-Realized I have kept a pretty good blog for an entire year. Only regret the wording of one or two entries (esp. one in which I describe state employees in a way that reeks of self-important, bourgeois expectations). Always interesting to see comments from people I've never met. Blurkers who read this blog should always feel free to comment.
-Finished the semester, graded two big stacks of papers and exams, turned in grades, and then ran screaming from the institution.
-Raised a last glass and said goodbye to long-time close friends A. and S/Z, who are moving to Singapore. Still somewhat in denial about that. Can't really picture Houston without them.
-Packing for trip to Seattle, a city I've never been to but that I've wanted to visit for quite some time. Hope to run into an old friend from my teenage years, who I haven't seen since the early 90s. Plan to spend time on the Olympic Peninsula, visiting the coast and the rainforest.
-Finishing Nick Flynn's Another Bullshit Night in Suck City, a devastating memoir about a son, a father, homelessness, poverty, and work. Read it.
-Contemplating the interviews with Democratic Party presidential candidates I watched on PBS the other night. Journalists of color asked the questions. Particularly excellent was Michel Martin from NPR. She'd finish her question and I'd declare "A-NAL-Y-SIS!" while pointing to the screen.
I'll be posting from the road, y'all.
Saturday, June 30, 2007
Saturday, June 23, 2007
body
In Jennie Livingston's 1989 documentary Paris Is Burning, there's a shot of one of the subjects at a ball, descending the stage, completely naked. "Body!" shouts one of the MCs into a mic from the floor as the crowd goes wild, "Body! Body! Body!"
It is with this in mind that I began the day. An imaginary voice-over followed me from the bedroom to the kitchen and bath, exclaiming the word over and over. My knee has healed, and I took the last dose of nausea-inducing antibodies, but I am dragging stress around with me like a giant bag of rocks. The muscles of my upper-back, neck, and right shoulder are twisted up, stiff and painful, and there's a big red zit next to my right nostril. I'm scruffy. "Body!" I hear echoing in my head, "Body! Body! Body!"
And so what to do? I made an appointment with a place in the neighborhood that advertises for massage. I described the place to a friend, who queried, "THAI massage? Isn't that the kind that finishes with a happy ending?" No, no, I assured her, this place is legit. I looked up the website and it should be fine.
But I wasn't so sure once I got in and I met my massage therapist, Pauline, who was wearing a lot of make-up and, of all things, a short skirt. That seemed unusual. Where were her Birkenstocks? Nose-ring? She led me to a little room and I disrobed, leaving my boxers on for good luck.
"First time here?" she asked. Yes. I laid down on this futon-like mattress and the massage began. A lot of warm oil poured over my back. But she seemed awfully close -- practically sitting right on top of me. Shouldn't I be up on some sort of table?, I wondered, and shouldn't she be walking around this table?
She bent over my shoulder and whispered into my ear, Did I want a simple massage or deep tissue? Deep, I replied, I twisted a muscle in my neck. I could feel her breathing on my neck and she murmured very slowly, "Ahhh . . . IIII liiiike youuurrrr tattoooooo." She pulled one of my arms back and laid my hand so that my fingertips touched right above her knees. A bit hesitantly, I pulled them away. She picked them up and rubbed them, and put them back pretty close to where they were originally.
I decided right then and there that I could very easily say "Stop it" or "That's not why I'm here" if anything more unusual started happening -- No problem. But I was super-disappointed about the whole thing because, really, that's NOT why I was there, and I was afraid that the $80 I spent was not going to do a damn thing for the knots in my back and neck. Okay, I thought, why don't I just take a deep breath, relax into the massage, and see what happens.
A few minutes later, Pauline got up from beside me and, much to my alarm, she removed her skirt. The lights, mind you, were very, very dim, and it wasn't like she was completely naked, but she certainly was no longer wearing the skirt that she came in with. She climbed on top of my back and started, how to describe it? kneeing? yes, kneeing the oil into my shoulders. Kneeing it, if you can picture that, with her thighs sliding back and forth along my sides. It all happened very quickly. When I finally got around to responding, I uttered, a little louder than I wanted to, "Um!?!" She stopped. "Does it hurt?" "No," I said. "Okaaayyy, let me knooooow if it doooeesssss," she soothed. And I thought, But! I can feel! Your crotch muscles! Tightening! Against my spine!
Is this normal? Maybe this is what is meant by "deep tissue."
The knees in the upper-back, though, was super-intense, and they did the trick of pushing the knots in my back flat for about ten minutes. She used her elbows, too, then climbed down off my back and did my legs, head, and neck. The next thing I knew, the massage was over, and I was beginning to wonder if maybe the back-climbing part of things was just the way this woman liked to work. As soon as that part was over, she reattached her skirt and kept on working. So maybe it's all in my head?
