"It will be gender bending debauchery at its finest." Bradley Forkner stares at me with direct blue eyes and flashes a lightening-white smile. His teeth enchant me. They're not just white, they're bedazzling white— the kind of whiteness a electric bulb shines. I imagine them glittering in the spotlight, surrounded by scarlet lipstick and deep wet layers of lip gloss. "It's like getting baked for free!" He taps his temple with a long, slender finger. I imagine that temple crowned with a luscious blond wig, poofy platinum erupting over his short buzzed hair. "It will be good times," he says.
The "it" Bradley refers to is— of course— Pacific University's fourth annual drag show. Brad started the drag show his first year at Pacific, and the event has only increased in size and popularity since then. "I brought it up as an idea. We said let's do it. And we did it." Bradley cocks his head to the side and smiles proudly. His tall, slender body radiates confidence. Charisma and confidence. Yet Brad insists his confidence vastly intensifies when he sports a dress, a pair of tights, and the audience's attention. "It feels powerful to be in a position to demand that respect... in normal every day lives, gay men feel— unpowerful."
Bradley knows copious amounts about drag. He knows drag queens. He's dated them. He's written an ethnography about them. And once a year, for the entertainment of Pacific students, he dresses like one. I suddenly blush at my basic, uncomplicated questions. "So what exactly is the difference between a cross-dresser and drag queen?"
He smiles patiently, and I see my naivete reflected in his direct blue eyes. I feel like a child asking "Why do boys and girls have different parts?" Brad sits up straighter, elongating his neck. "Cross-dressers do it for sexual purposes. And transgender people literally want to be the other gender. But drag queens are people who do it as a form of expression. Most of them don't actually want to be women."
I think of all the time I have seen men elaborately dressed as women in the streets and wonder which category they fell into. As Brad elaborates on the complexities of drag queens, I realize how little I know about anything he's saying.
"It all started with masquerades... when people would do stuff they normally wouldn't do because they were behind a mask— or in our case— under a wig..."
Wednesday, April 29, 2009
Wednesday, April 22, 2009
He Was A Skater Boy
He sits, a spot of violent aqua and orange on the angled pavement. Thumbing an electronic game, he avoids my eyes as I approach. Click. Click. Uneasy glance. Click. As I ask him for an interview, his eyes dart everywhere except my face.
“Uh…okay,” He says, fumbling the gameboy into his pocket. His soft voice shocks me; I assumed it would be as loud as his neon shirt. The delicate sound is almost lost in the howling spring wind. “It’s Josh,” he mumbles. I move my eyes from his punky attire to his face. Acne-smeared cheeks. Blurry blue eyes. Chapped lips. No hint of man peeks out from this fifteen-year old boy’s face.
Josh and I are the only ones in the empty skate park. He’s been coming here since he can remember, having grown up in Forest Grove. The cement ravines surround us as he laments his hometown’s lack of excitement. Yet Josh does not long for the seductive clamor of city streets. “I’d rather be in the country... Outside… Away from a lot of people.” He rubs the side of his face and fidgets with a waterbottle. “I like being in the woods— the middle of nowhere.” If he could wake up anywhere, he wouldn’t choose New York or San Francisco. He would pick “Montana.” Why? “There are a lot of animals there.”
His quiet voice intensifies as he tells me what he hates most. “Teachers and I don’t get along. Our grades are 90% tests and I can’t pass them.” The water bottle cracks like knuckles as he twists it. “I’d rather work or do something outside.” I imagine myself in his scuffed Nike shoes: an introverted young boy at the most awkward stage of life, pining to be outdoors instead of struggling with exams. He describes himself as “easy to get along with,” and I wonder why he is here alone.
When I ask about the best part of his week, his lips almost rise into a smile. “I met one of my little brother’s friends. He didn’t act like a little kid. More— mature.” He squirms uncomfortably and will not give me an example of this mysterious child’s actions or words. My mind is left pulsing with ideas. What did this boy see in a younger boy that he would describe as “mature”?
I thanked Josh for his time, sentiments he returned with a clunky shrug.
Sprinting away from the island of cement ramps, I almost felt like I was wading through a field of rye.
“Uh…okay,” He says, fumbling the gameboy into his pocket. His soft voice shocks me; I assumed it would be as loud as his neon shirt. The delicate sound is almost lost in the howling spring wind. “It’s Josh,” he mumbles. I move my eyes from his punky attire to his face. Acne-smeared cheeks. Blurry blue eyes. Chapped lips. No hint of man peeks out from this fifteen-year old boy’s face.
