February 17th, 2008 by Hoopleton

Sitting around my apartment today, while watching House, wondering why everyone compares me to him and drinking whiskey, I was struck by the isolation in our lives. How we spend so much time alone. I thought about the extroverts I know, and how lonely they feel despite constantly being around other people. Then I thought about the introverts I know, and how lonely they feel due to their own, self-imposed isolation. And then I thought about something a friend and I discussed the other night.

To a large extent, when not performing in front of large groups of people in my capacity as an instructor, I tend to shy away from human contact. Shyness not out of fear but out of a general sense of disinterest. To a certain extent I am a misanthrope, the human species bores and annoys the piss out of me most of the time.

On the flip side, I do thirst for human contact. In relationships I tend to devour my partners, in friendships I tend to make decent demands on time. I enjoy my isolation, while at the same time love the idea that someone is around. I’ve been described as both distant and intense, sometimes by the same person and usually in the same breath.

I have been known to clear a dinner party. I have been known to set a bad first impression. I have been known to be rude and too honest. I often don’t see the point of discussing things that don’t have real relevance or meaning.

So maybe I am a bit like House. Maybe as a friend recently told me, all I need is a cane and a medical degree. But is there really something wrong with knowing who you are?

I don’t know what my future holds, and I take comfort in the idea that this life is all we have. Accepting that maybe nothing but darkness awaits us, forces all of us to feel everyday of our lives. To appreciate every passing minute. I suppose that’s ultimately why going to sleep everynight is hard for me, as I try to revel in every second on the clock.

But getting back to my original thought, I’m left wondering if maybe we’re going about the pursuit of happiness all wrong. Loneliness in a crowd or in an empty room is still loneliness. So maybe the trick to it all is to embrace our isolation before trying to find the cure in someone else? No, I’m not swearing off my friends or the prospect of relationships. I’m merely wondering if the reason so few of us can find real enlightenment is because we treat the understanding of ourselves like something we need to run from.

I guess everybody lies, especially to themselves.

February 14th, 2008 by Hoopleton

St. Valentine’s Day, a holiday of Hallmark cards, stuffed bears and boxes of chocolate in celebration of any number of possible saints with the same name martyred on this day by the Romans some 1800 years ago. The presumptive front runner in the race for who was the true St. Valentine was Valentine of Rome who was not just martyred, but beaten with clubs, then stoned and then, if all that wasn’t enough, beheaded. And all that for being the patron saint of beekeepers. Well, all right, he wouldn’t give up being a Christian either, but back then getting yourself beaten with clubs, stoned and beheaded for your beliefs was the righteous thing to do. Today I think it’s enough if you just don’t murder someone. Or is it if you do murder someone? I can never remember.

There seem to be two schools of thought about this holiday. The first, suggests that it’s a day for the commemoration of pure romance. A day to celebrate companionship in all of its forms. Memories of passing heart-shaped cards to the girl or boy sitting two desks away in sixth grade. Flowers. Candle-lit dinners. Love and innocence. The second maintains that it’s nothing more than an over-commercialized, diabolical corporate hoax to force people into unrealistic expectations and artificially inflated roles that undermine the natural state of relationships. In other words, love sucks and Valentine’s Day is the Devil’s doing, so lets drink till we’re blind.

I’m a bit of a hopeless romantic. No matter how much I get burned I can’t ever see myself saying that love is a bad thing. Alcohol inspired anti-love declarations at sunrise after nights of self-pitying binge drinking not withstanding. But I have to say that I definitely relate to the down with love crowd much more than I could ever see myself buying someone a pink teddy bear. And no, my objection is not some ridiculously clichéd imperative that love doesn’t need a holiday to reveal itself. My objection is not that V-day is some Hallmark holiday. Even though it is. No, it really is. I just simply can’t stand holidays that make demands and attempt to dictate behavior. For that matter, I just can’t stand holidays. Though Flag Day is pretty fucking awesome.

Anyway, my point is that being a V-day fanatic or a V-day basher is about the same, in either case you’re playing a pre-designed role and there’s a whole chain of products and services out there to serve your particular niche. I say be yourself. Shed the shackles of holiday expectations and just treat the 14 th of February like any other Thursday. If you want to be romantic, do that. If you want to deface pictures of your ex-girlfriend because she just couldn’t understand what a writer goes through on a daily basis in the process of creation, or that her fears of commitment were really projections of past relationships that… wait, what was I saying?

You are not luckier than others if you have a date. You are not more pathetic if you spend tonight alone. You are not a holiday. You are just a human being quickly racing toward your own lonely, miserable end… You know what, nevermind. Love sucks. Happy St. Valentine’s Day!

February 5th, 2008 by Hoopleton

I live moment to moment. Each moment is complete. I am free in the moment.

This is my mantra. This is my belief. Now only if I could put it into practice.

I had a strange incident last week. I was walking from the train with my headphones on and got to the crosswalk just in time to get a green light. Several people crossed the street ahead of me and as I began to cross as well a strange impulse overtook me. I wasn’t paying attention to my surroundings. I was barely focusing on the ground ahead, when suddenly I had an overwhelming urge to stop.

Without thinking I stopped in the middle of the street, just in time for a white sedan to come charging through the red light at some forty miles per hour, nearly knocking into the man in front of me, and surely killing me if I hadn’t decided to stop. As the day wore on this insignificant incident began to wear on me. I couldn’t figure out what had pushed me to stop.

