Archive for September, 2008
Hiatus
I’m taking a life hiatus. Which brings me to St. Louis. I’m here to avoid the everyday temptations of going out with my friends, which results in the ultimate no-no: talking. I’m on a leave from work because the voice thing was getting worse, getting painful, and getting scary. And now I’m home to avoid talking to my friends. Haha. Computer communication is so in! And texting – ooo lala. And by a small miracle or the grace of God, my iPhone is working and in amazing form! Go Apple for creating a stellar product that can withstand the depths of my toilet bowl!
I’m taking the opportunity to try and get my life in order. I’ve been working on improving my website koidesginchicago.com, getting it into better form and trying to market myself to some freelance clients. Gotta make that cash. I’m making Dr. appoitnments for everything I’ve been holding off on. And I’m going for long walks at night. I’m listening to “The Universe in a Single Atom” by the Dalai Lama, read by Richard Gere. Thought-provoking. I’m feeling less stressed and more relaxed. I’m applying for volunteer positions and looking into taking some courses at Columbia College. And so on and so forth. Oh, and I’m helping to start up a book club! This fall is looking busy and wonderful.
Ciao for now!
Going straight edge no other way, but by the hand of God.
I can’t tell if I’ve been spited or thrust towards enlightenment. It all started Saturday evening, when I came home from work. I went into the bathroom (don’t worry, this is going somewhere) and as I pulled down my jeans to take a seat on the throne, out popped my iPhone from my back pocket. It dove straight for the waters of my toilet, made a “plop,” and sank to the bottom of the bowl. I couldn’t help but laugh, right? I plunged my hand into the water (thankfully that’s all that was in there) and began to try to shake out the water. Fruitless. Finally I got the damn thing to turn off and watched incredulously as a bright white apple symbol faded into a watery LCD screen. The timing is the strange part. Monday marked the end of my other phone’s contract and I had been living with 2 phones, 2 phone plans. So luckily my back-up still existed otherwise I’d be screwed. I laid out a little towel and began a 2-day process of turning my iPhone like a rotisserie chicken to see if I could, by some miracle, dry it out enough to turn back on. Nope.
Alas, I go out Saturday night, iPhoneless, naked. I manage and come out on top, forgetting my woes with a few drinks and dancing the night away to country western music at a friend’s birthday celebration. A solid night.
Then came Sunday, and there was a certain point in the day, around lunchtime when I realized by the end of the day I was not going to have a voice left. Over the last month or so, I have been struggling with a raspy, hoarse voice that comes and goes. And I talk A LOT, in general yes, but mostly for my job because I teach. By the end of the day, I was outright yelling to produce any sound and I knew it wasn’t good. I went home early and by the end of the night, literally could not produce noise. Now it doesn’t matter how many drinks you’ve had, I know that’s not normal. The bar was noisy too, but I was doing more dancing and laughing than talking.
Time for action. I made a Dr.’s appointment yesterday and he couldn’t figure out what was wrong with my still missing voice, so early this morning I had an appointment with an ENT. They held out my tongue and put a long metal pole into my mouth that had a camera attached to the end. It took video of my vocal chords. It was weird, but very cool to watch afterwards, as they have the ability to watch it in slow motion. Throats aren’t pretty places. Anyway, it turns out that I have either nodules or polyps on my vocal chords – it’s hard to tell based upon appearance. I could see 3 white bumps in the area where my vocal chords meet. I’m hoping they’re nodules because those can go away, but the Dr. seemed to think they could be polyps because of the formation. They develop out of overuse or strain to the vocal chords, basically just doing what ya do. Anyway, of course I’m supposed to go on vocal rest for 6 weeks. Ha! I’m just going to try to conserve my voice and drink lots of water. I’m also going to be starting voice therapy to see if they can help me. No coffee, chocolate, alcohol, smoking, or apparently anything fun.
Now I’m going straight edge, like it or not. Because if I change nothing, they could get bigger and really interrupt my life to the point of where I would need surgery. Yuck. No thanks. I’m going to try to be kind to my voice.
