� Rebecca Miller, in �Louisa�

Note please! I do not endorse this point of view. I record the quotation only in the service of the entry on kitsch that I keep thinking I�m going to get to one of these days. The story is in Miller�s book �Personal Velocity,� which I read this weekend. Very good, and the film version, which she directed, won the Grand Jury as well as the cinematography prize at Sundance this year. And speaking of my diary epigraphs, it turns out that what I wrote to my friend on ignominy and hope and cover letters last time made him at least somewhat panicky that I was counting on him to pull some strings with regard to a job opening he�d forwarded me from his place of employ (for such was the context of my writing to him) � this is a long time for one of my sentences to go uncomma�d � and I also want to point out, in case a wrong note sounded here too, that this wasn�t the case at all. I wrote what I did meaning it generally, not specifically. Sorry if that wasn�t clear.

Also a point of view I do not endorse is that of my fellow Diarylander Non-Descript, who in a recent entry rapped my knuckles for my comments on certain aspects of last week�s episode of �Everwood.� Apparently without having seen the episode himself, he judges the scene in question �in-your-face, shock value, Howard Stern for President.� (The reader may be forgiven for wondering whether my responding to ND in this forum rather than via e-mail might not also merit the first two of those descriptors, and perhaps it would if ND had responded to any mail I have sent him in about the last year. Not to sound bitchy, it�s just a fact. Then again, maybe not, maybe once something bleeds out into the public-diary realm it�s fair game to remain there; for instance, I feel compelled in my defense to say to Qira that I absolutely agree with her point, that it�s precisely *because* love is not a pie that I get so wrecked; I know there is an unlimited supply of the good stuff, so what is it that�s keeping me hungry?) The point, since he asks, of putting something like that on TV is to provide an accurate representation of what it�s like to be a teenage boy, of this particular aspect of it. And � I am anticipating your next question � never having been one, I am drawing from conversations I�ve had over the years with many of my male friends. Boy is having heybaby dream, boy wakes up with a start, boy pulls up cover and glances under it, boy grimaces with distaste and exasperation, and in the next scene we see him putting his sheets into the washing machine. What�s so well done about this scene, and what I was in fact applauding, is the way in which it does not scream or howl or demand attention � la Howard Stern and is instead just incorporated into the narrative as a normal event. Boy has wet dream, life goes on. I do happen to think that parents should talk to their kids about biology and that people should feel free to put whatever bumper stickers on their cars they want to � though at the same time, on a personal level, I am a proponent of my own definition of civility � but I do not see how less than fifteen seconds of screen time that take a wet dream at face value is equivalent to �sloughing off of values in favor of nothing� and the consequent moral black hole that ND�s accusation implies, the ignorance and offensiveness of which is why I�ve gotten myself this torqued up about a slam which I arguably should just ignore and forget about. And as for his references to �values,� (1) vote with your feet: if you don�t like the so-called values driving a television program or any media product, don�t watch it, and feel free to let the networks know you�ve made this decision and to provide guidelines for what you would find more suitable; remember, media reflects demographics; and (2) if the result of co-existing and non-congruent value systems is necessarily �the right to have my values trump your values that oppress mine,� that is to say if it�s necessarily a slugfest in ND�s line of thinking, then what is the solution he�s proposing? Who should win? Perhaps his own personal value system, which ensures that the view from his hypothetical Windstar will be unsullied forever from that which causes him discomfort? All bow to ND�s Windstar! My slippery slope is the exact opposite of his � he sees euthanasia, abortion, suicide, and an imperfect distribution system for medicinal marijuana, and I see censorship, government control of media, sex ed not being taught rather than the opt-out being available to parents who are leery of it, and another kind of narrow-mindedness that can�t tell the difference between self-determined, self-reasoned personal choice and selfish moral anarchy. And please, watch the damn show before you decide what it�s all about. (I�m not angry, I�m irritated.)

Here are some things I�m thinking about, letting them drift into and then out of focus so that then I�ll have to tune them back in. I�m doing a lot of thinking-about lately, now that I�m not afraid of my brain anymore. When I have to run errands, I park the car far away from at least one of them and ideally far away from two or more so as to guarantee myself gobs and gobs of the liminality during which I have always done my best introspection.

