Dreams Into Reality

"Why weren't we able to transform our dreams into reality? Why didn't we succeed in creating a society where everyone could be free and fulfilled? Who is to blame?"

It's a partial quote from the first installment of Pandora's Box, an Adam Curtis series I was checking out this morning. Some of his messaging I think is a little off, but let's be honest here: Pretty much, I ride Adam Curtis' jock.

So, this quote came at the end of a 1-hour documentary on the establishment of a socialist state in the soviet republic, and the scientific approach with which it was engineered, justified, and instituted.

I remember learning a long time ago that our republican representative democratic style of governance, as well as more communal socialist governance epitomized by the USSR were both born of the ashes of the French Revolution. It was a point that the prof. made in passing on his way to a larger conclusion about fratricide en route to genocide, so I didn't go back and ask for discussion about a precept of his argument, which actually was more of an aside. But I was motivated to learn about the French Revolution, and the basis for determining how a nation is to be run when a failing economy leads to a violent revolution, precluding monarchies from being a viable option. Rule by corporate oligarchies?

Public governance seems to follow this pattern of concentrating determinative power in the hands of an elite who, based on paternalism, malevolence, greed, righteous indignation, or charisma or some shit, make decisions for/on behalf of/informed by the general populace.

Over time these structures become more recalcitrant, and less accountable to those whom they govern. Seems that part of this process is the cabal of leaders "learning" that, if left to their own devices, the people would not necessarily act in their own best self-interest, and therefore need their leaders to make decisions for them which are difficult and unpopular. (This is long before corruption sets in; this is still assuming that leaders are trying to lead toward the betterment of society.)

So, fast forward a few years, a few hundred years, of a few thousand years, and there will be an uprising and an overthrow as The People demand justice in the form of a more representative governing structure.

Pure democracy is too unwieldy and inefficient for so many reasons, and representative leaders emerge, and the whole process begins anew. I think all of public governance, at least at the national level, can be reduced to a small group of people making decisions for a population that they would/could not make for themselves.

So, "Why weren't we able to transform our dreams into reality? Why didn't we succeed in creating a society where everyone could be free and fulfilled? Who is to blame?" No one. It's a mirage that we are destined to chase; a dream indefinitely deferred. We are driven to institute a governing body which maximizes social welfare for all of its citizens. But, as the scale of the economy grows, it becomes less probable until it hits impossible.

In fact, I'm just now realizing that the demands of effective governance often run contrary to meeting the needs/wants/desires of The People. The demands of "effective governance" require that leaders maintain control and subjugation of the people, even when leaders act against the will of The People. This requires controlling a people who initiated a campaign to become free.

Home!

I finally made it home this morning. I think around 11. I set up a trip with some friends to go to a natural rockslide that empties into a waterfall. That's the kinda shit my weary soul could use right now.

The upside to coming back this morning was that I got to see one of my favorite people in the airport on her way out of town. So, I walked to her gate with her, and hung out while she waited for her flight. It felt very 70's, and it made me resent all of these security measures that mean you can't wait with loved ones and watch their plane takeoff anymore. I miss that.

I wasn't very good company. I didn't feel much like talking, or listening for that matter. I really just was excited to hang out and spend time with her, but I noticed that she seemed to be trying kinda hard to keep the chat up. It's gotta be confusing with someone who doesn't feel like talking or listening for more than 8 second spurts.

What's the non-creepy/non-sexual way to say to someone, "You don't have to do any work. I really just like being here with you."? I think I'll be a better woman when I can figure that one out. I can probably figure it out when I'm back to full brain capacity, rather than emergency reserve. I don't think anything is working except my brain stem right now; breathing, heart-beat, find food. Shit like that.

So, I got home, made a couple of calls, and then went down for a nap. I only woke up because I'm starving hungry.

I was so exhausted that I think a part of my being fused with the bed. Like, if you brought in some of that Ghostbusters II equipment, some kind of spectrometer, and did a reading of my mattress after I left the house you would pick up some of my lifeforce.

"Binkman," (is that his name? I think so.)"You're not going to believe this! I know I'm looking at a mattress in an empty room, but the reading says that there is an exhausted Black woman right in front of me. What should we do?"

Always Look on the Bright Side of Life

It's stuck in my head.

I'm stuck at an airport. An appropriate bookend to this trip. On the last, and unnecessary (let's fly you south to then fly you north so that your ticket is a couple hundred dollars cheaper) leg of my journey home, I spent hours on the plane.
I spent more time on the plane waiting than I spent in the air flying.

I sat there while they had a mechanic trying to fix some problem that was "only going to delay us 5 minutes." After an hour, we had to get off. The airline had to get another plane, so we waited. We waited a long time, and then they found one that for some reason had to park on the other side of the airport. So, we stopped waiting, and started walking. We started walking really fast, because "we didn't have much time" before the new plane boarded.

