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ShiJi
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Name: Jason
Country: United States
State: Illinois
Metro: Chicago
Birthday: 2/3/1978
Gender: Male
Interests: Elissa, Calvin, Baseball, May Fourth China, Women's Magazines, art house cinema, documentary film, poker, jazz, pub rock, monty python
Expertise: fantasy baseball, pretension, mandarin
Occupation: Student
Message: message me
Website: visit my website
Member Since:
2/19/2005
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| It's Friday I'm in Love
I really have to get through all these before I completely forget/repress the experience.
Anyway. Friday was when the reuning really kicked into full swing.
Unfortunately, or perhaps fortunately, lunch wasn't covered on Friday
and we were left to fend for ourselves. Having spent a restless night
adjusting to dorm beds, two extra-long twins pushed together with a
huge crack in the middle just like the old days, Elissa and I both got
started a little later than everyone else. Plus she was managing a
shoot remotely, so had to be on the phone all morning. Anyway, suffice
to say that I ended up walking over to the Subway and procuring us some
sandwhiches. Going to a Subway in a small town off the highway is
really a different experience from what you get in the cities. It's
much less efficient and there's not a huge crush of people behind you.
Also, the employees know most of their customers from outside work as
well and make small talk whilst preparing the sandwhiches. After four
years in Chicago, it's a little jarring to be engaged in conversation
by the person preparing your sandwhich. Anyway. After procuring the
victules, I was off again to the loggia. There were more people now,
and most of them were lawyers. It's just really really weird how
everybody seems to be becoming a lawyer. And of course, as Elissa
noted, none of them are doing criminal law. None of them are, from my
perspective, actually making a difference. I mean, was the world really
in need of more corporate lawyers and estate planners? Is this what a
college founded on the principles of service (at the time to God and
Country, but now to the broader national and international community)
has produced? Anyway, most of them were engaged in a game of asshole.
Seeing as I was sick and it was 11 a.m., I didn't take part.
The hours
from lunch until the picnic have become indistinct, so they were most
likely spent lazing around taking in Iowa. The picnic was the first
all-reunion function. At a school that up until recently had a maximum
enrollment of 1300 (they're increasing to 1600 in the near future) the
reuning classes are kind of small. The first reunion is done in a
cluster (1999, 2000, 2001) then the ten year (1995), then a 30 year
cluster (1974, 75,
76, 77), then the 50 year (1955) and then just a random conglomeration
of anyone who's still around (1938, 42, 45). Anyway, this picnic had
everyone there. Held on Mac field (the open area that stretches west
from North Campus to the train tracks) buffet style, it was a good
introduction to the food we'd be getting all weekend which was
passable, but nothing special. Tables divided up by friend groups with
little crossover between classes or cliques. Being one of the sober
people in the group, I was elected to help obtain the kegs of beer for
the class party to be held later that evening. Each class or cluster
was given $500 to buy party materials so that translated to two kegs
for our group.
The party started at around 9. It was in Norris lounge. Norris is the
second newest hall on campus, having been built as a temporary hall in
the 1970s. It's very much like a four story project, except with dorm
rooms.
Aside. My first crush lived in Norris. Okay, my first Grinnell crush. I
was enfatuated with her, got her drunk for the first time, even hung
out with her roomate, but it never went anywhere. Still, it resulted in
probably the best advice I've ever been given about a woman and I
intend to pass this on to my kids. I'll mention it here, but I must
preface this by saying that it should only be used if you are sure
there is no chance and that things are over, because this should pretty
much end any attraction you have to the person. Okay, basically, it's
this. Think of the person to whom you are hopelessly attracted. Now
think of that person having the most disgusting bathroom experience you
can imagine. If that doesn't help you get over him/her then you are
either too unimaginative or too perverse. End Aside.
It was a typical college, or Grinnell, party. Minimal dancing. Long
lines for the keg being cut by people who think they should be able to
cut. The rest of us handing off the tap to anybody other than those
people. And a lot of sitting around wondering what the fuck was going
on. I ran into a few people I wanted to see, but really, the whole
point of the college keg party is to either get drunk or go home with
someone or preferably both. Since I was still feeling sick, and because
I'm married, it wasn't too much of a concern either way. I got roped
into numerous conversations to be polite. Having been a DJ, a student
advisor, a part of the improv troop, and a dining hall worker, I am
known by a decent proportion of Grinnellians from my cluster (Elissa
always bemoans this because she was a transfer student who ended up
knowing relatively few Grinnellians), so it would have been terribly
uncouth of me to bolt the party as soon as I'd wanted. Eventually
though, having been drawn into a conversation with the
man who has convinced us to never let our children go near a montesori
school, we bolted. To the pub.
