Lesson Plan

"Voglio costruire qualosa."-- Simone Montedoro

Let me link you to my Dimmer Beacons essay imported to Medium from Breath and Shadow, not because I want attention, but because Medium has a better font, and the piece serves as an example of a cop out failure for which Ability Maine gave me a $25 dollar honorarium, Chris Kuell deeming it good enough, which it isn't.

I was trying to say something about failure, both in a micro and macro context, intent on enlarging on a deeper existential threat, and instead, I consciously stalled, perhaps unwilling to address that there was a homoerotic element of danger in both my admiration of my supervisor's ability to wield power as a disabled woman, and her inability to retain any personal loyalty she would project to subordinates prior to turning on them (I am not the only one who is triggered to upset at the mention of her name; like anything, IL has its particular subculture for the initiated.). I was also trying to examine the elusive metric of success, which I failed by virtue of feeling over discipline. The failed scholar in me has regrets, but tenacity in research takes time, and health--or at least enough energy to complete the task. 

Now, it is my work, and I can take certain components and remix them, but I think I was dredging a bit up on what it is to live a life fully instead of vaulting into safety valves, which is a personal flaw, rarely doused with cold water, and those I can count on my fingers: the cruelty of the first time I had sex with Scott, my affairs with married men, perhaps looking for a death via Medea, because when you get caught as the "other woman" the fury that Euripides brings to life doesn't feel quite so legendary in the fog of antiquity, and then life with Frank.

My ambitions, however, were essentially destroyed by a K-12 paradigm because I wearied of graduate studies. My aunt didn't. She has her PhD, negotiating that with being faithful to the Catholic Church-- though I cannot see that she has derived any real economic security as an educational administrator.

And the question remains. I signed into Medium and published myself, but I am not sure what that means. It is a platform, catering heavily to communication and computer tech, and the seismic new world order. I only partially speak that language, especially as the train left the station in my mid-30's, and I didn't bounce back.

And whatever my way forward, I won't bounce back into home ownership, having a car; perhaps not even a passage to Italy, though I still hold out hope to close my aging eyes on Rome. In the meanwhile, former follower Kelly Clark seems to have vanished-- not that I'm troubled. Normally I would not have followed a celebrity blitz feed as was her content, but I indicated my willingness to accommodate cute.

What couldn't she handle? My bad attitude? I'll never know, but I don't think I'll change. My earth was scorched; entropy now cometh... I may tire out, but I suspect happiness is a polite fiction-- not that there aren't genuinely happy folk who don't need Prozac. Or all we all on something? 

* I am past the point of anti-depressant utility; being made to look placid isn't a substitution for an actual repair, and regeneration past the half century mark becomes tricky.