Was it a sixth sense? Was it destiny? Was I in the moment?

I live moment to moment. Each moment is complete. I am free in the moment.

I’ve been thinking a lot lately about the book, The World Without Us , by Alan Weisman. It’s by far the most fascinating book I’ve ever read on the subject of future ecology and the role of human beings in geologic time. The premise is simple, what would happen to the world if human beings suddenly disappeared. The answer is just as simple, within just hundreds of years there would barely remain a trace of us. Within ten thousand there would be none at all.

It’s also recently been deduced that those radio and television waves of ours that were supposed to travel into the infinity of space actually dissipate within one light year.

And so we come back to the moment. This moment. We’ve only existed for a fraction of time and someday we’ll be gone without a trace. So each moment we breath, that we interact, is that much more important. All we are is this moment. But in this moment we are completely free. Completely free. Completely free. Completely and totally free.

Makes elections kind of pointless this Super Tuesday, doesn’t it? Vote anyway, as these moments are far more tolerable when sanity replaces fear.

February 1st, 2008 by Hoopleton

It’s another madcap day in the city of big shoulders, whatever the Hell that means. Six inches of snow coats the ground and we’re all wondering why we haven’t moved to Arizona yet.

When I was talking to my dad on the phone yesterday he mentioned that human beings shouldn’t live anywhere but the Mediterranean. Truer words were never spoken. But as I was standing on the L platform yesterday afternoon I couldn’t help but play in the snow. Covered in a thick sheen of white flakes I turned my face to the sky. I don’t know if it’s the realization of being single in a city of multiple possibilities, or if it’s because I feel that my writing has taken a serious turn for the better, but for whatever reason it was hard not to enjoy the cold.

However, if you’re not finding the same sudden joy in the rollercoaster ride that is Chicago weather, I offer this short list of six reasons to smile…

1. Less than a year remains in the Presidency of George W. Bush. After seven, long, long, long, long, long years, our beloved nitwit of a Commander in Chief will finally step down to a quiet retirement where the only lives he’ll be able to destroy are those of his own family. I can see him now, chasing armadillos off his porch. Trying to figure out when history will elevate him to the stature of savior that he deserves. Wondering why no one will return his calls anymore. We can begin to rest easy, I mean come on, what else could he possibly do in the next eleven months? It’s not like he’s got access to our nuclear arsenal. It’s not like he can invade Iran. It’s not like… well, you get the idea.

2. With a recession, bordering on massive economic depression looming, none of us will really have to worry about rising oil prices or our growing consumer debt. If all goes well we’ll be without cars or houses pretty soon anyway. And think about everything we have to look forward to… Soup kitchens giving away free soup. FREE SOUP! New affordable housing in city parks and forest preserves. Gangsters with really cool nicknames shooting it out on the streets. Speakeasies. Flappers. Hats making a comeback. Fireside chats. Radio plays. Maybe even a world war where we get to kill Nazis. Who doesn’t like killing Nazis?

3. George W. Bush has LESS THAN A YEAR left as President. He can’t run again. Seriously, he can’t. I checked. The only way he can be in office any longer is if he declares some sort of state of emergency and suspends the Constitution, and we all know that kind of thing only happens in destitute third world countries like Germany, Italy, Spain or… you know, nevermind.

4. With the war in Iraq continuing into the inconceivable future, especially if the Democrats screw up yet another gift-wrapped election, our war to bring democracy to the Middle East will turn into a quagmire not seen since the Vietnam War. Thousands more Americans will die dissuading young people from joining and bringing about a revival of the draft to fill our already dangerously thinning military ranks. Anti-war rallies will explode throughout the nation, and there will be the type of social crises not seen since the 1960s. But just think about how great the sixties were. Sex, drugs and rock ‘n roll! Free love. Young Paul Newman! But if that’s not your cup of tea, then who knows, we may still bring it home. We may help build a new peaceful Middle East. It’s not like the people of that region can go on killing each other forever. Especially not with the West imposing it’s principals, corporations, forms of governments and religious beliefs. Can they?

5. Okay, okay, you’ve convinced me. George W. Bush will become emperor of a new global American Empire and we’ll be stuck with him till the day he dies. But Cheney is practically dead already and couldn’t possibly take the reigns when he’s gone. And president Jenna? Come on, that’s just not realistic at all. And besides, unless they come up with some way to keep him cryogenically frozen into infinity, while he rules over us from some sort of artificial intelligence super computer, George W. Bush can only really hold onto power for another twenty years before the people take back the government and rebuild the world from the smoldering ashes. Thirty years tops! And Jon Stewart is just funnier with Bush as President, I’m sorry, but it’s true.

6. Finally, global warming is going to raise temperatures, melt ice caps and generally put a dent in the world’s penguin population. There will be hurricanes more ferocious and numerous than we have ever seen. Sea levels will rise and destroy coastal regions possibly displacing hundreds of millions of people and devastating the global economy. The great ocean conveyer will stop moving warm water to Europe triggering a miniature ice age. Nations will crumble under the weight of countless environmental refugees. Empires will fall. Famine will spread. Plague will reappear. But on the bright side, Chicago will never again have a cold winter, and isn’t that why we’re all so depressed in the first place?