The first night (Thursday) that we had been in Grinnell, the pub was
virtually empty. we had a booth to ourselves and could move about
freely. Friday night was the polar opposite. Packed full of people
drinking and dancing it was insane. We were lucky to have friends who'd
fled earlier and so secured a booth near the front. There were not a
few "townies" there as well and one of them kept leaning over our
booth. Finally, her friend asked me a question. I don't remember the
exact phrasing, but I do remember I responded by holding up my left
hand and hearing a couple "dang-its" from behind. Sitting there,
surveying the scene of drunken alums auditing for hook-ups, I was
incredibly thankful to have found Elissa. We stayed about a couple of
hours, then made our way back to Clark.
Second Aside. "Hook-up" has many different, though related, meanings on
the Grinnell campus. I remember vividly thinking that Ann, the girl
with whom I taught in China, was quite promiscuis (okay, I thought she
was a slut) when she told me about all the guys she hooked up with.
Well, as we soon discovered, in my circle of friends "hook-up" meant to
"go all the way." Whereas in her circle it simply meant to make-out.
It's safe to say that the term runs the gambit between these two
extremes, but whenever I use it I intend it to signify sex. End Second
Aside.
We again fell asleep, drunkenly, on the two twin beds pushed together. How the hell did we ever make it through a year of that? | | |
| What is Desparate?
So for about two hours last night my wife was on the phone with a few
separate women listening to their man problems and offering tidbits of
advice.
Obviously, I only heard half of the conversation, except for a few
moments where the other conversant really turned up the volume, but it
seemed that a good part of the anxiety these women were feeling was
over "sounding desparate." So what does it mean to be desparate? And
moreover, shouldn't we always sound desparate with the one's we love?
What kind of message are you sending to someone when you say you really
like them, but you don't have to have them, you can take them or leave
them? Is the idea that this aloofness will make them want you more? Is
it simply playing on notions of insecurity and self-image that have
become intensely problematic in twenty-first century dating?
Anyway. I think it's just stupid. There are many things worse than
sounding desparate. And I'm just talking about the relationship arena
here, obviously if we open up the system to admit the entire panoply of
human conditions, desparation takes on an entirely different tone.
Still, just within the context of Western educated (each of the women
has at least a BA and one is getting an MD) relationships, it seems to
me there are worse things than sounding desparate. For instance, being
alone and unhappy, which is likely what many people who are afraid to
sound desparate end up as. Is it the fact that we can somehow better
deal with (or can at least fool ourselves into thinking we deal better
with) our own unhappiness than with the disapproval of others? Does
Twain's (I think it was Twain) famous line about better to remain
silent and be thought a fool than open your mouth and remove all doubt
apply here? Is it better to be desparate, but seem controlled and cool
than to show your desparation?
I know I've been lucky in love (for the most part, we all have those
few trysts better forgotten), so perhaps I just don't understand the
whole complex around desparation as well as I should/could, but it just
seems stupid and pointless to me. If you want somebody, tell them you
want them. If you sound desparate, so what, maybe it will help because
the other person will realize what they mean to you, or more often than
not what they could mean to you?
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You can't Go home again, but you can shop there.
After we arrived at Grinnell we all headed in to Register to pick
up our keys and see our room assignments. The people working the
registration desk were current students or recent grads and they
treated us like alums from the 1950s who had no idea
what a key-card was. We all enjoyed making fun of them for this
afterwards. We were sophomores when the keycards went into effect and
in order to thwart the man we all exchanged our cards. Anwyay.
Being assigned a room in a dorm at your old school for a reunion is not
a fun thing. The only other time this ever happens is when you first
come to the school, after that you have some amount of choice. The only
good thing is that you at least know you'll have a single or you'll be
rooming with someone you know (and with whom you registered). Anyway,
Elissa and I were assigned to Clark Pit on the north side of campus.
South Campus and the newly built East Campus were all the privy of pre
1995 alums. Having stayed in some horid places in Yunnan province, I
can safely say that the room we had was not one of the worst places I'd
ever stayed, but it certainly wasn't worth ther $200/each we had to
fork over. It would have been a great dorm room, except for the pit
thing, but that was made up for because it was in Clark and had a
private sink. Still, living in dorms, even if it's only for four days,
after living in apartments for five years is a bit strange and not
something I wish to relive any time soon. The lighting is of course
horid, as is the smell, as are the beds and sheets.
