the big news was the hurricane. hurricane donald. no, i'm sorry, douglas. i was thinking of the other disaster afflicting our country, i suppose.
anyway, hurricane douglas has kept us all here in a loop. in the morning, the storm was tracking towards the big island. and then, later on, it sort of veered to the north, avoiding direct hits to both hawaii (big island) and maui (it did give them some surf, and a little rain, but nothing much else). by 11, they were worrying that it was on a course to hit my island, oahu, pretty directly. even if it veered a bit to the north, there was concern that it could do a lot of damage...
so, throughout this gray and humid day, we kind of did things to prepare. kind of. like i took in all the loose things in the yard and put them in the garage. and we cleaned up. my wife was worried that if there were a blackout, we needed the floors cleared so that we wouldn't be tripping over everything. yeah, right. there wasn't actually much to clean up off the floors or anything... but it was as good an excuse as any to clean the house.
later in the day, it became apparent that hurricane douglas was NOT going to make landfall on our island. it instead had taken a more northern route. as of right now (9:00 pm), we haven't seen ANYTHING here at my house: no significant rain, no winds. i believe that they're still tracking the storm to see if it goes anywhere near kauai (the most northwesterly islands in the chain), but my impression is that it's not expected to make landfall. could be wrong (there will be another update at around midnight).
but all in all, it was kind of a wasted day. all i did was follow my routines, in a kind of lazy way. i read some manga... played a bit of minecraft... worked out a little... drew another picture... played some piano... read some chapters in handmaid's tale and ottessa moshfegh... and now, i'm working on my writing...
regarding ottessa moshfegh... the stories are... disturbing. i suppose i'm a very naive and simple person. i think the stories i write are generally... i don't know... symmetrical? overly structured? i guess i dislike that about myself, but it's kind of inescapable. i don't like leaving things unfulfilled, i suppose. i don't like things that don't fit (even if i don't seem to fit). maybe i like a kind of progressive view of things, where, despite problems, we sort of evolve. come to an understanding... moshfegh's stories are NOT like this. they are stories of people who are trapped in the beginning, and remain trapped in the end. most of the time, they further obfuscate their situation by their choices (or lack of choices). i don't know what to think of them, really. maybe it is endearing, in the same way that i once found thom yorke's lyrics endearing... the plaintive cry of the hopeless and trapped, somehow is the only sound of liberation left... and all that. but in this case, i guess it's kind of a bridge too far. don't get me wrong. i think the writing is brilliant. fast paced, natural prose which disguises some ugliness and shockers. i just think... i don't know, the outlook... doesn't agree with me.
*****
i think my goal is to become like compost. like become this incredibly rich mixture... of course, i remain my own private pile. i consider myself a danger to myself and others... i often think that if i were to let my guard down, i'd react with the world irreversibly. my eyes are like cyclop's (from the xmen). if i open them, i could see right through you. and maybe you could see right through me. and all we would see would be this resonant emptiness... and maybe what would happen is we would fall into each other, inescapably...
yeah, right. haha.
my walls, my shields... are up too high. they prevent my nutrient rich mixture from getting adulterated... so there.
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