again

Well, [I was hopeful, again] the only logical explanation was that he was on his way, but it turned out he was only inattentive, lazy, forgetful, as usual. Is this destiny, doom, or merely hell?

Fire

Anything anyone could ever write about romantic love has become a time-worn cliche. Nevertheless, it is stunning how quickly and devastatingly it can hit. All of your rationality simply vanishes. It is completely involuntary and illogical. Why this person? Why am I so insanely drawn to – even obsessed – with this individual, out of all the people in the world? What was the spark that lit this inferno of utter silliness? In many ways it is painful, as you find yourself washed away in a torrent of emotion, practically unable to control your thoughts and actions – it’s really an awful sensation. Only a masochist could wish for this kind of torture.

It’s also an exquisitely wonderful experience when it is mutual, when you’re falling for someone and that someone wants to catch you, though reciprocity of feeling makes it all the more incomprehensible.

I’m scared nearly to death, I’m hurting in places that don’t exist, and I don’t want this to ever end. I’m trying to savor every single second.

My L.A. Times, part I (or: A Tale of Three Cities)

I’ve been trying to write this for days now, but intervening forces have conspired to keep me from it.

I sat for/wrote (both such quaint words to describe the experience) the Illinois bar exam on February 27 and 28. I was given Kellogg School at Northwestern’s downtown campus as my location – all who sit for the Illinois exam are forced to travel to within two blocks or so of North Michigan Avenue – and was rather happy with the Herman Miller chair I was assigned. It may have been the drugs, but I was really not bothered by the experience. For those unacquainted, the bar exam (most of the 50 states are similar) consists of two 9 hour days, give or take, which is an 8am start Tuesday, and an 8:15 start Wednesday. The actual examery boils down to about 6 hours a day; the filler is administrative, logistical, and a one hour lunch during which poor lost souls clumsily thumb their trusty BarBri guides or hand-written flashcards. I didn’t necessarily feel good about some of the essays I wrote – my right hand still throbs a bit after those six hours of frenzied writing – and I have absolutely no idea how the second day multiple choice fiesta went (six hours of filling in circles with a pencil is a bit easier on a sore hand than 10 essays) but the overall experience was humdrum. No anxiety, nor even resignation, which I find strange. I may be repeating the experience in July.

I blew my first chunk of vacation time on three days – the Monday before to mope, and the two days of pseudo hell – on the bar exam and its ancillaries, and booked a flight to LAX departing Midway at 7:45pm Wednesday, theoretically two hours and forty-five minutes after the conclusion of the exam. Due to the fascist (but understandable) restrictions on personal items in the test room I was carrying only a backpack, the same crappy Filene’s model I had lugged during my law school days, and unused since. The irony was not lost on me: an ingnominius [possible] end to an ignoble studential indenture to the law. We were released mercifully at 4:45, and I was so relieved and elated that the supposed ordeal was over [hopefully], that I headed to an old Rush Street bar I had never been to – though it was a block from my old Loyola University Chicago School of Law haunt. I entered with the intent of having a pint or two, and enjoying a couple of newly-purchased, overpriced, celebratory cigarettes. Though I’ve quit smoking perfunctorily, I really enjoy smoking while I drink. I’ll have to cut that out in a mid-year resolution, since everything else is going so well. I think I had four pints. It started to hail, or snow, or both, but I was numb before the booze hit my lips, because I was on my way to L.A., with sunshine and whatnot. I hadn’t been in 8 years, and even then didn’t see much, but I anticipated good things. After such a hell winter, I needed something to look forward to.

In the past, I’ve loudly proclaimed my distaste for Los Angeles. I find appalling the concept of an agglomeration of suburbs and small cities posing as “big city.” I find the city of Los Angeles itself aesthetically repulsive; in mentioning this I am, of course, speaking of the built environment. The physical, natural setting is another thing entirely, and on principle I hold it to be meaningless in the evaluation of a city’s relative merits. Based on this set of values, I naturally hold the city in which I live to be the most beautiful city I’ve ever seen. Let me explain: some hearty souls took some rather worthless land – entirely flat, frost-bitten at least 3 months out of the year, swampy (at the time) – and completely re-worked it into a marvel of human triumph (or somesuch). Yes, I’m discounting its location at the shores of Lake Michigan, because I’ve visited other cities on great lakes, and have seen that a great lake doesn’t a great city make. What we have today – admittedly thanks in large part to King Daley the Second – nearly lives up to its “City in a Garden” motto. If you’re foolish enough to doubt me, visit sometime. It’s stunning, even in the arctic chill of this record-setting shitwinter.