If you're going to any reunion of any kind and will be put up in
dorms, don't take chances, just bring your own set of sheets and a
pillow, it will be worth it.
Anyway, after getting settled in our various dorms (Joe and Adam got
Norris which was somewhat circular and cathartic for them as that was
their firstyear dorm) we headed over to Gabe's room. Gabe was lucky
enough (or maybe it's because he's class agent, but I doubt it) to be
given a room with logia access. I don't know if it's actual wear and
tear on the logia, or that my standards have changed, or more likely
that I wasn't concentrating on finding the keg or liquor when I stepped
out, but it felt frighteningly unstable (which matched well with the
psychological states most of us were in at the time). After a beer or
two, it felt better, and so did we.
Forced conversation with people with whom you used to be genuine
friends (and with whom you've simply stopped communicating rather than
having any sort of fallout) is really awkward. Not quite as awkward as
the parenthetical in that last sentence, but awkward. It's especially
weird when they are all making more money than you but doing incredibly
lame thing, like advising on mutual funds with a BA in religious
studies. Of course, I quipped that insofaras money is the new god, it
was fitting he was working with mutual funds.
Elissa's aunt and uncle live in Des Moines, so I had to meet up with
them for dinner. We went to one of the two decent restaurants in town.
The service was abysmal (much like my spelling), but the price was
definitely right. After dinner the Chicago cohort met us there for
drinks and we had a collective I'm-paying-$3-for-a-top-shelf-cocktail
moment. Then we headed off to The Pub.
Maybe this will have changed by our ten year reunion, but I think the
Pub is still the place where we have been drunk most often. I mean, we
started drinking there freshman year, though it was limited to Pub
Nights when ID checking was infrequent. Then sophomore year they
cracked down a little, but we still went. And we were all legal when we
came back from abroad second semester Junior year so that was when
every night was pub night...well, except that we did actually work most
nights. Still, the PBR flowed like water and cost slightly less. Senior
year, especially second semester, was when the 3pm trips began.
Being back at the Pub was weird, but good. Since most people were
getting in on Friday we and a few others were the only alums there. We
grabbed a booth, played some darts (Elissa injured herself with her
forceful throwing style which resembles Turk Wendell pitching from the
stretch) and utterly dominated the jukebook, putting in enough money
for 50 songs in a row. We sat. We drank. We avoided people we didn't
want to talk to as much as possible but still got roped into far too
many conversations. Stumbling back drunkenly to North Campus was a trip
back in time. When we got there we were incredibly glad to be drunk as
dorm rooms always look better intoxicated and dorm beds always feel
better when you're drunk.
This is obviously not the way I should have spent the Thursday before my Monday Chinese final, but oh well, it didn't matter.
Anyway, so much for this installment. I can promise more reflection and advice with a tad less narrative in the next few.
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| Union and Reunion
Okay, so I think I've finally gained the distance on my reunion
experience to discuss it coherently. Which is pretty much in keeping
with how long it took me to gain the distance needed to discuss college
coherently. Anyway.
Two weeks ago, my college friend in Chicago and I headed back to the
cornfields of Iowa and the touchy-feely quasi-socialism of Grinnell.
Unfortunately, the well known leftist leanings of the faculty and staff
didn't influence the price of reuning (at $200 per person, kind of
steep to stay in dorm rooms). Anyway. I had to work the morning of our
departure so the rest of the group (Bryan, Joe, Gabe, Emily, and Adam)
met me by the Harold Washington Library downtown. We'd decided to rent
a van, but for some reason when the others went to pick it up they were
convinved to upgrade to a small tank. On the phone my friends told me
that the SUV they got was huge, but I simply wasn't prepared for the
white Nissan Armada the pulled to the sidewalk on Congress. It's a
gigantic vehicle. Seriously, I'd probably pick it to win a battle with
an Abrams tank.
So we got onto 88 and headed west, prodded by the words of Horace
Greeley (supposedly uttered to Josiah Bushnell Grinnell the founder of
the town and the man who later convinced the Andover Band to move their
Iowa College to his town). We stopped in a Culver's somewhere for
butter-burgers. The food is decidely unremarkable and so the only
reason I remark on the stop is the perfect Illinois accents that came
from the booth next to us. There was a mother talking about her
children's after school activities. I think that if the French (yes all
of them) heard the way this woman said "ballet" they would immediately
get off their lazy cheese eating asses and invent time-travel just so
they could go back and make sure ballet never came into existence (I
mean, they do have an entire branch of government devoted to language
purity).
