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The first two days of April were a textbook Californian weekend! The sky was cloudless, the air clear and bright, the breeze a warm, dry, 80 degrees. The conditions were perfect to spend the weekend in the pit lane and Laguna Seca Raceway officiating a race meeting for about 200 historic sports and race cars.
I was in my element and savored every minute of it! While soaking in the brilliant sunshine and surrounded by the sights and sounds of magnificent racing machinery, I donned my headset and coordinated the efforts of thirty race marshals, rescue teams, and managed the event schedule. Although tired at the end of each day, I felt satisfied at having done an excellent job that few people have the skills or experience required to do. I was so happy with the entire weekend that I almost felt guilty accepting a paycheck at the end of event.
While all this business of racecars and joy was going on, my brain was working quietly in the background on the problem of what to do about my job. Last week I learned that the lab I work for was going requiring me either to take advantage of their generous offer to retrain me as an underwater acoustics scientist, or start making plans to work somewhere else. I arrived at the answer on Saturday, and talked to Brent about it on Saturday night when he took me out to dinner after my day at the track. (A satisfying day at the race track and a dinner date with the boyfriend I love! What could be better?!) The answer was evident in the contrast between the frustration and lack of interest I have in my work-week and the joy and dedication I felt working on the weekend. I'm not a scientist and no level of education is going to make me a scientist. I'm going to have to tell Prof. Chiu and the lab staff this week that I'm starting to look for work elsewhere and will be leaving as soon as possible. I've got to move on.
Move on to where is the question. I've already started to send resumes and cover letters to places like Boeing, Cisco, and EDS. I'll be sending out a lot more soon. If I can find a good fit right here in the Monterey area, I'll stay put for now to be with Brent. The problem is the Monterey economy is limited and there isn't much work here if you're not interested in waiting tables. For that reason, I'm looking for work in the Silicon Valley and Seattle areas too. In fact, a good offer almost anywhere might attract me. I'm not applying for specific jobs, but rather sending out resumes which describe my experience and skill sets. It is a job seeker's market right now, so it makes sense to let the employers match their needs to my skills since educated people are in such high demand at the moment. As far as the state of the economy goes, my timing couldn't be better.
This means I don't know what I'm going to be doing or where I'm going to be living in the not-so-distant future. Brent supports my plan of fishing for options and then evaluating the best choice for us from among them. He knows that I'll need to make the best choice for me, but he also knows that I'll not be making that choice in a vacuum; our relationship is a major factor. We both think it can survive a limited separation, but we would like to avoid one if possible. There are so many possibilities for our future right now, it just doesn't seem prudent to start excluding anything yet.
Wednesday April 5th, 2000
I feel relaxed, but the stress of finding a new life outside the comfortable rut I've been living in for three years is looming large. There are subtle signs of stress manifesting themselves in me. My face is breaking out. I haven't touched alcohol in five days. Last night, while having dinner with my tour guide friends at a Chinese restaurant I was quiet and withdrawn the whole time, like an outsider. I notice these little responses and changes within myself, but seem ineffectual at mitigating them.
The mounting stress sucks the life out of me and I become a passive observer of what happens to me. I'm like a beachcomber on the shore just before a tidal wave hits. The harmless water around my ankles is subtly but dramatically drawn out to sea, calling my attention to the alarming wall of water on the horizon, far too late to escape. I could grab a surfboard and prepare for the coming wave, or I could meander farther out to sea and admire the pretty shells.
Thursday April 6th, 2000
I had a nice quiet evening with Brent yesterday. He came over in the late afternoon, shortly after I finished work and stopped by the grocery store and Blockbuster Video on the way home. I made dinner for Brent, a perfected version of the tangy lime/cilantro marinara with jumbo prawns over pasta that I was developing last week. He loved it and so did I. While we ate we watched Notting Hill on video. I rented it having been told it was better than an average Julia Roberts chick flick. I was lied to. It wasn't a horrible movie, but it stuck as closely to the chick flick form as Haiku poetry does to its form. The very last scene was so obviously designed to please American women ages 22-45 I could almost see the focus group leader and staff of marketing experts standing just outside the view of the camera.
After dinner we curled up under the covers on my sleeping mat together and talked about my employment future. First, Brent assured me that if I found myself completely unemployed he'd take me in and provide for me. Although I have no intention of becoming a bum and living off my boyfriend, I really appreciated his intentions and just being told that I had that option made my stress level over the entire job hunting situation go down a great deal.
Next, we discussed the three general scenarios that my life will follow in the coming months. It was important for me to go over this with Brent again so we could make the decisions together, based on mutual interests and not based on sacrifices. In Mode One, I would find a worthy new job in the Monterey Peninsula area and things would remain largely the same. In Mode Two, I would find work in the Silicon Valley and either commute 3 hours a day after moving in with Brent or find a small ($$$) apartment in the Silicon Valley. Mode Three calls for me to find work in Seattle and live there without Brent for up to a year before he joins me there. We decided the best thing for me to do was to start looking for a good job and expand my search to cover all three modes. The job itself could be the most critical factor in choosing among the three options.
Obviously Mode Three was the option which we discussed the most. It offers both the most potential for positive change in my life and has the highest downside in not being close to Brent. Moving away from Central California would satisfy my need for exploration and adventure far from home. It would allow me to spread my wings as an adult away from the direct influence of my parents. Seattle offers many more potential jobs with higher pay and lower costs of living than California. Seattle is a youthful city and has a social climate I've never had the opportunity to experience as a full time resident.
