Total Perspective Vortex
What really happened to Trillian? Theories abound, but you can see what she's really been up to on this blog. If you're looking for white mice, depressed robots, or the occasional Pan Galactic Gargleblaster you might be better served here: http://www.bbc.co.uk/cult/hitchhikers/guide/.
Don't just sit there angry and ranting, do something constructive.
In the words of Patti Smith (all hail Sister Patti): People have the power.
Contact your elected officials.
Don't be passive = get involved = make a difference.
Words are cool.
The English language is complex, stupid, illogical, confounding, brilliant, beautiful, and fascinating.
Every now and then a word presents itself that typifies all the maddeningly gorgeousness of language. They're the words that give you pause for thought. "Who came up with that word? That's an interesting string of letters." Their beauty doesn't lie in their definition (although that can play a role). It's also not in their onomatopoeia, though that, too, can play a role. Their beauty is in the way their letters combine - the visual poetry of words - and/or the way they sound when spoken. We talk a lot about music we like to hear and art we like to see, so let's all hail the unsung heroes of communication, poetry and life: Words.
Here are some I like. (Not because of their definition.)
Mamas, Don’t Let Your Babies Grow Up to be Smart Girls
(A Trillian de-composition, to the tune of Mamas, Don't Let Your Babies Grow Up to Be Cowboys)
Mama don’t let your babies grow up to be smart girls
Don’t let them do puzzles and read lots of books
Make ‘em be strippers and dancers and such
Mamas, don’t let your babies grow up to be smart girls
They’ll never find men and they’re always alone
Even though men claim they want brains
Smart girls ain’t easy to love and they’re above playing games
And they’d rather read a book than subvert themselves
Kafka, Beethoven and foreign movies
And each night alone with her cat
And they won’t understand her and she won’t die young
She’ll probably just wither away
Mama don’t let your babies grow up to be smart girls
Don’t let them do puzzles and read lots of books
Make ‘em be strippers and dancers and such
Mamas, don’t let your babies grow up to be smart girls
They’ll never find men and they’re always alone
Even though men claim they want brains
A smart girl loves creaky old libraries and lively debates
Exploring the world and art and witty reparteé
Men who don’t know her won’t like her and those who do
Sometimes won’t know how to take her
She’s rarely wrong but in desperation will play dumb
Because men hate that she’s always right
Mama don’t let your babies grow up to be smart girls
Don’t let them do puzzles and read lots of books
Make ‘em be strippers and dancers and such
Mamas, don’t let your babies grow up to be smart girls
They’ll never find men and they’re always alone
Even though men claim they want brains
Life(?) of Trillian
Single/Zero
Wednesday, August 02, 2006
Whoa.
I just realized it’s August. I think I’ve been abducted. I’ve got a serious case of missing time. I flipped my calendar to July, featuring a print of the poster for Maltese Falcon, and now, what seems like about two days later, I have to flip it again. Which is kind of cool because this month I get to look at Peter Fonda and Dennis Hopper. This month’s movie poster is Easy Rider. With a little vignette of Marlon Brando in The Wild One. Yeah. It's rebel month.
Good call on the part of the calendar’s creative director. Those movies, especially Easy Rider, always seem like hot August movies to me. Easy Rider takes place in Winter, the guys are going to Mardi Gras. And yet this is a Summer, an August movie for me. When it hits about August 6 my mind turns to Easy Rider. I have no idea why.
Actually, maybe I do. I hate Summer. By August Summer is really wearing on me. I was one of those kids who was ready and eager to go back to school by the second week of August. Yes. I was a dork and I still am. I think maybe I need and crave more structure than I like to admit. I like to think I’m a carefree, spontaneous, live for the moment, refuse to be held to convention or at least a schedule kind of person. And for the most part I think I am. But. There’s also a part of me that clearly needs the rigidity and discipline of deadlines and routines. I need the framework of structure, but I need to be able to set my own pace within that structure. Something like that. I guess. I dunno. Maybe. What do I know? Not much. Who cares?
Anyway. August. Easy Rider. Getcher motor runnin’. Lookin’ for adventure. Yeah darlin’ go make it happen. Like a true nature’s child. Born. Born to be wild.
Snnnnnarl.
It’s so hot. I mean, literally, it’s hot. And when it’s literally hot I am not metaphorically hot. Well. I’m never metaphorically hot, but, when it’s literally hot I’m a lot farther away from metaphorically hot than when it’s not hot. It’s hot, it’s August and I’m feeling very cranky and rebellious. Born. Born to be wild.
