Archive for May, 2009
An idea machine
With some of my career-related emotional junk expressed, it is easier to see my goals and desires regarding this volunteer proposal for MS. Although it may ultimately balloon into a full-fledged wing or division of the company, I doubt I should present it as such in these early stages.
The simpler the idea, the better. I intend to start doing birthday parties and events for free, so long as they are free to the recipient. We already do promotional shows for schools to generate business, but the performer still gets paid for going. With a small change in perspective these shows can become an instrument of giving for both the company and the individual. This has a net positive effect for everyone involved. The kids get excited about MS and business is generated, but so is good will, because money isn’t changing hands.
From this point of entry we can branch out to more interesting arrangements. Perhaps we’ll run a lottery where one birthday party a month is done without charge. We can develop relationships with children’s hospitals to provide free shows to sick kids. Perhaps in time, additional volunteers can be brought on board to handle all promotional events and performances we conduct. At this point even some of the infrastructure could be handled on a volunteer basis, such as the training of our teachers and performers.
It is easy to imagine that a worker who starts their career as a volunteer could easily transition to a paid position, but without the hangups a more paycheck-focused employee would have. Someone trained to be a volunteer could pick up shifts and get paid for them, whereas someone hired as a paid worker may not necessarily be willing to volunteer so easily.
This is just another brainstorming session. I find myself in a creatively organizational state, which may be afterburn from the semester’s end. My brain isn’t receiving as much new information as it’s accustomed to, so it’s shaping and reshaping what it already knows. I’ll run some of these nascent ideas by my bosses tomorrow after the training class.
The Mad, Mad Scientist
My career with MS appears to be drawing to a close. I have been with the company for over three years, and have worked in nearly every capacity available. I’ve taught almost every class that’s offered; done birthday parties, events, booths, and workshops; I’ve hired, managed, and trained personnel. It was me who restructured the scheduling system, redesigned timesheets, suggested quality assurance and incentive programs, and was consistently there to help out when the day needed saving.
As I approach the end, I must confess: the aspect of my job I’ve always been unhappy with has been the money. It’s not the money received for teaching classes (which is lucrative, even though I haven’t gotten a raise in three years). It’s the issue of money between me and my bosses, who are like family. It’s the feeling of insufficient consideration, the persistent feeling of being cheated. It digs at me.
The final straw was when the senior instructors were “offered” training positions for summer camps. As an incentive, we were told we’d get the first pick of the camps we wanted to teach. They then looked at me and simply said, “We know you’re not going to be with us in the summer.” That’s it. No follow up, no offering to replace this lost “incentive.” A sentence fragment so dismissive in its construction that I realized how deeply flawed some of their business practices were. I was being asked to build a training program in my spare time as a favor to them.
What made it worse was this: the original incentive wasn’t an incentive at all. Of course the senior instructors are going to get first pick of camps. Who would even consider giving new, inexperienced teachers priority? They have established ones who want the work. What they were really doing was finding a way to keep from paying us more. They are literally paying their trainers the same amount as their trainees, and that’s fucked up. How serious can they take their training program if there is no hierarchy of rank? This was the last instance in a series of perceived abuses, done in the name of business and for the sake of frugality. Economy. Miserliness.
If I’m going to be working for free and doing favors for the company, I’m going to do it on my terms. Perhaps I just needed to vent these hard feelings before I explored my potential new relationship with MS. It builds up, you know? I want to develop and implement a volunteering position at the company, but how can I when I feel deep hostility for how I’ve been treated? I’m hoping my choice to work for free is a highly effective, counter-intuitive solution.
Bear in mind, this is just an airing of dirty laundry. This is the worst problem I’ve experienced at MS, but even that pales in comparison to the good times and good feelings my work has provided. I’ve loved my job for the years I’ve done it, which is why I feel so passionately about resolving this issue and maintaining some relationship there. I am hoping my volunteering proposal launches successfully. May there be no more blood money between me and my MS family.