The downside of moving to Seattle without Brent is self evident. I would miss him and feel bad about how much he would miss me. Mitigating that, we already have webcams to see and talk to each other with, airline fare between Seattle and San Jose is cheap enough to permit monthly visits, and a year is a short time. I have been told by a few people that I am taking a risk in loosing my love by leaving town. Brent and I discussed it in detail before and again last night. We're convinced there's no risk at all. Just that he's willing to let me go is a firm indication of how strong we are together.
There is one distinct benefit to the fact that Brent must stay in the Monterey/Salinas area until next January. Although Brent likes it, he's not sure the Seattle area is really for him, and it might not turn out to be to my taste either. If I live there for sixth months, scout it out, and have Brent come up to visit me often, we can both make a better-informed decision together. If Seattle turns out to be a poor choice for us, I can still come back to the Monterey/Salinas area and try another option.
Another downside to Seattle is that I'd be giving up a great deal of the life I've made for myself here in Monterey outside of my relationship with my boyfriend. The activities that give me the greatest joys in life; ski tour guiding and race officiating might no longer be possible. I could still travel to a few race events, but I'd no longer have a world class race track eight minutes from my apartment front door. I have no idea if another ski tour program exists in Seattle for me to become involved in. I also know that all my dear friends in Monterey would not move just because I do.
There's something to be said for giving up one life to build another. It's something I've done four times now, and it has always made me a better person. Each time I do it I gain new perspective on reality, gain a larger world-view. The old cliché life is a journey, not a destination holds true for me. Every time I feel like I've arrived, I know it's time to get going again. I've come very far in this latest stint here in my hometown. I needed the grounding of being at home to discover the part of my personality I've always previously fought off. In the last four years I've come out to family and friends, and began a relationship with my first boyfriend. I've done all that while kicking depression and heavy drinking. I'm ready to find out what the next big step is.
Brent left early this morning, so I had the shower alone. (Note: Matt and Bryan, sorry to disappoint!) I do some of my best thinking in the shower, and naturally today I was thinking about a new job. It occurred to me that since graduating from college, I've never actually held a job I really wanted. The jobs I've had paid my bills, and they weren't a daily horror (OK, one of them was!), but they were never anything I wanted to do with my life. This is my life we're talking about here. I'm dying, and although I don't expect to actually die for another 60 years or so, it's gonna happen. It's nuts that I should be spending half of my waking life doing things I don't care about just so I can scrape by and pay for a safe place to sleep during the non-waking part of my life!
Another showertime revelation, dear readers. My next job should be for me! I've got twenty weeks of employment left, and a good place to go after that. The economy and employment market are good right now and I'm not desperate for work right away. This time I'm choosing a job that I love enough to excel in, and get the recognition for my excellence that I deserve in terms of money and benefits. Any plan short of that is going to have to include education and training to ensure that it does happen for me one day.
Tuesday April 11th, 2000
If life is a journey, then I managed to derail the train on Sunday. It was a typical weekend working at Laguna Seca, this time officiating for the Skip Barber Racing School championship. It wasn't hot out, but the sun was strong and I didn't drink nearly enough water. I was somewhat dehydrated by Saturday evening when I went with Stuart and Carri to see Spalding Gray speak. The next day at the track, I continued to act like a rookie and not drink enough. I was in bad shape by the evening, but foolishly accepted an invitation to the Barber School awards dinner.
The dinner had an open bar, so I had two cocktails before dinner and a glass of wine with dinner. That was enough to send my dehydrated body into crisis. On Monday morning I woke up dizzy and shaking. I had a mild hangover, and massive dehydration. It was a lost day. All I did was sleep and drink. I hate lost days like that. What an incredible waste of time. The whole thing negated the fun of the weekend. I knew better. Why didn't drink enough water? Why did I drink alcohol in that condition? I just hate it when I behave like this, yet it seems like every six months or so, I have a bad experience with booze. You'd think I'd learn by now.
Today, I've got a badly sunburned face, with raccoon eyes from my sunglasses. I'm still kind of foggy, and I'm still trying to restore the balance of water in my body. It will be tomorrow or later before I get my strength back. Maybe this will serve as a reminder for me to take care of myself over the course of next weekend when Mark and I are heading down to Long Beach where we'll meet another friend of mine, David, at the Indy Car race through the streets there. Lots of sun and plenty more opportunity to dehydrate. I don't think I can take that kind of punishment again so soon with ending up in the hospital. Better I drink more water and take care of myself.
Wednesday April 12th, 2000
Last Saturday night, I went with my friends Stuart and Carri to see Spalding Gray speak in Carmel. Gray is a writer/actor from the hippie generation who plays small parts in Hollywood films but is at his best when touring the country giving monologues that he has written. Usually the monologues are based on something from within his experience. The high art of the performance is that Gray somehow manages to express far more of his own personal feelings and reactions to his subject than the mere words he is speaking should be capable of communicating. Amazing. Moreover, when I called Brent up after the show to wish him goodnight, I told him that I wanted to do exactly what Gray was doing for my next job. I want to get so good at writing that people will pay me to read my writing, or hear me present it. I simply don't know how to begin to make that happen.