Also, apparently born, born to be broke. And born, born to be lonely.
Which makes it easier to be a rebel free spirit. No one holding me back, living on the edge with a few dollars to my name, living by my wits…you don’t want to get messed up with me, I’m a loner, a rebel. Shame I don’t have a motorcycle and that I am absolutely abjectly horrified of them. So it’s me and my pink cruiser, setting out looking for adventure. Not exactly smoke and lightening, but hey, I’m not exactly Peter Fonda or Dennis Hopper. It’s all about free wheeling journey of discovery. It doesn’t really matter what kind of wheels, right?
I’m ready to take off, leave my life behind and set off on a free wheeling journey. I don’t really need any more discovery. I’m ready for the free wheelin’ part to begin. 2006, the entire year, has been a journey of discovery for me. Mainly discovery of some not so great things about myself and other people.
I’m proclaiming 2006 a disaster, by the way. I’m writing off the entire year. Now that we’re into the 8th month I think that’s a fair analysis. It’s more than half over and the first seven months sucked badly enough that they have tainted the entire year.
Oh sure, the worst could be over and tomorrow may be the dawn of a new 2006 era, one of mirth and joy.
But since I have to go to two funerals in the next week I kinda doubt it.
People die. It happens. To everyone. Period. I know this. I learned this a long time ago. I accept this. I accept death. I do not fear my own death.
But. I hate the pain death causes people who lose someone they care about.
A woman at work had a son killed in a drive-by shooting. A guy who lives in my building, a guy I saw almost every morning, killed himself. I have four friends who’ve had a parent die so far this year. My own mother was on life support for quite a while and flatlined twice. My cat has cancer and will be lucky to see another snowfall. I have a friend who was diagnosed with a serious form of cancer a few days ago. Death is everywhere.
Geeze, Trill. You’ve been gone a long time and this is what you give us when you return? We liked you better when you weren’t posting any words.
Yeah. I know.
And that’s another reason why I haven’t been posting. Even if I had access to a functioning hard drive and internet on a regular, normal basis, the words I have are not exactly uplifting, enlightening or even remotely interesting. Think: Really bad teenage angst words.
More negativity than usual. Which is quite a lot. This could just as easily be Death(?) of Trillian. Except that for some twist of cruel jest I’m alive and all these other really great people are dying. After the shock and fear and sadness of the news of my friend’s cancer ravaged me, I thought, “No! Take me instead! Please! Pick me, pick me!” And yes, fate, I am tempting you and you may take that as a challenge. It’s not that I can’t, don’t, or won’t accept death. It’s that I have difficulty reconciling the pain, suffering and anguish people are made to endure during the process. Decent, good people should be allowed to have a death that’s an event, not an ongoing struggling process. Why torture really good people with long, slow deaths? It’s a cruel twist of biology. Apparently that’s why the guy in my building killed himself. He didn’t want the long, slow process of dying with a disease that would take a few years, a lot of medication and money to kill him. He cut to the chase and chose to make it an event instead of a long, painful process. I respect that. I can reconcile his decision.
And here's something that's bugging me: In all the thousands of years of humanity why is it we've yet to figure out ways to a) make death not hurt so much for the people left behind or b) say just the right thing to people who are are suffering with the death of a loved one? "Sorry" is not a big enough word to encompass the true brevity and depth of sorrow and empathy. Yet the other words people often use, although true, are hollow and sound like platitudes doled out because they’re the appropriate thing to say and we don’t know what else to say. “I’m so sorry for your loss. I hope you can find comfort in the good memories. We’ll miss him every day but I am glad he is no longer suffering.”
Or, at best, for better friends, “Life sucks, then you get sick and die and it’s all a stinky load of bull shit.” Yeah. Hallmark wants to use that one. I’m negotiating a deal.
Hopefully you haven’t had to peruse the sympathy card section lately. I spend a lot of time there these days. I know them all by sight now. They’re all basically the same. They’re either “I’m sorry for your loss” or “In God’s tender care…” or some long soppy Helen Steiner Rice poem that makes you feel suicidal by the end, if you can even get through the whole thing without sobbing out of the store. The choice is horrible because no one knows what to say, not even Hallmark. But we all want to say something, we want to let people we care about know we’re thinking and caring about them. And suddenly, even with really good friends, anything other than a sympathy card seems horribly inappropriate. All these years, all this humanity, and yet, still, we fumble for words and stumble through emotions all the while hoping the people we’re trying to console understand that we all suck at this and that all we’re trying to express is that we care, we feel their pain and wish we knew the right things to say which would make them feel better.
