Pebbles weigh like elephants and oscillate wildly
Today I did one of my favorite tasks at work: clean and toss out the files and papers associated with newly published articles. I get to do this when a new issue is printed. It serves my impulse to organize
Aside: my impulse to organize is in part a neurotic impulse to keep things tidy but also an impulse to tidily group like things and then reorganize, i.e. tidily group things that are similar in a way different from the first, devise new order from new chaos. Toss the CDs into a big pile on the floor and then invent an organizing principle. Radiant.
and, on a more practical note, I’ve had the damnedest time obtaining more hanging files from this workplace in order to contain the paperwork for each article, so by the time the new issue comes out I’ve got the paperwork for at least a few articles fragilely perched and paper-clipped on the table next to my desk, homeless.
Clearing out the old to make space for the new—vital for the psyche. It’s ok that there is yet no solution at first, but the longer the homeless hang the stronger is the feeling that there is a long arm dangling heavily in the attic. It needs either mending or severing. The tension is palpable, an exhilarating band holding taut the cycle from chaos to order and on.
In the last year or so I’ve faced three fears, irrational as fears are:
1. Dancing in public. This may be fleeting, but we’ll see. Transcending was a boon.
2. Negotiating a city bus system. Buses have always paralyzed me, not the act of riding one but rather the whole business of getting on one, the paying, and then getting off at the right time—the cord that hangs across the top, which I’d seen people pull and ding and then get off the bus, was the apex of the horror. Just the thought put me paralytic outside the doors that hadn’t even stopped before me yet. I don’t know why. Last summer I went to Portland, Oregon. At first I walked everywhere—as I would prefer were that feasible. But there were places I wanted to go that were too far for feet. Believe me, though, I calculated multitudes of possibilities for foot-travel. It just wasn’t reasonable. So I faced the bus. I faced it alone, red cape flapping back behind me. On my last ride of the week the angels sang and I pulled the yellow cord, dinged, and got off at my stop. By this time I’d become rocking-horse obsessed with the bus system. I wanted to ride every possible route and know every possible transfer and stop to reach any destination.
3. Driving in Manhattan. When it came time to get my driver’s license I was not excited as my friends were. I did not feel comfortable behind the wheel of a car; I was not interested. Driving up and down straight highways, around in little college towns, caused me anxiety. Lead foot, heavy on the breaks, and by nature with vision spatially warped and abstract—these were not conducive for keen driving. Then I moved to Jersey where one must drive and one must drive well lest one be bullied and honked and cause accidents. I sank my canines into my fear of multi-intersecting highways, multi-lanes packed with fast and honking cars--christ, there were too many dimensions for my brain to handle in coincidence with my motor skills. Last night, with passenger-seat guidance I tackled tunnels and rampant taxi drivers, and last-minute city veers without fear. Not impeccable, but up through the soil.
Each of these fears involves movement. I wrote a poem once with a line in it about bulldozing through process so I won’t notice motion. I thought I was being melodramatic, just making shit up for the sake of the poem, but now I think I was rather dumbly honest about a fear of process and active, as contrary to passive, motion in it. I think this is a half-developed thought caught mid-cosine.
Elephants trying to trample a body into the corner get light shed on by reflection and grouping. In the light elephants dance and drive and ding, weighing little. I don’t know what fear goes next under the gavel. It must be physical, a firmly embedded calculus to throw out.
Aside: my impulse to organize is in part a neurotic impulse to keep things tidy but also an impulse to tidily group like things and then reorganize, i.e. tidily group things that are similar in a way different from the first, devise new order from new chaos. Toss the CDs into a big pile on the floor and then invent an organizing principle. Radiant.
and, on a more practical note, I’ve had the damnedest time obtaining more hanging files from this workplace in order to contain the paperwork for each article, so by the time the new issue comes out I’ve got the paperwork for at least a few articles fragilely perched and paper-clipped on the table next to my desk, homeless.
Clearing out the old to make space for the new—vital for the psyche. It’s ok that there is yet no solution at first, but the longer the homeless hang the stronger is the feeling that there is a long arm dangling heavily in the attic. It needs either mending or severing. The tension is palpable, an exhilarating band holding taut the cycle from chaos to order and on.
In the last year or so I’ve faced three fears, irrational as fears are:
1. Dancing in public. This may be fleeting, but we’ll see. Transcending was a boon.
2. Negotiating a city bus system. Buses have always paralyzed me, not the act of riding one but rather the whole business of getting on one, the paying, and then getting off at the right time—the cord that hangs across the top, which I’d seen people pull and ding and then get off the bus, was the apex of the horror. Just the thought put me paralytic outside the doors that hadn’t even stopped before me yet. I don’t know why. Last summer I went to Portland, Oregon. At first I walked everywhere—as I would prefer were that feasible. But there were places I wanted to go that were too far for feet. Believe me, though, I calculated multitudes of possibilities for foot-travel. It just wasn’t reasonable. So I faced the bus. I faced it alone, red cape flapping back behind me. On my last ride of the week the angels sang and I pulled the yellow cord, dinged, and got off at my stop. By this time I’d become rocking-horse obsessed with the bus system. I wanted to ride every possible route and know every possible transfer and stop to reach any destination.
3. Driving in Manhattan. When it came time to get my driver’s license I was not excited as my friends were. I did not feel comfortable behind the wheel of a car; I was not interested. Driving up and down straight highways, around in little college towns, caused me anxiety. Lead foot, heavy on the breaks, and by nature with vision spatially warped and abstract—these were not conducive for keen driving. Then I moved to Jersey where one must drive and one must drive well lest one be bullied and honked and cause accidents. I sank my canines into my fear of multi-intersecting highways, multi-lanes packed with fast and honking cars--christ, there were too many dimensions for my brain to handle in coincidence with my motor skills. Last night, with passenger-seat guidance I tackled tunnels and rampant taxi drivers, and last-minute city veers without fear. Not impeccable, but up through the soil.
Each of these fears involves movement. I wrote a poem once with a line in it about bulldozing through process so I won’t notice motion. I thought I was being melodramatic, just making shit up for the sake of the poem, but now I think I was rather dumbly honest about a fear of process and active, as contrary to passive, motion in it. I think this is a half-developed thought caught mid-cosine.
Elephants trying to trample a body into the corner get light shed on by reflection and grouping. In the light elephants dance and drive and ding, weighing little. I don’t know what fear goes next under the gavel. It must be physical, a firmly embedded calculus to throw out.
5 Comments:
Fascinating psychological insight. Retain that 'spatially warped and abstract vision'. I like it a lot. Thanks for the link.
I think I have no choice but to retain that vision, outside lobotomization and various surgeries. Thanks much--and thank you for the link.
I don't know if I'd call it backbone. I'm happy to say I can't call it liquor either. It was sheer will.
I love drafting up a list of fears and then checking them off. Now I dance in public, mostly in the supermarket.
Fear of active process & motion. I'll have to think about this and see if it impacts me at all either.
I only worry about buses when there is a front and rear door and a question as to whether one pays at boarding or exiting.
Lastly, I spend a great deal of time worrying about contributing to waste. Luckily(?) this is just superceded by my desire for consolidation and organizing.
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