I was joking yesterday that the Gods of communication (maybe they exist, maybe not) had nothing but scorn for me or that the Universe was telling me something about the way I communicate. Maybe’s it’s just old fashioned bad luck that over the course of the weekend I lost both my iPhone and my voice.
Either way, I like to embed meaning into life’s events and I am going to take a healthy approach to this. It probably won’t kill me to use my phone less or have one that’s less technochic. And it also won’t kill me to adopt a healthier lifestlyle for a while. I’ll miss my coffee, but I know that tea has it’s strongsuits. And as far as no alcohol or chocolate, well that seems near criminal. But I was a damn vegan for over 3 years … I’m off to find where that willpower went. Maybe all of this will leave me feeling better than ever.
My friend Taryn, on Palin’s stab at community organizers.
From Taryn, following Palin’s speech at the RNC:
I want to mention something about this “community organizing” issue. It’s something that I think many black people are feeling this morning, however no one, not even the Obama camp will mention it. For me, this isn’t about whether person X will vote for Obama. Or how this will help/hurt his or McCain’s campaign. It’s not about a politics. In other words it’s much more personal to me.
I found the comment vaguely bigoted. It wasn’t calculated, it wasn’t purposeful. I don’t believe Ms. Palin and her advisors sat down and intentionally tried to be racist. No one but the most extreme racists do that. And those people don’t worry me. What Palin said rolled off the tongue so naturally, without any regard for the impact of her words. It convinced me more than ever that prejudice is mostly implicit, at brain-level. It’s so easy to be dismissive of marginalized groups in almost every setting because it’s ingrained in our psyche. Perhaps the scariest part is that our own implicit biases makes us all complicit in discriminatory activity and in the institution of discrimination, That is something this country needs to come to grips with. So before anyone says, “well I don’t think they were trying to be racist.” That’s beside the point. The point is how easy it was for Palin and her speechwriters to dismiss something that historically, and even today, is a very important part of the black community.
These organizers include some of the greatest, bravest people of our time. They’re the ones who fight for marginalized communities, who stuff sandbags in New Orleans, instead of blaming victims for being in the wrong place at the wrong time (Barbara Bush). They risked their lives to register people to vote in places like Mississippi, Alabama, Georgia. If it weren’t for these people who supposedly don’t have actual responsibilities, we would never have had Brown v. The Board of Education, and all those tens of thousands of people wouldn’t have marched in Washington with perhaps the greatest community organizer of all time, Martin Luther King, Jr.
I know Palin’s comments implied a type of a racism that we are too terrified or even glib to talk about. It’s vague, and it doesn’t wear a white sheet over it’s head or say the N-word (out loud). It’s hard to identify. But as a black person I see it every time this type of thing happens. It’s the belittlement, the constantly calling Obama — a 47 year old man — not by his name, but a “young man,” (which is today’s “boy”), calling him elitist (today’s uppity negro) and now, the putting down of the backbone of many of our communities. What’s next, Republicans, calling out the black church?
You all are my friends, and you happen to be white. You guys are probably some of the more enlightened people out there when it comes to race. But I can understand how even this might make you scratch your heads a little. All I can say is I have a lot of experience dealing with vague bigotry. I know it when I see it. And I saws it last night. I always hear white people say complain about how black people always cry racism. You know, bigotry is such an evil presence in this country. I think anyone who’s been discriminated against for any reason knows how horrendous it is and would never make light of it by falsely accusing someone of bigotry without reason.
Discrimination makes you feel ashamed and less than human. The thing is, talking about it not only says something about the discriminator, it says something about you. I can’t quite explain it, but it feels like you’re giving credibility to the discriminator’s arguments. It’s facing the possibility, however small, that bigotry and racism COULD keep you from achieving your goals, from living that so-called American dream. That no matter what you do it won’t be enough because you’re black, Hispanic, Jewish, lesbian/gay, etc. That’s fucking scary, and that’s something I think about all the time.
In closing, as I said to Adam last night. If Obama loses, and the revolution starts, I cannot make any promises that I’ll save you guys from white slavery. So you all better get going working for Obama!
Your dear friend (until the revolution possibly),
Taryn