Josh and I are the only ones in the empty skate park. He’s been coming here since he can remember, having grown up in Forest Grove. The cement ravines surround us as he laments his hometown’s lack of excitement. Yet Josh does not long for the seductive clamor of city streets. “I’d rather be in the country... Outside… Away from a lot of people.” He rubs the side of his face and fidgets with a waterbottle. “I like being in the woods— the middle of nowhere.” If he could wake up anywhere, he wouldn’t choose New York or San Francisco. He would pick “Montana.” Why? “There are a lot of animals there.”
His quiet voice intensifies as he tells me what he hates most. “Teachers and I don’t get along. Our grades are 90% tests and I can’t pass them.” The water bottle cracks like knuckles as he twists it. “I’d rather work or do something outside.” I imagine myself in his scuffed Nike shoes: an introverted young boy at the most awkward stage of life, pining to be outdoors instead of struggling with exams. He describes himself as “easy to get along with,” and I wonder why he is here alone.
When I ask about the best part of his week, his lips almost rise into a smile. “I met one of my little brother’s friends. He didn’t act like a little kid. More— mature.” He squirms uncomfortably and will not give me an example of this mysterious child’s actions or words. My mind is left pulsing with ideas. What did this boy see in a younger boy that he would describe as “mature”?
I thanked Josh for his time, sentiments he returned with a clunky shrug.
Sprinting away from the island of cement ramps, I almost felt like I was wading through a field of rye.
Wednesday, April 8, 2009
WHAT THEY DON'T TELL YOU ABOUT STAIRS
What they don't tell you about stairs is the anatomy.
A stairway has a nuanced body. There's the shoe molding, where the hulk of the stairs is constrained to the floor. Your toe may nudge this before you traipse up or down the horizontal risers and vertical treads. The smooth railing that your hand clutches is called the balustrade. It's an intricate system of handrails, baserails, and spindles that sprout from the steps like ribs from a spine. If you peek below the balustrade, you can spy the spandrel, the empty belly of space beneath the stairway. Volutes, turnouts, wall brackets, winders, nosings, and countless more parts combine to form the body of a stairway.
What they don't tell you about stairs are the laws.
Human bodies have laws. We do not grow to be fifty feet tall nor shrink to five inches. Similar laws dictate a body of stairs. Building mandates assert the Riser-Tread formula: Riser + Tread equals 17-18 inches. The minimum tread length is a mere nine inches. This is shorter than the average person's foot. So when you climb a stair, your foot does not completely fit on each step.
What they don't tell you about stairs is the danger.
1000 people die from falling down stairs every year. I have always known that I will be one of them. I will be flying down a stairway, rushing to a movie, an interview, or a wedding, and my foot will miss the riser by an inch. Just an inch. The stair's sharp edge will peel of a petal of skin from my heel, and I will lurch forward, my stomach twirling, the corners of my mouth wilting with shock. My hands will shoot up to shield me, but gravity will overpower me, and my elbows will buckle from the steep collision. The stairs will shatter my jawbone and nose, and I will thump down the stairs, a carpet of blood unrolling behind me. I will die alone on that stairway, caught between where I was coming from and where I wanted to go.
What they don't tell you about stairs is that they can kill you before you ever realize your dreams, or meet the person you want to marry, or see the sun rise on the east coast. They can kill you while you are texting, dreaming, scheming, or laughing. One inch of surprise space and you could be nothing but a scrambled mass of flesh and blood strewn between floors, never to go up or down or anywhere again. Stairs can end your life while your are waiting for it to begin. So climb with care.
A stairway has a nuanced body. There's the shoe molding, where the hulk of the stairs is constrained to the floor. Your toe may nudge this before you traipse up or down the horizontal risers and vertical treads. The smooth railing that your hand clutches is called the balustrade. It's an intricate system of handrails, baserails, and spindles that sprout from the steps like ribs from a spine. If you peek below the balustrade, you can spy the spandrel, the empty belly of space beneath the stairway. Volutes, turnouts, wall brackets, winders, nosings, and countless more parts combine to form the body of a stairway.
What they don't tell you about stairs are the laws.
Human bodies have laws. We do not grow to be fifty feet tall nor shrink to five inches. Similar laws dictate a body of stairs. Building mandates assert the Riser-Tread formula: Riser + Tread equals 17-18 inches. The minimum tread length is a mere nine inches. This is shorter than the average person's foot. So when you climb a stair, your foot does not completely fit on each step.
What they don't tell you about stairs is the danger.
1000 people die from falling down stairs every year. I have always known that I will be one of them. I will be flying down a stairway, rushing to a movie, an interview, or a wedding, and my foot will miss the riser by an inch. Just an inch. The stair's sharp edge will peel of a petal of skin from my heel, and I will lurch forward, my stomach twirling, the corners of my mouth wilting with shock. My hands will shoot up to shield me, but gravity will overpower me, and my elbows will buckle from the steep collision. The stairs will shatter my jawbone and nose, and I will thump down the stairs, a carpet of blood unrolling behind me. I will die alone on that stairway, caught between where I was coming from and where I wanted to go.
