a list of running accomplishments that feel more satisfying than fulfilling expectations of walking up the steps of societal expectation and growth. Yes, I got a positive ninety-day review at work but also I bought pussy-willow at the store on a whim and that's even better. Under the florescent lights, we pathetically looked up reviews for vacuums on amazon and compared prices before, finally, settling on the first one we had looked at.

Last weekend Sara sighed at me as I chose three rings for ten dollars. It was the third time in my life I had ever bought myself jewelery. It took her a few seconds to choose earrings, and I kept trying on one ring, matching colors, wanting to know which fingers I'd wear them on and if on the thumb then it should be bigger but shoot they don't have that color in a bigger size. "Don't you do anything spontaneously?" she asked and I remembered that I had bought a ticket to Moscow what seems not too long ago but is has already been two and half years. But even that was a result of a long-seated desire to do so; the action was not planned, but the intention had been there for years. fuck I thought she's right. As we weaved through Haymarket, I bought a stem of grapes for a dollar and a whole fish for four. Spanish Mackerel, beautiful on ice, not yet gutted. Sara was impressed. 

"It is important for people, for whom part of their identity is being sensible, intelligent and responsible, to know that they can risk being foolish". This is what I told my visitor (or myself) this weekend, a friend of a friend who was here for the sole purpose of trying to see if this thing with a guy would work out. We went to the Isabella Gardner museum during the day and she met him for dinner later. Today we had brunch downtown and walk down Newbury street, and who know what will happen for them? But without spontaneously risking foolishness, one can never find out. I'm turning twenty-three in three days, maybe I'll learn.

a taste of life

Work, Work, Work (double), Work, (off), Work, Work (double), (off), Work, Work, Work, Work.
The snow hit hard and I ended up staying at Rita's, sledding in the morning before going to work and getting stuck there because people didn't come in for the night shift, and with the exception of me and one other person, everyone working evening was working a double from the day shift. Which meant that, five days after being mandated to do a double, I got mandated to do a double again. 3pm-7:30am. Not something I ever wanted to do or desire to repeat.

But one good thing: one Sunday the mbta was canceled and I had already gotten home on Saturday, so I had to call off work. Therese and I went to Aeronaut Brewing Co. for a beer & cheese tasting. We walked through the snow for half an hour and it was so beautiful, the snow falling softly, the roads mostly void of cars, and street lamps casting yellow-pink light. The brewery was gorgeous too: a huge hall with high ceilings and a bar, large Christmas-tree bulbs hanging on the rafters, which made it feel both spacious and intimate. And another hall where the beer and cheese was presented to us, pleasant strangers to talk to and we walked home through the snow satisfied.

My apartment just had the fire alarm go off. Everyone evacuated and a girl from one of the apartments started organizing a party for next Saturday. Amen to taking advantage of the situation.

what is substance

Death: We attended a memorial service for our neighbor Frank Musinsky who passed away in August. I remember one of my first conversations with him, I was nine or so and told him that I would love a boy if he was good and smart, regardless of how he looked: I almost believed it too. He had participated in founding the Paris Review, but I met him years later when he the sharp and inquisitive man in a wheel chair. As I got to know him he became more: the man who loved music and worked for most of his years and enjoyed a good conversation -- as evident by the number of people who attended the service. may he rest.

Growth: Sima just came from school and his roti chapati flatbread got a bit scorched in the toaster. He asked if the burned parts caused cancer, and then asked what cancer was. That he's heard that theres lots of different types and that one is not curable. That this little girl fell and her stomach hurt and when they took her to the doctor they found out she had cancer. He has homework now and a birthday party to attend soon.

Celebration: Eloosha came home for the Rosh Hashanah, so Yulka and I came over. Honey for a sweet year.

Future: Jo told me I seem calm and happy yesterday when we met for dinner. Alana joined and we walked around Cambridge and Sommerville. The future keeps coming and coming.

Season: It is undeniably autumn. Some trees standing bare and some are not ready to part with their emerald tapestry, but the others are yellow and orange and red, parting with their leaves, which one by one hit the ground.

(not at all like in the photo below)

a couple weekends ago; Ipswich River Wildlife Sanctuary - Mass Audubon

goes on

this weekend Hannah came and visited me. I also saw Sam in Boston, soon to leave on his tentatively year-long trip along the coast, on a sailboat he cobbled together himself.