So, we got on that plane and a curious thing happened. We started waiting again. A long time. As it turns out, if we had taken off on that plane, the landing gear wouldn't have come down, and that would have been a problem. (Or so they say.)

Well, I had a connecting flight. After a few hours and changing planes, and waiting inside the airport, only to move and wait inside the plane, a smart girl like me starts to thinkin!

"Uhm- excuse me sir. Since I'm missing my connecting flight due to all this engine failure/mechanical failure shenanigans, can we just skip the flight south only to fly back north and stick me on a flight straight home?"

He said no problem, except that I checked a bag. And, since I'm changing carriers in Florida, I'll have to go get my bag off of the claim belt and recheck it with the new carrier.

"Are you sure about that? I think that they checked my bag through to the final destination."

I asked a couple of times. I asked a couple of people. Same answer, same justification.

So, I thought, "Well damn! Good thing this happened, because I never knew that I had to transfer my bag myself." So, I got down to Florida just in time to get down to the baggage claim, and wait for a long ass time, only to find that I had no bag, and no one could tell me where it was.

The last flight out had departed 2 hours ago, and the woman working the luggage service office had the attitude of someone who had endured 8 hours of people yelling at her, and she was ready to go home. My problem was not her problem, and she tried to explain to me why the airline wasn't at fault, and they wouldn't do anything for me.

Do white people endure weeks like this? I mean really, if I hadn't gone to seminary and worked through the meaning of life, love, pain, and the limitations of our perceptions, I would be completely embittered and maybe in jail for having concocted some "Burn Baby Burn!!" scheme. Either that or I would have just kirked out one day, and the shit would have ended in tragedy.

Seminary and the God-shit really smoothed me out. And now? A bitch is just too damn old to be goin to jail on some bullshit. More than once muthafukas have called security on my Black ass!

So, I've had to learn/am still learning that I need to talk to people in a way that gets me what I want. I don't need this lady in luggage services to know how angry and frustrated I am. I don't need her to know what I think of her and this whole situation. What I need is a room. So, I figured out how to talk to her so that I got a room and a couple of meal vouchers.

Now, to be clear, this trick-ass bitch didn't do shit for me that she wasn't suppose to do. Nothing. I got what was coming to me. But, what I got was far more than she wanted to give me when I walked in at 8:50 pm, and all of the folks who would have otherwise helped me were gone for the evening.

I got a room. I got Florida sushi for dinner, which was delicious, and about the best thing I've had in the last 4 days. My room is right down the hall from the gym, so I'm gonna go run off this frustration/excess energy.

Oh, and my bag? I'm looking at it right now. The new carrier had it. It was checked through to my final destination. They had to pull it off the plane.

Hey! Are You Housing Discriminating Me?

Yeah, you! Old White Christian Conservative Guy. Are you housing discriminating me? Because, I was told that you were desperate to fill this unit, and I was the first one here.

I'm ready to sign, and I have a list of references in my left hand, and my security deposit in my right. Wait, what? You need to see if someone else wants the apartment? The unit is still available isn't it? So, what's going on again, cuz I'm looking to pay for somewhere to live, you have somewhere to live but you need someone to pay you. The shit sounds like a symbiotic relationship to me. You took down my references; even my boss' number. What's the hold-up papi?

So, that looked very confusing. After stewing over it, and talking to the folks who were with me, I decided, "Yup. Looks like discrimination." I found a housing alternative, and then decided to call the guy to find out what the story was.

I laid out what I saw, and told him what looked like a reasonable conclusion to me, and then asked him to help me understand what was going on. He got pissed, but it didn't deter me. So, we worked through it. He told me enough of his side of the story and what happened and why for things to look sane and reasonable.

He could be lying through his teeth. I don't think he is, but he very well could be. I'm still okay with it.

White people: If you are going to housing discriminate (really I guess any discrimination. really I guess, not just white people), please understand that you need to get your story together. As long as you can offer a reasonable explanation that stands up to scrutiny, pretty much you can have people easily accept the most absurd of circumstances.

I Punched Myself In The Stomach Just Now.

Well, not just now, but recently enough that I still feel like throwing up. I didn't punch myself in the stomach on purpose, in fact I was really fucking shocked that it happened. It kinda knocked the wind out of me, but mostly it made me want to throw up. It’s 6:28 am, I’m in the airport, and I don’t get to NY until 11:30, and I can’t eat anything before my plane takes off, because I punched myself in the stomach.

Terrible.