What they don't tell you about stairs is that they can kill you before you ever realize your dreams, or meet the person you want to marry, or see the sun rise on the east coast. They can kill you while you are texting, dreaming, scheming, or laughing. One inch of surprise space and you could be nothing but a scrambled mass of flesh and blood strewn between floors, never to go up or down or anywhere again. Stairs can end your life while your are waiting for it to begin. So climb with care.
Tuesday, March 31, 2009
November 19: A Link with Lincoln
On November 19, 1863, Abraham Lincoln commenced a terse speech. As he examined the solemn crowd gathered around the soldiers' cemetery, Lincoln probably saw many icy expressions glaring back at him. His audience, composed mostly of inhabitants of Gettysburg, still bitterly remembered the smell of 7,500 rotting corpses that had covered their town four months ago. And they knew that those fallen men composed a mere fraction of the quarter-million soldiers who had died for this war. The moment Lincoln started his speech, he knew many people in the town and the nation hated him.
Four score and seven (plus 49) years later, a squealing baby girl unwillingly emerged from her mother's aching body. I was immediately off to a nasty start in the world. For one thing, I was nine days late. Apparently, I didn't want to leave my warm, well-padded personal universe. I was also troublesome. The 43 hour birth caused my mother the most excruciating pain of her life. Plus, she had an allergic reaction to the pain medication, causing her to hallucinate about snakes slithering around the hospital table and spiders creeping down the doctor's arms. After I begrudgingly exited her body, my mother swore never to have any more children. And she kept her word. I wonder how many lives I prevented with my violent clinging to her womb
Lincoln spoke in his high-pitched Kentucky accent for three minutes, redefining the Civil War as not merely a fight for the Union, but a struggle for freedom and equality. He concluded his speech with a fervent oath that the "government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth." When he finished, no one applauded him. Silence hovered above the graves. The listeners had passionately clapped for the three hour speech that had preceded Lincoln's, given by Harvard president Edward Everett. When Everett complimented Lincoln on the brief address, Lincoln replied that he was glad it wasn't a "total failure."
After such a melodramatic birth, you would think the rest of my life would be similarly epic. And in some ways, I suppose it has been. Nasty tears, fierce thoughts, soothing laughs, deep breaths, and taunting dreams are all epic in their own ordinary ways. Even a raindrop sliding down your neck is epic if you think about it. Nevertheless, I'm cursed with that common, obnoxious desire to dazzle. To be seen. To be remembered. To be important. To burn the world with my thoughts and singe time with my actions. Yet, I am one in six billion. One who will die in a galaxy's wink of time. Why should I see myself as anything but a twig in time's fire?
Lincoln never knew that his carefully crafted speech would endure long after his tall body decayed. He never heard Carl Sandburg or Martin Luther King quote the iconic phrases. He never witnessed historians proclaim it "the turning point of the civil war." A bullet extinguished him, and he died in a finger's twitch of time.
I know death is inevitable, but the idea still viciously claws at my mind. What if I die ordinary? What if my rage against the dying of the light never sparks massive change or personal fulfillment? Yet perhaps my life's actions, just as the speech uttered on my birthday, will ripple through time in some unforeseeable way. Perhaps all people serve the future just as vitally and intensely as we serve the present, though not as clearly. Lincoln did not give the Gettysburg Address so his face could be stamped on bronze and paper currency. Desire for epic fame did not fuel his words. Rather, desire for present benevolence lit a brilliant trail of future good.
Who knows what sparks we ignite unknowingly?
Four score and seven (plus 49) years later, a squealing baby girl unwillingly emerged from her mother's aching body. I was immediately off to a nasty start in the world. For one thing, I was nine days late. Apparently, I didn't want to leave my warm, well-padded personal universe. I was also troublesome. The 43 hour birth caused my mother the most excruciating pain of her life. Plus, she had an allergic reaction to the pain medication, causing her to hallucinate about snakes slithering around the hospital table and spiders creeping down the doctor's arms. After I begrudgingly exited her body, my mother swore never to have any more children. And she kept her word. I wonder how many lives I prevented with my violent clinging to her womb
Lincoln spoke in his high-pitched Kentucky accent for three minutes, redefining the Civil War as not merely a fight for the Union, but a struggle for freedom and equality. He concluded his speech with a fervent oath that the "government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth." When he finished, no one applauded him. Silence hovered above the graves. The listeners had passionately clapped for the three hour speech that had preceded Lincoln's, given by Harvard president Edward Everett. When Everett complimented Lincoln on the brief address, Lincoln replied that he was glad it wasn't a "total failure."