I went to a gallery opening of my photo teacher from highschool, who retired this last year. Her eyes are a sharp blue, and her show was on female beauty and aging (Marky Kauffmann).

Everyone is well.

Marathon

Boston--

1. Minutes after it happened I got a text form a friend in California (also from the Boston area) asking if everyone was alright. I had no idea what had happened, but called my parents immediately. I remember doing this as if I was outside my body, and the weather was nice.
2. I’m from the area. The towns in the newspapers were ones where I had been many times. But I wasn’t there; I was in the same position as everyone else at Bard. My family was safe but otherwise nothing had sunk in, I was eating dinner with Shinno. Fifteen minutes.
3. Before anyone had been identified, my friend in Moscow was trying to figure out what was going on: I don’t know man, I just have conspiracy theories. Boston is a symbol of history, resilience, progress. It’s Tax day. It’s Patriots day. The Marathon is endurance, hard work, family, community, tradition. People on the internet say its Muslim extremists, but whoever did it had to know area well, so it seems unlikely that they are foreign.
4. Knowing people. Those watching the race. Another Bard friend’s mother is a nurse, so she was up there. 
5. Not really giving a damn about motivations, because why should I give them the satisfaction of getting their message across? 
6. I speak Russian. So pretty soon after I found out; Oh, this person I know had leased their first car from the family of (now) terrorist. And another one, who I’ve met, had the father as his auto mechanic. And then by the time I found out about my friend knowing one of them on a more personal level it was just like “of course my Russian stoner friend met another Russian-speaking stoner at the UMass Boston orientation”.
7. And that part made me so proud: so many injuries but somehow the medical system worked so well. Everything was so coordinated and fucking worked.
8. And then someone we know was going to work (from Newton to Watertown, I think). But everything was in lock-down so the police stopped her. “Where are you going” “work” “what work, everything is in lock-down…what accent is that?” “Russian” and then they practically followed her home.
9. The news. How which news sources spun the information or non-information. Miranda rights, terrorism, torture, how many people are killed in Iraq in a day? And everyone suddenly becoming experts on Chechnya. The some paranoid thought in my head of "I'm lucky Russians are Caucasian and Asian, and so we aren't as easily profiled". The photographs of Boston as a ghost town.
10. And now I just got a letter from my friend at MIT “It’s been such an absolutely crazy week…The police officer who died got shot about 100 yards away from East Campus, and we first heard just because someone was passing that way and saw forty police cars. So they got on the radio (a lot of people here have ham radios that can catch police frequencies) and started listening” and how people even the day after where just…living. Life. “and it’s surreal because sometimes you can hear gunshots and they’re bringing in, like, a hostage negotiator and you just realize – this is not a movie”

Two Flights

Saturday I spent a lot of time looking up flights to Moscow (and doing work), and then I went to the first floor of the library. I found Jack and we went to a show at the Root Cellar. Sycamore, a Bard punk-pop band was playing.  Adrienne/Alana/Cat+ were there as well; mason jar of something strong in hand. They had a good energy.

Jack and I we headed to Manor after picking up the emergency driving phone from security and our things from the library, and Jeff at Manor Annex. We heard that the Social Club and the Formal Club had pooled a lot of money and had fancy food. Jeff entered and scurried out as quickly as he could.

When I entered I felt disoriented. There was a girl in a leotard suspended by a ribbon from the ceiling, and a few other girls around her, blowing bubbles. Everyone was dressed up; top hats, spectacles, flowing dresses, ruffled shirts. The music reminded me of the Great Gatsby, to the point where I felt a flash of the misery under all the drunken partying, and could almost see the flash of green across the water. In reality everyone was actually having fun, this wasn't the constant partying of adults in the 20's. The food was gone so Jack and I drank some St. Pellegrino and ate what was left of the grapes, but I heard rumors of quail, consumed ravenously. Ajax (the boy from the train) Kelsey and Zappa and co. were there as well. Then this girl came out and started doing an old-fashioned strip-tease (she was wearing with a garter belt and a corset). Soon after a tall guy came out in his underwear and clown face-paint and danced for us too¹. Then the back room was opened and there were tables loaded with candy. A giant gummy bear lay in a bed of truffles, bowls filled with licorice and tootsie rolls and people swarmed. After that the dance floor was open to all. We danced; the music demanded foxtrot, samba and the twist.

