Joy Alert

Things like Marie Kondo’s book about owning only items that ‘spark joy’ and articles like “Arrange Your Morning around Tasks that Bring You Joy” make it seem like joy is some kind of everyday commodity, within reach just by a trick of organization. 

That’s not joy. That’s what the marketing department and the cereal packaging designers are telling you to sell books and smart phone apps and Coca-Cola. 

Beware of products that promise you joy. It isn’t something you buy or pencil into your schedule. 

Joy is a mystery. Joy is a very welcome but unexpected guest. Joy is going to surprise you when you didn’t make careful plans for it.

Joy is exaltation. Joy is overwhelming, discombobulating happiness. Joy is emotional and/or spiritual. It isn’t a glutton, a hoarder or a hedonist. It does not appear on the menu. 

Joy is not a voluptuous blouse or a silk tie or an almond chocolate bar. Those might be a pleasure. They might give you satisfaction, even deep satisfaction, but they will not exalt you. Joy is of another order. 

Here’s a goofy listicle hellbent on debasing joy at your expense: “100 Things That Can Bring You Joy.” Among the supposedly joyous activities here are things like Go Shopping, Have More Sex Than Your Friends, Organize Your Bedroom, Eat More Steak, and Make a Gigantic To-do List.

If Starbucks brings you joy every morning, what word are you going to reach for when your underappreciated, much-beloved, deserving daughter against all odds wins an award for bravery? I feel sorry for you if you group these two things in the same category: joy.  

It is exaggeration that cheapens value.

Are you going to let our emotional life be run by Time Magazine?

So it’s national poetry month but probably you knew that. As for me I am still munching my way through “Seriously Funny: Poems about Love, Death, Religion, etc…” 

I’ve gotten through love, sex, divorce, families, hatred, friendship, the self, neighbors, and today I arrived in America, where I read Allen Ginsberg’s terrific “America.” 

For some reason I looked it up online tonight and found it on a University of Pennsylvania site, complete with embedded links. The links suggested I should click out of the poem to inform myself about things mentioned there, such as the Wobblies or Sacco & Vanzetti. 

I have to say it is for old-fangled me a step too far to embed a poem with informative links. I hate it in a news story already (‘Are you sharing too much about your baby online?’ ’10 Sleep Habits that Cause Weight Gain’ ‘Check Our Recap of The Walking Dead Finale’), except sometimes. 

America why are your libraries full of tears? 

America when will you send your eggs to India? 

I'm sick of your insane demands. 

When can I go into the supermarket and buy what I need with my good looks? 

America after all it is you and I who are perfect not the next world. 

Your machinery is too much for me.

The Year of Abandoned Books

Years ago, my husband had a bookmark listing “The Rights of the Reader.” Along with the right to skip, to dip in, and to mistake fiction for real life, was the all-important right to give up. No one likes to, but sometimes it is a worse decision to press on.

For me, it was a year of abandoned books. True to my half-hearted promise of giving up on books that --given a fair trial-- look like they won't pay off, I drop-kicked a number of titles in 2013. 

“Songs for the Missing,” a novel of a suburban girl who goes missing, failed to make me care. The word ‘boring’ comes to mind. 

My "Lost Illusions" experience was sad and disappointing. I'd really wanted to read the book this year, but the typo/error/major screw-up on p. 1 left me shell-shocked.

“Fatal Vision,” sorry, was just badly written. Good try, true crime. 

Ditto “No Apology” by Mitt Romney, which came off as a self-celebratory and poorly written campaign speech. 

At Good Reads, I ranted about “Galileo’s Daughter,” which turned me off as a feminist, and drew a comment from a fellow reader about what a shallow and immature person I am. I was sorry to get dragged into that, but hey, after much soul-searching I still agree with everything I said. Smile. 

