moustaches and bowler hats
--- --- ---
I sped my bike to school with imagery of moustaches and bowler hats enviously on my brain. It was an odd ride, propelling myself forward in utter covetousness of the past. But I just felt like I had missed. And I miss. I look to this place where I found these symbols often on a daily basis to catch glimpses of the people that my heart is crying for. The people who have shaped me greatly. On the shuttle bus it dawned on me that I do not have friends in my daily life, which was a harsh binary to prop up against moustaches and bowler hats, and this realization made my eyes water against my will. I buried my face deep in my book and hoped the silent tears that slipped their way down my cheeks went unrecognized & unnoticed. Incidentally, in my anguish, I stumbled upon this passage:
‘Now and then, it’s true. I did think of her, not as of a person in a definite aura of time and space, but separately, detached, as though she had blown up into a great cloudlike form that blotted out the past. I couldn’t allow myself to think about her for very long; if I had I would have jumped off the bridge. It’s strange. I had become so reconciled to this life without her, and yet if I thought about her only for a minute it was enough to pierce the bone and marrow of my contentment and shove me back again into the agonizing gutter of my wretched past….
How many thousand times, in walking through the streets at night, have I wondered if the day would ever come again when she would be at my side: all those yearning looks I bestowed on the buildings and statues, I had looked at them so hungrily, so desperately, that by now my thoughts must have become a part of the very buildings and statues, they must be saturated with my anguish…
My world of human beings had perished; I was utterly alone in the world and for friends I had the streets, and the streets spoke to me in that sad, bitter language compounded of human misery, yearning, regret, failure, wasted effort…
I suddenly recalled that it was here in the squalor and gloom of this sunken street, terrorized perhaps by a premonition of the future, that she clung to me and with a quivering voice begged me to promise that I would never leave her, never, no matter what happened. And, only a few days later I stood on the platform and I watched the train pull out, the train that was bearing her away; she was leaning out of the window and that same, sad, inscrutable smile on her face, that last-minute look which is intended to convey so much, but which is only a mask that is twisted by a vacant smile. Only a few days before, she had clung to me desperately and then something happened, something which is not even clear to me now, and of her own volition she boarded the train and she was looking at me again with that sad, enigmatic smile which baffles me, which is unjust, unnatural, which I distrust with all my soul. And now it is I, standing in the shadow, who reach out for her, who cling to her desperately and there is that same inexplicable smile on my lips, the mask that I have clamped down over my grief...
Tropic of Cancer – H. Miller
--- --- ----
I am the first to admit that I tend to romanticize Winnipeg, but I very rarely cry about it.
----- --- ---
A day has passed and I have come to realize that this is a dangerous game of the same old mistakes and patterns. I can cry and laugh and cry and laugh about it again for two years, what has changed? Little, save attitude.
An incident has come to my attention recently which propelled me through the variety of sentiments one person can inspire in another. Betrayal. Confusion. *hot* anger. Understanding? Expectation. Madness. Elation. Defeat. My mouth hang agape, rendered speechless. My heartbeat quickened and squeezed. My mind, besides rolling through memories & moments & meanings of all things previous, forgot for a moment the present. To breathe. Adult logic soon restored itself.
Physically, I am removed. Emotionally, I am involved. Really, I am surprised.
A part of me knows very well that I have no power, hold no credibility, can name no territory, nor make claim of ownership on any person, place, thing or idea. I am not a colonialist. I will never be. No one can ultimately police a person from acting as they wish. No one can claim that they know anything better than anybody else because those are the grounds of morality war. Even if you can read what is happening, face value, six inches from the front of your nose. Even if it is fucking obvious. Even if it is the truth. The impact is too large. What is with this fear of rocking the boat? We should all just say what needs to be said.
This rant has two veins: one is obviously in journalism because that is all I seem to have to occupy my life. The other is, and always is, my personal experience in interpreting the actions of and my reactions to the other. If I could scream at the top of my lungs from the seventh floor of the Hall building before jumping to my ultimate demise, I would curse the day I was told to always remain objective, because I have been objectified. repeatedly.