1 This is when I realized that the party had a lot of overlap with the Surrealist Training Circus and the Burlesque Club.

Sunday there was Midnight breakfast, which involved karaoke. I left as soon as I had my French toast though, I had to paint. At some point I was working at the library and the beer ninja’s came, handing out free cans of cold Budweiser. Slowly everyone left campus. Friday Mama bought my ticket to Moscow. Some girl from Ukraine hear me talking on the phone and started talking to me in Russian, and then asked me if I knew anyone who would write her essay for her if she paid them, and talked about all the fur things she owns.
My last night Hannah and I read Wallace Stevens out loud to each other while drinking tea. Saturday morning I dropped by Adrienne dorm to say bye; she’s going to Ghana for a semester. Eames drove me home and that’s where I was until now².  

2 Hint: I’m currently at the JFK airport, waiting.

At 12am on Monday night my parents and I got to the Christmas scene in the movie Meet Me in St. Louise. Osya had really wanted to do the American-Jewish thing of getting Chinese take-out and going to the movies, and though we didn’t do the former, Mama took all of us to watch the Hobbit. Christmas Day we went for a walk around Newbury St.

Last night around six I finally started packing. I feel like I'm going bearing gifts to half the population of Moscow. Osya said that the balance of the family is off when I’m gone (and then proceeded to repeat the word ‘guilt’ over and over). Shimon was being troublesome about going to bed until I realized that I was leaving, and he wanted me to go through the night-rituals, rather than someone else. Stubborn sweet.

I finished packing after one and woke up at four. Папа kindly drove me to Logan Airport to be on the plane by 6. 

good excuses

October Break was dearly needed (we had the 8th and 9th, so I had  a five day weekend, since I don't have class on Friday's).

I went home and saw my family. The day before I left we went apple picking along with Inka&co.
They gave us these sticks to get the apples, but we made a team: she climbed up the tree, I caught the apples she threw down. This photo was taken after we had collected a bag and caught up with our brothers.

 

When I came up for a weekend last time Shimon had overheard me say that I had a good excuse to come. He later told me he wanted me to have more good excuses. This break he spent most of his time trying to situate himself in my lap, but he doesn't quite fit like he used to.

I also went to Yulka's apartment in Boston. It's in a nice area walking distance to Newbury St (and also Emerson) so of course there it's four people living in two tiny rooms. They call it their shoebox. It's a pretty accurate description. We danced in the apartment before going to a party somewhere. The night ended with me yelling on the phone at some guy I don't know, and I wish I could have done more than yelled. The next day we had tea for breakfast and then made lunch. Somehow between all of this I also read half of "The Perks of Being a Wallflower", adding to my list of books I have read half of. We walked to Newbury and sat at L'Aroma cafe and eaves dropped on a conversation and decided that the couple was not on a date but friends. 

Really, I'm here.

I am back at Bard, the land of chain smokers, sprinkled in anorexic girls and boys with bouncy walks. 

Social Stuff: This Friday I went to Smog with Amanda and Sumedah. There were a ton of people, but I left after an hour, a little after 12. Seriously though, so many people, many freshmen, it doesn’t matter.

Thursday I came over to Hannah’s dorm and we had dinner, after I had gone to the club fair and danced with Lila to help recruit for the Bard Science Journal (which I just signed up for) (this is where I got my face painted last post-by the art collective). At some other points in time various other similar things have happened; nail-painting and looking at peoples rooms before and after they were decorated.  

The weekend before that I went back to suburban Boston to photograph a family friend’s bar mitzvah party. I talked to a freshman on the train there, stayed a night in NYC with another family that was going to the bar mitzvah and then stayed a night at home after the party, bringing back to Bard a small suitcase full of stuff I forgot the first time around (travel mug, my neuroscience textbook…) The same family drove me back to NYC, we had lunch and then I took the subway->rail->bus back to Bard. 

The weekend before that I went to Amanda/Lila/Hallie's house in Tivoli for dinner, and then we went to Liz’s birthday party in Redhook, and some other party after that which had already died by the time we got there, we stayed for one song, which happened to be one I like (Crystallized by the XX).