So, August kicks off with Easy Rider on my wall calendar and two funerals penned in the dates below the free wheeling image of Peter Fonda and Dennis Hopper. The irony in that is not lost on me. It’s so me. Here it is August, Easy Rider month, and my calendar is filled with funerals, trips to the vet and deadlines for projects at work. Which is bittersweet and melancholic to me: I don’t want to be the kid who wants to go back to school in August. I don’t want to be comfortable trapped inside structure. It’s August, it’s Easy Rider month, and I want to be a wild, free reckless true nature’s child. But I am the dork who wants to go back to school, I am the one who operates inside rigid framework, and so like every other August, I’ll look at Peter Fonda and Dennis Hopper every day and fantasize about what I’d do if I were free and wild while I attend to my deadlines, appointments and funerals. I hate 2006. I really do. I can’t wait to tear through the rest of this calendar.
10:56 AM
Sunday, July 30, 2006
Yeah, well, Life(?)'s been very ?.
Sorry folks.
Along with a ton of other crap 'o life(?) stuff my hard drive crashed.
Raining, pouring...
So.
A) Sorry if you've been waiting with rapt anticipation of some words. Here are some which sum up the past few weeks: Everything and nothing.
B) If you've sent an email and I haven't responded, I'm not being a horrible bitch. Really. When I finally got back online long enough to really do a good email check, including bulk folders I discovered a ton of email from non-spam, non-bulk people. I am really sorry about this. I will respond to you as soon as I can, I'm working my way through it. I still don't have a fully functioning computer at home so my online time is limited at work (oh! work! big stuff happening there, too! potentially good stuff! right now it's pain in the rear end stuff because of a ton of meetings but for the first time in years there's a slight sliver of optimism regarding management above me. I know better than to tempt fate by even admitting that, so fates, go ahead, there's your challenge, your invitation to twist away and make things unfathomably worse, but for now I shall remain optimistic.) right, internet connectivity and me. Work and at sleazy internet cafés. It's not that I don't care that you care or that I'm a horrible person. I just honestly had no idea all that real mail was lurking in the bulk folder or even in my "regular" folder. Life (?), folks, life(?). At this point it's nothing shy of a bona fide miracle I haven't topped myself, and were it not for Furry Creature I dare say I would have done just that a few weeks ago.
The Furry Creature is still alive and doing quite well considering he has lymphoma. He's had one round of chemo and will start another next week. He's looking, acting and apparently feeling a bazillion times better now that he's on medication. The prognosis is 3 - 15 months. Depends on how well his blood cells respond to the chemo and how well his little organs can function with the advancing cancer. I'm going to lose him and that sucks. But. For now he's comfortable and seems like himself, eating, playing, running around and generally being the Furry Creature. I wasn't sure if I was doing the "right" thing by treating the cancer. As much as I didn't want to let go of him, I also didn't want to put him through any ordeal solely for my sake. I had concerns I was doing the wrong thing. A week after his first treatment he was back to almost his regular self and has been content and normal-ish since. He's had no side-effects from the drugs or chemo apart from obviously feeling a lot better. So now, in spite of the expense and the health risk to myself (the chemo drugs are waaaaay toxic) I think I did the right thing. He wasn't ready to go just yet. The vet assures me we'll know when he's ready, when it's time to let go. Now is not that time.
Right. Well. There you go.
Huge apologies to everyone who's written, I really am so sorry. I appreciate all the kind words and thoughts more than I can put into words. The subject lines alone are comforting and inspiring. Thank you everyone, really.
I promise ol' Trill will be back soon. I'm working on selling my soul to get my computer situation back to functional along with paying the Furry Creature's ever increasing medical bills and that's consuming a lot of my time. Selling your soul isn't as easy as they make it out to be. Kind of a bummer, that. I just assumed you signed in blood on the dotted line and then poof! Satan gets your soul and you get your mortal wishes bestowed upon you. It's actually quite a big business, this soul buying and selling, takes a lot of time and energy. Not for the weak willed, this soul selling stuff. You have to really want it.
There are loads of words and I'll be posting again soon.
But, for now, and mainly, thanks everyone.
4:30 PM
