Crushing Krisis

Comic Books, Drag Race, & Life in New Zealand

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Neo trying to fly faster than the speed of sound hit a chord inside me, not because The Matrix is nearly programmed to resonate with every twenty-something who feels separate from the world that contains them but because I have done it so many times before. Neo’s flying feel so much like my own dreams, from his straight upward ascent to his endlessly accelerated forward flight to his feet first nearly-crash landings. All of it could be cut scenes from inside my own head.

In short: yes to the flying, no to the Burly Brawl, yes to the Architect dialog, no to the Morpheus monologue, yes to the mansion fight, no to rave scene, yes to anytime Trinity kicked someone’s ass, and maybe to buying the careful but convoluted explanation of rogue programs.

There, I didn’t spoil anything, did I?

https://crushingkrisis.com/2003/06/200403325/

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In my many, many months of blogging i have to say that in title, intent, and content, Random Fixation most closely resembles what my original intent for CK was: a voyeuristic peek into the things that can derail an otherwise normally scheduled life. If blogger Cory keeps it up he has definitely scored a life-time subcriber.

Also, elsewhere in the Crushing department:

I don’t exactly remember how our conversation on Sunday lead to it happening, but i am currently in possession of Elise’s clarinet. After a not-so-brief lesson on Sunday i bought my own brace of reeds and a method book that i can thankfully navigate without much instruction as i already read music quite fluently. I have to say that the thing looks a lot more intimidating than it actually is, as all of those little keys and buttons wind up making a lot of sense once you start learning scales. Clarinet practice has so-far supplanted my regular guitar practice this week. In an unsurprising turn, i have already played one Tori Amos song all the way through on the instrument.

I cannot stop buying things on BlogShares. A few days ago i created a user name so i could claim Crushing Krisis as my own, and i innocently bought a few cheap blogs a couple of days ago to see how the system works. Of course, knowing me as well as we all do, this obviously resulted in my paying a subscription fee this morning and turning my initial $500 (not including a hefty gift from Rannie, which i wisely did not sell) into what is approaching a two million dollar fortune of untapped wealth. And, of course, being the blog-snob that i am, i quickly switched to buying only domain-name blogs as soon as i could afford it … blogspotters are for day trading only.

And, finally, through my intense day of trading i have discovered an interesting blog that is the tip of a potentially nauseating phenomenon. The blog is that of the so-called Tarot-Kid who is an Atlanta-based [insert my jaw dropping as i read his page] a blogging singer songwriter, who not only makes literate posts, but even goes so far as to post some of his music for readers to listen to. As we all know, i often lament the lack of DIY songblogging, so you would think i would be incredibly excited by this development. However, it turns out that 1sound, the domain he is hosted on, actually touts itself as “Music Online, featuring Streaming and Downloadable music, graphics and blogging.” Or, essentially, MP3.com humping Blogspot’s leg. Though i find the idea intriguing, i think i will vomit profusely if the concept suddenly takes off after all of my hard work on doing the same thing on my own.

https://crushingkrisis.com/2003/06/200382406/

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No matter how badass you look with you new buzzed hair cut, scruffy visage, black wifebeater, and “don’t fuck with me” carriage, an entire exercise in acting can be ruined when you remind the dry cleaner not to forget your black shirt because it’s “part of today’s outfit.”

Up until that point i was doing really good character work, though.

But, really what do pissed off looking potential West Philly gang members usually say when the dry cleaner tries to steal their favorite shirt?

https://crushingkrisis.com/2003/05/200367588/

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I didn’t think my question had been rude; after all, I would be missing half a day of work to attend their silly “Honors Day.” I just wanted to know what I would be honored for. My outstanding GPA? My flawless academic writings? My strenuous extracurricular schedule?

The associate dean was mum on the matter, somewhat indignant that I had even asked. Apparently the invitation itself should have been honor enough. After our exchange I might have skipped out on the ceremony altogether if not for the fact that Elise had also been invited. And ,she knew why: she was receiving an award for a particularly spectacular paper she wrote on the topic of style and pacing in James Joyce’s Ulysses. So, at worst I would be a pretty applauding face in the crowd when Elise took the stage, and at best I would be crowned as the most dominating intellect in the Liberal Arts program.