"Birdsong," a WWI novel that had been on my to-read pile for years, was a disappointment I ditched. The ooey-gooey sex did me in - how Isabelle realized she was "born" to have sex with Stephen, to be "impaled" by him, and to feel his "sticky seed" between her legs. Oh, come ON. 

Richard Brautigan’s “In Watermelon Sugar,” a classic of hippie America, was written in a little boy voice that got my eyes rolling. “I get that it's supposed to be simple and innocent, but it would be helpful if it were also good,” I said in a brief review. 

There was a faint odor of something foul lurking through the pages of “The Tiger’s Wife,” which was only fully revealed after I gave up a good lick through and discovered the schmalzy acknowledgements.

Alas! I abandoned a couple others that are not worth noting. I read a lot of worthwhile books, too, which I’ll highlight as part of my year-end list in the next couple days.

winter morning misanthropy

Our snow is gone, which is sad. Our slush is also gone, which is good. Not gone are those tiny pebbles they throw on the sidewalk to keep folks from slipping. These are legion, and mostly stuck in people’s shoes where they scratch across the floor of the subway car when the lazy shuffle in, just to annoy me.

museum shop

For spirituality, you can get the Mark Rothko gravelike placemats and magnetic 15th Century Buddha bookmarks. For sensuality, there’s the Egon Schiele masturbatory silk throw pillow and Henry Moore bulging salt-n-peppah shakers. The practical among us go for the William Morris Poverty-Proof Tote Bag, which eternally belches the smell of new plastic. And you can get a Tiffany scarf, the very last word in really good, bad taste. Or luggage tags picturing Hokusai’s "Great Wave," the last word in really bad, good taste. I particularly like the “Flight into Egypt” holiday cards, now 75% off. The Babylonian Carnelian multi-bead necklace that was $148 is now a bargain at $97.87 for members. Maybe you’d like to become a member? What better reasons than the deep discounts and show of deep cultivation? It’s almost embarrassing, how high class you can be. Who would have thought it possible? What a grip the museum shop has on sophisticated visitors! Some people never get past it.

gentle reader

Dear probably-otherwise-nice Man who lectured me about people who don’t clean up after their dogs while I was walking my dog in a very clean fashion,

Dear Murderer who had a difficult childhood about which I am sorry,

Dear upright German Lady who reminded me of the rules of the road while I was riding my bike slowly on a dirt path in the middle of nowhere without another bike in sight,

Dear Decent Writer who is otherwise somewhat of an egoistic foot-in-the-mouth kind of timesuck,

Dear I-bet-the-west-is-wrong-about-you Iranian President,

Dear must-not-get-enough-attention teenage boy who insists on playing his music for everyone in the subway despite being asked politely to turn it off,

dear manufacturer trying to sell my 12-year old a push-up bra

Man opens fire, robs bank, cheats welfare
Man threatens teller, resists arrest, blows up bridge
Man insults officer, shoots three, kills one
Man runs red light, poisons neighbor, solicits prostitute
Man loots booty, lights self on fire, throws wife from car
Man drives into crowd, goes insane, defrauds authorities
Man stalks actress, runs amok, kills self

judgement, as in showing a lack of

I read today that soon passengers on European flights may be allowed to use their cell phones on board. How's that for living hell? Sartre can come back from the dead and write "No Exit" all over again. I vow that if the person next to me is yakking away on his cell phone, I will read my book out loud for the benefit of everyone. I just started reading This Repubic of Suffering, which seems apt.

Bad Day at Black Rock

My kids go back to school today.

I hate school. And I hate to disappoint everyone who says to me, "You must be glad the kids are back in school!" I'm not glad. I hate school. I hate homework, I hate grades, I hate tests, and more than anything I hate the German school system.