Gray's performance was called "Morning, Noon, and Night" and was an account of one day in his life in 1997. The audience was more than ready to relate to the story, because all he did that day was support his young family as a house-husband. Of course, there are tangents in his story, one of which was a short bit on grappling with the fact that he's 56 years old and death is lurking out there somewhere waiting for him. Everybody knows they're going to die, he said, but no one actually believes it. He talked a little about near-death experiences, and then concluded that "there's 'near-death' and then there's 'DEATH!'." He shouted that last word, and then stopped for a long dramatic pause before moving on to something completely different. It was the shout followed by silence that made the idea of death seem so stark, so final, and so very real.
Last night I slept alone. Shortly after I put out the light, Gray's words came back to me and for a few minutes I lay in horror with a complete intuitive understanding of death. I nearly cried when faced with the certainty that it would happen to me. That the Universe would go on for billions of years without me in it or aware of it seemed like horrible waste! And the greatest terror of all came when I realized that no matter how much I cherish life and no matter how well I live it, the moment I die it will all be gone. Nothing I accomplished for myself will matter anymore. Game over. No score. No win. No loss. Nothing. Nothing.
There was no way I was going to sleep in that petrified state, so I distracted myself by thinking about the Harry Potter book I'd just finished reading. It worked, and not too much later I'd fallen asleep. But wasn't that Gray's point exactly? Don't we distract ourselves with temporal life and forget about the oblivion that we will succumb to one day? What would happen if we all managed to believe that we were going to die? What if we could keep that fatal thought in mind as we lived our lives?
I imagine the world might divide into two camps. There would be those that felt the fleeting fragility of life and loved it above all things. Then there would be those that would despair of the ultimate victory of death and no longer hold life to be valuable. Those that loved life would see that in death they would have nothing of their own, that they belonged to the Universe and nothing in it belonged to them. They might be inclined to use their precious time to build a civilization that could live on indefinitely. They wouldn't waste energy or time on purely personal experiences. But they might have to waste time defending their way of life against that of the others.
The others, that saw nothing but futility and pointlessness in life, would focus on securing for themselves all the indulgences possible before their short lives were over. They'd want to accomplish as many personal goals as possible in a lifetime, and they wouldn't mind doing so at the expense of others. All lives are worthless in the fatal end.
I think that it's no accident human beings only have a limited understanding of their own mortality most of the time. If it were any other way we would have extincted ourselves long ago. Our spirits need both a sense of contributing to something greater than ourselves, and personal accomplishment. For instance, when people climb mountains, they do it purely for personal satisfaction. As I write this, there are more than 100 people gathering in the Khumbu Valley of Nepal converging on Mt. Everest with the intent to climb it. This year the 1000th climber will reach the summit with a one in six chance of being killed while making the attempt. No one, apart from the climbers themselves, gain anything from the tremendous personal effort and risk they will assume. When I climb on much smaller mountains here in the U.S. the story is the same, it's just for my own personal satisfaction - for the feeling of having accomplished something difficult.
But I don't spend all my time working towards personal gain. I volunteer several hours a month with a youth group for gay Jr. and Sr. High School students. I do it because when I was growing up here, there was nothing of the kind and I thought I was the only gay kid in the county. I suffered for it and I see this youth group as a way of helping younger people suffer less than I did. In turn, they will be mentally healthier than I was and be able to help the next generation of kids even more. I also spend a fair amount of my time supporting my boyfriend, Brent. As a full time student and full time nurse, he's frightfully busy and I like to take care of lots of little things for him, like cleaning his kitchen, or stopping at the store for him, in order to make his daily life easier and more productive for himself.
It seems that our understanding of death as a species is perfectly balanced to our survival as a species. We can comprehend that our greater nature is temporal, yet every day we wake up knowing that we will one day die, but believing that today is not the day it will happen. I suppose that is good enough for me, but I just hate moments like last night when I realize that there is thinking about death, and then there is DEATH!!!.
Thursday April 13th, 2000
I don't suppose anybody noticed, but today is the 30th anniversary of the launch of Apollo 13. Last summer there was a little hoopla over the 30th anniversary of the first moon landing by Apollo 11, but there was nothing said last September when the second landing's anniversary came up, and now there's nothing in the media about Apollo 13 either. I thought for sure the renewed interest in Apollo 13 after Ron Howard's movie came out a few years ago might cause a least a footnote on the Paul Harvey News.
The picture I've placed here today is not just a generic Saturn V launch photo. It is Apollo 13, taken from NASA's archives. It is hyperlinked to a larger high resolution version for your detailed examination of the majestic machine. The needle at the very top of the Apollo/Saturn stack is an emergency escape rocket to save the astronauts should the Saturn turn angry. The white cone just below it is the Command Module (CM)in which Jim Lovell, Jack Swigert, and Fred Haise are presently experiencing the E Ticket Ride of their lives. The silver cylinder just below the CM, before the stack begins to grow fatter, is the Service Module (SM). This is the very part of the spacecraft which, two days after this photo was taken, would violently explode, blowing out an entire quarter panel of the SM and bleeding away the spacecraft's vital store of oxygen. The story from there is an heroic epic of survival equal to that of Shackleton in the Antarctic and told quite well in the movie Apollo 13.
The story of Apollo 13 documents just how dangerous each of the nine voyages that NASA astronauts made to the vicinity of the Moon were. The fact that eight of nine were successful belies that same danger. One of the major reasons that Apollo was cancelled prematurely was that NASA managers could no longer stomach the extreme risks they were taking with every flight. Even some of the brave test-pilot Astronauts actually resigned their positions as Astronauts rather than take their chances with flying to the Moon a second time because they intimately knew the hazards of deep space flight.
