betterparentinginstitute.com

My phone vibrated. “Come dance with us,” the text read. My friend Matt was at a club a few blocks from my house.

The choice was not easy. My couch was very comfortable, I had just leveled up, and I don’t think I’d worn anything but underwear so far that entire day. But I decided a strapping young bachelor such as myself should be out meeting people and whatnot. I accepted and told him I’d be there in ten minutes. I lied. It probably took me ten minutes to conjure the energy to stand up. A good hour later, though, I made it there. Matt and I walked to the bar area, and I ordered myself a drink.

It didn’t quite work. Everybody on the dance floor still looked like pixelated Soviet soldiers. So I had a second drink. And a few shots. The night so far was going roughly as expected. I was dressed, out of the house, and experiencing Baltimore nightlife. I weigh approximately two pounds, and compounded by my drinking pace, I was already rather far gone.

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It was at this point that I had the single most awkward encounter of my entire life. I have said wrong things and humiliated myself more times than a wild bonobo on Viagra masturbates. I’m pretty sure at least six small-scale civil wars can be traced back to some moronic thing I did. But I picked this past Saturday night to transform into Michael-Cera-meets-one-of-those-assholes-from-Blind-Date awkward.

Her name was Teresa. She did nothing wrong whatsoever. In fact, she was attractive, cheerful, and easily approached me. “Hi, I know you!” she shouted over the loudspeaker’s roar.

Now, unfortunately, I did not recognize her. At all. Maybe I just met her a long time ago and it slipped my mind. Maybe—and this is more likely—sitting down all day on a sustenance of potato chips and Pepsi followed by running down to a club and downing three alcoholic beverages obliterated my long-term memory. We all run into situations like that sometimes though! All I had to do was play it off. “Yes, of course! How are you?” I could have shouted back. In fact, I could have even been honest. “Ah, it must have been a while. Teresa, you said? You do look really familiar!”

But no. Anywhere I go in public becomes the Chernobyl of social situations.

“Whaa… are you sure?” I decried, as though I were some jackass celebrity talking down to the naïve fan who dared approach me in public.

dailydamocles.wordpress.com

She was taken aback. As she should have been. Her eyebrows squished together and a look of absolute hate glazed over her eyes. That should have been my cue to apologize immediately. But no, I pressed on as though I were three awkward sentences away from dropping a roofie in her drink.

“Where did we meet?” I asked the humble bar-crawler who was audacious enough to try and make a new friend.

She stumbled trying to recall. “Uh… it was a bar that had that monkey picture on the wall….” She huffed each word, upset that every second talking to me could be a moment spent with absolutely anyone else in the building. I was convinced she had me confused for someone else, though, and I had to prove it. “I don’t think I’ve ever been in a bar with a monkey on the wall,” I scowled. “Maybe you’re thinking of someone else?”

somethingelsetodistractme.blogspot.com

By now she was downright annoyed. “Don’t worry about it,” she said, eager to get away. But I would have none of it!

“No, no, really, who are you?”
“You’re friends with Danielle… and Jenn… right?” she asked.
“Yeah…”
“Yeah, that was you.”

I should have apologized now. For making her feel uncomfortable. For embarrassing her. For belittling a friendly gesture. But nope. I was steadfastly convinced that she was talking to the wrong person, and the three ounces of whiskey making its way through my bloodstream was having it no other way.

“What’s my name, then?”

I actually quizzed a near-stranger on my name after I spent five minutes reminding her how little I remembered her. At this point, my irreverent, inebriated self finally started becoming aware of the torture I was inflicting on poor, innocent Teresa. I could see her trying to leave. She was itching to make eye contact with anyone else she recognized, and she was backing away from me as though I smelled like a bedsheet from a Ron Jeremy film.

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Trying desperately to redeem myself, I strained to come up with small talk. “So how did you meet Danielle?” “What brings you here tonight” But it was futile. She ran away the moment she was free from my shackles of awkward.

Well, Teresa, I hope the gods of WordPress somehow direct you here. I spent the rest of the night upset that I would treat anyone, let alone one of Danielle’s friends, like that. In fact, here was how the rest of my night played out.

Anyone: Richard, let’s dance! I love this song!
Me: Wait, wait, I’m freaking out. Where’s Teresa? Oh God, I was so rude.

Or, when they didn’t want to dance,

Anyone: Let’s sit and have a drink.
Me: Okay. But wait, I’m freaking out. Where’s Teresa? Oh God, I was so rude.

Somewhere in the world, some gauche teenage kid got laid like 50 times to balance out global karma.

The legal reasoning course was taught by the same professor as my previous year’s U.S. law course. This one, however, was a small discussion-based forum where we discussed a series of readings and cases. At first, I felt handicapped, having a remarkably limited background in politics or law. Eventually though, it became apparent that politics is just what you call it when people talk with enough conviction to conceal their actual ignorance. I still usually lost debates that involved knowing domestic policy, but I quickly caught up to having an adequate awareness of the legal system.

blawgletter.typepad.com

One memorable class took place when the professor had us all read a case involving a legally questionable use of medicinal marijuana. We debated the legality and ethics of the case and largely kept our personal opinions at bay. Not one student though. I forgot his name, but he seemed seedy, so I’ll call him Kael. Kael launched into an argument that floored our poor teacher. “Ya see, this is what I’m talkin’ ’bout. You can’t jus’ go buy an eighth ’a weed for 30 dollars, 40 dollars, e’en 50 dollars an’ go tellin’ everyone ’bout it. This man din’t do nuttin’, he was jus’ sick. I wouln’t say nuttin’ to someone who was jus’ sick. He prolly bought a G or two, meb’ three or four Gs, an’ he prolly paid, oh, 20 or 30 bucks fo’ it. In fact, because he was caught, he prolly paid more—40 or 50 bucks fo’ it. Now that’s jus’ too much.” When he was done, I’m certain he did not name a single detail of the case, discuss the ethics of medicinal marijuana, or even give the slightest indication he was coherent enough the previous night to read an essay. Someone in or out of law school, please reassure me these people don’t make it that far.

coolchaser.com

Kael has nothing to do with my story though. Actually, Kael and I became friends. We had a mutual fondness for rambling on about nothing for hours. The bane of my legal reasoning class ended up being a short blonde girl named Darcy. She was a bit overweight, wore wiry John Lennon glasses, and spoke with a growl that was unpleasant but, for the most part, tolerable. Throughout most of the year, we had no bitter feelings toward each other. In fact, at times, we were downright friends. We shared a coffee a few times before class, and we gossiped about Kael whenever he was hazily distracted by shiny objects. We were paired together in our class’ final project, and initially, we were excited about it.

For the project, the professor had us all read a lengthy case involving a man accidentally shooting, but not killing, another man. The case had a number of fine legal points, at least as fine as a single undergraduate course could allow: whether the court should admit certain evidence, whether the case remains within a particular jurisdiction, and so on. My class was paired off, and we were each instructed to defend one of the point’s sides. The professor had a friend who worked as an actual judge who was going to preside over our undergraduate tomfoolery. The judge would determine, from an unbiased standpoint, who was most convincing. Darcy and I were assigned opposite sides of perhaps the most interesting question: was the gunman guilty? Darcy had to prove him guilty, and I had to prove him not guilty.

thepoliticalcarnival.net

After class, Darcy and I were walking back to our dorms, and I ran an idea by her. “Would you want to meet up one night and practice? We could each pretend we’re talking to the judge, give our arguments and counterarguments, and make our cases stronger.” Darcy agreed, thinking it would be helpful. After all, nothing huge was at stake. Winning the argument did not influence our grade in the class, and no man’s freedom was truly being determined. What was the harm in strengthening our speeches? We decided on a night and time to meet.

