She's Writing a Novel

Apparently, the economic recession this country entered in 2007 was over by fiat in 2009, but everyone knows this to be a lie. All the dire talk about "slipping back into a recession" is so cynically transparent; it's like threatening to kill a dead man. We know you can't go back to a place you haven't left; what's scary is the thought that things could get even worse. So we have to pretend that we took 10 steps forward so that, when we inevitably take the next 5 steps back, we can delude ourselves that things aren't worse than they ever were.

In some ways, though, things have "gotten better" since 2007. You could feel the panic and smell the fear that year; everyone hunkered down and waited for the other shoe to drop. Because the other shoe HAD to drop. The ponzi scheme had been called out, and the pain of realizing you've been tricked is only the first blow; the pain of being financially wiped out inevitably follows.

Except it didn't. The US government wouldn't allow it. Appearances must be kept; liars must be allowed to keep the spoils of their lies; suckers must be spared from suffering the consequences of their foolishness. And so the populace crept out of their caves to play along. And here we are.

If you are remotely perceptive, or perhaps just a teeny bit sane, you notice that something feels off. It's like when you were a kid, and something went horribly wrong. Maybe your grandmother was diagnosed with cancer, or your dad was laid off, or a neighbor was tragically killed; whatever it was, you could tell by the smile on your mother's face that something Bad, something capital b Bad, had happened. But she wasn't saying anything about it; in fact, she was suddenly offering you ice cream and movies and staying up past your bedtime. Happy happy fun! Isn't this wonderful? Aren't we enjoying ourselves?!

But children know their mothers on that intuitive level that mothers know their children, and you could see the way her smile wavered at the corners; you could see the glassy film over her eyes and the deep pools of sadness in them. You asked her what was wrong and she, shocked that her charade hadn't fooled you, quickly said "Nothing! Nothing, of course! I know, why don't we play a game?"

So you and your siblings pulled out Candyland, and you made a big show of Having Fun for your mother, because you could tell how important it was for her to believe that you believed nothing was amiss. And so while your grandmother was dying, or your father was weeping in despair, or an ambulance was solemnly transporting neighbor Bill to the morgue, you cheered ecstatically about getting a trip through the Gumdrop Pass and laughed at your brother for getting stuck in the Molasses Swamp, and you grinned chocolate-stained grins at your mother long into the night to assure her that all was well.

And this--roughly, metaphorically--is where we are right now. The government wants to distract us with ice cream and we are happy to eat it, if that's what it takes to maintain the illusion for everyone. But all of us in this little faux party know that eventually we will have to have conversations about the reality of what is upon us, and the ways it's going to change our lives, and the future we're approaching where ice cream can't make things better.

Today walking back from the gym I was nearly shoved by an industrial gas cylinder strapped to a hand trolley that some older man was pushing. I stepped off the sidewalk to cross the street as he pushed it too fast down the handicap access on the corner. I quickly stepped out of the way and he brought it to a stop, but just barely in time because the thing was as big as I am.

That would have been that, a fortunately avoided collision and some scrapes and bruises averted, but the guy had the nerve to remark, nastily and for my benefit, that I should stay out of the fucking way. Really? Because I had been standing in front of him on the sidewalk to begin with when he forgot that a mass on an incline has a tendency to gather speed.

So I shot over my should that, excuse me, maybe he should watch where he was going.

And he replied that I was the dumb bitch who should watch her step.

And I informed him that he was a fucking asshole who could take himself straight to hell.

And he mumbled something I couldn't quite catch as I was now 10 paces ahead.

And I waved my middle finger over my shoulder.

And he told me that I knew what I can do with that.

And I stopped and turned around, and told him that yes, exactly, he could sit on it and spin.

And he told me that my mother must be so proud of me.

And I told him that miserable men who verbally harass young women die old and alone, but sometimes they just die very suddenly.

Then I walked through the door of my office building, fuming. And hungry and tired, because it was 3pm, I'd just finished running 4 miles, and the only thing I'd had to eat all day was a trail mix bar.

I was raised to stand down and be a peacemaker. You know what that got me? At the hands of other children, it got me a lot of gum in my hair, a lot of vandalized library books, a lot of bruises from pinches and slaps, and ultimately a very low opinion of myself. There's a name for people who don't fight back, people who don't stand up for themselves. I was raised to call them pacifists, but by the time I was an adult I realized the words I was looking for were "punching bag."

Sometimes, I still choose to ignore or momentarily endure harassment. But it's mostly out of laziness, or an unwillingness to be interrupted by a confrontation at that particular moment. It is not, anymore, because I believe in the virtue of not standing up for myself when someone tries to put me down or intimidate me.

This, apparently, makes me a bitch. Which, alright by me. Better a bitch than an apologetic doormat scuttling out of everybody's way and everybody's ire. Somebody has to teach bullies about Newton's third law.

One of the things I always look forward to in September is the way my gym clears out. Suddenly I have space to dress, space to work out in, and room to breathe. I don't have to fight over machines or mat space, and I don't have to throw elbows to reach my locker.

The gym has an outdoor pool, one of the few of its kind in the city, and all summer long the women's locker room is packed. Oh, and the pool has children's hours, so sometimes there are kiddos in the locker room, too!