After such a melodramatic birth, you would think the rest of my life would be similarly epic. And in some ways, I suppose it has been. Nasty tears, fierce thoughts, soothing laughs, deep breaths, and taunting dreams are all epic in their own ordinary ways. Even a raindrop sliding down your neck is epic if you think about it. Nevertheless, I'm cursed with that common, obnoxious desire to dazzle. To be seen. To be remembered. To be important. To burn the world with my thoughts and singe time with my actions. Yet, I am one in six billion. One who will die in a galaxy's wink of time. Why should I see myself as anything but a twig in time's fire?
Lincoln never knew that his carefully crafted speech would endure long after his tall body decayed. He never heard Carl Sandburg or Martin Luther King quote the iconic phrases. He never witnessed historians proclaim it "the turning point of the civil war." A bullet extinguished him, and he died in a finger's twitch of time.
I know death is inevitable, but the idea still viciously claws at my mind. What if I die ordinary? What if my rage against the dying of the light never sparks massive change or personal fulfillment? Yet perhaps my life's actions, just as the speech uttered on my birthday, will ripple through time in some unforeseeable way. Perhaps all people serve the future just as vitally and intensely as we serve the present, though not as clearly. Lincoln did not give the Gettysburg Address so his face could be stamped on bronze and paper currency. Desire for epic fame did not fuel his words. Rather, desire for present benevolence lit a brilliant trail of future good.
Who knows what sparks we ignite unknowingly?
Tuesday, March 17, 2009
Cell Me Short
My cell phone is sleeping next to me. It's exhausted. It should be. We've had a long day. Pressed against my bed spread, the scuffed silver phone lies still. Florescent light from the ceiling festers in its wrinkled scratches. I slide my hand down its side. I know its contours well. Every day my fingers grind against its numerical chest. Every day I clutch the slim machine in my hand. All this attention is slowly destroying it. The numbers that were once elegantly precise have flaked off. Now I can see into its messy stomach with masses of wires and the dull plastic beneath the metallic skin.
The screen's blackness erupts into bright, sky blue. On the cell phone's newly alert face, a cartoon letter pops out of an animated envelope.
1 New Message from: Boyfriend.
Eagerly, I press the phone's round center button that watches me like an unblinking eye ball.
Love you babe goodnight.
10:58pm 3/25/09
Cradling the cell phone in my hand,Ｉimagine his eyes and voice.
Americans cell phone users between 13 and 29 send an average of 20 text messages per day.
I would like to know what I have missed because of my relationship with my phone. There must be so much. I imagine two lovers on the bus, holding hands for the first time. Hunched over my metal device, poking messages into they key pad, I do not see the their hands slink together. I will never perceive them, and to me they will never exist. How else have I condensed my existence? I think of all the trickles of sunlight, the shadows of knotted grass blades, the lacy silhouettes of trees that I never saw. All of them invisible to my eyes that stared at a square inch screen instead.
4.1 billion people own cell phones. That amounts to six of every ten people.
I would like to hear all of the things that people never told me because of my cell phone. If you can talk to someone anytime, why speak at all? My cell phone, a vein connecting me to my family, my boyfriend, my best friend. But what does this vein pump? Forgettable words and filtered feelings. When you're connected with everyone so intimately, able to interrupt them at any moment, it's so easy to take them for granted. Perhaps cell phones weaken that yearning that unites people in the first place
In a recent survey, 51% of those polled said they could not imagine giving up their cell phone.
Yes, I do love that blue illumination that announces a text or call. My cell phone whispers in my ear that people want me, people need me. That excitement is addicting. So addicting, sometimes I purposely forget my cell phone when I go to Portland. What liberation! Sprinting around a city with only my own thoughts. I feel connections with the grumbling max train, with the witch-like woman perched across from me on the bus, and the low growl of the crowded streets. No machine is needed for these bonds. It's satisfying. Yet, I always feel a slow pull of anxiety in my chest. Whose call am I missing? Whose texts have I not responded to? Who thinks I'm ignoring them? Times like those, I wonder if people can really be alone anymore.
I scoop my petite phone into my palm and tell it to wake me up at 8:15 in the morning. Tomorrow, my phone's voice will be the first noise to penetrate my ears. I place the weary machine on my nightstand, and switch of the light. I better go to sleep. We have a lot to do tomorrow.
The screen's blackness erupts into bright, sky blue. On the cell phone's newly alert face, a cartoon letter pops out of an animated envelope.
1 New Message from: Boyfriend.
Eagerly, I press the phone's round center button that watches me like an unblinking eye ball.