Pictures of spacecraft orbiting the Moon or even of men walking and driving on it's surface still seem cutting edge, almost futuristic. It's upon inspection, in person, of the antique hardware that Apollo reveals it's true age. It's often said that the computational power of a modern digital watch is more sophisticated than the Apollo navigational computers, but few of us really understand what is going on inside our modern computers. It is in the details of the hardware that the age of Apollo can be viscerally felt. Look inside a museum housed Command Module. The switches, lights, and dials in the cockpit are reminiscent of what you might see on an old run-down motel's black and white TV set, or in an aging roadside diner. The seatbelts look as if they came off a propeller driven airliner. Look at the control consoles and furniture in the recently restored Firing Room (Apollo Launch Control) at Cape Canaveral and you'll see the same chairs and telephones you might find in a decrepit small-town post office. Apollo was closer in technological spirit and style to the Wartime era than to the present day. To visit the Cape and see the weeds growing up through the abandoned hardware and buildings of the Nation's former Moon Port is wrenching. It all happened so long ago.
It is astonishing that such a complex and inspirational demonstration of mankind's spirit was achieved 30 years ago. Its equally astonishing that humanity is no longer capable of such achievement. Where has the bold idealism, creativity, and raw courage that sent explorers to the Moon 30 years ago gone? Yes, you can find much of the impetus of Apollo in America's Cold War rivalry with the old Soviet Union, and that rivalry is no more. But it did exist for nearly 20 years after the last Moon landing and no one accomplished so great an achievement as Apollo in all those intervening years.
The Cold War may have been the spark, but rivalry wasn't the flame that burned so brightly in the Apollo era. It was the thirst for exploration and achievement that landed astronauts on the Moon six times over three years. Mankind has always gone wherever it is able to go. We have an innate need to explore our world and expand our knowledge. It's in the best interests of our survival as a species to have that need. One day the Sun will supernova and the Earth will not be able to cradle us. Long before that it is likely that a devastating collision with an asteroid will make life on Earth as we know it impossible. Our minds are our only means of survival as a species through such catastrophes, just as they were during the ice ages.
So if Apollo was an expression of our survival instinct of exploration, again I ask, where has it gone? Since Apollo, we have been able to irradicate much of our planet's primary forest and also eliminated a huge portion of the Earth's biological diversity, no mean engineering feat, but not one to brag about either. Mitigating this, we've come a long way in understanding our own genetic make-up and molecular biology in general. We've speculated more intelligently about the physical nature our planet and of the Universe we live in as well. But we haven't sent human explorers out into that Universe to achieve more as human beings. I hope that humanity's standard of exploration, it's spirit of manifest destiny is merely in remission and not extinct.
On this day 30 years ago Jim Lovell and his crew accepted huge personal risk in the name of achievement and nearly paid with their lives. I wonder if Lovell is saddened by the appalling lack of eager young explorers following in his pioneering spirit? I know I am.
Tuesday April 18th, 2000
I'm going to start right in with a little bit of venting. What's a journal for if you can't rant and rave and vent your frustrations in it?
I think nine tenths of the drivers on the public roads are woefully inadequate. Why is it when a stop light turns green, we don't all start driving? It makes no sense for me to have to remain stopped at a green light, wasting gas for 15 seconds more, because the ten cars in front of me can't figure out that they could *all* start driving when the light turns green. They don't have to start up one at a time.
The traffic problem that bothered me the most this particular weekend was cars driving too fast for the conditions. I left LA yesterday over the Grapevine, a mountain pass freeway with six lanes in each direction which rises from sea level in the LA basin to 4000 ft over the summit and back again to nearly sea level in the Central California Valley. In the dry it can be a fun drive of high-speed curves and traffic averaging 75-80 mph. Yesterday, however, it was fraught with dumping rain and high winds.
I managed to move along averaging 65 mph (speed limit 70 mph), but was forced to slow down to 55 mph when it got very wet and I felt the car start slithering around a bit. I've got a very good performing car (BMW) and excellent tires (Michelin Pilots) and I know how to slide my car through corners at speed. I also know when I've exceeded the physical capabilities of my car and when I've lost partial or complete control. I don't think most that other drivers on the public roads can discern the gradual loss of control.
I was frequently overtaken by cars driving 70 mph through the storm, because that was the legal posted limit. If the conditions are frightening me at 60 mph, I know that the morons driving 70 must have no idea of the danger they were putting themselves in. They must be incapable of interpreting the cues their vehicles were undoubtedly giving them. There were more obvious cues than the feedback from their own vehicles available to them as well. Over the 50 miles of the mountain pass I saw no less than five recently crashed cars with attendant ambulances and tow trucks. Some had spun into the wall, others had rolled on their sides when they ran off the pavement out of control. All were single vehicle incidents. No collisions involved at all, simply drivers going too fast for their driving ability and loosing it.
I hate getting passed on the freeway by so many cars, but as my car twitched and slithered down the freeway, I knew I was going as fast as I could go with minimal risk of a complete loss of control due to hydroplaning. I've spun my car in the wet on the racetrack twice. I know the signs. I'm not going to risk doing that on a dangerous public road. Why do they give driver's licenses to all these other morons that can't figure out that green means go and that you *must* go slower in the wet if you don't want to finish rubber side up in a ditch?