1. The difference between living your life with people in it who want to help � I�m leaving this part vague because the definition is so broad � as opposed to the other way, which encompasses not having people in it, having people in it who don�t want to help, having people in it who don�t understand the concept of helping and therefore whose attempts fall flat sometimes without you ever having recognized them as such, ditto who are too self-involved enough to see that you need help and they could give it, and not letting yourself recognize that you need help and that this isn�t anything to be ashamed of, either. Best of all are the people who with their brisk and capable, practical demeanors effectively remove from the act of their helping the *possibility* of you being ashamed, those for whom helping is simply a reflex.
2. I should add to the long list of things I�ve lost and lost track of over the last x amount of time one of my former social credos, which is something like, Wherever you are and whoever you�re talking to, always act like you have every right in the world to be there. I lost my mojo wholesale. I didn�t even realize this was so until I�d been talking to someone over the weekend who on paper might seem rather intimidating, which itself I did not realize until it was pointed out to me a bit later, pointed out in the sense of a non-condescending right-on to me for not having gotten anxious and self-doubtful. And I agreed, and the words came out of my mouth about what I'd lost track of, and I saw that they were true. For me to have said them, though, implies that what I lost I am now in the process of getting back. Good.
3. What is the extent to which the social posture of being defended � this is slightly different from defensiveness; now I�m going in other direction and making sure to split this hair just so � *contributes* to that loss of self-confidence etc. as described above? In a very general sense this has some relation to ND�s statements about values, where the defition of a situation in the terms of a contest imposes on whatever the situation touches a matrix of hostility and antagonism. More to the point, there�s only one way for your life to be you against the world, and that�s for you to decide it is. Most people would like to be described as a scrapper, but to be scrapping is to be fighting against something. I don�t want to be fighting anymore, and I�m going to try to begin what unfortunately promises to be the slow and also solitary process of undefending myself. However, neither do I want to turn into one of these hey-man-it�s-all-cool Seattleites or to turn away from my belief that the hardest workers or smartest people (or whatever flavor of personal merit an individual situation is served by) should be allowed to succeed, and I am sure as hell no socialist. So how to reconcile (a) with (b).
4. The quality, in others, of negative self-involvement (see item 1 above) can look beguilingly like self-confidence (see item 2). Take heed.
5. And how is it possible to talk or write about this kind of thing without coming off as a narcissistic idiot or a spewer of self-help pabulum? If you have any tips, please let me know, because frankly I am not pleased with my results so far.