Three Colors
The semester is over, Flipside is over, and my career at Mad Science is nearing its end — or a vital transformation to a new beginning.
My spring session at UNT was the hardest and most rewarding chunk of school I’ve been through. I worked very diligently for my grades, and learned more than any prior semester. I successfully landed a lucrative summer research position and received several accolades for my performance. I also received deep, bluish-purple bags under my eyes.
Speaking of lack of sleep: Flipside really deserves its own post, and it will probably get one (or two) of them in the near future. I got exactly what I needed from the experience, but I’m not really sure how to define what that is. I’m definitely inspired for next year, which is something. I also rekindled my interest in fire spinning. I felt like I truly understood it for the first time, like every movement was an expression of some feeling, even distance from self, even alienation, even disgust over my own lack of focus. Every movement was like physical, fiery jazz. I kept seeing the final grand passage from “Sonny’s Blues” over and over in my head.
It gives me the blues to say goodbye to MS, so I don’t think I will. This is another topic that deserves its own post. How much could I write on this? The pride I take in my work, the sheer scope of what I’ve done for the company, the gratitude for opportunities and the dissonance of feeling cheated. It is such a thick miasma to see through, and the green of money just thickens it. I’d rather the monetary ties just disappear. I’m working on a plan for volunteerism through the company, so I can remain affiliated with them and also develop that aspect of my resume. I am giving my final training session on Saturday and will ideally have the plan written out by then, so I can immediately transition into that role. I am hoping I encounter no difficulty or resistance from them in the process.
I still have many things to accomplish during the following week, while I still can. Hopefully I will find more time to write — there is an elephant in the room. Perhaps it’s nearly time to mention it.
Easy Livin’
Sweet, sweet mercy. This past week rose from the time-stream like some chthonic god, hell-bent on the destruction of continents. This unholy incarnation demanded ziggurats be built in his honor from the corpses of the fallen, lest he devour chunks of reality and pump insanity forth from the void. Of course, he wasn’t counting on being patiently outwitted and slain by a true mastermind.
Me, I’m talking about. I’m the mastermind.
My stepfather is out of the hospital and things are looking up. My tests are done, my essays are done, my short story is done. Now back to the long story, i.e., Real Life. I’m gonna inch into the Flipside groove, play some hackysack and Warcraft, maybe write a song or two. Spend some quality time with my lady.
To kickstart the summer, I went to lunch with my pal Adam today. We chowed on some Thai food, and drank tea with sweet milk on a patio with a gentle breeze. A vulture perched atop a dilapidated house next to us. It would have seemed ominous if the Texas sun wasn’t beating down, but in the bright daylight, the vulture just looked silly. That’s right, vulture. Your symbolic milieu ain’t working right now.
Folks, I got some easy livin’ for the next couple weeks. Hope to see you.
A Steel Horse
I took my motorcycle into traffic for the first time yesterday. It was exhilarating. I was scared at first, as a matter of course. After about an hour riding through the city streets my fear evaporated and I got on I-35. There is a feeling of freedom that is difficult to communicate, but I equated some of my early sensations to being on a roller coaster that I had control of. There is that lurch in the stomach as the wind batters against you yet somehow you remain upright, propelling forward at tremendous speed. But there is no safety harness. There is no rail that determines your course.
It did me some good. It cleared my head from these family blues. All this writing and riding expels the nervous energy that I would otherwise be afflicted with when dealing with my mom, especially in her fragile and anxious state. I felt in a way that my ride was an homage to Chris (my stepdad), but I don’t know if I can justify it. There is a certain level of self-indulgence in the magician’s mind, as it hyperassociates and gives significance to the spiderwebs connecting things. But I feel the power of tribute, and this is a man who works on motorcycles for his wage. The first time I rode on a motorcycle, I was his passenger, and we went faster through space than we should have and I was terrified and I loved it.