Recently a friend of mine, let's call her Wendy, went to visit a massage therapist and had an orgasmic release. Wendy didn't go to the therapist for a happy ending, it just happened that way, and from what I remember of her description, the therapist was very cool about the whole thing. While a different experience from my own, I thought about Wendy's massage as I was walking home, and thought about how work on the body might always verge on the sexual depending on how we think of it.
And so this is how I spent the morning of H/town's Pride Celebration, with a nearly-naked woman sliding around on my back. I have to say, hours later, that something really worked. The knots are still there, but the severity of the stiffness is nowhere near as bad as it was. The massage was actually quite good, although I don't think I'll be going back. It was too oily.
But H. and I will be heading out to the parade this evening, rain or shine. Our street already has little places marked off for the floats. It's one of the good things about living so close to Westheimer -- we can walk to the parade and meander down the street, pop into a bar and have a couple of beers. I know I'll be keeping my eyes peeled for Cyndi Lauper and Margaret Cho, both of whom are in town for a live performance tomorrow, and both of whom are rumored to make an appearance in Montrose tonight. I'll bring the camera.
It is with this in mind that I began the day. An imaginary voice-over followed me from the bedroom to the kitchen and bath, exclaiming the word over and over. My knee has healed, and I took the last dose of nausea-inducing antibodies, but I am dragging stress around with me like a giant bag of rocks. The muscles of my upper-back, neck, and right shoulder are twisted up, stiff and painful, and there's a big red zit next to my right nostril. I'm scruffy. "Body!" I hear echoing in my head, "Body! Body! Body!"
And so what to do? I made an appointment with a place in the neighborhood that advertises for massage. I described the place to a friend, who queried, "THAI massage? Isn't that the kind that finishes with a happy ending?" No, no, I assured her, this place is legit. I looked up the website and it should be fine.
But I wasn't so sure once I got in and I met my massage therapist, Pauline, who was wearing a lot of make-up and, of all things, a short skirt. That seemed unusual. Where were her Birkenstocks? Nose-ring? She led me to a little room and I disrobed, leaving my boxers on for good luck.
"First time here?" she asked. Yes. I laid down on this futon-like mattress and the massage began. A lot of warm oil poured over my back. But she seemed awfully close -- practically sitting right on top of me. Shouldn't I be up on some sort of table?, I wondered, and shouldn't she be walking around this table?
She bent over my shoulder and whispered into my ear, Did I want a simple massage or deep tissue? Deep, I replied, I twisted a muscle in my neck. I could feel her breathing on my neck and she murmured very slowly, "Ahhh . . . IIII liiiike youuurrrr tattoooooo." She pulled one of my arms back and laid my hand so that my fingertips touched right above her knees. A bit hesitantly, I pulled them away. She picked them up and rubbed them, and put them back pretty close to where they were originally.
I decided right then and there that I could very easily say "Stop it" or "That's not why I'm here" if anything more unusual started happening -- No problem. But I was super-disappointed about the whole thing because, really, that's NOT why I was there, and I was afraid that the $80 I spent was not going to do a damn thing for the knots in my back and neck. Okay, I thought, why don't I just take a deep breath, relax into the massage, and see what happens.
A few minutes later, Pauline got up from beside me and, much to my alarm, she removed her skirt. The lights, mind you, were very, very dim, and it wasn't like she was completely naked, but she certainly was no longer wearing the skirt that she came in with. She climbed on top of my back and started, how to describe it? kneeing? yes, kneeing the oil into my shoulders. Kneeing it, if you can picture that, with her thighs sliding back and forth along my sides. It all happened very quickly. When I finally got around to responding, I uttered, a little louder than I wanted to, "Um!?!" She stopped. "Does it hurt?" "No," I said. "Okaaayyy, let me knooooow if it doooeesssss," she soothed. And I thought, But! I can feel! Your crotch muscles! Tightening! Against my spine!
Is this normal? Maybe this is what is meant by "deep tissue."
The knees in the upper-back, though, was super-intense, and they did the trick of pushing the knots in my back flat for about ten minutes. She used her elbows, too, then climbed down off my back and did my legs, head, and neck. The next thing I knew, the massage was over, and I was beginning to wonder if maybe the back-climbing part of things was just the way this woman liked to work. As soon as that part was over, she reattached her skirt and kept on working. So maybe it's all in my head?
Recently a friend of mine, let's call her Wendy, went to visit a massage therapist and had an orgasmic release. Wendy didn't go to the therapist for a happy ending, it just happened that way, and from what I remember of her description, the therapist was very cool about the whole thing. While a different experience from my own, I thought about Wendy's massage as I was walking home, and thought about how work on the body might always verge on the sexual depending on how we think of it.
