paisleypiper's Diaryland Diary

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pesky chirping crickets

This afternoon, after managing to be out of the office for most of the day, the Esquire returned and found herself trapped into being nice to me. She had no alternative but to compliment me and my hard work.

The main boss of the university shifted the supervision of the Esquire to the main boss of the academic side of the university, for a myriad of reasons, all of which, can be spun to the Esquire�s advantage. But really, doing that, makes me thirsty for a tall glass of lemonade.

Today, she had her first monthly meeting. I imagine that there she was dressed like Nordstrom�s thousand dollar version of the Pat Benetar signature clothing line, trying to flirt her way to success. As her own concept, she passes off my idea for how to handle the incentive for community-based, local research package. This is part of my job security insurance policy � I have hundreds and hundreds of ideas; I just pretend that I consider and cherish them more than someone entrepreneurially inclined. Because between the Esquire and I, she knows that it was my structure that received on-the-spot funding. I can see her sitting with the main academic boss, listening to his accolades regarding my work with service-learning. As if praise were not enough, he is interested in finding funding for the faculty incentive portion, provided that I can work out a partnership with Dr. Popcorn Brain. At 11:30, she had no funding. At 12:15, she had an additional $50K. All because of me.

I could tell that this was difficult for her. She was quite serious about the whole thing. Perhaps even wondering what she had accomplished. Although it is unwise to put thoughts into her head, because I am convinced that she only knows how to create the look of success. She puts up the tallest and best martin house on the block in hopes of attracting the most promising little martins around.

This was a pleasant ending to the long work day, which I spent delving into the volunteer protection act. Not being an attorney, I am having trouble conceptualizing what should scare me, what scares me unnecessarily and what I am overlooking. This is why we have a risk management office. They use the term war game as a verb in that office.

The past three nights I have gone to bed completely exhausted, only to feel invigorated after what amounts to a twenty-minute nap. The rest of the time I spend in some state of rest without sleep, consciousness without dreams, and dreams without depth. The entire night is spent with a chattering, clattering buzz in my head that sounds like ten thousand crickets chirping the lonely lessons of the black, night sky.

A friend of mine recently removed all of the offensive parts of an advertisement that attempted to sell streetwear by suggesting violence to women and sex for power. I am quite proud of her. I would have wondered what would happen were I to be caught, because I am the most unlucky person I know and this sort of thing happens to me. But anyway, she has inspired to me to take more risks for my beliefs and self-esteem.

At the risk of sounding like a prude, I am tired of sex cropping up everywhere.... Selling things, especially. But even becoming so "cuturally significant." Even the name of the program I run is a takeoff on a cable show that I guess has a great deal to do with sex and relationships. I�ve never seen it because I do not watch television, unless I am ill. Needless to say, Quinn and I are cable-free, and it isn�t that I am completely industrious, I would just rather close my eyes while laying on the couch and listen to some big piece of music. So I would end up having to somehow relate to the pun, knowing enough to know it is there and to hope that people don�t think I made it up. I think we all know that the Esquire loves this show and made up the name in an attempt to be hip and with it. Kind of like her Pat Benetar top and her Joan Jet pants ensemble that she wore today.

So I am a prude who cannot stand the sound of crickets prattling on into the night. The sound of them reminds me of a long bus trip I once took with a shrill-voiced woman sitting next to me, narrating into a tape recorder, for hours, all of the painfully obvious details that would not register in most people�s minds. This voyage was not some poetic odyssey for her, but more of a lonely reflex to curate her short-term memory.

Sometimes I wonder about all of the stuff that gets lodged into my brain unintentionally. Is there a giant sorting process that has been keeping me awake? Sending me to work early because I am unable to sleep anyway? Or is it just the turning of the season and my sense of anxiety over whether I really have it what it takes to be the person I want to be. I suppose I will find out in November, when it all dies down.

I love the early winter, when the ground becomes slightly crunchy in the morning. When I can step out onto the porch and see my breath. I love having a reason to fold my arms across my chest, to shiver just a bit at the sound of the wind outside. Fall, by necessity, is fast. Like a popular party guest, just as it arrives it is leaving, heading south to another festivity. And it returns after a long reflection, to undo the end it wrought and bring new green sprouts up out of the dull, cold earth. Spring, leaves before it even gets through the front door it seems�.

We have not even had fall yet, and I am looking forward to winter. That is exactly how tired I am of being hot and sweaty.

Disturbance

I�m tired of crickets; they ruin the rain.
their carnival of cacophony
feeds the hungry red sky gaping outside
my window, waiting to consume me.

Even louder than big, banging drops
of rain, they storm with a primitive stride,
eroding my comfort,
washing discretion away.

They persist like bedsprings,
in the apartment above.
Excited by this late summer rain,
they rub faster and shriller.

The clock ticks off infinity
with brash, unmeasured clanks.
As the sheets scrape my body,
and the pillow feathers crunch,

I blanket myself with a sedative thought
of the world calming down to the quiet of frost.

10:42 p.m. - 2002-09-18

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