It seemed innocent enough, I was tired of carrying my bag, so I got one of those carts with the handbrake. Push down it rolls, release and it stops. Well, I can be a brisk walker, and in my briskness I forgot that the handbrake violates the laws of inertia. Your cart will not slow down with you as process that a bathroom is ahead on the left. If you let go of the handbrake, it stops. It stops rather abruptly in fact.

If you’re not paying close attention you will walk, kinda fast, into a stationary object with a bar that comes right across your abdomen. I don’t ever remember someone being really pissed at me and punching me in my stomach. But, this shit makes me want to be nice to everyone I meet for the rest of my life, just in case. This shit is terrible.

Before that I had a security guard yell at me because I asked him if he was having a bad day. He was being really rude to an old woman who hadn’t flown since the new security measures had been implemented, and she was confused about a lot of things. He yelled at me because “I didn’t know him” and therefore couldn’t tell if he was frustrated or not. So, since he was already pissed, and now taking it out on me, I toyed with him.

“Well, I hope your day gets better.”

Fumimg words!!

“I’m just saying that I hope you have a good day.”

“Ma’am! Just take your bag and leave.”

“Oh, my bags still haven’t come out yet. If they had, I wouldn’t be standing here listening to you take out your frustrations.” (smile)

Fuming words!!

“Ok then, have a nice day!”

Fuming words!!

I told all of the folks in the security area to have a nice day. Some of them laughed. Some of them didn’t.

Before that, my cab forgot about me. I called for a cab to the train, and then planned to ride the train to the airport. I called several times and was told that he was on the way each time. Finally, I called back pissed, and demanded to know what they were going to do for me since this whole ordeal had taken nearly 30 minutes, and now it was too late for me to catch the train. Free ride to the airport, and the driver was the guy who “forgot” to pick me up. Ok.

After 10 minutes, I’d started walking. Not because I thought it would make a difference about time/convenience, but because I would have been pissed if I just sat in the house waiting. So, I walked ¾ mile at 5am through not necessarily the safest part of town, carrying my luggage over my shoulder.

The whole thing was almost laughable, which wasn’t lost on me. So, the guy finally arrives, and tells me that he forgot. He didn’t have an answer for why he never came after the subsequent calls, but I tell him that because of his dropping the ball, I now need to go straight to the airport, and they said that they would take care of it.

“No problem, I’ll take care of it for you. And, I’ll get you to the airport early. I’m really sorry.” he turns off his meter, and were off.

So, we ride to the airport at 80+ mph, and I decided that mistakes happen, so I would pay him the fare that I would have otherwise paid to get to the train plus a tip. So, $15 is better than nothing; he’s just a working stiff.

We pull up to my airline, and he says, “Okay, that’ll be $30.” WTF!?!?

“Normally, it would be $33, but I want to take care of the inconvenience.”

I ran him through the litany of inconveniences he caused me, including the need to get a ride all the way to the airport in the first place. $3, uhm- I had to tell him that I was doing my best not to curse him out.

So, I had to argue with him, and he finally agreed to a lower fare.

He got $10, I told him that I shouldn’t give him anything, and made him give me change from a $20. (ouch!)

Started with that, went to the friendly security guy, and then punched myself in the stomach. Somehow, I’m still in a pretty good mood. I haven’t succumbed to “having a bad day”. Could be my crush. Could be that a couple of shitty instances haven’t ground me down to the point that I’m starting to take it personal.

I think I’ll go get a croissan’wich.
___________________________________________________

Fast forward to 1am. I had a pretty good day. I found a really good BBQ joint; found the apartment that I plan to live in for the next 12 months; wandered out to the edge of town and found what may become my favorite Polish restaurant; and went with a friend to grab a drink, where I met some cool-ass folks and got me some digits.

Not a bad day at all.

Am I Too Old To Call It A Crush?

It honestly feels so 7th grade to call it a crush, but it makes me feel like I'm in 7th grade. I have a crush!!!

She makes my heart go pitter-thump! Like it thumps so hard in my chest that I can't breathe. I can't remember my thoughts. I can't remember that I'm not boring, or that I have witty witticisms. I have a crush, and she makes me all redundant and shit, but I don't even care, because because her hair is pretty.

What does she do? I don't know.
Where is she from? I don't know.
What does she like? I don't know.
What excites her? Justice, I think.

I love everything about her!!!!!

Does she like me?
I don't know. Maybe. I'm pretty likable, except I can't remember that when I have a crush on someone. I'm too busy feeling awkward, and unattractive, and gangly- like my arms are too long or something, but I never had a growth spurt. I've always been fairly well proportioned.

I like her so much that I take on other people's awkwardness and discomfort. My crush makes me feel like I'm really tall, but uncomfortable about my height.

She has beautiful brown eyes. I wonder if she wears contacts...

Blogette VIII

I went for a run yesterday.

I hurt my foot.

Stupid Latin body parts!

Stupid longus tendons!