Have a nice day.

mariners, all

"Just because you're concerned about climate change doesn't mean you have to live in a yurt in outer Mongolia. You can be passionate about the environment, without strapping yourself to a whaling ship or using yourself as a human shield against bulldozers that mow down old-growth trees. All it takes are a few smart, fuss-free choices to make the change you wish to see in the world, while rejuvenating your body, home, and planet at the same time. Choosing green might even save you some green in the process. Our list is by no means exhaustive, but it's a righteous start." (from an article on live science)

I cringe at the tone of this - the assumption that being concerned about the environment is a silly extremist attitude that could embarrass you and the rest of us, for chrissakes! I think the writer struggled not to strew exclamation points all over.

And I wince at how the alliteration of “mow down old-growth trees” blows “MOLD!” in my ear, insinuating maybe it’s time those futzy old trees made way. Not to mention the word “yurt,” which says to me yoghurt --> kefir --> grunge. As if being green means living with permanent dirt under your fingernails.

I guess it’s positive that the writer is trying to make environmental protection “palatable,” but that saving the planet could in some way be “fuss-free” is such absolute bullshit it makes me want to die.

And since protecting the planet, ie saving your own ass, isn’t incentive enough for the consumer, doing a couple convenient things around the house can also “rejuvenate your body!” OK? And “save you some green.” (It’s not possible the writer used that pun, is it? Groan.)

And what does the word “righteous” reveal besides that the writer has had it with the holier-than-thou-ness of people concerned about the environment?

I ask you.

my easter thought

Believe me, reading Da Vinci's Notebooks IS better than watching "Friends" reruns.

It IS better for young girls to learn a musical instrument or how to draw than to devote 4 hours a week to cheerleading practice.

If the country caught on fire, what three things would you rescue (besides people)? "The Hunt for Red October," or Paul Klee's Fish Magic?

Hey, I like fun, too, but not more than anything. Humor, yes. Wit, yes. Blond jokes, not that much.

I'm a little early for my Monday resolution, but I am swearing off vulgarity again right now.

On Monday I made my weekly resolution to avoid the vulgar. To avoid the vulgar and all vulgarity. To avoid in fact anything beginning with “vul-,“ be in the vulva, the vulnerable or vultures, because particularly on Mondays everything with the vul- prefix grosses me out.

But I digress. I ask you: what is worse than being an American abroad and being confronted with vulgar American tourists? Quite consciously and apparently proud vulgar American tourists? I tell you: nearly nothing is worse.

Four Americans get on the train. I guess they’re 18. They’re swigging away at some alco-pops that look like green beer, and planning their week loudly, apparently for the benefit of everyone who delights in the American accent. In the American accent and vulgarity. Their week is going to consist of drinking as much as motherfucking possible. And mac and cheese. And why can’t you buy it in a box in motherfucking Germany? And did you hear about the two guys from Lancaster who dug up the dead body and decided to fuck it? Did you wonder if the body was still warm? Or if it was a young body? Did you ask yourself how long had it been buried? Or where they bought the condoms before they set to it? Har har!

But I digress. I must urgently refresh my resolution eschewing vulgarity, and it's only Thursday. I don’t think getting drunk in public is cool, especially in a foreign country, no matter if you are truly unintelligent or just think it's cool to be stupid. If you are really that stupid you should be in an assisted living home. Vulgarity is not funny or cool, and being regular joe asshole is not cool. And being American is not inherently cool. Um, at all.

I felt like I was in that scene with the frat boys in Borat, except there was no Borat, and no movie camera goading them on.

They Said It Couldn't Happen

When I jump also my nose jumps.
When I sneeze also my arms and knees are sneezing.
I'm a collective noun.
They said my blood could not fly
but jumping from the swing on the uptick
my blood goes flying smack into the woodchips with me.
It’s no miracle. I don’t even need determination.
Put that in your hoity-toit and smoke it.

what do i have to do

to get a goddamned pack of matches in this country? They don’t sell them at the supermarket (like they’re goddamned contraband or something). I have to go to the tobacco shop. So I go to the tobacco shop, and the guy says he doesn’t have any “today.” Today, my ass! Where are the matches?