I spent the next couple of weeks working out my arguments. The professor specifically told us not to attempt actual legal research. In other words, we were not supposed to try and track down prior cases or laws. Instead, we had to use a few legal details she supplied us, cases from previous classes, and pure logical reasoning. Even after all these years, I remember there was reason to believe the defendant did not know the bullet would actually hit the plaintiff. To prove the shooter not guilty, I thought of an analogy. Say you became extremely upset one day and recklessly fired a gun into a wall of your own home. However, someone was walking around outside of your home, on your property, and happened to be in the way of the bullet. If you hit him, is it your fault? It was a neat way to personalize the case and call into question whether the shooter was at fault. I liked it so much, in fact, that I decided to begin my argument with it.

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Eventually, it was time for Darcy and me to meet, and we agreed on a room in her dormitory’s basement. We went through our usual routine of gossiping about Kael behind his back and complaining about the general plight of the vagabond twentysomething. I proposed that we get started, and both of us sat down on the opposite sides of a long rickety table. We took out our copies of the case and our notes so far and spread them out in front of us. I volunteered to go first and stood up. I paused a second and eased my gaze into Darcy’s eyes. I craned my chin up, hunched my shoulders back and began. “Say you became extremely upset one day and recklessly fired a gun….”

There was no use continuing. The idea of talking to an imaginary judge was comic gold to Darcy. She started laughing hysterically, her cheeks turning a purplish red, and her glasses cocked towards the end of her nose. I knew practicing a mock trial in a dormitory basement was not exactly a matter of grave importance, but I still wanted to get through this. “Calm down, Darcy! You’ll have to speak soon too, you know!” I was beginning to see the sinister side of Darcy. She threw herself onto the table, her laughs turning into high-pitched wails and her ears becoming the same hue as her cheeks. I began to feel embarrassed, as though if I looked down, I would suddenly realize I was naked from the waist down.

At first, I tried to handle this as though a rambunctious nine-year-old kid were trying to disrupt me. “Okay, okay, I know this is ridiculous,” I said calmly, “but we’re going to be doing this in a few days anyway.” It took a few seconds, but she straightened her back, and her laughs turned into a few involuntary pops, similar to a pot of water on the verge of boiling. I smiled at her, trying to ease the awkwardness, and began again. “Say you became extremely upset one day and recklessly fired a gun….”

The outburst of laughter erupted like a volcano, swallowing my dignity with an endless flow of ridicule-tinged lava. Her glasses were now fogged with tears, and her entire face was instantly a deep crimson, seemingly unable to control spasms of snickers and grumbles. “Fine!” I shouted, with a mixture of anger and resignation. “Why don’t you go first, and I’ll follow you?” As I waited for her to wipe tears off her cheeks and adjust her glasses, she hiccupped “Okay, I’ll try” in between restrained chortles.

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As I hesitantly lowered myself on my chair, she stood up. Her body was practically shaking, and there was still color throughout her face, but finally, she made a concerted effort to stop laughing. She adjusted the sheet of notes in front of her and cleared her throat. “Okay, your honor, I would like to…,” and then she stopped. She could no longer speak, and the pent-up laughter roared out of her while she fell down onto her chair. Her notes flew out of her hand, and she had to catch her glasses as they tumbled off her convulsing face and nearly crashed onto the floor. Her laughs were now unrestrained shrieking outbursts.

We continued like this for another fifteen minutes. I did eventually make it through around a third of my speech, but that was all. Eventually, we admitted there was no use continuing. She never learned what cases reminded me of this one, and she never heard my argument for why the person who was shot should be held liable. Similarly, I never heard a single one of her thoughts. Instead, I mostly learned that Darcy was a bumbling idiot.

Or so I thought, anyway. Several days later we had the mock trial. The professor elected me to speak first, and I walked up to the podium and greeted her friend. “Good afternoon, your honor,” I began. “Say you became extremely upset one day and recklessly fired a gun….” I half-expected Darcy to roll over laughing during my opening speech, but she didn’t. She remained calm and emotionless, nervous even, and she spent most of her time jotting down notes and preparing her own arguments. I finished my speech, the judge thanked me, and I returned to my seat next to Darcy. It was her turn now.

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“Welcome, your honor. The claimant mentioned an analogy where you fire a gun in your own house and accidentally shoot someone on your property.” I froze. She knew my analogy, the crux of my argument, and had days to prepare a rebuttal. “Although, what if,” she continued, “he was no stranger, but instead someone you knew and had reason to assume might be on your property.” Not only had she prepared a counterargument, but she had found a good one. She had thought through my analogy, found a way that it differed from our case, and exploited it for all it was worth.

I wanted to scream to the judge, “You don’t understand! Darcy’s not actually clever! In fact, she’s an idiot with the self-control of a chimpanzee! She only had a good argument because she knew mine in advance!” Unfortunately, I doubted that the teacher would approve of us sharing arguments, even if it was ultimately damning for me. Moreover, unlike Darcy, I had matured past the fourth grade. I accepted that I had just been played like a Neo Geo.

Needless to say, I lost the trial. Darcy’s gumption won her this round. The good news, though, is I suppose I had an early taste of the “real world.” I did not lose because I tried hard but fell to the better man. Rather, I lost because I trusted someone and got laughed at. I think this is also why most bills never become law.

videogamecritic.net

Most of the world doesn’t know about him yet, but they should. Because he looks like this.

Because he is a living, breathing, walking pile of awesome. Because he sounds like this.

He’s listened patiently while I was upset, and he’s gabbed endlessly when I was happy. I’ve swallowed my pride when he found other guys, and he’s understood when I did, too.

Over two months ago, I asked him, “What should my next blog be about?” David’s response: “Me.” My promise: “Okay.”

Then, over the past months, I wrote so many scratch blog post ideas that I could start a Library of Congress of Partial-David Blogs. The ideas ranged from kitschy to high art. Cartoon; biography; metaphor; poetry. The only break I took from my next-blog-post-must-be-about-David was when that Kael guy messaged me. I couldn’t ignore that. But it came and went and I was determined to stick to my promise.

If David has one flaw, it is this: He lives in Tennessee. Thus, as much as I have wanted to forget about anyone else, it was a scary proposition. Oh, one more flaw: He’s allergic to cats. But nobody’s perfect.

Over the past few months, he’s inspired me. To write:

When you open your mouth to sing,/ It’s as though a rookery of herons and birds:/ Buttonquails, ospreys, and Jamaican owls,/ All joined in a chorus of zeal and passion;/ Each one listening with his wing/ Perched at beak to harmonize in octaves and thirds,/ Weaving a tapestry as breathtaking as/ Fine silks of an Oscar de la Renta fashion.

To draw:

And to compose:

And I don’t-really-care-if-you-like-these-or-not because they’re not for you.  I owe this blog post to myself; I have gone so long without writing one because I would neither break a promise nor settle for anything imperfect. I owe it to the select few desperate folk who read my blog; I have not posted in quite some time. Most of all, though, I owe it to David; I spent last weekend with him in Nashville and, honestly, it was one of the greatest weekends of my life.