Enough bitching, it's time to emote about the unbridled joy I felt during most of the weekend. I was on the road for my annual pilgrimage to LA for the Grand Prix of Long Beach. (Technically not true Grand Prix because it's not a Formula One event, but rather Indy-type cars, but still open cockpit single seat racers with wings and huge open wheels doing 180 mph on city streets - woohoo!) I drove down to LA on Friday night with my friend Mark. We sat up talking until almost 2:00 am, then got a little sleep, before getting up at 6:30 to head for the racing circuit.
LA is a big city, and we had spent the night on the northern edge of the metropolis. After half an hour of driving South at 75 mph, we exited the freeway onto Santa Monica Blvd. for a short stop at my friend David's apartment. He gave Mark and I two hospitality credentials for the race from Chip Gnassi Racing, one of the Indy teams. David somehow managed to get them from a co-worker but couldn't go with us on Saturday, so Mark and I alone would be Gnassi guests.
Another forty-five minutes of careening south on the Long Beach Freeway and we were in Long Beach parking the car, and listening to the glorious sound of racecar motors echoing off the buildings! We spent the day walking around the circuit, basking in the warm sun and taking in the scenery. The sensory input at racing events like this is overwhelming; the speed, noise and color of the racecars; the smell of methanol fuel mixed with aromas of gourmet food coming from the hospitality tents and smell of hotdogs and stale beer from around the grandstands; the hundreds of beautiful shirtless bois (for me!) and scantily clad girls (for Mark!). The backdrop for all this spectacle was the no less spectacular Long Beach harbor area, with it's lovely green urban parks and the enormous oceanliner Queen Mary reigning serenely over the port.
After all the qualifying and practice events of Saturday, Mark and I retired to the Disneyland area, about 45 minutes away from the track. I like staying there because there is plenty to do, and the motels aren't all booked up like they are immediately around the race circuit. I have missed my annual trip to Disneyland the last two years, and regretted it right away when we got there. It has changed enormously since my list visit. Disney has bought much of the public property around Disneyland and are transforming it into a resort complex similar to Walt Disney World in Florida. I didn't know my way around what used to be a familiar playing ground. The changes are for the better and Mark and I had a fun time getting reacquainted with the area. We had a very nice dinner at the Disneyland Hotel, with a good bottle of wine, then sat around a great outdoor bar for an hour or so before retiring to our hotel for the night.
The next day, Sunday, we met David at the racetrack at 8:30 and enjoyed another sensory feast, just like the day before. I brought my videocam and made a short movie of our adventures. The key difference between Saturday and Sunday was that this was race day. At 1:00 p.m. we had found our seats in the grandstand overlooking the hairpin turn and settled (earplugs in!) in to watch the cars compete for the next two hours. It was a great race. My pick for the win actually led the race for a while and was looking like he would indeed win when his car started having problems. Another driver was particularly rude and ran into the cars of several drivers that David and I favored, so we decided to hex him with a Devil's horns gesture as he drove by. Two laps later his car erupted in flames right in front of our grandstand! The obnoxious driver got out of the burning car unscathed, but his day was done. Seven laps later the race was won by a Canadian driver who won it last in 1993.
It was a wonderful time with good friends and a great race to experience in person. The LA sunshine went away for what turned out to be a harrowing drive home on Monday, as I've already described. But I made it back home in one piece and am ready to start dreaming up my next adventure.
Thursday April 20th, 2000
The world is rushing past me in a blur while my mind has slowed down to a snail's pace. I'm drugged. I've been sneezing and sniffling and suffering from allergies and itchy eyes for weeks now. I'm allergic to Spring. I couldn't stand it any longer so I broke down and took a pill from my old Zyrtec perscription. I stopped using it only days after getting it last year. The druggy side effect was so unpleasant, but today I just needed the blessed relief at any price.
My favorite allergy medicine of all time was called Seldane. It was by perscription only and had but one effect on me; I felt normal. No tingly, itchy nose and eyes, no sneezing fits, no wierd sensations. I just felt like me, minus the allergies. The FDA took it off the market because hazardous drug interactions with Seldane were killing people who couldn't read labels. I tried Claratin next. It didn't stop the allergies. After that, I got the Zyrtec perscription. It stopped the allergies, but left me feeling very weird.
It took a couple of doses before I figured out it was the Zyrtec doing it.
When I take it, I feel lethargic and a bit drifty. But it's what it does to my
social mood that is really scary. It's kind of like an anti-XTC. When I take
Zyrtec I become distant, even more self-concious than I normally am. I don't
want to talk with people or deal with them. People disgust me. I even feel a
touch of paranoia - like I'm being vaguely threatened by crowds. I ignore
important phone calls because I don't feel like talking to anyone. Whatever I
do, I'll do it in my own sweet time and other people's needs be damned. Zyrtec
is a powerful medicine, and I'm feeling it's power right now. At least I'm
aware of the artificially induced mood shift and don't mistake my perception
of the world for reality itself. I can mentaly compensate for the drug. It's
a little annoying dealing with a strange mood, but at least I'm not sneezing
every two minutes.
Friday April 21st, 2000
I got my first nibble in Seattle this week. The research vessel McArthur, which I've worked aboard many times as a mission-specific specialist from my lab, is looking for a permanent crew member to opperate and maintain oceanographic research equipment. The McArthur is based out of Seattle, and having already worked aboard her, I know her systems and some of the crew. The job pays OK too.