Also I have been thinking about something I referred to on Thursday, the conversation with Amanda W. some years ago in which I found out the bad impact I had unknowingly had on her life for a while. I think that it was in the wake of the Amanda incident that I started to think about, I mean think about rather than in an academic, women�s-studies kind of way, female social competition, I mean � god � what we�re up against. I mean, that was my probably belated The horror! the horror epiphany. People, well-meaning people, will tell you, �All you have to do is be smarter than the pretty girls and prettier than the smart girls� and I think for a long time I took that in in my straight-A-student mode, I memorized it and did my best to enact it like it was going to be on a fucking test or something. But the thing about that statement is that to be female is to realize in equal parts That�s an awful thing to say, whoever first formulated it is a sick and mean person and should be taken out and shot and That�s true. I was thinking about Amanda and the whole narratively jam-packed week or so in NYC around the party where we talked, I was thinking about female competitiveness and flashing back to the time last winter when I got sick-and-mean competitively righteous over arm chub and a black dress on my way to see �Gosford Park,� and late last week I was listening to the Mint Records tribute to the �Nashville� soundtrack that I ordered months ago and finally showed up in my mailbox, and on Friday night I had yet another, positively pregnant (but with what?) dream about Todd�s friend Lori. I was at some kind of a club, seeing a band, and even though the band was excellent, the show was very sparsely attended, maybe two dozen people spread out in small groups in an area that was the size of my basement. At first I was with Vanessa and then at some point Vanessa shape-shifted into my friend Doug�s wife, Lisa (Note: LISA). The difference didn�t seem to faze me, as if having people shape-shift were annoying but I�d gotten used to it, what were you going to do. Then the room itself started to shape-shift and become DM�s apartment in Manhattan, but I felt strongly that this must not happen, and I shook my head and made the steely driver�s-license face � at what or whom, I don�t know � and it settled down. For a while I was fighting with the room like this and then it seemed to give up and let me have my way, I was tougher. All the time the room was unstable, everything and everyone in it remained the same, in the same places, but the club was dark and the apartment was brightly lit, and during one of the light periods I noticed Lori across the room standing by herself. First thought: Oh shit there�s going to be a scene, she�s going to say horrible untrue things about me in a very loud and authoritative voice and she knows everyone here and I don�t and I am going to cry and be embarrassed to death and more people are going to believe ugly stuff about me so I have to get the hell out of here right this second. Second thought, distracting me from the impulse to flee: Huh, why is she dressed in exactly the same costume as the person on the �Nashville� cover who sings the Sueleen Gay song? � red sequined halter dress, long pink gloves, Louise Brooks bob (now that I think of it, there was a lot of pink and red in the dream). And then I looked to Lisa, next to me, for support, and she wasn�t there, she wasn�t anywhere in the room, and then I looked up and Lori was looking at *me* with the license face and my heart dropped down into my stomach and immediately began to shrivel and curl in that bath of acid and I waved at her once, in a feeble and defeated OK-you-got-me-I�m-leaving way � the band is still playing, by the way, and they sound like the Sugarcubes circa �Life�s Too Good� � and then she waved back, nicely, and started to walk over to me. I still wanted to run but my shoes were stuck to the floor, and also something strange was happening with perspective; as she got closer she didn�t get any larger in my view, though the room started to flutter again and for a few moments, while she was moving, it was difficult to maintain my hold and keep it as the club rather than the apartment. And Lori came over and introduced herself to me, regally, and I realized that this was a charade of pretending that we�d never met before, which honestly was such an amazing present to me, if that ever truly happened I feel like I could live my whole life without making another wish, and at first we were small-talking, playing the roles of strangers � oh wow, I just realized I don�t even remember what I was wearing, incredible � and after a little while, in the middle of an amiable small-talky-stranger interchange, I interrupted myself and asked, petulantly, �Why can we only be nice to each other in bars in my dreams?� and she laughed a twinkly laugh and replied in a voice like Glinda the Good Fairy, �Don�t you know?� But amused, not snotty. Then some parts I don�t remember, though we were talking during them, and I think I was also talking to some other people as well � Amanda was there, and Karen � and then I felt so grateful for my non-awful evening that I decided to let the club be the apartment, since it wanted this so badly, and it was happy and came up around me, as the apartment, in a palpable way, petting me as if I were a cat, and at that point I was wearing the same thing I was wearing on January 2, 1999 (two days after Amanda) but I wasn�t afraid, and then I was collapsing into the futon from the effort of having held the apartment off and the relief of not having to anymore, spent but happy too, knowing that I was going to sleep the sleep of the just in the room that I had inceptive-verbed into its current state, and I was sleepy sleepy sleepy and just before my eyes closed, I saw people gathered around the futon, watching me as if it gave them pleasure to do so, smiling with gentle indulgence, and again I had a first thought: Everyone is happy, this is such a nice dream and then as I scanned their faces, realizing, a second: Women, they�re all women here. Then I woke up.

I like that one a lot better than the one with the stolen coat. Don�t you?

Note: to my knowledge, Amanda is the only person I�ve ever met who had her wedding written up in the NYT Vows section. Also, last Thursday night I told Julian and Rebecca that I was going to go see a show alone sometime in the next week. I�m extending my deadline through this coming weekend, but I�m sticking to it.

Even though this is ostensibly a public diary, I still get a little wiggy every time I find out I should add one more real actual live person to the list of those who know where to find it. (Hi, Rebecca!) It�s OK, though � then I calm down.