Love you babe goodnight.
10:58pm 3/25/09
Cradling the cell phone in my hand,Ｉimagine his eyes and voice.
Americans cell phone users between 13 and 29 send an average of 20 text messages per day.
I would like to know what I have missed because of my relationship with my phone. There must be so much. I imagine two lovers on the bus, holding hands for the first time. Hunched over my metal device, poking messages into they key pad, I do not see the their hands slink together. I will never perceive them, and to me they will never exist. How else have I condensed my existence? I think of all the trickles of sunlight, the shadows of knotted grass blades, the lacy silhouettes of trees that I never saw. All of them invisible to my eyes that stared at a square inch screen instead.
4.1 billion people own cell phones. That amounts to six of every ten people.
I would like to hear all of the things that people never told me because of my cell phone. If you can talk to someone anytime, why speak at all? My cell phone, a vein connecting me to my family, my boyfriend, my best friend. But what does this vein pump? Forgettable words and filtered feelings. When you're connected with everyone so intimately, able to interrupt them at any moment, it's so easy to take them for granted. Perhaps cell phones weaken that yearning that unites people in the first place
In a recent survey, 51% of those polled said they could not imagine giving up their cell phone.
Yes, I do love that blue illumination that announces a text or call. My cell phone whispers in my ear that people want me, people need me. That excitement is addicting. So addicting, sometimes I purposely forget my cell phone when I go to Portland. What liberation! Sprinting around a city with only my own thoughts. I feel connections with the grumbling max train, with the witch-like woman perched across from me on the bus, and the low growl of the crowded streets. No machine is needed for these bonds. It's satisfying. Yet, I always feel a slow pull of anxiety in my chest. Whose call am I missing? Whose texts have I not responded to? Who thinks I'm ignoring them? Times like those, I wonder if people can really be alone anymore.
I scoop my petite phone into my palm and tell it to wake me up at 8:15 in the morning. Tomorrow, my phone's voice will be the first noise to penetrate my ears. I place the weary machine on my nightstand, and switch of the light. I better go to sleep. We have a lot to do tomorrow.
Wednesday, March 11, 2009
Truth Shmuth
What if truth was one of us? Just a slob like one of us? Just a stranger on the bus, trying to make his way home?
Pardon my ridiculousness. I just felt the urge to be silly. Because honestly, I find the question "what is truth" as silly as the lyrical questions above. I have my opinions about nonfiction and judging from the general comments in class, you probably won't like them. Don't worry. I'm not asking you to. Your agreement or disagreement won't make my ideas any less true to me.
Personally, I think metaphorical truth is MORE real than factual truth. Shocked? Good. Let me explain. Last night I had a dream about my old elementary school. It was not a reproduction of a literal experience, but it captured the truth of my complex emotions about childhood. Like all dreams, it was an metaphorical exploration of the truth I extract from life's overwhelming details. And that truth, that essential core of my experiences matters more than the sum of the facts that created it. I have the same opinion about memoirs. The facts don't matter as much as the emotional truth that emerges from them.
I hate discussing "what is nonfiction" because I think that writing truth, like dreaming, is extremely personal. Only you know when you're tapping into the essence of your life and only you know when you're exaggerating. Most people don't seem to like that idea of morality being personal. We live in a mirky age that craves absolutes. So we satisfy ourselves with calculating gravity, predicting the weather, and striving the categorize the massive world around us. But when it comes to the unique universe between our ears, sorry math majors, but you can't measure that.
So do me a favor. Don't tell me if I'm telling my life truthfully. Critique the art I use to convey truth, but do not question my sense of truthfulness. I have a sensitive conscience that squeals sharp chords when I lie. I don't need you as a truth policeman. And guess what? You don't need me as one either. Change the trivial facts if it helps guide me to the emotional truth. I don't care if you tell me you wore a red shirt when you actually wore a white one. I don't care if you tell me you brother was sitting when really he was lying down. Why you would lie about that is beyond me, but if your conscience doesn't beep furiously with alarm, then I trust that it's part of your metaphorical story. And that's okay with me. Just make me feel what you felt. Keep that core, that essence, that personal truth and it will be true to me too.
When I wrote my memoir, I always tried to keep my eye on that vital emotional truth. At one point, I talk about a very vivid childhood memory. But the thing is, I was seven years old, so even though the emotions are vivid, the factual details blur in my mind. So what did I do? I imagined I was seven years old again. I tapped into that vivid emotion, and tried to reconstruct a skin over the memory's soul. And from what I hear in my responses, it was my most effective moment of my memoir. Do I feel guilty for recreating my Dad's dialogue? Hell no. Using my own intuition, I chose things my Dad would say. Without concrete facts, I could still explore the more important truth of who my Dad is and how he made me feel.