Then I read the comment. First, I am going to reproduce it uncensored and in its entirety before I rip the author to shreds. For the purposes of addressing this person, I am going to assume it’s a guy and his name is Kael. Not only does Kael sound like a name that could only belong to an annoying jerk, it’s also the first name of one of Faded Paper Figures’ bandmates, and that just seems like a band Kael listens to.

You are so annoying.  There is such a thing as bad music, and some people don’t spend half their fucking life chatting on the internet so that’s why they ask…okay, what the fuck do you want to talk about now, I have to go.   I love how you of all people act like you’re some expert on social etiquette, or you criticize people for being condescending douche bags, then write a blog bashing people in bars for having a good time as if you’re better.    Go fuck yourself.  Lady Gaga fucking sucks… your self-righteous opinions are nauseatingly fucking annoying.

First off Kael, and most importantly, this is the Internet. That means if you take anything to heart, you’re an idiot. This is the same Internet that treats Glenn Beck and Hilary Clinton as rough political equals. This is the same Internet where some three-toothed Alabama recluse can start a webpage on white supremacy and garner a following. This is the same Internet where a girl can become a pop superstar for being frustratingly unsure over which car seat to take.

“You are so annoying.”

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You reference at least three of my blog posts over the course of your tirade. If I’m so annoying, why did you read so many? Why didn’t you read one, get annoyed, and close the window? Thank you for being inspired by me.

“There is such a thing as bad music, and some people don’t spend half their fucking life chatting on the internet so that’s why they ask…okay, what the fuck do you want to talk about now, I have to go.”

mixedmediawatch.com

There is such a thing as bad music. I agree with you. I just claim there’s a difference between what you don’t like and what’s bad. To be honest, I would give more deference to a half-retarded chicken’s musical tastes than yours, but you’re still entitled to listen to whatever you please. And as far as spending half my life chatting on the Internet, it’s only half of my waking life, thank you very much. I don’t typically go online in my sleep, although perhaps science will fix that one day.

Also, you suck at writing.

“I love how you of all people act like you’re some expert on social etiquette, or you criticize people for being condescending douche bags, then write a blog bashing people in bars for having a good time as if you’re better.”

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For the record, he’s referring to this blog post on social etiquette and this blog post on bar life. Kael, you also suck at recognizing satire. In case your IQ hasn’t caught up to your shoe size yet, I am clearly a bit foreign to things like “partying,” “sex,” and “happiness.” I’m not better than the average bar slum, I’m worse. While they’re out enjoying life, I’m busy writing sarcastic-but-clearly-not-sarcastic-enough blog posts about them. Who’s condescending now, bitch?

“Go fuck yourself.  Lady Gaga fucking sucks… your self-righteous opinions are nauseatingly fucking annoying.”

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I do have an actual point to make out of this. The Internet could be a fantastic medium for debate. Buried beneath Kael’s horribly-written prose is a tiny hint of legitimate dialogue. What makes music bad, for example. Or, In what ways does Lady Gaga succeed artistically? Is satire on social grace by default condescending? Does piling on a comma splice and “I have to go” make any sense whatsoever? These could be online editorials or beginnings of forum threads. With the entire Internet at one’s disposal for research and a shield of anonymity dissolving superficial judgments on age or race, substantive conversation could take place.

Instead, Kael fails to support a single thing he says, except perhaps for his utterly genius take on social etiquette and condescension. Why does Lady Gaga “fucking suck,” Kael? Because you say so? Go choke on rat poison.

Jolly Green Giant + Princess Leia = Scott

The bus ride was uneventful, save the woman sitting next to me. She seemed friendly, and we didn’t exchange any harsh words—a feat facilitated by headphones firmly lodged in my ears, even if I had no music playing. However, she only had a single bus ticket. This was problematic, as she considerably exceeded the width of a single bus seat. Moreover, she compounded the problem by napping in a jagged, horizontal position that occupied the entirety of her seat and around half of mine.

She apologized, which I appreciated, but it wasn’t for her galactic girth. Rather, she apologized for her purse that she had casually tossed behind her, which was digging into my right thigh. After apologizing, she half-unconsciously ruffled her hand behind her, attempting to move it to a more convenient location. Trying to move the purse though was about as effective as trying to edit a Michael Bay-directed romantic comedy. Every time she moved the purse, it eventually settled right back to where it started, further digging into my leg, accompanied by a witty quip to win my love, a character flaw that tests the love, a change of heart that cements the love, and an exploding Range Rover. The annoyance was temporary though; a memoir on the Cuban Missile Crisis, one of the Twilight movies, and a Britney Spears album later, I was in New York. The trip would have been especially appropriate if I were a dancing Soviet vampire.

robertpattinsonwho.com

It was a few minutes before 2 o’clock, and making it uptown to Martha’s concert was doable. Unfortunately, the New York metro system is a labyrinth of one-way traps and confusing words like “via” and “Brooklyn,” and I initially boarded the wrong train. I did manage to realize my mistake quickly and arrive with Scott near the venue, but it was already past 3 o’clock by then. We had to choose between walking in 30 minutes late or waiting to see her afterwards. We chose the latter, out of respect to the performers and a persistent disquietude of arriving anywhere late. In retrospect, I regret that decision, but I had no idea how long the concert was. I’ve been on the other end of concert latecomers and have pulled every passive-aggressive trick I could conjure: the death-stare, the hushed gossiping, and the eye-roll-combined-with-an-obviously-dissatisfied-grimace.

Our decision was finalized once we resigned ourselves back to the metro and returned downtown. We decided to pass time at the Metropolitan Museum of Art while Martha’s concert finished. I could have kicked myself when, a good bit past 3 o’clock, I received a text from Martha: “It’s intermission now! Come on back!” Clearly, the concert was plenty long to accommodate our tardy tomfoolery. We were a 15-minute metro ride away now though, and even with serendipitous timing, we would have been every bit as late to the second half as we were to the first. I apologized and felt as defeated as Charlie Sheen after his inaugural Detroit performance.

I hope Martha knows I love her at least as much as the that episode of Seinfeld where the bakery sells only muffin tops but nobody is willing to take all the muffin bottoms.

Not long after Scott and I had entered the museum, we decided to split up and see whichever exhibits best caught each of our individual interests. Scott probably looked at Greek art, European Realism, and other signs of culture. I was mostly interested in parking myself on a bench and playing the Which-Tourist-Is-the-Dumbest game. It’s a fun game, and there’s really no winner, but my life improves a little bit every time I see a middle-aged parent with a backpack and Disney World t-shirt walk an exaggerated arc around a large black man dressed in rainbows and pleather. Sadly, Scott interrupted my game when he called me about an hour after Martha’s text. “Richard, I screwed up. Our tickets for tomorrow are to New York, not from New York. And all bus tickets are sold out for tomorrow.”