To see him broken now, breaks me. And I see now that I can’t remember ever telling him I love him, but I do. It’s not the kind of thing we’d say to each other, and we may not yet. But I know it. If it informs my actions, I guess that’s enough. So I’ll let my ride be a tribute of sorts, an act of magic that vents my pain and restores his health. Godspeed to his recovery.
My ducks and their respective rows
I need a battle plan for the coming week. Here is the great, last push of the semester, to embed all the knowledge acquired into my tired brain. To check the last boxes on the syllabi, to make the last good impressions on my teachers. I’ve received quite a few accolades this semester for my academic achievement: induction into Lambda Alpha (Anthropology Honors Society), an award on Honors Day, and acceptance into the NSF Summer Research program. Can’t stop now.
On my to-do list:
A. My term paper for Development of Anthropological Thought, comparing and contrasting Tylor and Frazer’s interpretation of myth. I have a significant amount of reading before I can even start writing this, but luckily it’s only five to seven pages, and it’s something I have a high degree of interest in. Due today at 5 pm, but I am trying to get it pushed back because of my family emergency.
B. Final exam for the same class. This will be about the same length, but it’s three separate essays involving interpretive analysis of Mauss and Wolf, and identification of major anthropological theorists. I’m pleased with the format and expect to excel at this one, because I’ve been doing the work the whole semester and the essays will reflect it. Due Tuesday at noon.
C. Revision of my short story for Fiction class. Given the sheer bulk of information I got from the workshop and written critiques, this should be fairly easy to do if I can keep my creative headspace through those first two assigments. Wednesday at 5pm.
D. Major project for Archaeology over the Kennewick Man case, including the research we did over the Native American groups involved, the legal decision, the ethical ramifications of the case, and an evaluation of a biased 60 Minutes segment. This is a seven to ten page monster, but it’s interesting, and it’s not due until Thursday at 5 pm.
E. Final exam in Ethnomusicology. Thursday from 10:30 to 12:30. This is barely on my radar right now. It’s difficult to predict what this will cover exactly, but it will probably have to do with Japanese Takarazuka, Egypt’s Umm Kulthum, and the theoretical positioning of Bruno Nettl. This teacher was engaging but kind of kooky, and it’s hard to tell sometimes what she wants you to know and what she doesn’t.
After all of this, I’m hoping to get excited for Flipside(!) and not see it as a time thief that makes me want to kill my friends with power tools. Just kidding!
Sort of.
“The scepter shall not depart from Judah…”
Josie and I just got back from the hospital about an hour ago. My stepdad was attacked yesterday morning by one of my mom’s pit bulls, Shiloh. His arm was seriously injured; he couldn’t feel his hand and he’d lost a lot of blood. The surgeon originally thought there were seven lacerations on his forearm and underarm (four on top and three on the bottom). He was hopeful that they could repair most of the internal damage.
Unfortunately, when he was working on my stepdad’s arm it became evident that there were actually eighteen lacerations and a lot of it was beyond repair. All of the major damage was to his left arm, and he is left-handed. The surgeon advised that after significant rehabilitation he should have ‘reasonable’ functionality in his hand. Once he’s discharged, he will have to return to the hospital multiple times for skin grafts and reconstructive work. My mother is devastated.
Shiloh was taken by animal control and will be put down. My mom loves that dog, and I’m sure she is extremely ambivalent about the entire experience. It must be very difficult to see her husband in such pain and know that her beloved pet is going to die. I tried to comfort her in her suffering but I can only do so much. I just sat with her and listened.
It’s difficult to envision where this will all lead. My mom says she isn’t worried about the financial aspect of it, and that’s good, because she shouldn’t be right now. But it’s obviously catastrophic. My stepfather is a mechanic by trade, and works with his hands, which he won’t be able to do in the foreseeable future. There is some assurance that he won’t lose his job over this, but everything is up in the air.
I’ll need to sleep before I can access and process the deep emotions I’m experiencing. I recognize this account of the ordeal is detached and sterile, but that’s because my heart is still there in the hospital. Maybe tomorrow, after everyone is rested, we can make better sense of it all.
hatchet
Love, I’ve got rebellious little fires in my belly.
