December 2005 Archives

The Korean acupuncturists wanted me to come back for a second treatment so I did. An indulgence. "Your chi is depleted," said Mrs. Kim, "Your spirit is wandering. We need to help it come back."

I received more moxa in the same places, needles in the same and several more new sites, and an extravagant, custom blend of medicinal tea. I asked for the names of the "more than twenty" goodies placed in neat piles on a tissue paper before being bundled up for brewing. Instead, Mrs. Kim told me what each one is for:

Well. I spent the evening (last night) with my father, who introduced me to his girlfriend and treated us to dinner at Mi Ranchito (it was yummy).

There were a number of reflective moments (!), a fair amount of joking, and basic information sharing. I learned more about the details of the automobile accident last year, that they thought dad's spleen had ruptured and almost took it out, they almost didn't let Shirley in to see him, etc.

Got treated today for my shoulder, rib cage, and emotions. My tongue and eyes revealed me as "a lung person". Kidneys are also implicated, but they only got one mention. Lung people are prone to melancholy, apparently, and I was admonished: "Don't go to bed with cry. Your ch'i disappears."

In addition to the actual acupuncture, I also received moxabution. "Moxa is a Chinese herb (Mugwort) which is rolled into sticks and burned above the skin ..." (What is Oriental Medicine?)

In addition to salves, needles, and burning moxa in the vicinity of the physical ailments, I received a treatment in the middle of my back for "strong mind." I think it was a bonus. :-)

"Whoa! It demonstrates how to do it! That's new."

"That's cool."

"The graphics aren't as good, do you see that?"

"Can anybody hear me?"

"That's weird." What does that mean? It had Y button with like an arrow down. Just do the move. huh. Oh that was cool!

"Oh wow, what was it?!"

"That's new." "That's cool!"

Both of them are a trip. Separately and together. Austin took us on the scenic route to Waid's for breakfast that just happened to take us by GameStop where the new release of DOA 4 awaited. :-) I really enjoyed watching him play last night, shifting between female and male characters and winning every single game. He explained a lot to me. Very interesting discourse involved with gaming. I asked Alec last night about whether he felt himself thinking in the ways of the games during his real life. "It doesn't make me violent, if that's what you mean." No, that wasn't where I was going. (Obviously he's aware of that interpretation.) He's articulate and concise: you don't solve problems in real-life like you do in the game. I know. What I meant was, there are parts of the games - especially the commercial elements - that are quite optimistic. They point toward possibilities. Austin acknowledged this: some things are just cool, but part of what makes them cool is that they demonstrate potential.

Jesus Evil Kachina tells me one ought to communicate only that which rises to the top.

I arrived in KC to surprise my nephews and sister-in-law. Dad had a few hours warning. :-) The youngest's eyes just about popped out of his head when I told him who I was. Yes, it's been that long. I'm getting lessons in PSP, Dance Dance Revolution Extreme 2 (Alec scored a perfect 100 tonight on Captain Jack), Halo (Gamertag SS4 Shinobi), and Dead or Alive Ultimate (Austin is in the top 100 worldwide).

I'm planning on downloading Full Metal Alchemy once I've finished this trip; got a bit of an explanation from the Jamester as I peered over his shoulder yesterday and was intrigued.

Little Brother calls during bowling (affection flows back). Blood brother suffers. Parental pathology is passed on. I dream randomly.

SEMP subjected me to the most intensive grilling I’ve yet received over the Informed Consent form for Reflexivity. :-) The beginning point was this “favorite sentence”:

The guidelines used for selecting material have to do with intrasubjectively-perceived salience in the moment,…

The individual words make sense, but what do I mean by stringing them together in this way? Most simply, what I mean is, “I decide”. Yet the consent form puts limits on this power. The different choices people make concerning their own consent establish certain conditions that I commit to operate within – each individual’s decision contributes to a structure of accountability for me. Why do I need to be accountable to others in this way? Why not just rely on my own personal integrity? Because any kind of integrity requires a supporting structure and I’ve had no other. The academic language adds (hypothetically) a precision that seeks to specify the rationale justifying the choices I make.

I’m quizzed about “public” and “private”. “There’s no such thing as privacy,” says Jesus Evil Kachina. Intersubjectivity theorists (whoever these might be, smile) agree: we all mutually co-construct each other through acts of calling (instead of/in addition to "mission", also identity: interpellation). In commonsense terms, one could say we do this through culture (norms, values, etc).