Fortunately, when one subsists off leftover pizza and public transit, one excels at thrift. Scott and I collectively earn about 3 dollars a year, so when we buy bus tickets to New York, what we lack in detail we make up for in thoroughness. BoltBus, a Dallas-based bus company, offers the first available seat in every bus ride for one dollar. Scott receives updates when it releases new dates, and we go on a shopping spree. As part of our last binge, not only did we have incorrect tickets for the following day but we also had correct tickets for that evening. Our overnight trip became a day trip. This meant I had to call Morgan and Ari, two Brooklyn housemates who had agreed to house us, and let them know we no longer needed their apartment for the night. Once again, my life was an abject failure; they had planned a brunch-and-shopping date for the following morning.

Morgan and Ari

Scott and I finished our day with a walk through Central Park and cheeseburgers around 71st street. It was a stretch from our original plans, but enjoyable nonetheless. After dinner, we made our way back down to where the bus picks us up and returns to Baltimore. My seating companion on the ride back, while considerably fitter than my morning neighbor, was icier than the Aletsch Glacier. I sat down and began the ride by being friendly: “Would you like me to put any of your stuff in the overhead compartment?” Usually, the response is either “yes, please” or “no, thank you.” I was not expecting Queen Frostine to reply, “why, is it bothering you?” It was time to isolate myself in a world of former presidents and vampire-werewolf clashes.

The bus stopped once at a rest stop in Delaware. The bus driver only granted us 10 minutes, but that was all I needed to witness a uniquely American brand of stupidity. I wanted to snack on some frozen yogurt from TCBY, and there was an 11- or 12-year old boy in front of me in line. He wore his hair in an aimlessly gelled bob, ensured all his clothes had ostentatious designer labels embroidered on them, and spoke in uncomfortable sentence fragments that reeked of a misplaced sense of superiority. God, this kid annoyed me. Clearly, he was superior to no one, seeing as how he was in Delaware. Nobody has an excuse to be in Delaware besides Joe Biden and that struggling writer from Melrose Place.

blogs.babble.com/famecrawler

He pointed to a sign behind the cashier and barked, “Can I have that?” It was a thin waffle cone filled just to the brim with chocolate frozen yogurt. The cashier pointed to a display of cones behind him, somewhat resembling the one in the picture, and asked if that would suffice.

“Yeah, sure, whatever,” the child slumped.
“What flavor do you want? Chocolate or vanilla?”
“Do you have twist?”

The cashier nodded yes, and the boy insisted on rainbow sprinkles on top. The cashier dutifully opened the display case, removed one of the cones, and slathered a generous swirl of chocolate-and-vanilla yogurt into it, easily overflowing past the top of the cone. He spooned a heap of multicolored sprinkles on top, crafting a concoction sure to please anyone with operational taste buds. Personally, I would have put in a teaspoon of yogurt, added a single sprinkle, preferably green, the color of poison, and handed it back to him, saying, “Here, this one’s on me. Now use those 5 dollars to pay a tailor to tear the knockoff Dolce & Gabbana label off your ill-fitting jeans.” In case you don’t share my hatred yet, this was the actual conversation that followed.

“Are you kidding me?” the boy asked.
“What do you mean?”
“This looks nothing like the picture.”
“You said you wanted that cone.”
“But yeah, this is so… so big. Look how much less is in the picture.”

Let me reiterate that, in case you missed it. A preteen boy, whose metabolism inherently runs faster than Timothy Leary running from an imaginary purple tiger, is upset because the ice cream man gave him too much ice cream. There is no way I could eat this, he thought. I will grant this kid the benefit of the doubt . Maybe a former TCBY employee molested him when he was younger, and he has turned frivolously throwing away the company’s resources into some lifetime revenge plot. Or, maybe he believed that through some past health reform bill, United States legislation obligates its citizens to eat everything they purchase. I can think of no other explanation for his next utterance: “I can’t eat all this. Can you make another?”

blog.cherihardaway.com

For a moment, I witnessed a genuine reaction in the cashier. Something along the lines of, “Is this really worth 8 bucks an hour?” But he was a loyal employee—a much more loyal one than I would have been. After the initial shock, he responded as if this brat actually had a point.

“Oh? Oh! I see. Sure, I can try again.”

He tossed the entire confection into the trash, retrieved another cone, and filled it again, only this time with slightly less ice cream. He spooned another heap of sprinkles on top and offered it back to the boy.

“Is this better?”
“Uh, yeah. I guess.”

In this boy’s mind, he was running a multinational corporation and demanding nothing but perfection for his hurting shareholders. He handed the cashier his credit card—scratch that, his daddy’s credit card—and made sure he drove his point home.

“This really is false advertising,” he sighed loudly.

The cashier smiled, his eyes likely glazed over from recreational drugs he nestled before going to work at a truck stop ice cream shop. He swiped the card, watched the budding CEO humph and grump about while the system read it, and then handed it back. I was next in line. “I’ll, uh, just have a cup of chocolate please.” And even though I didn’t, I wish I had continued, “and can you make it look exactly like that other picture over there, please?”

For about half the trip, we had six Israelis staying with us—five soldiers and one student. Among the soldiers was a girl named Lotem. She had big, wavy hair, a bigger voice, and an even bigger personality. If you are within earshot of her when she’s talking, which is every moment in the history of the universe, then you have already been introduced to her. My first real introduction to her, however, was while spending a night in Bedouin tents. Mind you, this was tourist Bedouin, not actual Bedouin. The Bedouins there provided us with central heating, sleeping bags and mattresses, and, well, a gift shop. Nevertheless, we did have to sleep surrounded by dozens of other people, and our itinerary had us waking up at 5 o’clock the following morning.

Inside the Bedouin tent, Sarah writing something presumably of far better quality than my blog.

By around midnight, the string of short nights was taking effect, and I decided to try for some sleep. I was itching to stay outside, talk to people from neighboring groups, and enjoy an unusually warm night in the desert. But I knew I’d be thankful the next day for the little extra rest. Falling asleep was no easy task though. I accounted for campfires, guitar playing, and whispers; I did not account for Lotem.

Person A: (whispering) Hey, pss, Lotem, how much time do you have left in the army here?
Person B: (whispering) Yeah, do you like it there?
Lotem: I HAVE ONE YEAR LEFT, AND I LOVE IT. DO YOU KNOW MY NAME? MY NAME IS LOTEM. I LOVE ALL OF YOU!
Person A: (whispering) Shh, shh, keep it down. People are trying to sleep!
Lotem: (whispering) Oh okay, I’m sorry. (accidentally changing her volume to a mind-numbing scream) I’LL TALK QUIETER NOW.

I gave up and hung out with Lotem. She sounded more fun than sleeping. And now, thanks to my decision, somewhere out there is a video of our corner of the tent inadvertently proclaiming “Richard is a beautiful woman” in Hebrew. That night, I’m pretty sure at least twelve people gave me the look of shut-the-hell-up-Richard-or-I’m-going-to-kill-you. Whatever, it was Lotem’s fault.

Lotem doing the Soulja Boy.

It was not until several hours into our Lotem shout-a-thon that I finally retired into my Bedouin-approved stack of mattresses and tried to sleep again. Approximately six microseconds later, our guides stormed the tents and woke us up. It was already 5 o’clock. The Bedouins generously provided us a breakfast of half a saltine and a teaspoon of hot tea, and we hobbled to our waiting bus. The driver then trekked for around 30 minutes to the bottom of Masada, an ancient fortress where the Jews once got all suicide-y when the Romans started invading. None of us had slept, the sky was horribly overcast, and I was pretty sure that, by the hundredth step, we had already traversed the distance between Earth and Neptune. Lotem made staying awake easier though. “HEY EVERYONE, AFTER WE GET BACK, WHO WANTS TO GET SOME DINNER? GOD, I AM SO TIRED. WHERE ARE THE BATHROOMS? I AM LOTEM!”