My feeling on small children in locker rooms is this: I am happy to ignore your little darling(s) as long as the little darling(s) keeps out of my way, and as long as you appreciate the fact that it is entirely your problem that you might have to explain to your three-year-old what nipple rings and Brazilian bikini waxes are.

Anyway, the gym itself is also packed from May until August because the people that aren't sitting by the pool during the week are working out in anticipation of laying on the beach over the weekend. It turns out that very few people view exercise as a year-round obligation to their health. Most of them just want to look good, or at least half-decent, in a bikini or board shorts for a couple of months.

And this is something I really don't understand. Why sit around on your ass eating Oreos from September to March, and then suddenly panic in April and jump on an elliptical while cutting every single carbohydrate on the planet out of your diet? This sort of annual crash diet-and-exercise cycle seems to me to be just a binge-and-purge habit on a grand scale. People who are so bulimic about their health ...well, they just can't be healthy. They might be sufficiently thin for a couple months out of each year, and I guess that's all they want.

My philosophy is that you never have to lose the weight you don't gain. So maybe I never look as good in July as the girl who doesn't eat pasta all summer. But I also don't look like she does in January after she's stopped running and shunning Italian. Here is where my laziness works for me; by doing a little bit each day, I never have days where I have to do a lot, and I hardly notice that I don't get to have stretches of time where I can do nothing.

Taking the tortoise approach, as it were. And we all know who the winner in that story was.

Today started off like it always does: Realizing I am awake, I am struck by an all consuming crankiness. I quickly take inventory - is this a day I have to get up and go to work? It is. Further dejection. Is there any time, any minutes at all, left for me to revel in a little more AM slumber? There is not. Total despair.

There are "morning!" people, and then there are "why is it morning?!?" people. I have always, always, been squarely into the latter category. Lest you think that my current reluctance to rise and face the day stems from a general depression or a present sadness, I can assure you that, even as a young child, I loathed waking up and getting out of bed. Just how much? I was willing to forgo Saturday morning cartoons. Yes, while my little brother was up at 7 so as not to miss a single episode of anything ever, I slept until almost noon. Why? Because I could.

The idea of getting up early and accomplishing a whole list of things before I've even had coffee appeals to me, in theory. Putting it into practice has proven to be nearly impossible. There is something so delicious about being curled up in bed with blankets and pillows and maybe a lover; if I am even the slightest bit sleepy it's enough of a reason to stay exactly where I am, day's obligations be damned.

But an unfortunate side effect of getting older is that while the days do not get any longer, your to-do lists do. And should you care to have any hobbies or interests or general pursuits, and not merely engage in the minimum amount of activity required for functioning in civilized society, you are going to have to cull more hours of the day somewhere. And those hours are called sleep.

I like a good 8-10 hours of sleep a night if I can get it. I KNOW. I can also feel the pea someone put under my mattress, and I hate when my lover doesn't rub my feet the right way. It's an indulgence that I've been able to squeeze out this much dozing every 24 hours for this much of my adult life, and I fully realize that. I also fully realize that these days are soon behind me. Because as much as I like sleep, I also like: making money, having clean laundry, no dirty dishes in the sink, dinner that doesn't come in a cardboard tray, running a few miles, reading, rolling around on the internet, writing, rolling around with my lover, socializing with friends, socializing with new people who might become friends, catching up with family, learning new things, clean floors, spotless litter boxes, idle walks in the park, shopping, yoga classes, and going out for drinks. And that's just the fun stuff! (Not including facebook stalking and reality TV.)

So. Can I cut back to 6-7 hours a night? I think I have to try. Russian lover's opinion on this point is that if I wake up miserable after 9 hours of sleep anyway, then I might as well only sleep 7 and gain 2 hours of living. And really, I can't argue that.

But tomorrow morning I probably will.

Recently I started going to yoga classes again. Ok, I went to one class last week, and I'm going tonight. It's practically a habit! I have many motivations for picking it back up, not least of which is the fact that I cannot and never have been able to touch my toes and I'd like to cross that off the list before 30. So that leaves me about 6 weeks to double my flexibility.

Once upon a time I couldn't run a mile without stopping, and that's a feat I've long since accomplished. But by comparison, that was easy. Dragging myself to the finish line is a mentality that comes easily to me; I may be half-dead when I get there, but by god I'll get there. Running is empowering, assertive (if not to say aggressive), and goal-oriented; as such it's an activity that jives with my personality and cultivates those comfortable and familiar aspects of myself. It can also be punishing and monotonous; which, again, the masochist in me embraces without qualms.

But stretching I have always loathed, and this is why I cannot touch my toes, and this is why I have a love/hate, on-again/off-again relationship with yoga. Flexibility is something I struggle with in every sense, and stretching is an expression of that aversion. The patience, the stillness, the gentle push - it's the antithesis of how I think and how I naturally relate to myself and the world. Stretching forces you to confront your innate inability; it's almost always possible to finish one more rep or to take one more step. But when you've reached as far as you can reach, you feel the wall that stops you from reaching farther. And this sensation has always been so discouraging me that it has made me not want to reach at all.