I don't think I'm going to apply for it. I like going to sea, but permanent crew duty would mean being at sea for something like eight months of the year. The pay isn't good enough to justify that. There are too many things I enjoy doing on shore to be gone that long. If the pay were extremely high, then I could justify doing it as a one-year deal to make a big pile of cash, but that's not what they're offering.
Another problem with this job is it won't take me in a new direction. It emphasizes all the things I enjoy about my present job, and eliminates many of the things I don't like, but it's still more of the same. I never intended on becoming a technician assistant to Oceanographers. I want to be a leader or creative individual, not a support lackey. The only way to achieve that in science is to earn a Ph.D. - something I don't have the motivation or money to do.
I have a deeply rooted need to write, and other people seem to think I'm OK at putting words together correctly. My next job needs to be more in line with this natural ability I apparently have. I hate math, and my career in science and engineering is simply chopping against the grain. Ironically, when I submitted my letter of intent to resign this Fall, the only comment I received from the higher-ups at the lab was how eloquent and well-written it was.
I don't know anything about the writing business. I'm working on improving that, with some reference books, but I'll need a paycheck from somewhere. I'm looking at technical writing jobs, and at technical Marketing and PR jobs. It seems like a nice combination of my experience and ability. I'd also like to find out more about how to break into journalism. I'd like to have a go at writing news copy or editorial. I suspect that kind of work requires a long apprenticeship at sub-living wages. I'll have to attempt it on the side, along with a paying job. When I discover more about the writing field, I may find out there is night school and new degree in English or Journalism in my future.
This is the Easter Weekend, and today, for those of you in the Catholic tradition, is Good Friday. What am I doing for Easter? Well, I'm spending eight hours of each day at Laguna Seca Raceway officiating for a car club. I'll also be getting up early on Easter morning for sunrise service. No, not Christian services, but rather the services of my religion - Formula One! That's right, the British Grand Prix will be broadcast live from the hallowed grounds of Silverstone and I'll be up watching at 5:30 a.m. before I go to the local track to work.
Sunday evening I'm having Easter dinner at my parents' house. I'm going over there as a nice occasion to socialize with the family, but to my parents Easter is a more significant occasion than it is to me. I'm sure they'll be spending a lot of time at Mass over the next few days. What an incredible waste of time. I just don't understand how my Dad, a scientist with a Ph.D., can fall for such mumbo jumbo. For instance, today is Good Friday, the day Catholics traditionally remember as the day Jesus was crucified to forgive our sins. But why did he have to die for forgiveness from God? Why couldn't he have played chess for our sins, or maybe cooked a nice dinner for the forgiveness of sin? What's the magical power involved in becoming a political martyr?
Oh, I don't even know why I bother pointing out the silliness of it all. Just like my parents, you readers are going to go on staunchly refusing to see all the outlandish contradictions of your faith, aren't you? You're going to go right on believing everything you've been told without thinking about it for a moment. Never you mind that none of it makes any sense at all, that it can't be possible, and that it serves no useful purpose in the modern world. Have your Easter and waste your mortal souls on fantasy. I'll be lifting my spirits to the heavens with glories of Formula One racing, and trying to enjoy some family time with my parents despite the evil pall your religion has cast over my relationship with them.
Monday April 24th, 2000
Oh, man is my right arm sore! Too much repetitive motion over the last couple days has left it stiff and sore, but it will prolly be much stronger the next time I need to use it that way. Hey! Knock that knowing grin off your face! I'm talking about waving green, yellow, and checkered flags from the Starter's stand at Laguna Seca Raceway all weekend. Sheesh, you guys! You've been watching my webcam too much.
It was a great weekend at the race track. National Auto Sports Association paid me to start races for them all weekend. If you're a true aficionado of motor racing, you can appreciate competition at all levels. This was perhaps one of the lowest levels of professional road racing in the U.S., but there were a few thousand dollars involved and the competition was keen. From my raised box at the Start/Finish line I was able to see almost all of the action taking place on Laguna Seca's 2.2 miles of winding road. Connected via radio to headset to Race Control and all the signaling stations around the course, I could hear what was going on in the areas blind to me.
When I woke up Saturday morning I felt so pleased with myself. I've worked my way up the race officialdom ladder into some pretty good jobs over the last few years. I felt really proud and excited as I put on my official uniform, with it's kewl sponsor labels emblazoned all over it, and picked up my racing briefcase to head out to the track. As I drove the ten minutes it takes to get to the race track, I thought about how happy I was to be going to a hard day's work. This, I thought, is the kind of job that I want to pay my bills. Not necessarily a job at a race track, but a job that I feel proud of, and excited about going to in the morning. The kind of job that I can leave at the end of the day, tired and spent, but fulfilled and feeling like I'd done something well that others couldn't do. I'm going to be dead sometime in the next 70 years or so, and I don't want to spend half the waking time I have left in miserable drudgery.
Easter Sunday for me was another great day at the track. I was too tired to wake up at 5:00 a.m. to see the Formula One Grand Prix of Great Britain on live TV, so I let my machine watch it for me and I'll see it later this week. I had to expend a little bit of effort not to overhear the results while spending the rest of the day surrounded by racers! When the racing was all done I ran home for a quick shower, then went over to my parents' house for Easter dinner with them and my brother. The dinner was wonderful; roast lamb, grilled potatoes, creamed spinach, and fresh rolls served with a delicious Sancerre I brought for the occasion. My Mom and Dad were in a decent mood and the family managed to avoid sensitive topics like religion, morals, Dr. Laura, etc. My parents have two trips to Europe coming up in the next year and we enjoyed talking about their travel plans. I'm not the only one in the family with a love of geography and a need to see as much of the world as possible. I had to get it from somewhere!