We made it to the peak slightly before dawn, and our guides led us to small promontory so we could see the sun rise from the top of Masada. To be fair, “see the sun rise” is an overstatement. We actually saw a small dot of light through the clouds that might have been the sun or might also have been the moon, an airplane, or a Jewish, glowing Superman. As the day passed, it warmed up, we summoned whatever energy we could, and we began to enjoy the ancient ruins. At one of the highest points of Masada, just by where King Herod once slept, per another group member’s idea, I pocketed two rocks. I figured they would find a good use later.

At the top of Masada

The trip planners were a special breed of evil sometimes. Walking up Masada was exhausting, but manageable. It was a straight shot up one side of the hill, and even though conquering it felt like seven lifetimes, it was in reality only 20 or 30 minutes. However, we did not walk back the same way. We took the “Snake Path,” which is probably Hebrew for “We know you Americans don’t exercise, so here’s some old-fashioned Biblical torture.” I drew a diagram to explain the difference between the two hikes. The top image is our ascent, and the bottom one is our descent.

Now fast-forward to much later that night, after a long shower, an even longer nap, and enough water to alter the salinity of the Dead Sea. Our guides took all of us to downtown Jerusalem and treated us to a completely unsupervised night. Lotem’s gregariousness had advantages. She called a friend and landed the entire group complimentary entry to Konstantine, a local nightclub. Out of 39 people in the group, an unbelievable 36 of us all managed to find our way to the same club. To an Israeli, it was probably a horrifying sight. Three dozen Americans invaded their domain, started dancing like rabid spider monkeys, and it wasn’t even 11 o’clock. No matter though, we managed to eke two Lady Gaga tracks out of the DJ.

As I mentioned, Lotem was not the only Israeli with us. There was another soldier with her named Ofir. He was tall with warm eyes, a chiseled jaw, and an easy future as a Calvin Klein model if he should ever be so inclined. Moreover, he spoke English better than Noam Chomsky. There was almost no trace of an Israeli accent, and I wish I could hire him as my permanent translator.

Me: Uhh… uhhh… I’d like that, um, chicken dish with ham and… stuff.
Ofir (as translator): My friend would like the chicken cordon bleu.
Me: Yeah. Uh, do you have that grape-but-not-grape-colored tangy stuff?
Ofir (as translator): What chardonnay would you recommend with it?

Unfortunately, Ofir had one crippling disability: heterosexuality. As of yet, there’s no cure, but I’m not the kind of person who judges someone based solely on an untreatable illness. I decided to look past his obvious shortcoming and briefly shared a dance with him at the club. We may have been within walking distance of the Holy City, but some things are truly important to capture permanently on film. “Just one second, Ofir,” I pled as I fumbled for my camera. “Okay, now smile like this isn’t awkward!”

Greatest moment in the history of photography.

For about half the nights, we concluded the evening by regressing to kindergarten. We sat around in a circle, shared our thoughts for the day, and finished our pow-wow by reducing the day to one high moment and one low moment. I may own a Hello Kitty pillow and a small tube of wearable glitter, but I’m still a boy. That means I don’t share my feelings. I bottle them up and turn them into bad poetry and domestic violence. I found it hard to take this high-low game very seriously. “Well, my low was probably finding out what the female breast feels like.” I waited for the laughter to subside so I could make sure everyone could hear my high. “And my high was getting photographic proof that I, in fact, danced with Ofir.” Laughter from everyone. Except Ofir probably.

We kept going around the circle, and after eight or nine people, it was Ofir’s turn. “I have two highs,” Ofir started. His first high was unimportant because it didn’t involve me. “The second high,” he continued, “is learning that Richard’s high was dancing with me.” It was so sweet I almost contracted an acute, but treatable, case of type 2 diabetes. Later in the circle, someone mentioned a high involving Ofir’s girlfriend. I waited a beat and interjected, exasperated, “Wait! You have a girlfriend?” Thank you everyone, I’ll be here all night.

Israeli graffiti is delicious.

There were, of course, countless other stories I could recount from the trip: not sleeping in order to watch the Super Bowl, being ordered to stop dancing on a Tel Aviv bar counter, or singlehandedly solving the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. (One of those didn’t happen.) However, to end my Israel reflections, I choose to highlight the one brief moment where I actually felt proud of my Judaism and sincerely thankful I went on the trip. And it did not happen while we were in Israel.

The very evening that I arrived back in Baltimore, I called my parents. It wasn’t too late—maybe 5 o’clock. I told them I would love to get dinner, show them pictures, and talk about the trip if they were free. They were, my brother joined them, and the four of us met at a quiet restaurant downtown. Before I even mentioned details of where I had been, my mom confessed that she had always wanted to scale Masada. Because of several battles with health, however, we both knew that adventure was unlikely. Not long afterwards though, I produced the two rocks I took from Masada’s peak and handed one to each of my parents. “Here. I know you’ll probably never have a chance to see it yourself, so at the very least, I tried to bring it to you.” My Jewish identity may be tenuous at best, but for a moment, I was happy to have one.

Because I’m a self-serving jackass, I’m sure I’ll eventually advertise this blog post on Facebook. Moreover, because I’m Facebook friends with nearly everyone who went on the trip with me, I should probably explain why I waited almost two months to write this entry. Basically, it comes down to sensory overload. Here is a normal day for me in Baltimore:

• Work.
• Get home from work.
• Make super brilliant awesome plans.
• Ditch plans so I can play video games and watch reruns of That’s So Raven.
• Sleep.

Here was a day in Israel:

• Wake up ungodly early.
• Do stuff.
• Do more stuff.
• Be social.
• Do even more stuff.
• Sleep for like 8 minutes before having to repeat.

buddytv.com

Normally, all that needs to happen for me to have another idiotic, rambling blog post is dinner with a friend. “Wow, okay, everyone, you’re never going to believe this. Jill called me, and we ate chicken together. Chicken! I wonder if it was free range.” Thus, after spending 10 days with 40 people in a foreign country and actually doing something every day, just trying to reduce everything to a single blog post was too much for my brain to handle.

Realistically, unless I feel like writing a 76-part blog post (this post will have two), recounting everything that happened is too ambitious of an endeavor. Not to mention, reading your toothpaste ingredients would probably bore you less. However, it was beginning to feel too strange that I maintain a personal blog with nary a single mention of the trip. So it’s about time I recount a few stories from the trip, beginning with one from Ein Gedi, a spring not too far from Jerusalem. We may have climbed mountains, seen museums, and toured landmarks from three major religions, but I received a wholly unexpected education while touring Ein Gedi. And it started out so innocently.

This dude was chilling on top of a car when we got to Ein Gedi.

My tour group had walked through a maze of outcrops, mosses, and streams, eventually winding up at a thin, steep waterfall, advertised as Ein Gedi’s highlight. There was a flurry of wholly predictable photographs taken all around us, and a lot of people gathered on the tops of nearby rocks for some harmless touristy shots. Meanwhile, I was busy announcing that the top of the waterfall looked remarkably like a portion of the Draenei’s starting zone in World of Warcraft. I could feel my coolness skyrocketing as I snapped a few dozen photos of the same crevice near the top of the falls.

