Oblique Look at Early Childhood

A piece of the Internet:

A writing device that I use when I get stuck is Brian Eno's Oblique Strategies. While I've never seen an actual deck of these cards, I do use this website to provide me a unique way of looking at a situation when I get stuck writing. It's a random server that gives a lot of different ways of looking at problems.

A story:

Scenes from the Academy

When I was four years old, I attended Covenant Christian Academy, a Christian private school in Panama City, FL. Originally, I only went three days a week: Monday, Wednesday, and Friday. Other kids went everyday, so I had to learn very early that if I wanted to participate and do everything, I had to be able to do tasks quickly so I could catch-up on what I missed. If I wanted to make a J out of assorted legumes and construction paper, then I would to have blaze through my math sheets and eschew coloring in true colors for broad strokes.

In the first grade, we had a school-wide Thanksgiving event. My class was better than the other first grade class because we had real feathers for a pine-cone turkeys. The other class had construction paper feathers. We won so hardcore. We glammed up our turkeys with so many feathers that they looked more like a drag queens centerpiece or the NBC logo than an actual Thanksgiving symbol, but we as children fully embraced the concept that more is more.

And then there was the meal. They took us to the meeting hall and sat us all at long tables. Half of us were dressed as Indians and the other half as Pilgrims. As a child who hated being sticky, I obviously sided with the more civilized English. From there, the meal started.

Our re-enactment was pretty true to the original: we Pilgrims brought guns and smallpox and the Indians brought corn and that commercial 80's where the Indian cries that tear because of littering. We ate a big meal and the Pilgrims forced all of the people dressed as Indians (which, why did we call them Indians? As a child, I'm sure I could have wrapped my mouth around the words "Native American.") to march the Trail of Tears and go live in Oklahoma. Then, we fought the British. Okay, maybe not really. But we did have a meal.

I have always been a huge fan of ketchup, and the fact that there was no bottle on the table for either my potatoes or turkey was distressing. However, on the side of my plate, nuzzled between the roll and the dressing, there was this gelatinous blob in roughly the same color as ketchup. I tried to dip my turkey in it, but it wouldn't give. Always a rational child, I assumed that the ketchup had congealed because it was too cold in the kitchen. Thus, I scraped some on my turkey and ate it. I promptly wretched--as much as I loved ketchup, my first encounter with cranberry sauce left something to be desired. One of the den mothers of my class explained the dish to me and told me that I'd like it later in life.

I've always hated that--just because someone is older doesn't mean they know a damn thing about you as a person. Instead, what it means is that they think that the next generation will be a copy of the current one, and, thus, their experience can inform the future.

You Remind Me Of The...

At lunch today, Ellen leaned across the table and said, "I don't want this to sound weird..." and I finished her sentence in my head before she even had the chance to. But you're just like this guy I..."dated in high school." For some reason, this sentence always starts that way and the only thing that ever changes is the last detail.

"Oh, really? Well, I'm sorry if we broke up under bad terms."

"We did."

"Why?"

"I wouldn't sleep with you."

Shrugging, I said, "Yeah, I do that."

However, is it as ubiquitous for everyone as it is for me for people to come up to them and say "I know you, but different and somewhere else?" I'm known for a dry sense of humor and for reflecting too much (read: obsessing) over the dark parts of life. But I'm always someone's best friend from high school.

And then they say that we should meet because either A) we'd be perfect for each other or B) we'd get along so well.

My response to this is that A) I don't need someone like me. I'm screwed up in my own ways. And if I can't help myself, then I certainly can't help someone going through the exact same things. We have to help each other out if that's going to work. Plus, if they're just like me, they're far too paranoid, feisty, selectively social for it to work out. We'd end up getting on each others nerves. And as far as getting along...I don't know...I think there can be only one person holding court at a time.

Plus, I never say this. Nobody I meet and spend time with is the same as anyone else. They are all unique. So, do we say this as a gross over-simplification or do we say it because we just meeting the same boring slags again and again?

Characteristic Humor

I feel like I don't let enough of myself come out in this blog. I overthink it. Which is stupid. I generally like what I write in other places, so I should just let if flow. I mean, I did read that last night (I had it in print at 2 AM...I'm completely unable to look at a computer screen comprehendingly after 1 AM. You can read it here). So, I'm just going to talk about whatever is in my head.

And right now, what I'm thinking about is K'Fain. At lunch today, there was a general consensus at the theatre table that she and I, while good apart, are usually much better together. We haven't been spending much time around one another, so we were both at full wit potential today. I imagine that will keep going for the rest of the night.

But, an interesting topic of conversation was brought up at lunch. We sat down, and my friend Davis, out of the blue, much like she usually does, turned to my friend Marty and said, "I don't understand why people are called African-American. I mean, you're not from Africa. You're from America." With that little comment, and his broad-sided stare, that set off our conversation.

People exploded into conversation, tip-toeing around the right words to use, but mostly just plowing through. We generally came to a consensus. Among our 2 white girls, 2 white guys, 1 black guy, and 1 mixed origins guy, we decided that it didn't really offend any of us to just be called American or whatever the color of our skin was. That doesn't really matter. Because none of us have any desire to go to Africa. I mean, I might end up there in the Peace Corps (damn you, basic French!), but there's not really a huge draw for most of the continent. You can go see the room where Angelina Jolie had her baby. Or, you could go and see a world really trying to get itself on its feet.

However, Africa is not where I tend to think about going for mindless fun. Somebody really needs to put some development dollars into that area. It really is an untapped region. Hello? I'm basically saying that I need a Disney in the Congo. I think that it would work out really well. And it would get people out of the house.

So, we talked about Africa's possibilities as a future entertainment venue, and then Davis piped up again: "I think I'm a Native American." Once again, we all stop and turn and stare. "I mean, I was born here, I've never even been anywhere else. I'm about as native as it gets." Sam, who is part Native American (enough to belong to a tribe's rez), was a little taken aback. And for some reason, people were more into defending Native American than African American. And I don't exactly understand why, but I have the same feeling. I mean, do we subconsciously quantify suffering? Do we compare genocide and the Trail of Tears to slavery? Do we still, in the South and in America, consider the tone of somebody's skin as it relates to lily-ass white? Or is it just something we've never thought about and we're dealing with issues which cafeteria food really isn't inspiring.

Anywho, that reminded me of the xkcd.com comic below.



























And that is my scattershot post. Hells yes, stream of consciousness