But before a yoga class starts, I am pumped. I'm down with down dog; I'm stoked for warrior two; I'm psyched for some grueling sun salutations. And then the teacher will start with her mild intonations, and I remember that I am not at the gym, and I start to feel a sense of panic. Because I'm about to relax and if there is one thing the world has taught me, it's NOT TO RELAX.

At the gym, the voice in my head says "ATTACK IT! ATTACK IT!" And I do. I hit those weights, I pound out the miles. And in the end I feel tired but triumphant.

There is no attacking in yoga. You can't attack utkatasana -- you just stand there, vulnerable, awkward, like someone waiting to be stabbed. You move, you breathe, you try to think about nothing but moving and breathing-- and it's that last part that is the hardest.

The constant babble in my head is what keeps me alive and evolutionarily speaking, it's what brought all of us to birth; that stream of analysis and planning and counter-planning is the reason my ancestor did not get eaten by a saber-tooth tiger before producing offspring. My biological instincts and my life-learned lessons all keep me in a state of low-level paranoia, and that's good up to a point. It helps to spare me harm from Septa buses and thugs. But then it starts to cause chipped teeth from clenched jaws, and muscle spasms from tension, and domestic shouting matches from agitation; the long build-up of unarticulated, unfocused anxiety finds its outlet in destructive ways instead of contributing to my well-being and survival.

So I try yoga as a way of letting it all go, against my judgments to the contrary, and against the primal scream inside that needs to be in control and needs to come out on top. There is no moment of victory, but eventually I become still enough inside that there is acceptance. And in a world where despite all our best efforts we will sometimes fail and sometimes be defeated, I begin to understand the value in learning to accept my limitations as well as my accomplishments.

Coming up against the boundary wall that is the furthest limit of my ability, I gently urge myself to go a little bit further; and sometimes, to my surprise, I find that I can.

There has been a sudden religious revival in this country's youth population -- they are taking one of the seven deadly sins head on. Granted, it's the sin in OTHER people they are taking on, but let's cut them some slack! The new new Irony is not being aware of your own Irony. Which deadly sin has everyone up in arms? Well, this is America so you can bet it's not gluttony.

Greed is the offense du jour; specifically, "corporate greed." I'm not sure what this phrase even means. The greed of corporations? The communal greed of our civilization? All of the above? People tend to ignore or loathe these kinds of protests because for the most part they are big on angst and short on articulated grievances; there is a reason these things are made up primarily of teenagers and protracted adolescents.

The best gist I can get is that people are angry at the banks in particular because of this whole recession brouhaha that stemmed from the collapse of the mortgage-backed securities ponzi scheme. (Actually, I think a lot of them are angry at the banks because some cute bike messenger from Brooklyn told them he was angry at the banks.*) Well, I'm angry at the banks too! Look at that, liberal hipsters and I can agree on something.

The difference is, that I'm not just angry at the banks. Being angry at the banks is like just being angry at an STD that's killing you instead of being angry at the whore who gave it to you and at yourself for not using a condom.

I'm angry at the politicians who mandated that banks must relax their lending standards in the name of being "fair." After all, it's not fair that someone who only makes 25k a year can't get the same 500k loan as the guy making 800k a year, right? That's discrimination! And what about the fact that people who don't have a job can't get any loan at all? Why, that too must be because of some "-ism" on the part of financial institutions.

And I'm angry at the people making 25k a year who decided they could buy a 500k house. That means, yes, I'm angry at the family of 5 having their 5-bedroom house foreclosed on, I'm angry at the homeless couple who used to have granite counter tops, I'm angry at the 30-somethings mailing the keys to the bank and moving home with mom and dad. And I'm angry at the people who bought into the collective insanity and frittered away their good standing by taking out their ballooning equity to buy boats and trips and whatever else they wanted and thought they needed.

I know the current zeitgeist is that these people are the victims of greed. And they are, but not just the greed of the banks. They are victims of their own greed, and that is why I do not feel bad for them. At best, I regard them with the benevolent contempt we can't hide from people who are simply experiencing the consequences of their own poor choices. Including the naive belief that a politician with lofty vision and soaring speeches is going to be "different", and that such a politician is going to save them from consequences instead of bailing out his big-money cronies.

But I digress. Here is where the other catch phrase "predatory lending" comes up, and I have to again ask if we'll never place any blame with the damn fools who sign papers they don't read and borrow money they can't repay for the big house they want now. The rules about how much money it takes to buy so much house never changed, it's just the belief that those rules could be ignored went viral. I know that as someone making less than 100k a year there is no way I can afford a 650k condo, and I don't need my college degree, or even a high school degree for that matter, to know that any guy in a suit who tells me otherwise is a liar, plain and simple.

So the kids who so passionately protest greed might want to take a hard look around around Main Street instead of just marching up Wall Street. Because there is no shortage of greed here. I too want granite counter tops and stainless steel appliances. I was not willing to gamble to get them. I do not feel sorry for people that were, and lost.

*Quick, someone do a survey of the Wall Street protesters and see how many of them even know what a "mortgage-backed security" is. No wait, even better, see if any of them know what "securities" are.