There has to be SOMEONE else who sees it.

Eventually, I decided having friends is a good thing in life, so I stopped taking those pictures. At that point, three nearby people in the group—Sarah, Anait, and Ben—and I took our turn on top of a particularly well-placed rock so we could get our requisite waterfall-in-the-background shot. Unfortunately, the rock was not particularly wide, and it was slippery from the surrounding mist.

Anait lost her footing and began to slip forward. Being the chivalrous young man that I am, I reached out my arms and grabbed her torso to keep her from falling. Because I revel in heroic feats almost every moment of my life, I thought nothing of what I was doing. I did not even consider that the normal human reaction to my grip would be to use it to her leverage and position herself back on the rock. Instead she just lay there, frozen, and laughing.

In fact, as I was courageously risking my life to rescue her from a precipitous tumble, I noticed that she was not the only one laughing. Everyone at the bottom of the waterfall was laughing—the tour group, the guides, the nearby tourists of ambiguous Asian descent, everyone. It was at that point that I realized my right hand was positioned squarely on her right breast. Here I was, thinking I was Superman, unaware that Anait had two round pieces of Kryptonite secured under her bra.

Moments prior to disaster.

With my newly discovered heterosexual inclinations, I became thrown inside some Twilight Zone episode where the entire middle school ethos is reversed, and being called “straight” is an insult. (What I’d give to live in that world.) I had to endure this as everyone returned to our bus, and we began our 30-minute commute towards the Dead Sea. “So what was it like, Richard?” “Do you like girls now?” Fortunately, Anait laughed it off. I’m pretty sure though that she is still high off her brief stint with Richard-love.

By the time we reached the sea, I had not showered in well over 24 hours, my cleanliness further marred by my proximity to female glandular organs. Israel secures its beach locker rooms more than its customs secures borders. Once I got out of the bus, I had to pay for two vouchers to enter the gated locker room: one to enter and change and another to enter and dry off once I was finished. Luckily, the beach was completely empty. Sadly, this was because the temperature was 280 degrees below zero.

I don’t usually feel the “Well, this may be my only chance to do this” sentiment. Frankly, I think it’s dumb. If Alex Rodriguez went up to someone and asked to assault him with a baseball bat, the average person would not think, “Well, this may be my only chance to get beaten up by Alex Rodriguez.” I fail to see how “Well, this may be my only chance to swim half-naked in unbelievably salty water whose temperature is roughly what’s required to make molecules stop moving” is all that different. Anyway, I digress. Well, this was my only chance to swim in the Dead Sea. I changed into a swimsuit and strutted towards the water.

I now know that the Dead Sea’s beach is not like an ordinary beach. Instead of sand, there’s salt. Instead of shells, there’s salt. Instead of rocks, there’s salt—enormous, spiny salt formations, actually. By the time I finally made it to the water, I had lacerated every one of my toes and was hoping the spirit of the Holy Land was not a disease transferable through blood.

tripadvisor.com

The Dead Sea lived up to its reputation, and once I was sufficiently far from shore, the water rather forcefully kept me afloat. It was cool, I guess. If you like submerging yourself in freezing salt baths. I swam over to some other people in the group. One of them, a surly, blonde Army veteran named Danyul was lying in the water and kicked some of the water into the air. The water landed in my eye, and for a moment, I was certain there was no god. It was as if I had wandered into Denny’s at 2 in the morning, and the employees had converted the restaurant into a torture chamber. (Granted, finishing their Moons Over My Hammy already does that.) I was shackled to one of the dining room tables, and the waiters took turns, one-by-one, emptying entire salt shakers into my eyes. It was at that moment that I also became acutely aware that while my eyes were being doused with Hebrew salt, more salt was making its way into the cuts on my feet.

It did briefly cross my mind that by the time I could find a way out of the sea, I might be transformed into a quasi-Magneto, capable of extracting salt out of any substance with nothing but my mind. More noticeably though, I was flapping around like an epileptic 11-year-old girl at a Justin Bieber concert. Struggling and in immense pain, I reached the shore, which I had, until then, forgotten consisted of nothing but salt. I stumbled towards my towel and shirt, left a trail of blood and hate back to the dressing room, signaled for the attendant to accept my second changing room voucher, and took the most painful shower of my life.

To be fair though, there was much more to Israel than lessons in anatomy and abusive sea salt. In fact, some parts of Israel were simply amazing. For example, we had an Israeli accompanying us whose name was Ofir.

To be continued…

1. Write songs in a basement.
2. Find gigs, starting in inexpensive local venues and one day hoping to open for bands people had actually heard of.
3. Spend eight years’ income to get professionally recorded and press CDs (or cassette tapes or records).
4. Find enough gigs and sell enough albums, eventually, maybe, improbably, attract attention of someone capable of signing to a financed record label.
5. ?
6. Profit.

The negligible percentage of artists who completed that sequence succeeded in turning a hobby into a profession. (Paradoxically, many original fans lamented the transition from starving artist to successful musician and thus derisively dubbed the move “selling out.”)

Improvements in technology, along with the Internet, have changed everything. For one, it used to cost 75 dollars an hour to get recorded. Now, anyone can buy a 30-dollar microphone, download some cheap recording software, and record at his or her leisure. Similarly, there’s no need to press CDs. For better or worse, they are slowly becoming archaic, and a computer audio file is completely sufficient to market oneself and share one’s music. Moreover, not only are live gigs no longer a necessity, for certain genres of music, they’re an impossibility.

www.ranchstudio.com

Some effects are refreshing. For one, everyone listens to everything. Tastes still vary, and there are still plenty of condescending douchebags who demand that their musical tastes are superior to anyone who disagrees. However, if someone has, say, Phoenix on his iPod, he is just as likely to have Kanye West or Beethoven. I love that. I don’t even consider myself very old, but I can vividly remember being forced to pigeonhole my middle school identity to a strict genre of music. Moreover, I was only able to discover music if it was either local or signed to a major label. Now I can freely download, with ranging degrees of legality, anything from a ballad a shy teenage girl recorded in her basement to an album that a major label spent half a million dollars to create and market. Without analyzing the paradigm shift too much, if nothing else, it’s about time that any artist with a message can find an audience.

One change saddens me though. I miss the cover art. I thought about it while in Soundgarden, a used CD store not far from my apartment. I positioned myself in front of the rock aisle, squarely between the M and N columns. I first ran my index finger along a column of CDs, forcing all of the albums to lean away from me and exposing the frontmost cover: an urgent Morrissey caught mid-motion in front of a hapless sky, gracing his 1991 Kill Uncle solo album. I gripped the ridged crest of the plastic cover with my thumb and thwacked the next few albums towards me, exposing a new one, The Misfits’ 1997 American Psycho. Another thwack: My Chemical Romance. Madonna. No Doubt. The National. Alphabetization was haphazard at best, and each new album was accompanied by the familiar tsst of plastic cases colliding. The artists spanned decades of popular tastes, and every sound had a distinct image accompanying it.

uulyrics.com

Some covers were ornate and resonated with as much energy as the music it embodied; others were bleak, minimalistic, and understated. Some were iconic, others obscure. Most noticeable for me, however, was the nostalgia. This is how I used to browse music; the art was seen first and heard later. Some covers—like Nirvana’s Bleach or Rage Against the Machine’s Evil Empire—still bring back feelings of angst and adolescence. Others—like The Velvet Underground’s The Velvet Underground & Nico or The Clash’s London Calling—I know better than the music they contain.

