This weekend was full of distractions, drinking, and sleep. Friday night crept into Sunday morning quickly. Home at 4:45 am. No reason for me to have been driving my car after all of the that vodka I drank. I was drinking because I was happy. This decision has brought with it a surge of powerful energy. I have felt dead since June 26th, 2004. Until last week, for the most part. Dead. Lifeless. Forcing most enthusiasm. Feeling little faith in my abilities. Having so little time to work to improve my personal essay writing (the academic shit I have down; informative, expository essays are no problem. It’s the personal that fucks with me.) But the energy is galloping back with a vengeance. In “Beyond Ecology” by Neil Evernden, he talks about “the individual as a component of, not something distinct from, the rest of the environment.” He also discusses this fish called the cichlid. The fish is small, but it’s a bad ass. It makes itself think it is as big as its territory so it can compete for sustenance; “the fish is no longer an organism bounded by skin--it is an organism-plus-environment bounded by an imaginary integument.” (An integument is, according to Definition Number 5 on www.dictionary.com, “an outer protective covering such as the skin of an animal or a cuticle or seed coat or rind or shell.”)
When I first read this essay, I was living in NYC. The essay emboldened me to lap up the energy the people on the subways and in the streets provide, to swim with the other sea creatures, as opposed to darting from them, letting them annoy me, wear me out.
Now, instead, my feeling recalls the essay (for the past two days, at least): I am the fish and I am part of the environment, my familial environment, my social environment. I do not feel outside of the happenings; I feel inside of them; I’m taking part. So often I feel so “distinct” from my surroundings. I am a petite, over excitable, 32 year old woman fighting to possess more confidence and drive, and I am making myself bigger, wrapping my arms around my grandmother’s home and its visitors, my family, and around the entire bar and everyone in it.
What I need to be watch out for is the little fish engulfing absolutely everything and leaving little room for others to breathe. Sometimes, though, it’ll be the others who need to become cichlids.
Friday. The vodka. The good new feeling. Super spazzy Jen in effect. Accompanying my friend M to a show so he could make contact with someone who was interested in him. He was unsure of his interest, but he not rash. He made an effort. He was smart about it. People always have their guards up because we’ve all been so burned by those we’ve dated, attempted to date. Those who like us but are afraid, and vice versa…But I was impressed at how rational he was about it. You have to at least try, sometimes, even if the person is not generally your “type.”
Back to the bar that is too comfortable to me. I am not going to meet new people in that bar. Just new acquaintances, maybe, but I keep going back. Happily, my friend and favorite bartender, WCZ, was still sitting where we had left him. The one who got shot in the ass by a thug the night before Thanksgiving hovered in the back. M and I “berated the pitfalls of the opposite sex” as my Maddog so aptly puts it. And we antagonized the one who got shot. A few people said it was kharma, but they also made clear they wouldn’t be joking if the victim had been seriously hurt.
Things get blurry with the fourth and fifth vodkas. (Milwaukee bartenders make such strong drinks!) My good feeling is transitioning into rowdy craziness. But that’s ok, because then my hot acquaintance Ms. S arrives and she can hardly stand. I grope her at the bar. T comes in moments later, smiley and looking dapper. WCZ hugs him, happy that the person he can so easily converse with has finally arrived. My feeling does good when I literally ensconce T in a little Jenny bear hug and pronounce that I never want us to fight again! He says all is ok, and a wave of relief overwhelms me briefly. I had been wanting to ensure that things were all right, but I hadn’t known how. Sometimes drunken, spur of the moment simplicity works best.
When last call rolls around, the owner is playing Thin Lizzy, three songs in a row, including “The Cowboy Song.” I grab my young acquaintance and attempt to dance in the aisle but we are so trashed we just fall around. T okays a small after bar at his place. I tell the bartender that he MUST come, and I convince WCZ by brazenly/obnoxiously trotting behind the bar and telling him passionately that he, too, has to come! Ms. S brings her hipster hairdresser friend who is moving to NYC and is talking about it in that naive, pretentious way that people who are about to move to NYC do. (I can talk shit because I'm sure I sounded the same way four years ago.)
I am at my limit now and should not be drinking anymore. The little fish is in everyone’s lap. Everything is drunkenly surreal and crazy, and I hate that I not be able to accurately convey the scenes and the feeling. So hard for me describe feelings. At the end of the night, when T becomes weary and politely lets me know, the guys separate from the ladies. They walk while we carry on, all a little too much to handle at this point, and I end up at the hipster’s house briefly. I shouldn’t be there, but I want to make sure Ms. S is okay, and she is, she has her friend. I go home shortly after, falling in the slush as I try to open my car door.
The next morning, I awake hungover and paranoid. What did I do? Did I make a foolish spectacle of myself? The feeling can’t push through the hangover. I make some calls and discover all is well. This time.