The event program was huge, listing all ninety honors that would be conferred during the ceremony to seventy-some individuals. It even listed the title of Elise’s paper next to her name (“Oh god, I’ll die if someone reads a passage from it”), though I could not locate the indication of my achievements as easily.

I finally found my own name, in the midst of a small group at the top of the last page, listed under The General Electric College Bowl Award. The image it summoned was that of the Alex Trebek hosting the National Geography Bee, which I absent-mindedly audited on PBS last week. I remember thinking that those kids were either geniuses or freaks of nature, and that either way I would gladly get them liquored up to avert their almost inevitable descent from middle-school smarty-pants to high school social reject.

Yes, I know that they’re mostly twelve. I’d still show them a good time. But I digress.

Being on the last page, my award was near the end of the ceremony. My trip up to the stage was unremarkable: two quick handshakes and I was down again, tiny envelope in hand, back to my seat. Like the Oscars, only without any movie stars or acceptance speeches. I opened my envelope and scanned the letter inside. Congratulations, blah blah blah, esteemed, yadda yadda yadda, deposited in your account, blah blah huh, call with questions.

It was not just a dorky award given in the memory of a former Junior-team-Jeopardy style television show that all of our parents apparently watched on weekend afternoons. Not just recognition for my two year string of As, only broken once. All of that, plus an anonymous faculty nomination in light of some distinguished facet of those efforts. And the end result was money. Cash, dollars, paid on my behalf directly to Drexel University. Not an alarming amount of money, but enough that I made my advisor assure me that he could deliver a thank you card to my anonymous benefactor. It’s only the third scholarship I have ever earned, and the first I had not applied for on my own.

In retrospect, missing out on a few dozen dollars from work was definitely worth it.

https://crushingkrisis.com/2003/05/200363453/

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The Philadelphia Academy of Fine Arts show was absolutely wonderful. “Are these people,” I reverently asked Melon, “really our age? ”

Maybe I could have believed it after looking at the odd-shaped photorealistic paintings of clouds, or the conference of nearly a dozen porcelain toilets in the middle of the room, or what looked like an drawing Shel Silverstein would have done while taking acid named something to the effect of “A Beautiful Woman Shaves Her Hairy Gums.”

What stunned me were the pieces of art that looked timeless, looked beyond my ability to conceive of. A canvas, as big as my bed, depicting an armored female set against a descending purple twilight. A classical sculpture, in wood and maybe bronze, of a man wearing a boar’s skull. Painting, sculpture, photography, mixed media, all from people who are a part of my generation. Did the student who painted the female warrior watch the same He-Man cartoons as I did? Or, have I lived in a world apart all of these years, separate from the dimension where these artists exist?

In the gift shop I became enamored with a sketching set, suited for the artist who is constantly sketching in the margins of her notebooks. It combined a simple book illustrating how lines form to create simple things like cats, people, and chairs with a neat black sketch book, three pre-sharpened pencils, three sticks of charcoal, and a black crayon of wax (I forget what those are called).

I was determined to buy it for someone – almost everyone I spend my spare time with is an artist of some degree. Any oft hem would appreciate it. But, as I held it in my hands longer, offering it to Erika and Mellon to examine, I realized that all of the people who I wanted to give it to had made it past the margins-of-a-notebook stage of art. I had seen their art, in their rooms, hanging from magnets on my refrigerator, and even decorating their furniture.

No, the set was not for them. It was for me.

So far I have drawn a paper bag, Erika springing from the ground like a tree, a page full of felines and rodents, and a sketch of a Waterson painting. All of the images are imitative, even Ent-Erika, all trying to achieve an image that I have accessed once before. Every time I turn my glance inward I am rewarded only with blank white space, which is mirrored by the empty page in front of me.

Do the artists have a verdant jungle of imagery inside of them, pressing against the backs of their eyes and the insides of their fingertips begging to be rendered into real time and space? Or, is it that they see the same world as I do, yet are inspired to capture the fleeting and intangible beauty of it so that it can always be seen?

I suppose you could ask me the same question about my songs, and my answer would be that it’s all of the above – sometimes they spring from within and sometimes I observe them outside of myself. Sometimes, though, they really do spring fully formed from the proverbial thin air, begging to be formed into something more.

I bought myself a sketch book so that I can learn where to see.

https://crushingkrisis.com/2003/05/200356828/