There were even some albums that I bought for no reason other than their cover art. Thinking back, it really wasn’t that strange. The cost of a CD was about the cost of a small art print. When displaying my CDs, I always made sure my favorite covers were visible from some angle. Who says I couldn’t use them as decoration as well as entertainment?

rateyourmusic.com

One of my favorite albums was Marilyn Manson’s Smells Like Children, his sophomore endeavor. Critics dismissed it, and with good reason; it was an utterly average rock record. A few weeks back though, while generally angry at the world, I downloaded this album and played it in my car for a few days. The most striking part was that, despite the album being a vivid teenage memory, none of the songs was familiar, aside from its lone breakout single, a cover of Eurythmics’ “Sweet Dreams.” Instead, my memory of it is a horrifying green Manson silhouette, juxtaposed with a pink, childlike “Marilyn Manson” stamp, complete with a top hat planted above the first M. In fact, the entire album oozed rebellion and taboo, summarized with a “Parental Advisory: Explicit Content” label, which was a hot-button issue at the time. Just the words “Marilyn Manson” during the mid-90s evoked images of Columbine, self-mutilation, and sexual ambiguity. Even the reverse side of the album was intriguing. The track titles alternated between disgusting (“May Cause Discoloration of the Urine or Feces”) and obscene (“Fuck Frankie”). Profanity in the titles had asterisks in place of most of the letters, adding to the album’s intrigue. To this day, I maintain an enormous amount of respect for Manson. As a musician, he is mediocre at best. But as an artist, he is superb.

www.amazon.com

Sometimes the cover art became personal. I grew up on classical music, and it was not unusual to find, say, Haydn string quartets sandwiched between Nirvana and Marilyn Manson. Sometime around when hair started growing in weird places on my body, my parents took me to a Barnes & Noble in downtown Baltimore. I decided I was going to pick out a new classical album but couldn’t decide which one. While rock artists hire friends to make memorable avant-garde album covers, classical artists seem to think it’s fine to just get a picture of them smiling into a camera and looking mildly constipated. (It’s no surprise I had to conceal them with songs called “Fuck Frankie.”) However, one classical label, Seraphim Classics, adorned their album covers with portions of famous paintings. It’s still no urgent Morrissey, but it at least beats some guy holding an oboe and smiling as though he just consumed eight live humans.

Thumbing through Barnes & Noble’s rows of CDs, I found a recording of pianist Tzimon Barto playing Chopin preludes and nocturnes. To grace the cover, Seraphim Classics chose a painting called “Nocturne in the Parc Royal” by Impressionist painter William Degouve de Nuncques. The choice may have been superficial: Barto plays nocturnes, and the painting has nocturne in the title. The painting is a powerful one though. Just like a Chopin nocturne, at first glance, it is a tepid canvas of a single color. But when examined more closely, it sings stories of yearning and passion and despair. The scene looks familiar, lonely even, but it is also distinctly foreign. There are multiple moons and an arrangement of trees that could only exist in de Nuncques’ imagination. Even today, whenever I hear a Chopin prelude or nocturne, I can’t help but think of an expansive blue garden with a few trees in it. I have since given away or lost many of my CDs, but this one stays with me.

William Degouve de Nuncques "Nocturne in the Parc Royal"

Lest I sound like a grumbling old man who fears change, let me clarify that I have no problem with how many people create and consume music today. All things considered, as a kid who waited entire schooldays to finish downloading a 3 megabyte mp3 file, I welcome the convenience. But as someone who still has that antiauthority 16-year-old boy forever bottled up inside, I miss my creepy obscenity-laden Marilyn Manson album. Here’s hoping that someone who has barely bought a CD in his life reads this essay, ventures into a used CD store, and buys an album just because it looks cool.

www.irishindeed.com

The obvious way to celebrate that is to wear green and drink a lot. Duh. Thus, St. Patrick’s Day is celebrated in bars across the U.S. with guys heralding their machismo and spewing odd language like “bro” and “sick.” I have found myself surrounded by this creature many times in my life. I have raised my hand and hesitantly thwacked it against a straight man’s mirrored raised hand, accompanied by the proclamation “high five” in an Eastern European accent. I have thrashed my body against a straight woman’s body to the rhythm of a popular song blared so excruciatingly loud that the only viable conversation is small talk howled deafeningly into each other’s ears.

Needless to say, I don’t fit in. Maybe if the bars installed Xbox consoles around the perimeter, I’d stand a chance. I can more or less sum up my hatred for this environment with a situation called the “Inside Joke.”

good-times.webshots.com

The Inside Joke

When these types of people go out together, they find it necessary to showboat the depth of their friendship. “Depth” might be the wrong word, actually. It doesn’t matter if they became friends 10 minutes prior. Bar life is just part of an intricate mating ritual, and making fellow patrons jealous is roughly equivalent to a peacock flourishing its feathers. Thus, it is merely important that every person in the bar gawks at these friends, intensely jealous of their bond.

Unlike the peacock, however, they do not indicate their bond through fashion. Every guy is wearing a light colored button-down shirt with vertical stripes hanging over dark tight-but-not-too-tight bootcut jeans, obscuring the tip of his ironic casual-style sneaker produced by a high fashion label. Nor do they indicate their bond through shared hobbies. Ask them what they do for fun. They “party.” “Hang out.” And if they feel like injecting some inimitable humor, “sleep.” They broadcast their bond through the art of the inside joke—the quirky and individualistic phrase, name, or gesture that tells everyone that they have “partied” and “hung out” before.

Take, for instance, the following conversation. Let’s make this bond be between a boy and a girl.

Boy: Remember that time we jumped at the boobfest?

Girl: (laughing uncontrollably) Boobfest! Boobfest! (makes a honking sound and raises both hands in the air with palms facing the ceiling)

Boy: (also now laughing uncontrollably) And Jack was there!

Girl: (laughing so hard that she spills her drink onto a stranger next to her dressed as a leprechaun) Jack! I miss Jack! Boobfest Jack! (makes another honking sound and raises both hands in the air with palms facing the ceiling)

Boy: (doing his best Abraham Lincoln impersonation and suppressing laughter) Four score and seven years ago… boobs! Jack! Boobfest!

Girl: (laughing so hard that her left leg convulses violently and falls off, splashing pulses of blood onto the already beer- and vomit-soaked floor) I miss jumping with Abraham Lincoln at Boobfest! (honks again)

The problem is that sometimes these friends did not go to the bar alone. Sometimes, they had a lapse in judgment and invited me. So while they laugh about Abraham Lincoln and boobs and one-by-one lose their appendages in fits of laughter, I am left sipping my Dr. Pepper and wishing I were on my couch digitally slaughtering middle school boys who are up past their bedtimes.

hyreviews.com/FringeNYC2009

So you know how I’ll be spending my St. Patrick’s Day? In my room. Sipping grapefruit juice and reading Stephen King. That’s right. I will be drinking the most hardcore of all juices while reading about zombies chasing telepathic mummy-dogs instead of downing shots of Jägermeister with the poor man’s cast of Jersey Shore. Oh, and maybe I’ll worship multiple gods just to spite the whole event. Take that, Ireland.