New York, another of my beloved cities, has both of my arbitrary aesthetic elements – a nifty natural formation, and awe-inspiring manipulation of the built environment. No need to get into that here, as I’m sure throngs of folk have written about home sweet archipelagolopolis before (holy shit, did I just coin a phrase?). L.A. has a mind-blowing natural setting, and a gut-wrenching built environment, on the whole. It simply didn’t develop “correctly,” as made clear in Mike Davis‘ immensely illuminating City of Quartz. Los Angeles is thoroughly “post-modern” and “deconstructivist” – as a largely 20th century phenomenon, it had no need to grow organically. Ergo, as a lover (connoisseur?) of classic cities, I’ve always abhorred it simply on principle.

So why on earth would I want to visit Los Angeles? I think I’ll take this up in a post in the near future.

Coupe de gras

Today, I was able to [comfortably] wear a pair of pants that haven’t fit me for at least two years.

wail and gnash

A painful year came to an end, and I never took the time to do some kind of happy new year post. It’s far too late for that now. I guess it’s never too late to hope the year will be happy, and to beg that it will be easier than the last, but the reality is stark: obscurity lingers, and time moves much too quickly.

I don’t really dwell on personal details here. There is not enough vitriol in the world to fuel a full-blown screed on my part. That is not why I started doing the blog thing. From time to time, anecdotes and laments have crept in, but I’ve just never been the sharing kind. I have plenty of very good friends, and I’m not afraid to burden them with my woes, because one who won’t listen is not a friend. Of course it is painful to find that one you thought of as a friend is merely an acquaintance or a co-worker, but… well, better late than never (or is it?). Often I don’t talk about my problems because I want time to work them through for myself. I either work it out, or I’m too embarrassed, after a little reflection, to admit that I’ve been foolish. That’s the case with this past year; though my friends – and some acquaintances – have shared in my wailing and gnashing of teeth to some extent, I’m embarrassed to say that I brought it all on myself.

I spent a year lolling about, really. 2006 dawned, and I looked around and thought, “where did the time go?” I made some mental lists of things to accomplish and change, and did nothing. I had some enjoyable moments in those twelve months, to be sure, but I was wilfully blind to what was going on, and what I was doing to myself. I want to hold grudges and hate and blame, but in the end, I lost control of the whole situation. I was blind and lazy, and despite being jostled half out of my slumber several times, I continually dozed off.

I finally realized around Thanksgiving that I had taken the last 8-10 years of, in a way, just coasting, flitting on autopilot and doing nothing to improve myself. Collecting degrees means nothing when you put forth little effort in the collecting; dalliance doesn’t earn a PhD.

So here I am, halfway through the second month of this new year, and I really am no better off. Other being 12 weeks into the idea to pay more attention to my physical fitness, and having lost 25 lbs since Turkeytime, I still have no plan. Any suggestions?

Must love…

Have you ever really liked a terrible movie? I’m hoping I wake up tomorrow with more sense, but I recommend “Must Love Dogs,”if only for the Cusack-Lane-Plummer-Channing  performances.

The final few scenes are gut-wrenchingly awful.

New … resolutions

I’ve been following a monastic regime. I got tired of the way things were going, so I decided to change them, and it’s been difficult – though maybe it’s this monstrous beastly cold spell, combined with the dirty crunchy snow that’s getting me down.

I eat much less. This is kind of a fun game to play with myself, I’ve found. Before bed, I can actually remember what I’ve eaten during the day. Eating less somehow gives me more energy, too. I imagine I was just taking in so many calories before that I was sluggish just trying to process them.

I wake up at 5am to go to the gym before I go to work – every day. This also helps with energy, and with the day as a whole. I had hated going after work, and getting home with little of the day left to me. Unfortunately I also hate waking up, so I just made a choice, decided I would believe the latest study, saying 7 hours sleep is optimal, and package the whole thing into this quasi health kick I’m on.  So while I do have difficuly actually getting out of bed at 5, working out in the morning is much more pleasant than in the evening, which I’ve occupied otherwise…

I spend the evening studying for the bar. I have to pass, this second time around; I’m just sick of this state of not-having-passedness. I’ve started hating it more than actually studying.

So now I have no time for my friends, my books, or my Netflix. Boo hoo, poor me. At least I’m starting to feel better, and I’ve got a head start on all those annoying New Year’s resolutions one is supposed to make.