My eyes, my eyes are smoky.
Crows fly overhead – they carry pebbles in their beaks
to quench the Thirst
beside a potter’s broken wheel.
He abandoned his dreams!
He abandoned his sleeping wife and her tears fill this stream!
And the salmon froth the water
and their eggs soak in cream
and everyone remembers the first thing they killed.
I’ve always loved you.
Even when this hatchet hums and hungers for a head
you soothe me.
Even with the weapon in my hand.
Grief and a Headhunter’s Rage
Posted by Stephen in Anthropology on May 6, 2009
A brief overview: Renato Rosaldo studied the Ilongot people of the Philippines for nearly three years with his wife, Michelle. He focused on the practice of headhunting, which is killing and decapitating largely random victims. The Ilongot themselves describe this practice as being a rage born from grief and bereavement. Rosaldo details how he didn’t accept this explanation until years later, when his wife’s death forced him to confront his own rage, giving him a more emic perspective of the Ilongot’s practice.
Rosaldo differentiates between conventional funeral rites and the murderous act of headhunting as two reactions to loss. He expresses that funeral rites don’t necessarily deal with bereavement; they are instead one point in the constellation of grief, something of an unfinished process that doesn’t provide real comfort to those close to the deceased. He critiques other anthropologists for studying the trappings of ritual in funerary rites when real grief is expressed outside of the ritual context. He reports that the headhunter throws away his suffering by throwing away the decapitated head of his victim. Rosaldo appears to believe this is a more satisfying method of release than going through the motions of a funeral rite, and I can understand his sentiment.
However, at no point does Rosaldo judge the practice of headhunting itself. Given his postmodern positioning, he frequently states his emotional experience and how his personal feelings intersect with his understanding of the practice, but never does he judge it as right or wrong. How can we escape this? When, as anthropologists, do we become confident enough in our moral standpoint to assert that a cultural practice is abhorrent, regardless of its function or context? Cultural relativism is not moral relativism. Surely the decapitation of random individuals to relieve one’s grief can be judged as morally deficient.
I can see a bit of a failing here in the postmodern perspective. If Rosaldo had supplemented with a functionalist or materialist argument validating headhunting in some way, then an argument might be made for this ugly practice. As it stands, Rosaldo got me to empathize with the people that decapitate their neighbors (and with him for the loss of his wife), but didn’t convince me that the Ilongot should get to keep doing it. I recognize that wasn’t his goal, but perhaps moral concerns should have been addressed in his essay.
Origin.
I walk a spiral path. I find myself expanding ever outward, my feet pressing into the soil just to the left of where I’ve been before. It’s like a circle that grows.
I am disarmed right now. When you wait to say everything on your mind, your tongue gets tied when you finally speak. I find myself needing to pierce through the cryptic and seize the real. As a poet, I am a master of expressing complicated things to myself so that no one else can understand them. I write like I dream: fragments of confusion hiding an underlying symbolic order.
Well, let there be lucidity.
I see now the shells of discarded experience that litter the wastelands of my past. I see now the knotted threads of relation. I survey all. And there You are, my oasis. I want to be honest with You and reveal myself, but sometimes it’s so painful. I know if anyone can appreciate that, it’s You.
Can I be a god and a man in the same flesh? Do all men dream of this?
My system runs hot sometimes, but she is there to cool me. I am a molten planet breeding life and she is the depth of cold space I fit inside. You brought her to me and I started a war, because I begin all things inevitable. You taught me that sometimes the unpopular choice is the right one, and that all good things are worth fighting for. You know how deep my pride is too, don’t You? I’ll never give up on us.
Perhaps they can reconstruct my life from these ramblings, this aegrisomnia. Perhaps I’ll develop clarity and directness in my speech, brevity in my language. Maybe I’ll speak simple truths and the world will remember them.
Until then, these are my thoughtprints.