for · the · sake · of · a · single · verse

From "A Rope and A Prayer", the fifth installation in a series by a New York Times journalist captured and held more than seven months by the Taliban.

The phone rang. This time, Kristen picked up.

“David?” she said, breathlessly. “David?”

“Kristen,” I said, savoring the chance to utter the words I had dreamed of saying to her for months.

“Kristen,” I said, “please let me spend the rest of my life making this up to you.”

“Yes,” she said. “Yes.”

I went for a run after work today, and on the way back, bumped into Jeff from Chinese class last year and his daughter Anissa. We made small talk for two minutes before Katherine from the same class and her boyfriend Gene came by as well, and we all stood there for a few minutes, chatting and watching Anissa jump in puddles with her rain boots. She has big blue eyes and practically white blonde hair.

After a few minutes, I asked, "Anissa, how old are you?" She responded quite proudly, "Two." Thinking that some of the kids I had worked with last year during my psychology job were 24 to 30 months and somewhat smaller than her, I noted that she was quite big for her age. Jeff wondered out loud whether she was really small or big. Katherine put in her two cents that she was still quite small.

"Well, what are you, Anissa?" She asked, and Anissa responded, "I'm TWO!" At which we all collapsed in laughter. That's right, girl. Fight back against the subjectivity of strangers, and stick to the facts. She's got it right from the beginning.

I suspect there is something inherently misguided and self-defeating and hopeless about any deliberate campaign to achieve happiness. Perhaps the reason we so often experience happiness only in hindsight, and that chasing it is such a fool’s errand, is that happiness isn’t a goal in itself but is only an aftereffect. It’s the consequence of having lived in the way that we’re supposed to — by which I don’t mean ethically correctly so much as just consciously, fully engaged in the business of living. In this respect it resembles averted vision, a phenomena familiar to backyard astronomers whereby, in order to pick out a very faint star, you have to let your gaze drift casually to the space just next to it; if you look directly at it, it vanishes. And it’s also true, come to think of it, that the only stars we ever see are not the “real” stars, those cataclysms taking place in the present, but always only the light of the untouchable past.

- Tim Kreider, 'Averted Vision'

“The honor of the political leader, of the leading statesman, however, lies precisely in an exclusive personal responsibility for what he does, a responsibility he cannot and must not reject or transfer. It is in the nature of officials of high moral standing to be poor politicians, and above all, in the political sense of the word, to be irresponsible politicians.” – Max Weber, Politics As A Vocation

And there you have it, folks. The difference between Eddard Stark and Roose Bolton, theorized and formulated long before George R.R. Martin was a squalling baby. Oh, to be a fly on the wall of Winterfell!

For the sake of a single verse, one must see many cities, men, and things. One must know the animals, one must feel how the birds fly and know the gesture with which the little flowers open in the morning. One must be able to think back to roads in unknown regions, to unexpected meetings and to partings one had long seen coming; to days of childhood that are still unexplained, to parents whom one had to hurt when they brought one some joy and did not grasp it (it was a joy for someone else); to childhood illnesses that so strangely begin with such a number of profound and grave transformations, to days in rooms withdrawn and quiet and to mornings by the sea, to the sea itself, to seas, to nights of travel that rushed along on high and flew with all the stars—and it is not yet enough if one may think of all this. One must have memories of many nights of love, none of which was like the others, of the screams of women in labor, and of light, white, sleeping women in childbed, closing again. But one must also have been beside the dying, must have sat beside the dead in the room with the open window and the fitful noises. And still it is not enough to have memories. One must be able to forget them when they are many, and one must have the great patience to wait until they come again.

For it is not yet the memories themselves. Not till they have turned to blood within us, to glance, and gesture, nameless, and no longer to be distinguished from ourselves—not till then can it happen that in a most rare hour the first word of a verse arises in their midst and goes forth from them.

- Rainer Maria Rilke

Did it work? Was the audience moved by McCain’s description of the plight of Joe, the Ohio plumber, who discovered that the Obama program might mean higher taxes for him if his business were to net more than $250,000 a year? Or were they stunned by the idea that anybody still expects to make that much money in the foreseeable future?

- Gail Collins, Oct. 16th NYT editorial.

I love the reading for my gender studies class.

Political aspirations in women and (at least according to one expert writing as late as 1920) a fondness for cats in men were manifestations of a pathological condition, a kind of psychological hermaphroditism tellingly but not essentially expressed by the preference for a "normal" member of one's sex as a sexual partner.

- "One Hundred Years of Homosexuality," David Halperin

"Her Praise"

She is foremost of those that I would hear praised.
I have gone about the house, gone up and down
As a man does who has published a new book,
Or a young girl dressed out in her new gown,
And though I have turned the talk by hook or crook
Until her praise should be the uppermost theme,
A woman spoke of some new tale she had read,
A man confusedly in a half dream
As though some other name ran in his head.
She is foremost of those that I would hear praised.
I will talk no more of books or the long war
But walk by the dry thorn until I have found
Some beggar sheltering from the wind, and there
Manage the talk until her name come round.
If there be rags enough he will know her name
And be well pleased remembering it, for in the old days,
Though she had young men's praise and old men's blame,
Among the poor both old and young gave her praise.

On using "Bitch, please" too many times in my memes...

beeeeeep: first time is funny...second time is silly...
beeeeeep: third time is a SPANKING
cette_vie: LOL
beeeeeep: not that connie would mind that

*falls over* *cries so hard* *dies so hard* *resurrects self and gets up* *loves so much* *falls over again* What can I say?! I'm just a bipolar machine!

No work was done today. I am wholly satisfied with that fact. Actually, not really. I found two short answers I need to do for Tufts. *growls* I really don't want to go to Tufts, so remind me, why am I applying again? Oh, because of my PARENTS. I need to stop getting headaches at inconvenient times. *looks innocent*

AAH. Apparently Kate thinks I am renowned for... certain things. *shakes head* I love her even though she was really high when she wrote me my Christmas card.

I'm just arguing with Avram about why Boston owns TJCL, kind of talking with sortie6 about why Pepsi is a BAD thing when he has it late at night, and listening to this song that Olivia got me - she is the bomb for getting me these French songs that are like French rap and French crack and I'm never going to get to sleep. *falls over*

That's it. I've unseated myself three times tonight. Also. jediman114 admits he doesn't want to be anywhere near Kate when she talks about spanking. AAH. Kate, the world is terrified of you. I think I love being a teenager. Awesome.