“I don’t know if I want to be a blog! “ A log? A bog? “It sounds like a glob.!” A lob?

You can pick your nose.

Put that in your blog and smoke it!

~ SEMP

Jesus Evil Kachina tested me. Do you want world peace? I do. Are you at peace with yourself? Getting there. The last eight days, yes. Thank you.

While driving, I talked with Shemaya about gut feelings and the trick of learning to distinguish between the “gut” that’s reactive defensiveness and the “gut” that’s intuitive guidance. She explained “the enteric brain” to me (note especially the section on The Third Neurotransmitter: serotonin), which I hadn’t heard about before. We agreed it’s probably connected (somehow) to the biochemical pathways in the mind that channel consciousness.

make the most of each and every moment!"

I was awaken by the Dan-ism via walkie-talkie this morning. Jamie was delighted with himself. :-)

Had a mellow evening after my quick drive to see Ruth - realized I was kinda in a hurry. :-) In fact, realized I'm often in a bit of a rush.

No comma. That's what caught my attention. I anticipate where it is I want to be in emotional/relational terms and express it verbally a wee bit prior to its actually being true. I suspect this tendency makes me appear inconsistent (?), and/or even flaky. :-( The worst aspect is that it means I miss the soft pleasures of the moment; the best (I guess?) is that it pulls me toward my own growth.

Yesterday was wonderful. My being sang. :-) Shall I be chronological?

The conservatory filled me with memories: "Those who dwell...among the beauties and mysteries of the earth are never alone or weary of life." ~ Rachel Carson. Among the biomes were a pair of blue and gold macaws and some lories. We tasted some fine old Chocolate, and learned quite a bit about the cultivation of cacao (40% produced in South Africa) and production of chocolate. Hershey's Kisses have been around since 1906! Tootsie Rolls were the first chocolate-type candy, 1896 (if I remember correctly). We watched electric trains circle the outside courtyard, admired a bizillion plants (I'm bad with names but one that stuck is the African Mask), and took in some art. Joyce Tenneson has some amazing photographs of flowers, doctored to appear suspended in black, velvety space. She's an author as well.

It was an 11 hour drive from Brattleboro, VT to Columbus, OH, with the longest stretch across mid-state New York. Dry in the beginning and end, I encountered rain midway across NY which persisted until the Pennsylvania state line.

I spent most of the time listening to The Prodigal Summer by Barbara Kingsolver. It is strangely suitable, with the preface mentioning something about this being a book for those with "wildness" inside. :-)

Ila kept me waiting (!) once I got to Columbus, which was fine as it gave me time to locate the Ugly Tuna Saloona. (We plan to check it out tonight as it was closed yesterday.) Now, we're off to the Franklin Park Conservatory and Botanical Gardens (she's quite worried about being a proper host and taking me sightseeing). What a sweetie! :-)

Sam's doing great this morning, although he says he can't talk. He has managed a few words. Was trying to tell me something about the painting of the woman in reddish-pink and orange with her head slumped heavily in her hand, elbow on her knee....she looks either exhausted or frustrated or both. Heavy. I'm guessing this is Sam's morning ritual, to peruse his paintings and contemplate whatever they inspire.

We fiddled around with the communication board a little bit. Added "bitchin" as per Larry (talk about a big grin from Sam!), and "channel" to the tv portion. There are many detail questions Sam gets asked in the course of the day; I need more exposure to them to gather the pattern and imagine what might work on the board. Right now its rudimentary and folks don't seem to be using it. Instead there is a yes=one blink no=two blinks system - but it has difficulties too. First, you have to ask a simple yes/no question (no options!), then you have to wait, then ask another one. Sam's a puzzle sometimes: is he not answering because the question is so far away from what he wants that it doesn't even seem worth it? Is he still thinking if yes/no will get him closer to what he wants? Or is he so tired that he forgets to answer? Or feels he has exerted the effort to answer but it's not detectable to us?

Anyway. There was BIG Romance in the room last night, as a boyfriend of one of the nurse's aides' came by during her workshift and proposed, right here in Sammy's room! It was before I arrived, but the story is she planned to propose to him today, but he beat her to it. He said, "I know Sammy wants to marry you but I've got the ring." :-) Sam has always been a positive influence on couples, at least, he always brought out my better parts. One of Sam's gifts is that he gives permission to love and cultivates an environment or atmosphere for it.

