And The River Freed Me

Death Is An Advertisement

2011-02-02T21:42:00.000-05:00

Since my last post on this blog, I have moved from Washington, D.C. to Tennessee and then to North Carolina. I've also gotten married and taken a new job. In short, my life has rotated 360 degrees. No, that's not right. Maybe more like 180 degrees. I definitely haven't come full circle. I wish I knew what I was doing, exactly, but I don't. Nevertheless, I plan to live out loud. After all, I don't think anyone really knows what their doing anyhow.

I am now employed by a media conglomerate that owns several newspapers and television stations in the Southeast. My new title? "Obituary Specialist". I process obituaries for six newspapers (Well, only three right now, but the plan is to take on three more in the coming weeks). This means copying text forwarded by e-mail from funeral homes into a program designed to process classified advertising. Today, I was told I no longer am required to implement AP Style, or, really, edit the obituaries much whatsoever. They are now considered paid ads and nothing more, and newspapers will now print only what funeral homes provide. If you've ever seen an obituary written by a funeral home, what I just said may disturb you. Funeral home directors aren't exactly prolific writers. Most of them seem on the verge of death themselves. Anyhow, this news, to me, doesn't bode well for the individual grieving process, or how we as a society deal with death in general. If death was already considered an after-thought where news is concerned, now, it's an after-thought that is also solely a method by which funeral homes advertise their business and make money. This is not uplifting news.

Why I Admire Amelia Earhart

2009-10-27T21:10:00.001-04:00

It's not the flying, though we wouldn't have ever known her if she had never flown. And it's certainly not the fact that the media/government needed to promote her as a ray of hope during the Great Depression. What struck me, and still does, about the story of Amelia Earhart was her determination to hold on to some sense of self through the journey. She knew her love of flying was her own. Even though her husband, and the government, and the world at large clung to her as a beacon of light in darkness, as some extension of their own desire to soar; she had the strength to focus on the thin line that separated her own fragile veins from theirs, and held on to the mystery of her own evolving identity. This is what separates heroes from the famous.

The Train and the River

2008-04-20T15:49:00.003-04:00

On the train yesterday a young girl, maybe 12, stood at the front and held tight to the silver pole with her left hand. On her right arm she wore a cast colored with red and blue magic marker to look like the American flag. She focused on keeping her balance. A few feet away from her, everyone else in the car was seated. Watching her. Reading. Sleeping. Staring out the window.

Her two younger brothers sitting in the front row seats were dressed alike in plaid shorts and striped shirts. Off to the zoo. The younger one flirted with me while sitting on his father's lap. Looked at me seductively. Dismissed their parental comments. He must've been 3 or so. Funny.

There is something about the train that is like the river. It delivers. It is generated from a source. It can rescue but will not hesitate to annhilate. Its final destination may be indifferent to the individual. It brings out the best, and worst, in people.

2008-04-18T23:06:00.002-04:00

Today, on the train, a young kid offered me his seat. He was wearing a Redskins jersey and khaki shorts with his hair cut short. "Normal". I'd been careening my head around to see if there was an open seat and had found none. Then he sprung off the gold vinyl bench and told me I could sit down because he felt like standing. He must've been 16 or 17. Eighteen at the most.

I sat down and immediately started crying. Chivalry is not dead, even in the young.

A couple of minutes later I listened while two teenage girls (one of them wearing a flowing blue dress with black palm trees on it) studied for a vocabulary quiz. They were discussing the difference between "empathy" and "apathy".

2008-04-18T22:36:00.001-04:00

It was only recently I realized that copperhead snakes swim in the Nolichucky River in East Tennessee, my home.

Even though I grew up not far from its winding, omnipotent current, I didn't want to admit that, like me, copperheads need to cool off now and then.

After years of basking in the sun and swimming in the river, I finally saw a copperhead last summer. It was coiled on the sandy beach like a useless, rusty hose suddenly sprung to life; its small head greeting the air, kissing it. My friend Debby asked me to hold onto her dog, Sammy. "It's a copperhead," she said.

I don't remember what happened next except that, now, I live in Washington, DC.