And so this is how I spent the morning of H/town's Pride Celebration, with a nearly-naked woman sliding around on my back. I have to say, hours later, that something really worked. The knots are still there, but the severity of the stiffness is nowhere near as bad as it was. The massage was actually quite good, although I don't think I'll be going back. It was too oily.
But H. and I will be heading out to the parade this evening, rain or shine. Our street already has little places marked off for the floats. It's one of the good things about living so close to Westheimer -- we can walk to the parade and meander down the street, pop into a bar and have a couple of beers. I know I'll be keeping my eyes peeled for Cyndi Lauper and Margaret Cho, both of whom are in town for a live performance tomorrow, and both of whom are rumored to make an appearance in Montrose tonight. I'll bring the camera.
Friday, June 15, 2007
daily rain
It's been rough, these past few days, but I'm glad for the rain. For the past couple of days, it comes down hard out of a dark grey sky in wide curtains, lightening and thunder like angry exclamation points.
Those damn antibiotics didn't work, and I've been back to see the doctor. Now I'm on round two, this time I'm on something stronger that takes just about all of the energy out of me. Gosh, it is really just astonishing how exhausted a person can be after doing practically nothing all day. I guess that's called "rest." I'm not very fond of it.
Wednesday I went to have an MRI done on my knee and I went to see a specialist. I go back again this afternoon, to see what has developed.
I've had two dreams about going to visit a friend who is out of town who doesn't realize she's left her apartment unlocked.
Those damn antibiotics didn't work, and I've been back to see the doctor. Now I'm on round two, this time I'm on something stronger that takes just about all of the energy out of me. Gosh, it is really just astonishing how exhausted a person can be after doing practically nothing all day. I guess that's called "rest." I'm not very fond of it.
Wednesday I went to have an MRI done on my knee and I went to see a specialist. I go back again this afternoon, to see what has developed.
I've had two dreams about going to visit a friend who is out of town who doesn't realize she's left her apartment unlocked.
Monday, June 04, 2007
knee, i worship thee
all knobby patella and elastic cartilage, bending at my whim . . .
Why You Should Not Get a Knee Infection:
1. It hurts.
2. It's gross.
3. It'll make you sick with fever.
4. It will make you think that someone has a pin in a doll somewhere.
5. It will force you to look up subcutaenous infections on WebMD where you will learn about necrotizing faciitis and its symptoms. You will quietly decide that you have this and the resulting panic will ebb and flow all day.
6. It will make you spend a lot of time inside, which will make you very cranky. And paranoid.
7. It will cause you to miss work during a condensed summer schedule where every minute counts.
8. Like some colds, it will seem like you are 100% cured in the morning, but will get worse as the day goes on, and leave you distressed and exhausted by nightfall.
9. It will call attention to your other, non-infected knee, and you will start to compare and contrast the two, out loud, to anyone who you can get to look at them (especially your partner, who has been very, very kind), even if it has only been about an hour since the last time you rolled up your cuffs for inspection.
2. You might get some anti-inflammatory drugs, which act like mild-sedatives.
3. You might have vivid dreams every night about people from your past.
4. You might have time to read.
5. It might become fodder for a blog entry.
Why You Should Not Get a Knee Infection:
1. It hurts.
2. It's gross.
3. It'll make you sick with fever.
4. It will make you think that someone has a pin in a doll somewhere.
5. It will force you to look up subcutaenous infections on WebMD where you will learn about necrotizing faciitis and its symptoms. You will quietly decide that you have this and the resulting panic will ebb and flow all day.
6. It will make you spend a lot of time inside, which will make you very cranky. And paranoid.
7. It will cause you to miss work during a condensed summer schedule where every minute counts.
8. Like some colds, it will seem like you are 100% cured in the morning, but will get worse as the day goes on, and leave you distressed and exhausted by nightfall.
9. It will call attention to your other, non-infected knee, and you will start to compare and contrast the two, out loud, to anyone who you can get to look at them (especially your partner, who has been very, very kind), even if it has only been about an hour since the last time you rolled up your cuffs for inspection.
10. It will make you miss your favorite yoga classes.
The Short-List of Good Things about It, if It Does Have to Happen:
1. You might remember how totally awesome your doctor is and it might give you pause over how lucky you are to have health insurance.
1. You might remember how totally awesome your doctor is and it might give you pause over how lucky you are to have health insurance.
2. You might get some anti-inflammatory drugs, which act like mild-sedatives.
3. You might have vivid dreams every night about people from your past.
4. You might have time to read.
5. It might become fodder for a blog entry.
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