The next notable stop was The World's Largest Iowa 80 Truck Stop
(http://www.iowa80truckstop.com/) which has the greatest single
collection of Americana outside your grandmother's house. There's an
entire wall devoted to pins (where "Vietnam Vet" shares space with "I
Need It Bad") and six rotating racks of patches (such as "Vietnam, if
you weren't there, shut up!") for jackets and such. There are also shot
glasses from every state and kitchen magnets with all the state saying
(I amused my companions by holding South Dakota and Florida next to
each other and asking what was wrong -- both have the motto of "The
Sunshine State" but for some reason Will Smith hasn't done any songs
about Sioux Falls). There's a stand where you can have customized
embroidery, carving, or painting done (actually overheard, "So, do you
want the eagle crying or not?"). Predictably, the three of us from the
midwest are nowhere near as entertained by all of this as the three who
aren't from the midwest. Still, it was entertaining and somebody will
doubtless do an ethnography of the place within our lifetime.
As we pulled into Grinnell we realized just how completely out of place
our vehicle was. We all agreed that if the undergrads had actually been
on campus our white Armada would have been covered in real blood and
not just red paint in order to make some point or another. I also
realized how completely out of place I was. We all noticed it. It just
felt really too weird to be back. We had changed more than the place
had changed.
(okay, I can't sustain this thread right now, so I'll have to come back to it later)
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| “Dude, that is so not your era!”
That was my brother’s response to my statement that I loved
the music on the Grosse Pointe Blank soundtrack. It’s a perfectly
understandable response since he and Martin, the John Cusack character in the
film, are approximately the same age and I am ten years younger. Still, I
didn’t think it was entirely fair. It seemed agist, if that’s a word and if
that’s how you spell it (though obviously not in the “you can’t work at this
high-powered consulting firm, you’re 50!” sort of way). What was amiss about me
liking English Beat (“Mirror in the Bathroom” which was unstylishly aped by
Goldfinger on “Here in your Bedroom” in the late 1996ish) or the Violent Femmes
(“Blister in the Sun” though I admittedly got into them only when Why Do
Birds Sing? came out in 1993ish) or The Specials (“Pressure Drop”)? I had
some righteous indignation. The first music I had purchased was an 8-trak of Dark
Side of the Moon (I liked the cover). The first cassette I bought was …And
Justice For All. The first CD was Sgt. Pepper’s, the second was Rattle
and Hum, and the third was London Calling (followed by some more
unfortunate purchases to which I’d rather not admit such as Pocket Full of
Kryptonite and EMF). Of course the Clash had been Big Audio Dynamite since
I gained object permanence and I didn’t know who John Lennon was until he was
dead, but I could still like the bands. I could still feel a great allegiance
to Agent Orange even if it was because of This Is The Voice rather than Living
In Darkness. Even though I hadn’t seen Hill Street Blues, I could still
enjoy the obvious sarcasm and social commentary of Black Flag on “TV Party
Tonight.” This disagreement was of course amiable in every way with the vast
majority of my brother’s rejoinders consisting of combinations of the phrases
“yeah” “whatever” and “uh-uh.”
So it is with all of this in mind that I say “DEAR GOD THAT
IS SO NOT YOUR ERA!!!!” to the girl I saw walking north on Woodlawn Friday at
around 6 wearing an Operation Ivy t-shirt. Seriously. She was maybe 16. Maybe.
Definitely not legal and didn’t even look it. So what the hell was she doing
wearing an Operation Ivy t-shirt? I mean, come on. I know there’s a whole thing
about how t-shirts in general and specifically music t-shirts are overloaded
signifiers filled to the brim with identifications and intended meanings that
allow us to be grouped into neat little categories (even when that category is “does
not fit into any category” or “resisting being placed in category”). Someone
wearing a Pixies circa Surfer Rosa might want to associate with someone
wearing a Pixies circa Doolittle shirt, or he or she might prefer to associate with someone wearing
a Stiff Little Fingers shirt, but neither would likely associate with someone
wearing a Mariah Carey t-shirt unless it was being worn ironically. Still, what
the hell is a prof-brat or other HP teen doing wearing a shirt from a band that
stopped existing before she was born and only existed for two years and wasn’t
even particularly earth shatteringly widely known at the time. Maybe her older
sister gave it to her. Still. That is so not her era. | | |
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