You truth fundamentalists may be scowling at the screen right now. You're probably taking my argument to the extreme, thinking "Well using your logic, one could completely fabricate a memory and claim it still conjured that emotional truth!" Let me defend myself. Firstly, I seriously doubt that anyone but a sociopath would claim that a story ungrounded in any type of fact is nonfiction. Secondly, I doubt that without some important facts, a writer is capable of tapping into that emotional truth of a memory. And thirdly, my argument isn't grounded in logic but human intuition. That probably makes you hard-core fact addicts cringe even more.
Well, go right ahead and cringe. I respect that your consciences differs from mine. But don't think that I'm a liar because I value the metaphorical truth more than the literal truth. In creative nonfiction, I think there should be an ambience of trust in each other's intuition. Otherwise, we may slip into the philosophical swamp of whose truth is truer, creating an atmosphere as tense as witch-hunting puritan times. Let's not burn each other on philosophical stakes. Let's accept that though we walk different roads, we still desire to arrive at the same place. After all, that desire to find truth is what makes us writers in the first place, right?
Pardon my ridiculousness. I just felt the urge to be silly. Because honestly, I find the question "what is truth" as silly as the lyrical questions above. I have my opinions about nonfiction and judging from the general comments in class, you probably won't like them. Don't worry. I'm not asking you to. Your agreement or disagreement won't make my ideas any less true to me.
Personally, I think metaphorical truth is MORE real than factual truth. Shocked? Good. Let me explain. Last night I had a dream about my old elementary school. It was not a reproduction of a literal experience, but it captured the truth of my complex emotions about childhood. Like all dreams, it was an metaphorical exploration of the truth I extract from life's overwhelming details. And that truth, that essential core of my experiences matters more than the sum of the facts that created it. I have the same opinion about memoirs. The facts don't matter as much as the emotional truth that emerges from them.
I hate discussing "what is nonfiction" because I think that writing truth, like dreaming, is extremely personal. Only you know when you're tapping into the essence of your life and only you know when you're exaggerating. Most people don't seem to like that idea of morality being personal. We live in a mirky age that craves absolutes. So we satisfy ourselves with calculating gravity, predicting the weather, and striving the categorize the massive world around us. But when it comes to the unique universe between our ears, sorry math majors, but you can't measure that.
So do me a favor. Don't tell me if I'm telling my life truthfully. Critique the art I use to convey truth, but do not question my sense of truthfulness. I have a sensitive conscience that squeals sharp chords when I lie. I don't need you as a truth policeman. And guess what? You don't need me as one either. Change the trivial facts if it helps guide me to the emotional truth. I don't care if you tell me you wore a red shirt when you actually wore a white one. I don't care if you tell me you brother was sitting when really he was lying down. Why you would lie about that is beyond me, but if your conscience doesn't beep furiously with alarm, then I trust that it's part of your metaphorical story. And that's okay with me. Just make me feel what you felt. Keep that core, that essence, that personal truth and it will be true to me too.
When I wrote my memoir, I always tried to keep my eye on that vital emotional truth. At one point, I talk about a very vivid childhood memory. But the thing is, I was seven years old, so even though the emotions are vivid, the factual details blur in my mind. So what did I do? I imagined I was seven years old again. I tapped into that vivid emotion, and tried to reconstruct a skin over the memory's soul. And from what I hear in my responses, it was my most effective moment of my memoir. Do I feel guilty for recreating my Dad's dialogue? Hell no. Using my own intuition, I chose things my Dad would say. Without concrete facts, I could still explore the more important truth of who my Dad is and how he made me feel.
You truth fundamentalists may be scowling at the screen right now. You're probably taking my argument to the extreme, thinking "Well using your logic, one could completely fabricate a memory and claim it still conjured that emotional truth!" Let me defend myself. Firstly, I seriously doubt that anyone but a sociopath would claim that a story ungrounded in any type of fact is nonfiction. Secondly, I doubt that without some important facts, a writer is capable of tapping into that emotional truth of a memory. And thirdly, my argument isn't grounded in logic but human intuition. That probably makes you hard-core fact addicts cringe even more.
Well, go right ahead and cringe. I respect that your consciences differs from mine. But don't think that I'm a liar because I value the metaphorical truth more than the literal truth. In creative nonfiction, I think there should be an ambience of trust in each other's intuition. Otherwise, we may slip into the philosophical swamp of whose truth is truer, creating an atmosphere as tense as witch-hunting puritan times. Let's not burn each other on philosophical stakes. Let's accept that though we walk different roads, we still desire to arrive at the same place. After all, that desire to find truth is what makes us writers in the first place, right?
