For Waiting, For Chasing

There. I tried to get away, you know. I tried to restart blogging--don't know if I can still call it that, the word seems to have taken on several different implications, none of which particularly applies to what I do here--on different terms. I tried writing an esoteric entry. I tried writing an entry in iambic pentameter. Neither of these things panned out particularly well. Fact is, I can't seem to keep this going if I take it too seriously, if I don't keep it on an effortless, almost unconscious level. Even if that means the stream of consciousness sometimes dries up. So it is.

I've been away a lot these past two months. Been out of town virtually every single weekend. What was all that for? Visiting PhD programs. That's right, turns out second time's the charm; and in retrospect I was lucky to not have gotten into grad school last year. Gave me time to fall in love with M., as well as think about what I actually want to do in--but that's getting too much into the kind of faux-aspirational academic tech-speak I've had nauseating quantities of recently.

Rather, let's talk about how I met an old high school cohort (we shall refer to her as EJAG) in Philadelphia last Friday and proceeded to discuss comrades past and relationship commitment while getting loaded on exotic beers. Or how strange it would have been to our 16-year-old selves to see us there, her tapping on an iPhone and about to go to law school in Nashville, and me--by God!--drinking alcohol. That was the Great Mystery of my high school graduating class, really: how EJAG went from a ne'er-do-well punk dating the school's (second?-)most notorious drug dealer (who also happened to be my mentor for a year or so, in things that did not include drug dealing), eyeliner and vodka and stickered bass guitar and all, to well-groomed, well-adjusted, well-personally accessorized, if still hyper-literate...I guess the word would be "prep," though a signature personability still set her apart, over what seemed like the blink of a summer. (It was this personability--or what seemed like it--I suspect, that kept her doorstep filled with young literati boys during her rogue years.)

I never did figure that one out. And when I asked her about it that night, all she responded with was a laugh and, "I was a fucked up sixteen year old." But I've made peace with that particular Great Mystery. As well as various others. In fact, most of high school now seems like a Great Mystery to me, a murky sea over which I hurriedly sailed. Certain people, certain failed relationships were Great Mysteries as well. Once upon a time, nostalgia would've forced me to return to these overlooked depths, to try and infer what happened, what went wrong, what did so and so really think about such and such, and when they said this, did they really mean this; but nostalgia is shockingly powerless in my present life. (Otherwise, I would no doubt write a lot more.) Amazingly, it seems I'm finally learning to let go and stop asking why.

And that's kind of disturbing, in a way. It involves making peace with a lot of atrocious certainties of reality. That kind of peace brings a silence that can be chilling. Want to know what my greatest dream is right now? It is to be a househusband. To commit to caring about myself and one other person and not be swayed by happenings in the rest of the world. I'm now OK with letting questions go unanswered, problems go unsolved, the human race go unsaved. If I could cure cancer instead of cooking dinner and playing with the cat tomorrow evening, I'm not sure I would. A BA in Biophysics isn't worth a good spiced cider recipe. I'm heading into hyperbole here, but you get the idea.

So that's more or less what my life is like right now. Traveling, trying to care about science (just enough to wish I had majored in physics or math instead), and getting as much domesticity in as I possibly can. Being sick, but getting healthier. Drove to DC with M. to see the Mountain Goats, her favorite band, in a historic synagogue. Turns out she likes to boss me around when I'm driving, but this is partially due to the fact I can't drive very well, so I suppose I'll allow her that, if only begrudgingly.

Possible future locations!:

1. New York City
2. Philadelphia
3. Chicago

Thoughts?