Tuesday, September 11, 2007

Fast Train to Idiot-Town

Ah, well.  I don't do much weighing in here at the 'spit on cultural stuff, feeling like any judgments I could hand down about who's doing what would only contribute the zeitgeist of bullshit surrounding motherhood in this country.  But I will say these two things.


First, do not read these books if you tend to engage in middle-of-the-night fretting about natural and manmade disasters and how they will wreck your nearly perfect life:


The Road


Spilling Clarence


White Noise


A Canticle for Leibowitz


Anything on the evening news.


Let's just say I was up until ungodly hours last night wondering if Eric had enough plywood stored up in the garage to board up the sliding glass doors in case of nuclear attack.


And then, there's this:


 



Britney Spears at the VMAs.  Which I didn't even see.  But Eric came home and said the internet was all abuzz about how fat (!) she looked and how she stopped lip-syncing and stuff.  And I'm thinking to myself, I can't even send off an email attachment properly, much less dance around in front of a bunch of people with cameras in a bikini and remember the words to a song.  The girl's obviously gone off some sort of deep end, but I'm swimming around in my own, so give her a break for chrissakes.  I hate it.


Also, I'm swimming around in my own confusion and crisis of self-confidence.  Who told me I should be on the tenure track?  What was I thinking?  I'm trying to remind myself that I wanted this challenge, practically begged for it.  And now that I'm in it, I'm scared witless.  How ironic would it be if I, oh teacher of writing, couldn't actually write?  All signs seem to be pointing to idiot-town, but I'm trying not to pay attention.  Trying to remember I have some sort of value or worth or meaning in the world even as I flail about like some flat white fish out of water, beating itself to death on the dock.


Ugh.  Don't listen to me.  I've had too much wine, and I don't plan on cleaning up a damned thing tonight, or on reading one single page of anything.  So there.



2 comments:

  1. You crack me up. I have read 'canticle' before - dont worry - I think the apocalypse is still a ways off yet. As for the tenure track, I have utter faith in your ability - if anyone will succeed with that - it will be you.

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  2. I concur. I've been apocalypse oriented my whole life and it really hasn't helped me much, except to fuel an optimism-inspired nagging at young people to be willing to change the world--and that's probably a good thing. You are going to rock tenure, no doubt in my mind. So stop worrying about it for now!

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