I have a strange obsession with grammar. It’s no secret to anyone who knows me; I’m probably the right person to ask if you’re ever curious if that dash should be one or two hyphens or if that participle is dangling. Moreover, my job involves equal parts math and writing. I’m fine with the math part. However, I admit I have a weakness with the writing part. I sometimes overlook the big picture, instead agonizing over insignificant morsels of text like capitalization or punctuation. I feel compelled to comment on two things that have been bothering me lately. The first is general “correct grammar.”

I felt this post needed some Batman.

Part I: Kindly Shut Up

When I was 15, I was that annoying show-it-off that people who actually succeeded at life laughed at. “That guy.” Consider the following conversation:

Person A: Hey Person B, where are you at?
Person B: I’m almost at your house. I’ll be there in five minutes.

Here is how this conversation would have happened if I were Person B and it was 1999.

Person A: Hey Richard, where are you at?
Me: Why did you end that sentence with ‘at?’

I earned the unenviable reputation of being a “grammar nazi,” a derogatory term still passed around online today. It took me several years to finally get it. (Yes, I split that infinitive like a champ.) There is no such thing as “correct grammar.” Only “formal grammar.”

Bear with me. We created language seemingly out of thin air, and quite frankly, it’s amazing we can even understand thoughts conveyed via a sequence of sounds. Obviously, language depends on a variety of factors—most notably, one’s location. Someone from Zambia and someone else from Tonga would have a difficult time conversing without English as a lingua franca.

The gradation becomes much finer though. Someone from New York speaks a slightly different language than someone from Charlotte. It’s not just accent either; there are different vocabularies (e.g., the word “indie”), different conventions (e.g., profanity is less offensive in New York), and even different grammars (consider uses of the words ain’t or y’all).

from www.flickr.com/photos/subcow

There are also differences in language that can exist within the exact same location. Socioeconomic differences can create a huge language barrier. Put simply, the rich speak a different language from the poor. Consider the identical variances in vocabularies (filet mignon vs. Crip), conventions (stock options vs. welfare checks), and grammar (influences of classic literature vs. influences of Mexican Spanish and African-American English). Many linguists would claim that these differences in language are significant and, in the extreme, constitute a new dialect (or possibly even new language) altogether!

I believe this socioeconomic difference in language is what spawned “correct grammar.” Generally speaking, people believe the rich to be better than the poor. This is a fallacy of course, but it permeates every aspect of American society. It hardly needs clarification; we value status symbols, exaggerate our incomes, and idolize the rich and famous. Objectively speaking, the difference between a $100,000 Lexus and a $10,000 Toyota is actually very minute. The same goes for a $50,000 Rolex versus a $15 Target watch. Nevertheless, American society perceives the more expensive object to be vastly superior, and from a sociological perspective, perhaps it is.

from www.iamboredr.com

This brings me to my point. Why should one should write “where are you” instead of “where are you at?” Semantically, the difference is nonexistent. Any English speaker understands both sentences equally; therefore, the writer is employing language just fine either way. However, “where are you at” breaks “rules.” It ends in a preposition, invents an otherwise unheard adverbial phrase where at, and has a “superfluous” word at. I place “rules” and “superfluous” in quotation marks though. They are rules invented by scholars and wealthy, influential people over the course of many years.

Why follow the rules at all? Because it allows the author to mimic the language of the elite. In other words, it makes the text (or speech) more formal, gives the author more inherent authority, and adds professionalism to the sentence. One must use “where are you” when writing an academic paper or speaking to a potential employer. It’s the same reason one should wear appropriate clothes. You could show up to a job interview wearing Lady Gaga’s flaming bra and panties. And in the broadest sense, there is nothing intrinsically wrong with doing so! However, would a wealthy, educated (and boring) applicant do that?

As an editor, I observe these rules. I make sure published text adheres to the rigor of professionalism and formal grammar. However, I am no longer a “grammar nazi” outside of this context. I firmly believe that anyone is allowed to speak how he or she wishes. If someone tells me a sentence and I understand it, that person has used language exactly as intended. “Correcting” that person is petty and condescending. If I know what the person is saying so well that I can even transform it into the “educated” version of the same sentence, then what am I correcting exactly? It makes no sense unless I am helping the person write something formal.

All of that said, I have a message to anyone who feels compelled to point out when someone types “its” when “it’s” was intended or correct someone’s use of “I” instead of “me” or “whom” instead of “who.” (Or anyone who is seriously thinking of commenting that I began this tirade with a sentence ending with “laugh at.”) Unless that person is writing an academic paper and asked for your input, kindly shut up. That person knew what he or she was saying. You know what that person was saying. The whole freaking English-speaking world knew what that person was saying. But you decide to impose your arbitrary editorial fist on it nonetheless. Nobody cares, and you look like a pompous jackass.

from www.dissertationindia.blogspot.com.I suspect the woman on the left is a lesbian serial killer.

Part II: It Is What It Is

My second diatribe is far shorter. It concerns the now common phrase “It is what it is.” We’ve all heard it before:

Person A: Oh my, Person B, you’ve missed six child support payments, stolen three kilos of cocaine, and put a hooker in a dog crate, calling it ‘art.’
Person B: It is what it is. I’ll call a locksmith for the dog crate now.

In this case, it’s the rest of the world that seems to hate this phrase. I have heard at least 497 rants in my life over how that sequence of words is someone’s deep-seated pet peeve. The objections seem to be never-ending. “Of course it is what it is. What else would it be?” “That doesn’t even mean anything!” “That is so obviously a tautology.”

I, for one, like it. Yes, logically, it’s vacuous. (It’s equivalent to saying, “That green object is green.”) However, language does not always follow the rules of logic. American English speakers understand sentences such as “I could care less” and “I ain’t never gonna do that” even though they are logically flawed. Thus, instead, I want to analyze what that phrase implies.

So many quips that people offer to distressed friends involve haughty wisdom. For instance, we have all heard “Hindsight is 20/20” and “Everything happens for a reason.” These aphorisms are insightful, granted, but I hate the egotism they carry. It’s as if the speaker is saying, “I have a larger and more accurate worldview than you, and I can assure you that your misfortune, along with everything else, happens for a reason.” Yet somehow, “It is what it is” lacks the haughtiness. The speaker professes no superior knowledge, and it frames any misgiving in a pragmatic light. Someone using the phrase could just as easily expand it into a calming reality: “Sure, there are things you regret and mistakes you made, but that’s all in the past. The situation is what it is now, and all you can do is figure out a solution from here.” How did that become a despised saying?

I support it, and I like hearing it. The speaker places him or herself on the same field as the listener and offers a genuine coping mechanism. I hear it used often in high schools and downtrodden parts of cities, though, and I suspect that’s why the phrase has become so popular to hate. Nobody likes teenagers or people on welfare. Until they have a kid and lose their job, anyway.

Now that you have thoroughly wasted a few minutes reading about my linguistic obsessions, I encourage you to leave all spoken “incorrect grammar” alone and freely say “it is what it is.” I’m pretty sure you’ll be saving the pandas and stuff.

from wildiaries.com