Hey all, only just got on the Mass Pike heading to Albany when I found out how ill Sam has been. He says he wasn't scared, but I don't think he was thrilled to be alone. Anyway, he's in good spirits tonight, was watching Twister when I arrived, after having been up and out listening to carols earlier. We watched it together for awhile, then turned off the tube and checked in. His voice is only at a whisper, but he was understandable, especially for the first few words. His enunciation fades then and sometimes i couldn't understand him. :-/ He's getting good care and attention from the staff; lots of affection. Connie says, "Sam's got some of the finest friends. Everybody loves Sam."

We did email for an hour or more....trying to get caught up on the backlog of jokes and news. He laughed really hard at some; I've pasted in a few that got the most response below.

Shemaya sends genealogical information on a potential ancestor, Rockwell Kent (he's not). She marked a few passages in "The Voyaging life...", an article in the Jan/Feb issue of Ocean Navigator.

He engaged in vociferous political discourse in bars everywhere, often getting into fights; he was even tossed out of Newfoundland in 1915 - forcibly escorted to a ship by a government agent.

...Kent considered every adventure a success if it combined enough elements of disaster, companionship and physical exertions.

You don't think she was making any inferences about me, do you?

I leave in mere hours...

We made momo's at Lava's for hours last night, sipping beverages and chatting up a storm. P.D. and I talked blogging, who does one write about, how? He knew of some scene in NY where people would attend parties and then check each other's blogs the next day to see what had been written. I would enjoy something like that ... but why? I've been thinking about a comment someone recently made to the effect that being written about feels dehumanizing. I can imagine that. :-(

Sometimes when I'm writing I think of myself as a collector. Collecting experience, memories, connections. I like the idea of being a node through whom others can also maintain connection. It's not clear that many people consider reflexivity as a blog in this way, but it has always been my dream that what gets generated here becomes a kind of a 'community resource'. In the past couple of weeks, another reason for the way I blog has clarified itself for me: as social infrastructure.

I left at 6:35 to drive to the sunwheel. The sky was already lightening up but headlights were still in order. My mind drifted. When I got close, the stones hove into view, and a moment later, a tightly-gathered crowd of 50 people. The stones were gorgeous but the cluster of people took my breath away. I wasn't expecting that.

I pulled on my outer layers (17 degrees F, - 8 Celsius) and opened the car door to laughter. Forty-eight of the folks gathered were from a middle school in Springfield; great kids. :-)

Professor Young from the Astronomy Dept at UMass explained her brainchild, the perseverance it took to complete it over a decade (including two false starts), and then taught us five facts about the winter solstice and more.

A slight curve in trajectory and day begins to lengthen.

Will happiness, too? I've eschewed therapy (a.k.a. grief counseling) since spring. A few stalwart friends and poetry have seen me through.

The sun is supposed to rise tomorrow at 7:16 AM.

Yeseni commented a few weeks ago about Reggaeton and his favorite, Daddy Yankee. Neat site. And I do like the mix of percussion and vocals...party music for sure!

(Yeah, me slow. Did someone say, "end of the semester?")

Anuj collected several accounts already, including a link back to a rant on stupid people.

Seems he's been having a bad run-o-luck in the vehicular department. :-( Maybe it's because he reads while driving? What the heck is Mobile Eye? I bet that's what beat me out for company. Jeez. You know it's bad when Research beats Roadtrip.

Bring a camcorder ("The blog isn't enough?!) and Little Brother is unleashed! 181. Not quite a record; shy 6 pins from his all time high. "If not for those first two frames..."

I set just about an all time low, although I got a 'perfect' 100 in Game 2. Niru, by the way, had the magic touch on the slowest strikes I've ever seen. Zeynep beat me by 7.... then there were the usual erratic shenanigans from the spin dudes. No turkeys last night. :-(

A friend sends another link to warn me off blogging: Bloggers Need Not Apply.

with friends like this ...!

:-)

Here's a new documentary described as (imagine!) "a successful human rights movie. We'll have to see to it to believe it.

Sam says, as he dozes off and I'm finally here for a visit! Poor guy - looks exhausted. He's been partying hard - Lee, Christine, Phil & Lorraine have all been here recently, and Jennifer and Edith were here a few weeks ago. But he's tired today because he missed his nap this morning. I'm gonna hang out for a bit see if he gets recharged/wakes up before I have to zoom on to the next thing.