Wednesday, February 25, 2009
The Stranger
I have seen her around campus and she seems sad. No, not sad so much as shut. She reminds me of this locked door in my apartment building. It's not a beautiful door. No neon signs demanding attention or decadent flourishes flirting with my eyes. Just a banal pastel rectangle rising erect by the recycling. I've tried opening the enigmatic entryway but it's always locked and I have no idea what's behind it. Storage? Corpses? A lifetime supply of chocolate? Waldo? I don't know. And that makes me notice it more than the doors I walk through thirty times a day.
Now here I sit in the UC with a chorus of college voices pervading the air and this girl-door is cracking open. Her words invite me to peek behind that solemn facade that has taunted me for so long. Like a Western tourist sneaking into Mecca, I'm going to slide into the maze of her mind. But don't worry, sweet reader! The cacaphony of the crowd is my invisibilty cloak; I sneak around unnoticed.
Let me describe to you what I know so far about this sulking creature of mystery whose presence so bewilders me. Her stand looks like a stoop. Her sit seems like a squat. Long black hair strings down her cheeks like stern curtains. She seldom speaks, but when words do march out of her mouth, they are brief and frugal. Her body has always reminded me of Saturn, not because of its girth, but because it seeths a kind of self-reliance. And I could easily imagine a ring of ice particles encircling her.
Oh, how those first impressions strip away as I hunch in the cafeteria and study this girl in her natural habitat! But let me snip short my rhapsodizing. Now, my scholarly reader, I will silence my biases. Like a rational anthropologist or psychologist or lifeologist, I will remove myself from the scene. I will present you with the simple, essential ingredients and see what delicious conclusions your minds bake with them:
She towers above her table of friends with her hip jutted out. Slicked back in a stylish pony tail, her black hair no longer divides her face from the world, but beckons admiration. The gaggle of friends below her all look like a strange blend of geek and gypsy. Only a few of them speak directly to her, but the others stop babbling every few seconds and eagerly glance at her.
"Oh my god, isn't it like Ash Wednesday or something?" blurts a girl with greasy blue hair and a black sweatshirt. The ripples of chattering at the table fade.
"Yeah it is." Mystery Girl twists her keys between the crevices of her fingers.
"Are there like church services or something here?"
"Yeah there are church services here. But I was sick on Sunday so I forgot to go to them."
"Is the church here any good?"
"Yeah I just didn't want to got to church cuz I was sick. Christians have bad immune systems." As she speaks, she traces the outside curve of her thigh with the keys. "Oh my god so like the funniest thing happened last week. Me and a bunch of the lacrosse players were working out and watching TV. And you know how you don't want to change the channel when you're working out?" Blue Sweatshirt girl blinks in agreement. "Well this evangelical thing came on which was all like 'Jesus bled for you blah blah blah' and ever since then I started calling Gatorade Jesus Juice." Giggles billow through the crowd. "And now I'm always like 'want some Jesus Juice?' when we work out."
Blue Hair Girl adjusts her brown hat that pleads for attention. "Are you like really religious?"
"I'm Catholic and Pagan which makes life interesting." She cocks her other hip out and shifts her weight. "Christmas is fun cuz I get to go to church services and solstice parties. It was like really awkward one time cuz my friend had this Christmas party. I was all like 'uh-no-can't go you're party's on solstice." A rich laughter gushes from her lips.
"HOLY SHIT I FINALLY FINISHED THE LAST LEVEL!" A puffy face erupts from behind the labtop next to Blue Hair Girl. The others at the table look fairly amused. Sucked back into reality, the computer boy greets Mystery Girl, who rewards him with a half-smile.
"You religious too?" She brushes across his whole body with her eyes.
He fingers the rims of his glasses. "Yeah. There's this math demon that sits on my shoulder and makes me worship him."
"I see."
"He's always like 'is there really such thing as infinity' and-"
"What does the math devil look like?"
"Thin. Emaciated."
"Interesting."
"You're like really good at math, huh?" Bursts Blue Haired Girl, gazing at Mystery Girl.
"She's a Math troll!" Computer Boy howls at his own joke before anyone else has the chance.
"It's my major. I have to rock at something." Her chin elevates a little, elongating her wide white neck.
"OH MY GOD! One of my friends is engaged!" Computer Boy's beady eyes expand like black holes.
"So what. All my friends from high school are either pregnant, engaged, or dead." Her keys jingle as she speaks. "Do you facebook stalk your girlfriend?"
"No I don't." His face looks liquidy like yogurt, and screams for the supportive structure of glasses to keep it from gushing onto the floor.
"I stalk you girlfriend on facebook. She's hot." She smirks and angles her head towards him. "Well I have homework to do. Au revoir!" She sachets out the door, snaps it open, and enters the night.
