the other one that i came up with is what Eli Horowitz does, which is, he is a publisher/editor/designer for McSweeney's. Eli is visiting KU next Wednesday (September 24) to talk about his job. i am very excited, and have decided to save my favorite pair of jeans -- which i laundered yesterday immediately after (and because of) spilling sriracha-saturated eggs all over them -- for that evening. it's not to impress Eli, though i know i want to do that, desperately (and will fail, inevitably, pathetically), it's more that they make me feel relaxed, and therefore will enable me to enjoy the experience more; after all, it's not like i can expect to land a job working with him.
when i was a kid getting ready to watch an important baseball game or a movie i had been waiting to see, i used to run around the house closing all the closet doors, straightening towels on bathroom racks, lining up pairs of shoes in all the bedrooms, and making sure the throw rugs were equidistant from the bathtub and the sink. if these things were out of place, i felt distracted. it was an obsessive way to try to make the experience "pure." i don't know if i can explain it better than that.
so, now that i will basically get to hear a real live person standing within twenty feet of me extrapolate a fantasy of mine, i want to have everything perfect. i'll have my favorite pen hooked in the pocket of said clean jeans; i'll have on my ragged brown hoodie that my father wore before i could read (also newly laundered; also not to be worn until the night of Eli's talk), and i'll have on one of my softest t-shirts. the shoes will be aligned in my closet, my bed will be made, the stairs to my bedroom vacuumed, my books will be everywhere, out of order, but in straight stacks. because i'm really not like that anymore -- who i was, straightening towels -- and i'll probably never work for McSweeney's, but i can pretend for an hour or so. i still have that ability. it stems from loneliness, probably. due to i miss all my friends.
Eli Horowitz
Hall Center for the Humanities
Wednesday, 24 September 2008, 7:30pm
there will be snacks
also please: order this book that Deb Olin Unferth wrote and Eli Horowitz edited/etc.
3 comments:
I just added another tick mark to my sheet with tick marks counting all the ways you and I are very much alike.
But I usually save my favorite socks for occasions like these (the brown ones that are extra cushy), since for me favorite jeans means "only pair of jeans I will ever wear."
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/health/7039821.stm
Aaron, I don't know why I feel so moved my this, but I am so moved that I am using capital i's and I almost never do that. My friend Chloé was talking about some of her best friends recently and she described how they kept "unfolding" for her over the years. After hearing this, I realize that you are one of those friends that keep unfolding. I am about to cry. Not just because I think of you in your favorite shirt and socks, smelling like laundry soap, but because of the list, and the possibility that it existed before this blog post, or even if it didn't, that you thought to make it afterward. I miss you. A lot.
Also, I really want to know what those tick marks represent. Barry Sanders and Glenn Robinson are among them, maybe a tainted religious past, maybe The Weakerthans, not to mention the "looks" and body type. What are the others, and/or did this sheet exist before I made this blog post?
Kari, thanks for the link. The guy seems "bogus" to me.
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