He did tell me that he got to call Mangeca and Jess Smith; obviously he was thrilled to get to do that. :-)

is the subject of today's quote from the Word-A-Day site. Anuj has it updating daily on his blog (I'm jealous of all his tricks).

Intolerance of ambiguity is the mark of an authoritarian personality. -Theodor Adorno, philosopher and composer (1903-1969)

Adorno is big in theories of mass communication. Anyway, inability to deal with uncertainty can also be the mark of insecurity. Perhaps the two often go hand-in-hand? Or, one looks like the other...

I've been guilty of the latter, ain't no doubt about it (sing a song of regret). The former? Heck, I like leading and being followed but I've always been extraordinarily uncomfortable when it was without open contest.

do exist - in quite organized fashion! Following this interview/declaration is an impressive list of links.

This December 11, 2005 NYTimes article refers to the Justice Department (distinct from the Dept of Homeland Security?):

"But the department has said that it had never used the provision to demand records from libraries or bookstores or to get information related to medical or gun records, areas that have prompted privacy concerns and protests from civil rights advocates, conservative libertarians and other critics of the law."

Wired put a story a few days ago (Dec 16) that leads with info on radical librarian Jessamyn West (from Vermont!), who wrote the declaration linked above. Her blog includes a link to today's Buffalo News story Bush intensifies rhetoric in battle over Patriot Act.

Well, I have had fun the last couple of nights. Only got a wee bit confused when I called Broughton last night but dialed Cris instead... I did NOT have a hangover from those CAIPIRINHAS with the real CACHAÇA from Friday night's bash to celebrate Cris' acceptance into the Translation program. Nonetheless, it DID take about two minutes before I realized who I was talking with and why the conversation wasn't going the way I expected! Prior to going there I had dinner with some interpreters and Deaf friends I haven't seen in ages. That was cool. And last night I danced and chatted for hours with many of the bowling crew in an extended celebration of Anuj's birthday (I think he's going for a record...?)

The highlight, of course, was when I was dancing between two hot young Nepalese men. I won't tell you which one of them thinks I'm in my 60s. :-)

I enjoyed reading the excerpts from a collection of blogposts from Iraq about the recent elections.

Hassan An Average Iraqi includes pictures and more description.

The Kid Himself Eject: Iraqi Konfused Kollege Kid seems to have removed his original posting?

Riverbend Baghdad Burning includes "the lists" - party slates on his December 15th entry. Also can't locate the entry extracted by/for the NYTimes. Weird.

Finally, Najma A Star from Mosul indicates a competition between "list number 618 (Tawafuq Iraqi front) and list number 731 (National Iraqi list).

I guess it'll be a few weeks before the results are deemed official.

Donna sends round a story by AARON NICODEMUS of the New Bedford (MA) Standard-Times, "Agents' visit chills UMass Dartmouth senior" about Homeland Security monitoring interlibrary loans.

My first ever public speaking class wrapped up yesterday with a paean to friendship, a 'devil's advocate' argument about the many ways in life people gamble, and eight extraordinary 'farewell' speeches. I wish I could put them all in here, indeed, speeches over the last couple of weeks improved vastly in quality, especially since Teresa's critique of my teaching and Elaine's declaration of faith in all of her peers. I hope Matt's exposition on friendship describes at least a few transcendent moments for members of our class. Not at the same level of consistency as with his best friends of course, but such peak moments are how one knows the public sphere has connected the individuals involved in the shared experience of living, of being alive.

Serendipitously, a good friend sent this mid-year commencement address to me this morning (thanks John!). It addresses many of the issues and concerns raised by soon-to-be-graduating seniors, and encourages you to grab and not let go of "YOUR ONE WILD AND PRECIOUS LIFE."

Student-generated awards for each other follow. Disclaimer: many refer to topics students spoke about, others refer to aspects of each other's lives of which I have no knowledge!

This ethnography, subtitled Geographies of Race in Black Liverpool, is amazing. In addition to superb analysis that grounds complicated theory with real day-to-day living, there are bits that might relate to my study on interpreters in the European Parliament. An obvious connection is with RP, Received Pronounciation, also known as posh (p. 14).

The author, Jacqueline Nassy Brown (who will give a talk at UMass in Feb), is interviewed (briefly) on the BBC radio program Thinking Allowed (interview starts about 8 1/2 minutes in). In the book, she provides a two-page summary of phenomenology that's quite useful (p. 9-10). Interestingly, she distances herself from it as representative of her own epistemology, stating "my point is not to endorse ... but to lay the groundwork for one of the arguments that follows..." (p. 11).