About 10:00 p.m., just as I was arriving at my apartment complex, Brent was parking his car there too. He'd spent the day working a long shift at the hospital and was coming over to spend the night with me since he didn't have to work Monday. We haven't managed to be together in the same town since Thursday, so it was nice to see him. I gave him a big hug right out in the middle of the street, saying "Hi, boyfriend!".
Once inside, we enjoyed a little bit of Easter candy while relating to each other the events of the last few days (despite that we talked on the phone each day too!) and tried to organize our visits for the coming week. Oreo the rat was running around the apartment too, looking for back scratchies, loves, and maybe a cut of the chocolate windfall. After visiting a while, I made up the sleeping mat, put Oreo back in his cage, and we tucked in. Lying on my back, I started to read my Harry Potter book. I thought Brent was reading his magazine when I felt a hand gently sliding down my chest and over my stomach. It didn't stop there. I quietly marked my page, put the book down, and rolled over to kiss him. It was quite a while later before I put out the light and drifted off to contented sleep in Brent's arms.
Tuesday April 25th, 2000
Last night Brent and I went out for dinner together, than progressed on to Border's Bookstore to snoop around awhile. I bought a nice big coffee for myself and a bottled water for Brent. (I'm hopelessly addicted to coffee, he doesn't like the stuff.) Brent wandered around looking at books that might interest him, while I continued a reconnaissance of the bookstore which I began over the past weekend and will continue in the coming months.
Have you ever considered a bookstore from a research point of view? I haven't before. Usually I go into a bookstore with either a particular book in mind, or at least the desire to find a book I might want to read - exactly what my boyfriend was doing while I got out my spiral notepad and a pen to begin prowling the shelves. My mission was to methodically find out what kind of books were in the bookstore, and what was selling well. I wanted to find out what everybody else was reading about rather than make a beeline for the sections I like best.
It makes sense, if I'm going to have a go at a writing career, for me to know what people want to read about, and moreover, to know what publishers want to publish. I could write the Great American Novel - a piece of literature for the ages - but it would never be more than a manuscript if I can't find a publisher who is interested in buying the rights. Every book in Border's got past editorial review and published. Therefore, each one is a clue to what publishers want writers to give them.
The general trends can be seen in the categories the books are shelved by. Of course there is fiction and non-fiction. In the Monterey Border's there seemed to be about an equal number of square feet of shelf space for both, so that wasn't really a telling point. Within the category of fiction, there were subcategories such as; Westerns and War, Romance, Science Fiction, Fantasy, and General. The General category was the largest and contained the most number of hardcover books that had been reprinted more than once. The other fiction categories were primarily paperbacks, even in their first edition. Some category fiction authors were able to achieve many reprints in paperback.
The non-fiction section area contained more categories. Some categories occupied entire aisles, or at least multiple rows of shelf space. Others were much smaller. Some interesting categories of non-fiction that contained a fair number of books were; Military History, Speculation, Eastern Thought, Science, Computers, Inspirational, and Biography. In the area of non-fiction I was particularly looking for a large (i.e. popular) category with a gap, a specific topic within the category that wasn't represented. Such a gap would provide a place in the bookstore for my book. From a publisher's point of view it would have market potential as a book, in a popular category, that hadn't already been written or sold in some form.
The world doesn't need another book on Princess Diana, Cats, or Angels. My research made that pretty obvious. But what do American readers want to buy then? It wasn't very obvious to me. I think I'm going to have to come up with several ideas, propose each one to publishers, and see if one gets any takers. In fiction, the General Fiction category has the most potential. Western is dying off, with few new books being written. SciFi and Fantasy are popular, but are completely dominated by name-brand authors. In non-fiction Computers are well represented but show no missing topics. Military History was surprisingly large and active, and seemed to have a big hole around the Gulf War. There may be potential there. I found Speculation to be an interesting and large category that contained topics from the philosophical interpretation of Quantum Physics, to Area 51. A hole I found there might be the effect of technology on social culture.
It was very interesting to look at a bookstore from a wholesaler's point of view, rather than a consumer's point of view. Books are a fascinating phenomenon. There are so many titles available, yet how many of us have actually met someone who wrote a book you can buy? The topics of books are varied almost beyond imagination. Despite their differences, they're all just bound piles of paper with symbols in ink stamped on them. Amazing that people will pay anything from $7.00 to $50.00 or more for these stacks of sheets. It's not the paper that's for sale, it's the boggling myriad of ideas bound within them that Border's is hawking. And that's what I need - an idea that is so appealing, someone will publish it and Border's will hawk it. I think the actual writing of the book must be the easy part.
Thursday April 27th, 2000
I've been reading the three 'Harry Potter' books over the last few weeks. They're just the sort of stories that I like best. They are packed full with honorable heroes and with villains of unmitigated evil. There's plenty of fun and mischief for the lead characters to be involved in. The complete nonsense of magic adds to the fun. An overarching sense of mystery permeates the entire theme, and each of the stories has a self-contained mystery for Harry to solve too. The stories each contain thrilling moments of crisis and suspense, but they are always resolved to satisfaction, if not to tumultuous joy.
I think that the latter feature is my favorite part of the Harry formula. When I read a story or see a movie, I always want a happy ending. Not just simple-happy either. Not good enough. I want an ending that is so filled with rejoicing and pathos that it makes me get all choked up and shed a few tears! That's how I like my stories to end. Harry Potter delivers plenty of resolution moments like that in every book.