I have to make some food now. I have to read that fucking theory. I could just stop now, I suppose. Don’t turn in the projects, maybe even stop going. Does it matter that I paid over $3200 for these classes? I’ve never given up on school though, and in 26 days, I will forever retire my role as full-time student in a formal academic setting. More time to be spent writing. Good shit, better than what is written here. (I hate how this writing reads, looks, feels.) Writing that doesn't center so often on bartime shenanigans and neurouses. Writing that better resembles that of Katha Pollitt, bell hooks.
I want to be a cichlid, albeit one who imbibes a little less vodka, swimming amongst the other urchin.
When I first read this essay, I was living in NYC. The essay emboldened me to lap up the energy the people on the subways and in the streets provide, to swim with the other sea creatures, as opposed to darting from them, letting them annoy me, wear me out.
Now, instead, my feeling recalls the essay (for the past two days, at least): I am the fish and I am part of the environment, my familial environment, my social environment. I do not feel outside of the happenings; I feel inside of them; I’m taking part. So often I feel so “distinct” from my surroundings. I am a petite, over excitable, 32 year old woman fighting to possess more confidence and drive, and I am making myself bigger, wrapping my arms around my grandmother’s home and its visitors, my family, and around the entire bar and everyone in it.
What I need to be watch out for is the little fish engulfing absolutely everything and leaving little room for others to breathe. Sometimes, though, it’ll be the others who need to become cichlids.
Friday. The vodka. The good new feeling. Super spazzy Jen in effect. Accompanying my friend M to a show so he could make contact with someone who was interested in him. He was unsure of his interest, but he not rash. He made an effort. He was smart about it. People always have their guards up because we’ve all been so burned by those we’ve dated, attempted to date. Those who like us but are afraid, and vice versa…But I was impressed at how rational he was about it. You have to at least try, sometimes, even if the person is not generally your “type.”
Back to the bar that is too comfortable to me. I am not going to meet new people in that bar. Just new acquaintances, maybe, but I keep going back. Happily, my friend and favorite bartender, WCZ, was still sitting where we had left him. The one who got shot in the ass by a thug the night before Thanksgiving hovered in the back. M and I “berated the pitfalls of the opposite sex” as my Maddog so aptly puts it. And we antagonized the one who got shot. A few people said it was kharma, but they also made clear they wouldn’t be joking if the victim had been seriously hurt.
Things get blurry with the fourth and fifth vodkas. (Milwaukee bartenders make such strong drinks!) My good feeling is transitioning into rowdy craziness. But that’s ok, because then my hot acquaintance Ms. S arrives and she can hardly stand. I grope her at the bar. T comes in moments later, smiley and looking dapper. WCZ hugs him, happy that the person he can so easily converse with has finally arrived. My feeling does good when I literally ensconce T in a little Jenny bear hug and pronounce that I never want us to fight again! He says all is ok, and a wave of relief overwhelms me briefly. I had been wanting to ensure that things were all right, but I hadn’t known how. Sometimes drunken, spur of the moment simplicity works best.
When last call rolls around, the owner is playing Thin Lizzy, three songs in a row, including “The Cowboy Song.” I grab my young acquaintance and attempt to dance in the aisle but we are so trashed we just fall around. T okays a small after bar at his place. I tell the bartender that he MUST come, and I convince WCZ by brazenly/obnoxiously trotting behind the bar and telling him passionately that he, too, has to come! Ms. S brings her hipster hairdresser friend who is moving to NYC and is talking about it in that naive, pretentious way that people who are about to move to NYC do. (I can talk shit because I'm sure I sounded the same way four years ago.)
I am at my limit now and should not be drinking anymore. The little fish is in everyone’s lap. Everything is drunkenly surreal and crazy, and I hate that I not be able to accurately convey the scenes and the feeling. So hard for me describe feelings. At the end of the night, when T becomes weary and politely lets me know, the guys separate from the ladies. They walk while we carry on, all a little too much to handle at this point, and I end up at the hipster’s house briefly. I shouldn’t be there, but I want to make sure Ms. S is okay, and she is, she has her friend. I go home shortly after, falling in the slush as I try to open my car door.
The next morning, I awake hungover and paranoid. What did I do? Did I make a foolish spectacle of myself? The feeling can’t push through the hangover. I make some calls and discover all is well. This time.
I have to make some food now. I have to read that fucking theory. I could just stop now, I suppose. Don’t turn in the projects, maybe even stop going. Does it matter that I paid over $3200 for these classes? I’ve never given up on school though, and in 26 days, I will forever retire my role as full-time student in a formal academic setting. More time to be spent writing. Good shit, better than what is written here. (I hate how this writing reads, looks, feels.) Writing that doesn't center so often on bartime shenanigans and neurouses. Writing that better resembles that of Katha Pollitt, bell hooks.
I want to be a cichlid, albeit one who imbibes a little less vodka, swimming amongst the other urchin.
posted by Jen Threat at
12:04 PM
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