One more thing...

Just totally learned how to embed links into the text on this stupid blog. Am delirious and reeling from latest technological triumph.

Fitness

My friend, Thinh, recently posted a youtube clip that makes me wonder, "Who needs 24-Hour Fitness when you have post-apocalyptic, urban hellholes?"
Here's another bit that is cool in a variety of ways--lots of neat physicality with just a touch of simulation. But I think, if you were training to be a Ninja, there would need to be more killing...

Also, I kinda wonder why mental workouts never make it onto youtube. Where are the dissertation defenses, the chess games, the physics problems solved? Dudes without shirts always get more airtime.

Traveling vs. Moving

I have been thinking lots about traveling lately. I think that moving and traveling are different things: Traveling makes you world-aware, but Moving makes you self-centered. And so I am worried about the new city and the old love and the ways in which those things will work--when I am moving to another place... will I be a Traveler or will I just Move?

I can see the worries manifesting themselves in my writing--discussing identification and definition, I find myself waxing sentimental--which is the opposite of good in an academic work. Actually, waxing sentimental is annoying in alot of places. Moving makes you self-centered.

And then I heard from a good friend this morning--one of her family members died last night, suddenly, and in terrible circumstances. Before I went to bed, I saw that I had missed her calls. And, thinking to myself, "I am weary with worry, and tired of words--I'll call her tomorrow." And I went to bed.

Moving makes you self-centered.

While I should be writing the diss

We could talk about the philosophy of sex like
We talk about leaves.
But I am watching your arm—
As you describe the dreams you’ve had,
And something about the reasons for those dreams—
I am watching your arm.
The navy elegance of blood vessels,
Written on supple, white skin.
Defenseless.
Like a secret that I shouldn’t know,
Or a scene I definitely shouldn’t be watching
While you talk so seriously
About the regrets you feel
And the ways you try to make them small.

The philosophy of sex is distracting.
I try to define the bend of your soft, warm, white arm…
Studying the angle of your neck…
But each of the moments I language
Becomes just that.
A moment in language…
Cold marks on a colder screen.
A technology of distance.
And, really, what is a philosophy of sex but skin?
Sliding over concepts,
Cool explanations of warm spots,
A bloodless philosophy of silk and dark hair…

Like skin, the philosophy of sex
Is too close when it’s mine.
And too far away when it’s yours.
Because you are talking
(Something about dreams),
I am thinking of your moving mouth
And the tongue behind it.

The philosophy of sex is dangerous.
Wiggly—sharp…
In this philosophy
The corners are hulking memories.
Waiting to remind me of the barely caught breaths,
The smirking resolutions,
The bendability of truth.
It is always just beyond a clarification…
This philosophy.
Always lurking just underneath a liquid layer
Of wine.

Moving

Just found out I'm moving to NY in the fall--to work on the faculty of St. John's. Mmmmmm. An Alabama girl in a big city. Everytime I move, I move farther from home--Tuscaloosa, Winston-Salem, Austin, New York.

But I fell in love with the school when I was there--a Catholic mission, they propose to actually help the poor and underprivileged. So almost half the students come from families at or below the poverty level. And there is such a wide array of cultures, backgrounds, accents, perspectives... They asked such good questions, and the faculty seem genuinely like one another--and me--which seems to be a great thing.

Now I can really use my powers for Good. And hang out at MOMA.