If you are not familiar with the English series, it is the coming of age story of Harry Potter. Harry is 11 years old when, to his great surprise, he finds out that he is a wizard and is invited to attend Hogwarts School. Hogwarts is a traditional English boarding school only in the sense that traditional English school kids board there and take classes. What is not traditional about Hogwarts is that it that it's classes are on magical topics, ranging from Divination to Potions, and that none of the non-magical families in England even know it (or wizards and witches for that matter) actually exists. Each book is the story of another year of mystery and adventure set at Hogwarts. In the book I'm working on, the third book of the series, Harry and his friends have turned thirteen and must find and stop a maniacal killer from accomplishing the goal he broke out of jail for; the murder of Harry Potter.
I think the series was actually intended for kids of about Harry Potter's age. It turned out to be wonderful light reading for me too, two decades beyond. If you like a ripping-good yarn, spun with magic and friendship, then you'll enjoy Harry Potter too, no matter how old you are. The books come with my high recommendations.
After finishing a particularly satisfying chapter in Harry's thirteenth year last night, I put out the light, snuggled up next to my sleeping boyfriend, and began to think about what my thirteenth year had been like. It wasn't spent and boarding school learning charms and transfigurations, nevertheless, it was a magical year. It was the year that the world, formerly a baffling kaleidoscope of color and motion to be navigated only with the guidance of my parents, resolved itself into a refined picture which I could see and interpret for myself. As the awesome meaning of free will was dawning on me like a bright morning sun that year, it was easy for the more subtle shades of new emotions to pale before it. But new feelings turned out to be one of the most powerful magics I experienced at thirteen.
My first class in my new school was English. I had to use a map of the school just to find the classroom (a mobile classroom on the edge of school)! My friend Mike from the 6th Grade was in English with me and sat to my right. A boy from another primary school, who's name I discovered was Steven, sat on my left. Steve was my height (a bit shorter than most of my classmates), and had clear hazel eyes, an unkempt mop of curly brownish/blondish hair, and a lower jaw that was set quite forward in his mouth. He had a look of intelligence about him, and as we got to know each other in class, I found his vocabulary to be as full in depth as my own.
I found Steve to be intriguing and spent a fair amount of time in class talking to him, when the teacher would let us. I also tried to find him in the cafeteria for lunch. During the first few months of 7th Grade, I learned about Algebra, U.S. History, and, in English, how to read big novels like 'Watership Down'. But it was that very first day with Steve, when I learned that you have choices about your friends. I learned friends aren't assigned to you by fate like family are. Friends are made together by the decisions of individuals. My parents didn't provide me with Steve, I found him on my own. We became friends because we liked the qualities we saw in one another.
One of the biggest and scariest changes moving from Elementary School to Jr. High was the addition of locker rooms and showers to P.E. It seemed like an unnecessary waste of time and was certainly an embarrassment. How humiliating to take of your pants in public! No way was I going to shower in public too. Fortunately, that wasn't required. Steve was also in my P.E. class, and, since we had been friends since English that morning, he picked a locker alongside the one I chose. In a stupor of self-consciousness, I kept my shirttail pulled down low while very quickly swapping my jeans for gym shorts. Steve was going on about 'Watership Down' and apparently wasn't burdened with the modesty I was experiencing. When I felt dressed enough to stop averting my eyes, he was standing next to me wearing only his white briefs. There was something about him that made me hold my gaze.
Steve noticed my rapt attention to his story and smiled warmly at me. I felt a happy, glowing sensation growing inside me. Steve looked to me like a cuddly puppy. As when girls are watching a nature film about baby seals, I instinctively felt like saying "awwww!" out loud. I liked Steve right off when I'd met him in English class, but now, in the locker room, his appeal was almost overwhelming! I quietly sighed with content that I'd met him on my own and he was my friend. There was a span of perhaps another two minutes before we were both dressed for P.E. and heading out of the locker room doors together. For me, however, the time had been stretched out by the intense feelings that I'd never experienced before and couldn't name.
How amazing that I could control events that happened around me enough to spend more time with this new friend whom I found so appealing! The world, at thirteen, was becoming more incredible than I had ever dared imagine it could be. Within a week I had dreamed the most wonderful dream about Steve. In the dream, we were standing in the school locker room changing for class after P.E. Most of the other boys were gone or in the shower, so our aisle was empty except for us. Facing each other in our underwear, Steve took both my hands into his, and we stood there just beaming at each other and contently swinging our joined hands. I woke up feeling giddy with the pure joy and excitement that sharing a moment of affection with Steve in my dream gave me.
Although I knew it would be inappropriate to actually hold hands with Steve, it never occurred to me that other boys weren't discovering the same feelings about their own new friends. I figured everybody could see how nice Steve was, and how adorable he looked, and how good it felt when he was around. It seemed perfectly obvious to me! It seemed perfectly sensible and natural that all the other boys should feel the same way about Steve, and about many of the other attractive boys I had begun to notice around.
The world is wonderful at thirteen. Oh, sure, there is a lot of trouble and pain too. For instance, Steve moved away after our 7th Grade year together. But emotional pain like that doesn't spoil the magic, in fact, it is part of the magic because it's all new! Maybe that is another reason that I like reading the Harry Potter series so much - it reminds me how amazing the world was when it was new and I was thirteen.