I also went to the budget defense forum where clubs vied for more funds. I hadn’t gone to one before. This is how it works; first there are the friendly amendments. Clubs come up on stage (this was set up outdoors) and ask for money, saying what their purpose is and how much they are hoping to get. Other clubs will donate: “5 dollars from the boffing club” “20 dollars from the Bard belly-dancers collective”  “5 pounds from the half-naked lunch club” (yes, these are all real).  My favorite one of these came for the Bard Moderator (a semi-annual sexuality and body politics magazine that has writing, art, and photographs): “Two years ago the Bike Co-op donated 200$ to the Moderator in exchange for an alley-cat naked bike photo shoot. This photo shoot never happened. We now donate 15$ to uphold that contract” After that go the hostile amendments where club heads attack other clubs, saying they have too much money, and that that money should go to them (this actually didn’t last very long). 

Oh! also at the very start of the year I went to the Amanda Palmer and Grand Theft Orchestra show. It was fun, they even sang a song I know from when she was the Dresden Dolls.

trying to get used to being around people so much. even when I'm alone at Kline, it's still filled with faces I recognize from just being at such a secluded school.

Matt

I welcome the rain. The humidity and heat have been steadily edging into my brain, with only one brief reprise for a few hours one night this entire week. I welcome the rain, though of course it’s not just rain, we got an e-mail with a tornado warning, and the light just flickered and the thunder was a crack right by my ear.

The semester is off to a good start, but I will write about that later.

The Sunday before I left home, I went to climb Mt. Washington with Папа, Yosef, and his best friend. The peak is at 6,288 ft (1,917 m) and the highest wind recorded there was 231 mph (372 km/h), which was the world record until a few years ago. For me these numbers only make sense when Папа told me that the air is thinner at the top, though unlike many of the mountains he's climbed, I can actually manage this one. The day we went wasn’t too hot or too cold, and there was hardly any wind. Папа  says he has never seen such perfect conditions there, ever. Granted, he has a tendency to climb it when there’s snow. The mountain does tend to attract clouds though, that’s true. 

I hadn’t climbed the mountain since I was nine, and then we had arrived at the top soaking wet from the rain and took the last train down. Last time I remember Папа bought me hot cocoa at the top, which burnt my tongue as I too-eagerly tried to drink it. It was strange arriving at the top this time, because many of the people up there had driven, and we still had ways to go before the end of our journey.This time I bought a banana and stole sips of cocoa from my brother.

On the way down, when there was only about twenty minutes left to go (we had started around eleven in the morning, and it was near eight, the sun was setting) we bumped into two other hikers, an old man and a young man. My dad started talking to the older guy, probably in his 60’s, and we soon left them behind, catching up to the two 13-year-olds that had decided to run off ahead. 

The guy I ended up talking to was twenty-something, from Oxford, MA. Shorter than me, with braces and a beard and he introduced himself as Matt at the end of our conversation. He has a job painting lines on the road. His father and grandfather had done the same, and he likes it, says it pays well. In the winter, he gets laid off and gets unemployment until the weather clears up and he can paint lines again. He was planning on staying in his jeep for night and hiking another peak in the morning. He turned out not to be the adopted Russian son of the 60-year-old man, and in fact had just met the man half an hour ago. The old man had looked slightly confused so he was walking down with him and was going to give him a ride to his car, since it wasn’t on the main lot. We were talking about New England* and skiing came up and he said something about being a loser for not knowing how to ski, which was absurd, and he was looking forward to moving to Maine (his job moves him around, you can’t paint road lines in the same place all the time) because of the solitude and mountains, and how photography allows you to remove yourself from a social scene without actually leaving it. We talked about psychology and orphans and the fact that he likes to go to the Middle East café in Cambridge for music concerts, though he generally shies away from the city (and, it seems, people in general.) 

Eventually my dad came down carrying the old man, whose legs had given way from exhaustion.

Matt went to get his jeep and drove the old man to his car. And that was that, and it left me thinking, yet again, about how narrow a world I live in, and how few people I meet.

*fun fact: when I was little I thought New England was just another name for the USA. The fact that my dad’s map of New England was different from what other maps of the USA did cause a moment of pause for me, even then.