Her argument is fascinating, involving the ways "people make sense of place-as-matter, a practice that includes reading landscapes and acting on the view that place acts, that it shapes human consciousness" (p. 11).

Broadly, Brown's argument is situated to engage the question of "how we might theorize the local in view of increased scholarly attention to transnational processes of racial formation" (p. 5).

We're on! The University opens by 10 am, so we'll still have the Public Speaking final as scheduled at 10:30.

Snow day rescheduling for final exams.

Cosette "just a finance person" mentioned this quote the other day and I couldn't quite recall it, but look! She posted it in her blog:

"I am "the overeducated in pursuit of the unknowable." - Solow (1997) paraphrasing Oscar Wilde. Why didn't they tell me that in the beginning?!"

Yet now we know, and we still don't stop!

Dissertation ingredients assembled, are they to taste? Frosting comes last, and some day, a cake!

Anuj's 29th (!!) birthday dinner was fine until someone mentioned my birth in the 1940s. Actually, it remained delightful, espeically since we got to taste Romanian hospitality! And it was just as well someone's mom didn't speak English, as the spermatozoa comment just was not understood. (It would have been way too complicated to explain the semantic merger of "sinus" and its Nepalese counterpart.)

I received several directions regarding blogposts about bowling. They're a challenge to prioritize...there was DemonDon's sprint from the bar to a seated position at the foul line (resulting in a strike!), Lava's attempt to take out the competition by breaking Zeynep's hand after she scored a spare (and this after he let a backward throw nearly take out several people's toes), Chris' body english, and Little Brother's one point loss to yours truly again.

A discussion about Christian hegemony and the new Narnia movie is taking place on the social justice listserv. Barbara interjected these questions into a communication process that was bearing hints of polarization and othering:

What are the goals of this discussion on our list?
How have people experienced the discussion?
Do participants feel that their perspective has been extended, enlarged, stretched?
Have we been able to be inside other’s perspectives as a way of extending our own?
Obviously my questions reflect certain values?
Which brings me to another question: what values do we bring to the discussion?

We were actually talking about the merits of vegetarianism at this point, or at least of eating meat from grass-fed, naturally-raised, free range types of critters... but it struck me as a parallel for the life of academics as we unwound from the culminating presentations for the European Field Studies program.

This was after I learned about snakebite, car bombs, the end of lock-ins, and curiosity about transmogrification to the ritual of last orders, a.k.a., the mad rush. Which was well after Elizabeth observed that it sucked to go first, was awful in the middle, and terrible to be last. Brougton showed us all up - predictably! I can hardly wait for the right professional moment to unveil certain camcorder documentation...although Billy Martin the tinker-gypsy isn't the best moment captured from yesterday.

"I can't love and live if I don't fight and die." (Ryan)

"You need to remember what used to be good to predict what will be bad." (Chris)

"You need to remember what used to be good and forget what has become bad." (Matt)

a few others are oh so close... :-)

I think Bahktin and Benjamin are going to get me from the act of interpretation to the practice of democracy. Some folks to follow up on and/or revisit include:

Derrida, "On Democracy to Come", here's a critique, suggested by Briankle along with Jacques Ranciere and Etienne Balibar, who I was introduced to in the class on transnational citizenship last year. Here's a 1999 lecture, At the Borders of Europe.

Stephen also mentioned Balibar, and had us reading Chantal Mouffe. I've got to back up and read her work with Ernesto Laclau too.

Tangent a.k.a. multi-tasking.

So much thinking recently on the necessity of (what I keep referring to as) an emotional/social infrastructure. Maybe there are folks in the world who've succeeded at living highly ethical lives without being embedded in such, but it remains a struggle for me. I imagine folks have, otherwise my self-judgment couldn't be so harsh, could it?

I've got this fairly simple equation going: neglect (neither censure nor encouragement) fosters anomie. In this void, 'self' (however conceived?) must be shielded by various forms of defensive/protective insularity. Joining an infrastructure requires certain skills not fostered in an environment of neglect. Some folks are undoubtedly much quicker studies than me!

One of those skills is trust.

More information on official languages, educational efforts, percentages of the population "speaking a language other than mother tongue well enough to take part in a conversation", etc.

This Council is not one of the official institutions of the European Union, if I remember correctly, however it too has an extensive document on