My eyes watch the blackness envelop her figure. More than ever, she is a mystery to me. I have discovered that behind that locked door there is not a mere room but an entire complicated, nuanced country. And I will always be a stranger there.
Now here I sit in the UC with a chorus of college voices pervading the air and this girl-door is cracking open. Her words invite me to peek behind that solemn facade that has taunted me for so long. Like a Western tourist sneaking into Mecca, I'm going to slide into the maze of her mind. But don't worry, sweet reader! The cacaphony of the crowd is my invisibilty cloak; I sneak around unnoticed.
Let me describe to you what I know so far about this sulking creature of mystery whose presence so bewilders me. Her stand looks like a stoop. Her sit seems like a squat. Long black hair strings down her cheeks like stern curtains. She seldom speaks, but when words do march out of her mouth, they are brief and frugal. Her body has always reminded me of Saturn, not because of its girth, but because it seeths a kind of self-reliance. And I could easily imagine a ring of ice particles encircling her.
Oh, how those first impressions strip away as I hunch in the cafeteria and study this girl in her natural habitat! But let me snip short my rhapsodizing. Now, my scholarly reader, I will silence my biases. Like a rational anthropologist or psychologist or lifeologist, I will remove myself from the scene. I will present you with the simple, essential ingredients and see what delicious conclusions your minds bake with them:
She towers above her table of friends with her hip jutted out. Slicked back in a stylish pony tail, her black hair no longer divides her face from the world, but beckons admiration. The gaggle of friends below her all look like a strange blend of geek and gypsy. Only a few of them speak directly to her, but the others stop babbling every few seconds and eagerly glance at her.
"Oh my god, isn't it like Ash Wednesday or something?" blurts a girl with greasy blue hair and a black sweatshirt. The ripples of chattering at the table fade.
"Yeah it is." Mystery Girl twists her keys between the crevices of her fingers.
"Are there like church services or something here?"
"Yeah there are church services here. But I was sick on Sunday so I forgot to go to them."
"Is the church here any good?"
"Yeah I just didn't want to got to church cuz I was sick. Christians have bad immune systems." As she speaks, she traces the outside curve of her thigh with the keys. "Oh my god so like the funniest thing happened last week. Me and a bunch of the lacrosse players were working out and watching TV. And you know how you don't want to change the channel when you're working out?" Blue Sweatshirt girl blinks in agreement. "Well this evangelical thing came on which was all like 'Jesus bled for you blah blah blah' and ever since then I started calling Gatorade Jesus Juice." Giggles billow through the crowd. "And now I'm always like 'want some Jesus Juice?' when we work out."
Blue Hair Girl adjusts her brown hat that pleads for attention. "Are you like really religious?"
"I'm Catholic and Pagan which makes life interesting." She cocks her other hip out and shifts her weight. "Christmas is fun cuz I get to go to church services and solstice parties. It was like really awkward one time cuz my friend had this Christmas party. I was all like 'uh-no-can't go you're party's on solstice." A rich laughter gushes from her lips.
"HOLY SHIT I FINALLY FINISHED THE LAST LEVEL!" A puffy face erupts from behind the labtop next to Blue Hair Girl. The others at the table look fairly amused. Sucked back into reality, the computer boy greets Mystery Girl, who rewards him with a half-smile.
"You religious too?" She brushes across his whole body with her eyes.
He fingers the rims of his glasses. "Yeah. There's this math demon that sits on my shoulder and makes me worship him."
"I see."
"He's always like 'is there really such thing as infinity' and-"
"What does the math devil look like?"
"Thin. Emaciated."
"Interesting."
"You're like really good at math, huh?" Bursts Blue Haired Girl, gazing at Mystery Girl.
"She's a Math troll!" Computer Boy howls at his own joke before anyone else has the chance.
"It's my major. I have to rock at something." Her chin elevates a little, elongating her wide white neck.
"OH MY GOD! One of my friends is engaged!" Computer Boy's beady eyes expand like black holes.
"So what. All my friends from high school are either pregnant, engaged, or dead." Her keys jingle as she speaks. "Do you facebook stalk your girlfriend?"
"No I don't." His face looks liquidy like yogurt, and screams for the supportive structure of glasses to keep it from gushing onto the floor.
"I stalk you girlfriend on facebook. She's hot." She smirks and angles her head towards him. "Well I have homework to do. Au revoir!" She sachets out the door, snaps it open, and enters the night.
My eyes watch the blackness envelop her figure. More than ever, she is a mystery to me. I have discovered that behind that locked door there is not a mere room but an entire complicated, nuanced country. And I will always be a stranger there.
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