I Loved You First

That many-faceted truth, that truth which is me but also the water washing away my shampoo and dripping mascara rivets down last night’s unwashed face to mat my dark, dark brown lashes: still. It bubbles to the surface as if to say, “Silly. You haven’t forgotten.”

At the kitchen table I twirled the phone cord around two fingers while my tea chilled in Monday morning’s sunlight. “Jessica,” I think I said, “I’m afraid I’m in love. I’m afraid I’ve been in love for a long time.”

“Well of course,” she said. “Didn’t you know?”

Didn’t I know that my normally felicitous mind’s eye reverted to his dark brown ones unwarranted after I kissed another, as if sorry to see me go? That the man sleeping next to me the morning after and the shirts on the floor (removed methodically at 1:07) and the pants (…feverishly at 1:10) and the softer things from Intimacy (desperately torn from each tremulous frame with unspeakable wonderfulness at 1:12) next my dangling hand were to be left carefully where they lay while I tip-toed my way to the bathroom for solitude, where, after warm water encased my nonchalance, I would wipe the steam from the mirror only to see brown eyes, his, no, mine, but his just the same…?

If one wanted to know my heart, they need only look at my eyes. They would see him.

That my dreams reverted to him inexplicably?

But then, dreams inexplicably include an unprecedented amount of oddities I don’t plan for…

I’ve missed the bus. It’s warm here. I think of the road. I think of the mileage between us. I think that it is very inconvenient. What use are brown eyes on the other end of the state? What use is that bubbling truth if it only makes me pine for an impossible union?

“Skim latte. Two shots,” I think I said. I think I walked back to the bright concourse. I think I sat through a lecture regarding ethical journalism. I think I thought the subject oxymoronic. I think I still have a blue sweatshirt of his stuffed in the higher corner of my closet from our last conversation underneath the dim outline of the big dipper in an eroding desert.

The buzzing lights around the track come on earlier now that it is truly autumn. I think I’m running. I think I hear music… far away, like the soundtrack of a techno-heavy club placed in a small tin can. I think I could veer from the track and merge onto interstate 50. His small blue house is just at the other end.

“Are you staying here to work over wintermester?” My roommate made us something. Matt’s laughing at something the TV said on the couch in the next room.

“Actually,” I said. “I think I’ll go home for Christmas.”

This Particular Humanists’ Moral Canon

Most easily compared to the thiestic 10 commandments. Except these make sense. A common arguement against my dis-belief in the supernatural sounds something like this:

“If you don’t believe in God, how can you be moral? How do you determine what is right and wrong?”

It should be noted here that Christians have more or less picked and ignored the moral teachings that the Bible holds. Keeping the Sabbath holy? Sure, I mean if I can. It’s actually pretty hard to do that in the real world. Not taking the Lord’s name in vain? An exception should be made for painful toe-stubs and bad calls made by the referee… otherwise I’m screwed. Giving my money to the poor in order to get to heaven? Hahaha… Jesus was such a joker. Come on, guys, he was totally kidding about spreading the wealth.

Point being, if we’re going to be picking and choosing morals, why don’t we take out the middle man (i.e. God) and focus on an ethical creed that is developed with rational observation and reasoning?

So what have I come up with?

Janet’s Moral Canon

1. Education and learning is the scope whereby we can see the larger picture and the entire spectrum of reality. Never stop questioning. Never stop learning.
2. Human dignity should never be challenged or exploited. Pawning the lives of men and women in times of war should never be tolerated. Treat one another with respect and compassion. Promote equality for all. All.
3. Relay the truth. Lies and secrecy destroy democracy and hinder education. (See Moral Canon number 1.)
4. Use the earth’s resources with foresight. Conserve what you can and actively campaign for renewable and sustainable power.
5. Love myself. Try to improve upon every aspect of myself, but never cease to love.
6. Tolerate opinions and belief that differ from my own, as long as they do not challenge the human dignity of others or promote the needless suffering of animals. Embrace art in all its powerful reflections of expression.
7. Do not eat animals.
8. Chocolate however, is to be consumed with praise.
9. Do not believe in anything that violates the natural world without sound evidence. In which case, it would not violate the natural world.
10. Taking what you have not earned devalues yourself and also breaks Moral Canon number 2.

The wonderful thing about a canon vs. a commandment is that it is not absolutist. If I am ill, chocolate need not be consumed with praise. If I’m facing the choice between starving to death or stealing an apple, I won’t have to fear that the more intelligent decision will send me to hell.

Any tack-ons? Earmarks? Canons of your own?

Here’s to a more ethical universe. Peace.

Womanizer And An Opportunity to Stalk Me

I never thought I would say this, but I have been seduced by a woman that has been my enemy based on pure principle ever since I dissected “Hit Me Baby One More Time” in a Women, Society and Culture class in high school.

(Whereby I concluded that a cute blond giving permission for her ex to “hit her one more time” was the epitome of female chauvinism and everything that is wrong with our country.)

But, um, Womanizer is the single most amazing thing to run to since Green Day’s Holiday and I am officially hooked. I mean, I repeated that song five times and completely ignored workout-playlist-protocol. (I.e. Don’t mess with the ipod strapped to your arm every other song because then you swerve on the treadmill and could potentially loss your balance and kill someone passing by behind you.) I IGNORED THIS WISE ADVICE just so I could listen to Britney’s voice electronically pulsating “Boy don’t try to front/ I know just what you are, are, are/ Boy don’t try to front/ I know just what you are, are, are.” over and over and over and over.

I’m a total sucker for sucess stories, and Britney’s crazy turn-around is one I will applaud. Though, yes, I understand that her weightloss is thanks in part to the dietrician she hired, the trainers, and the therapy that normal fat people can’t afford. Her song was more of a product of the mysterious men in the soundbooth who are inexplicably talented when it comes to manipulating instrumentation and sub-par voices into music that makes homosapiens jump up and down in a trance.

Kudos to the men in the sound booth.

BUT the fact that she can come back after she was the butt of everyone’s jokes for what, five years? Reminds me that a) I don’t know this chick at all and b) I’ve reached a point in my musical journey where I can look back at the nineties and realize it wasn’t all bad and an especially wonderful resurrection of the era can still send me to dance-hall bliss. Who am I to hate the beat?

Woman, woman, woman, woman…

________

Tomorrow night I will be attending Joanne Newsom IN CONCERT FOR CHANGE. This lady is amazing, and hi, it’s an event for Barack Obama.

ALSO, (FYI), early voting is up and running. Do it. Do it now.

(Casey, you are awesome.)

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