I sped my bike to school with imagery of moustaches and bowler hats enviously on my brain. It was an odd ride, propelling myself forward in utter covetousness of the past. But I just felt like I had missed. And I miss. I look to this place where I found these symbols often on a daily basis to catch glimpses of the people that my heart is crying for. The people who have shaped me greatly. On the shuttle bus it dawned on me that I do not have friends in my daily life, which was a harsh binary to prop up against moustaches and bowler hats, and this realization made my eyes water against my will. I buried my face deep in my book and hoped the silent tears that slipped their way down my cheeks went unrecognized & unnoticed. Incidentally, in my anguish, I stumbled upon this passage:
‘Now and then, it’s true. I did think of her, not as of a person in a definite aura of time and space, but separately, detached, as though she had blown up into a great cloudlike form that blotted out the past. I couldn’t allow myself to think about her for very long; if I had I would have jumped off the bridge. It’s strange. I had become so reconciled to this life without her, and yet if I thought about her only for a minute it was enough to pierce the bone and marrow of my contentment and shove me back again into the agonizing gutter of my wretched past….
How many thousand times, in walking through the streets at night, have I wondered if the day would ever come again when she would be at my side: all those yearning looks I bestowed on the buildings and statues, I had looked at them so hungrily, so desperately, that by now my thoughts must have become a part of the very buildings and statues, they must be saturated with my anguish…
My world of human beings had perished; I was utterly alone in the world and for friends I had the streets, and the streets spoke to me in that sad, bitter language compounded of human misery, yearning, regret, failure, wasted effort…
I suddenly recalled that it was here in the squalor and gloom of this sunken street, terrorized perhaps by a premonition of the future, that she clung to me and with a quivering voice begged me to promise that I would never leave her, never, no matter what happened. And, only a few days later I stood on the platform and I watched the train pull out, the train that was bearing her away; she was leaning out of the window and that same, sad, inscrutable smile on her face, that last-minute look which is intended to convey so much, but which is only a mask that is twisted by a vacant smile. Only a few days before, she had clung to me desperately and then something happened, something which is not even clear to me now, and of her own volition she boarded the train and she was looking at me again with that sad, enigmatic smile which baffles me, which is unjust, unnatural, which I distrust with all my soul. And now it is I, standing in the shadow, who reach out for her, who cling to her desperately and there is that same inexplicable smile on my lips, the mask that I have clamped down over my grief...
Tropic of Cancer – H. Miller
--- --- ----
I am the first to admit that I tend to romanticize Winnipeg, but I very rarely cry about it.
----- --- ---
A day has passed and I have come to realize that this is a dangerous game of the same old mistakes and patterns. I can cry and laugh and cry and laugh about it again for two years, what has changed? Little, save attitude.
An incident has come to my attention recently which propelled me through the variety of sentiments one person can inspire in another. Betrayal. Confusion. *hot* anger. Understanding? Expectation. Madness. Elation. Defeat. My mouth hang agape, rendered speechless. My heartbeat quickened and squeezed. My mind, besides rolling through memories & moments & meanings of all things previous, forgot for a moment the present. To breathe. Adult logic soon restored itself.
Physically, I am removed. Emotionally, I am involved. Really, I am surprised.
A part of me knows very well that I have no power, hold no credibility, can name no territory, nor make claim of ownership on any person, place, thing or idea. I am not a colonialist. I will never be. No one can ultimately police a person from acting as they wish. No one can claim that they know anything better than anybody else because those are the grounds of morality war. Even if you can read what is happening, face value, six inches from the front of your nose. Even if it is fucking obvious. Even if it is the truth. The impact is too large. What is with this fear of rocking the boat? We should all just say what needs to be said.
This rant has two veins: one is obviously in journalism because that is all I seem to have to occupy my life. The other is, and always is, my personal experience in interpreting the actions of and my reactions to the other. If I could scream at the top of my lungs from the seventh floor of the Hall building before jumping to my ultimate demise, I would curse the day I was told to always remain objective, because I have been objectified. repeatedly.
posted by Loco at
12:07 AM
2 Comments:
object: spoon
objective: spooning
objectively: i love you <- a statement based on fact
Last night I stood nose to nose with a piece of art that would have broken your knees. I let silent tears slip down and refused to wipe. Those were for you. If anyone should be wearing a moustache and bowler, it is you my love. I miss you strongly, feverishly, sisterly.
With much respect, tu me manques has never been so appropriate. Please do not forget that with this girl, there is NEVER a 500 word limit. Email, pour forth and I will drink it greedily.
Sadness and goodness, Madge.
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